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May 2017
Having recently travelled to Milan expecting to find a heavily industrialised town I was pleasantly surprised to discover that the city does have a green side. Street trees and boulevards with segregated metro, bus and taxi lanes pass along several radial routes and large city centre parks.
The city has a metropolitan landscape strategy that was adopted in 2005 which connects existing green areas through a series of regular interventions to create a set of routes for pedestrians and cyclists throughout the urban fabric. The project has eight green rays which connect the heart of Milan with a large ring of parks in the metropolitan area.
These residential blocks are inhabited by 380 people, 780 trees and 5000 shrubs, climbing plants and perennials!
What impressed me most was the scale of ambition, the way the architect convinced the client it was the right idea and, of course, the technical skill involved in realising the vision. My only slight criticism is that where the building meets the ground it lacks activity, loses its greenness and as such, is not as impressive as what is above. The reflection on the side of the building however does create a powerful impact.
This strategy is also being reinforced through regeneration project and in particular within the new Porta Nuova Business District. Particularly striking in this area is Stefano Boeri’s residential towers ‘Bosco Verticale’ or Vertical Forest which is visible on the skyline across the city.
A number of exciting built development and landscape projects are also being delivered as part of the new business district ‘Porta Nuova’, including the central plaza in front of the Unicredit tower and enhanced links to the Porta Garibaldi Railway Station. These contemporary spaces and buildings contrast with the Neoclassical city gate which is located on the ruins of the ancient Spanish walls to which this area owes its name.
A new Unicredit pavilion is presently under construction and the ‘Library of trees’ project links this area with surrounding districts and Stefano Boeri’s vertical forest. The ‘Library of trees’ project is the creation of a large botanical garden and public space which is based on three distinct elements
The principal idea is to create different gardens and circles formed by trees of the same species to provide spaces for relaxing and socialising. The park roads are proposed in white and black concrete avenues with inscriptions placed on the ground to help interpretation of the landscape.
A water feature within the plaza encourages you to interact with it. Paths intersect at this key location and a combination of water elements and different textures add to the dynamic of the space, as do the retail and café uses that surround it, creating much needed activity.
Consideration has also been given to green routes and green roofs with a merging of the two in places, where you only realise after you have travelled through a space that you were in fact, walking across a roof.
The city is very flat which makes walking and cycling easy. A city-wide bike scheme called Bike Mi is a convenient and very cost effective way to get around the city. The cycle infrastructure is undoubtedly not as good as cities in Holland and Denmark, but was far better than I had expected.
The other surprising feature that I was not aware before I travelled to Milan was that the city has a canal district to its south-west. Several canals in other parts of the city have been filled in, but still provide reminders of former canals network with some being turned into green spaces.
One disappointment was that the Expo 2015 seems long gone, following a wasted trip to the suburbs to find few of the exciting pavilions that had been there just two years earlier.
Milan is a fantastic case study that demonstrate that using green infrastructure to create place, providing routes which encourage walking and cycling, linked to good public transport infrastructure and having high density residential apartments results in the creation of a truly vibrant city.
