Objectives of the project

The idea of ​​the project is focused on the upgrading of public spaces and the squares complex of Monsummano Terme, that involves almost total elimination of traffic crossing Piazza Giusti, implementing the deviation of the traffic on via Buozzi, via Vantavoli to merge again on Via Martini, limiting and regulating both the input and the rest of the traffic flux on the square. As it represents the best solution in order to operate a urban regeneration in the center of the city, contributing to determine a enhancement of all of the spaces surrounding the Shrine of Our Lady of Fontenuova and an important impulse for what will become a living space always open for citizens. In conclusion, the proposed project proposal wants to find the true function of the center of the city.

Project proposal

The project proposal, in accordance with the instructions contained in the Notice of

Competition, is based on re-paving and pedestrianize, at various levels, the treated areas.

For which it was tried to find, first of all, a historical reference that, in some way, could validate the project proposal.

So we revive an ancient roman grid, as a connection between the E. Berlinguer square and Avenue V. Martini, both recently renovated.

This grid in the design of public space resumes, in some ways, the experiences of Superstudio (a famous italian conceptual architecture firm) at the end of the 60’s.

So, as I said, not a simple repaving of places but a more complex operation where the grid is realized on squares, on the streets, on the sidewalks, becoming key regulator of contradictions of the city providing a new meaning, that comes from its formal values.

It stucks relations between buildings constructed in different eras and forms different.

The unity achieved through this redesign of all the open spaces is then strengthened by the water that is inserted at various points of the project.

The project

The grid, formed by square modules in size of 5.00 ml x 5.00 each one, allows the installation of “de hors ” in front of the shops and bars located in the central square.

Cornerstone of the redevelopment of the sites treated remains pedestrianization which, however, was deemed to have to associate with the possibility of a vehicular crossing over a lane perfectly identified and partially delimited from the rest of the square.

There is also a staging area that is well-defined and separated from the curtain buildings, through spaces arranged lawn and planted with tree species in able to reduce almost completely the perception of the parking lot, both from the rest of square from the arrangement that it assumes in that particular area.

The area with the poet’s monument in front of the church is characterized by an ample space placed on the lawn with the main purpose to revive the almost bucolic atmosphere of the place at the time of the construction of the sanctuary.

The underlying theme of the project is represented by the careful redesign and redefinition of the places but also by the use of water, as a constant reference to the birth of Monsummano Terme around Fontenuova and the hydros.

While in St. Mark’s Square the water flowing over the sloping side of a solid made by travertine, with some verses of the poet engraved on one side, in Piazza del Popolo water becomes an element of play and at the same time refer to the local hydros with water gushing from the ground. In fact, in the central portion of the Square paving is interrupted by a completely stone paved ground with particular nozzles inserted in.

Piazza Amendola, taking advantage of the particular altitude, was connected to Piazza Martini with a path designed as a trench in the water.