People at the heart of inclusive and flexible urban ecosystems
The health, social and economic emergency caused by Covid-19 has accelerated the change of urban contexts and the way we live in our homes, workplaces and public spaces.
Never before has there been such a need to create so-called ’15-minute cities’, urban areas where neighborhoods can become inclusive and vibrant parts of the city available to the communities that live in them, true ecosystems rich in networks of relations, proximity services, coworking spaces to integrate the possibility of working remotely, as well as places for outdoor activities.
Flexibility and hybridization are the key concepts from which design must start to respond to this new way of “urban living”, proposing modular, integrated and functional solutions to new needs. We design places with a defined identity that can accommodate several functions and recipients, adapting to different needs, times and attitudes.
We consider buildings and public spaces as generators of opportunities, structured and at the same time capable of adapting to the uses and roles that users can and want to give them.
In this respect, the designer has a key role to play in facilitating the transition.
The challenge for the designer will be to be able to look ahead, to imagine how a work can respond to future changes made necessary by the continuous evolution of urban models and lifestyles.
Modular and shared spaces to reconcile private life and work needs
The way we live and work is rapidly changing, with ever-renewed and different needs: we work from home, in public places, in shared spaces or outdoor, trying to adapt and find a sustainable balance between work, personal and social life.
Offices are transformed into new environments, with spaces that adapt to the changing flows and dynamics of work groups, becoming urban catalysts of city users and potential containers of services and opportunities. Our projects envisage complex buildings, no longer intended just as work spaces, but as places of aggregation that accommodate a multiplicity of expectations, needs and disciplines, promoting a new idea of sociality.
A new concept of ‘home’ is being born, offering the most varied uses and becoming a place to stay and live fully, work and spend freetime. The direction to follow is therefore that of creating housing units that can be quickly and economically adapted to the changing needs of their occupants, also using shared condominium spaces and services, and enriching residences with renovated, green and outdoor meeting places.
The Covid-19 pandemic reminded the world of the universal value of health, its nature as a fundamental public good and the macroeconomic relevance of public health services. In response to the diktat of the World Health Organisation, design professionals and the National Health Systems have been asked to build or transform facilities with rapid, local and cost-effective solutions.
The exchange of experiences between architects and engineers from all over the world on the best practices of the new Covid-Proof Hospitals is one of the keys to working together in this global challenge and leaving no one behind. In 2020 we launched a digital training programme aimed at some developing countries, in particular Jamaica and Belize, to pass on our expertise, technological options and strategies adopted in Italy, to facilitate the planning of interventions accessible to each state according to the economic and cultural resources available to them.
By taking part in the national tender launched by the Government, as part of the hospital network reorganization plan to upgrade Covid hospitals in Italy, we have been awarded important lots in the regions that host our head offices (Tuscany, Emilia-Romagna and Lombardy), where we are supporting 75 interventions in about19 hospitals.
Our team, which specialises in the design of healthcare facilities, has also developed and started, in just a few months, two modules adjacent to Modena General Hospital and Baggiovara Hospital, equipped with all the biomedical systems and technologies needed to assure full functionality and autonomy of the facilities, for a total of 47 intensive care beds, establishing itself as a pioneer of an innovative model that can be replicated for the hospitals of the future.
We are investing in research in order to face an exciting new challenge: creating structures that are adaptable, versatile and ready for new emergencies. Our mission is to minimize risk in the hospitals of tomorrow, to be designed to ensure safety and meet the basic needs of users.
We promote the use of digital technologies to help build Smart Hospitals, ensure smart disinfection procedures, enhance telemedicine, facilitate the development of booking apps and enable inpatients to stay connected with loved ones. We support proximity and humanization, promoting the concept of the “friendly hospital”,without neglecting quality, beauty and interior design, which make the healthcare facility a comfortable and welcoming place for both patients and staff.
The path towards recovery and the transition to a sustainable development model as envisaged by the European Green Deal and the United Nations 2030 Agenda, with the significant opportunities and resources of the Next Generation EU that Europe is preparing to put in place, will also go through the creation of modern, safe and efficient infrastructure.
Increasingly sustainable and accessible mobility is a key point on the political agenda of Europe and individual countries, which will make it possible to combine innovation and scientific research to create solutions capable of supporting the industrial and economic growth of an area and improving the quality of life of its communities.
The infrastructures of the future shall be interconnected and use digital technologies for an effective monitoring of their status and performance data, recording their impact on the environment, consumers and costs, and improving route and traffic planning, enabling the sharing of data information according to transparency and security standards.
They must be adaptable, to cope with climate change and any high impact phenomena, and eco-sustainable, to facilitate the de-carbonisation of mobility and encourage public and alternative mobility, favouring environmentally friendly materials with the same durability and safety performance.
They should be located within green corridors, respecting the natural landscape and the environment, according to a systemic approach and integrated planning aimed at implementing strategies and positive interactions for ecosystems.
The challenge of a truly sustainable project is to assess all these aspects with a view to long-term growth, maintaining and implementing it on an ongoing basis, evaluating what is concretely pursuable and improvable: a path that Politecnica has already been following for several years in numerous projects around the world.
We are one of the first design companies in Italy to apply the Envision® protocol, the main rating system for sustainable infrastructure, founded by the Institute For Sustainable Infrastructure in the USA.
We are engaged in knowledge sharing programmes on innovative design issues, such as climate change resilience of infrastructure works, to share know-how and technical expertise with local partners and clients involved in the projects we are supporting abroad, notably the Wismar Bridge in Guyana, the Philip Goldson Highway and the Haulover Bridge in Belize.
In Italy, we helped found and promote the AIS – Associazione Infrastrutture Sostenibili (Sustainable Infrastructure Association) in 2020, which brings together multiple forces and authoritative voices to fully exploit synergies and opportunities for innovation and to give life to rivoluzionaretruly sustainable projects, capable of revolutionising our system by favouring ecological transition and social progress, encouraging digital transition, and supporting and increasing competitiveness.
heritage to be transformed
The neighbourhoods of the future must be highly specialised, integrated and serviced, capable of adapting to the needs of their inhabitants.
Within this strategy, disused buildings can be recovered to become co-working and co-housing spaces, reactivating a multifunctional urban fabric, imagining new creative roles for disused containers.
Italy is one of the countries with the largest architectural and building heritage in the world, an asset to be protected in order to hand on its historical and identity values to future generations. Nonetheless, it is an often neglected heritage to be returned to the community. Careful planning can safeguard and, at the same time, transform the heritage of the past, enhancing it by adding new layers of uses and meanings that respond to contemporary needs in terms of functions, sustainability, social and cultural values, to generate places of life full of a renewed urbanity. We welcome new design challenges that enhance the territory and its iconic places, which are the repositories of a stratification of ancient histories. One of Politecnica’s major recent projects in this area is the restoration plan for Palazzo Sartoretti in Reggiolo which included seismic upgrading and retrofitting to make a historic building, rich in pictorial decorations all over its main floor, functional, and to house the current municipal offices.
Another significant restoration project is the Arsenal in Verona, about 20,000 square metres of almost totally unused space in the immediate vicinity of the historic centre, which we are redeveloping mainly for public and cultural use, giving it a new life. This project is part of the voluntary GBC Historic Building® certification process, which shows how sustainable our restoration work and, more generally, the recovery of historic buildings is, especially from an environmental point of view.