Several studies have examined the correlation between climate change and pandemics; one has outlined a strong connection within the Justinian plague (Keys, 1999). This thesis on the causes of the fall of the Roman Empire aroused critics in the beginning but most historians seem to acknowledge it today. During the VI century, most of the big cities as well as the main roads were abandoned introducing a new territorial cycle (Caniggia and Maffei 2001) and a new morphological period (Whitehand, Gu, Conzen and Whitehand, 2014). Climate change and the pandemic were the focus of the G20 in Rome and the COP26 in Glasgow meetings, and there is indeed a widely diffused idea that the governments are not at all fulfilling the urgent needs of our times in terms of climate change. We believe that it is necessary and urgent to redefine the development model in the light of a new territorial cycle and morphological period that is about to start (Strappa, 2021). How will this affect the built environment, which are the building types, aggregation principles, urban models and building technologies that will help us in mitigating the impacts of this new phase? Within the different hypothesis, we are proposing a new role, as an alternative to the metropolis, for the small historical towns in the post pandemic phase of urban design and planning. We foresee a shift of population from the metropolitan areas to the rural areas and therefore plan to reinhabit the existing small towns by reusing/recycling existing residential buildings (Strappa, Carlotti & Camiz, 2016). Most of the population living in metropolitan areas moved there from rural areas and small towns in the last century causing a dramatic growth therein and abandonment phenomena in the areas of origin (Camiz, Ebert and Verdiani, 2021). We can reverse this trend, and the COVID-19 is probably now accelerating the inversion, but we need to guide this transformation otherwise it would most probably tend to increase the urban sprawl in the countryside, with no achievements in terms of sustainability
Pandemics and climate change. Towards a new territorial cycle and morphological period
ALESSANDRO CAMIZ
Primo
2024-01-01
Abstract
Several studies have examined the correlation between climate change and pandemics; one has outlined a strong connection within the Justinian plague (Keys, 1999). This thesis on the causes of the fall of the Roman Empire aroused critics in the beginning but most historians seem to acknowledge it today. During the VI century, most of the big cities as well as the main roads were abandoned introducing a new territorial cycle (Caniggia and Maffei 2001) and a new morphological period (Whitehand, Gu, Conzen and Whitehand, 2014). Climate change and the pandemic were the focus of the G20 in Rome and the COP26 in Glasgow meetings, and there is indeed a widely diffused idea that the governments are not at all fulfilling the urgent needs of our times in terms of climate change. We believe that it is necessary and urgent to redefine the development model in the light of a new territorial cycle and morphological period that is about to start (Strappa, 2021). How will this affect the built environment, which are the building types, aggregation principles, urban models and building technologies that will help us in mitigating the impacts of this new phase? Within the different hypothesis, we are proposing a new role, as an alternative to the metropolis, for the small historical towns in the post pandemic phase of urban design and planning. We foresee a shift of population from the metropolitan areas to the rural areas and therefore plan to reinhabit the existing small towns by reusing/recycling existing residential buildings (Strappa, Carlotti & Camiz, 2016). Most of the population living in metropolitan areas moved there from rural areas and small towns in the last century causing a dramatic growth therein and abandonment phenomena in the areas of origin (Camiz, Ebert and Verdiani, 2021). We can reverse this trend, and the COVID-19 is probably now accelerating the inversion, but we need to guide this transformation otherwise it would most probably tend to increase the urban sprawl in the countryside, with no achievements in terms of sustainabilityI documenti in IRIS sono protetti da copyright e tutti i diritti sono riservati, salvo diversa indicazione.
