Expected Decay. A multisensory experience in Milano, Italy
This article aims at “staging” the Milanese urban landscape between Rogoredo railway station and Lodi square through an individual approach that can point out the relations between physical-architectonical characteristics of the space and the perceptive-emotional impact on the users. The “narration” is set in 2018, in a morning winter walk through the area, focusing on themes as multisensory, atmosphere, cultural landscape. The contribution aims at representing the basis for an implementable method to describe and understand the territory, with consequences also on the project.
The consideration of landscape as an “invisible” element — emerging as the consequence of cultural meanings and values that we use to interpret “things” — represents nowadays an accepted view, able to give the concept a specific character, oriented to a better understanding of the relationships between human beings, their social and cultural references and the forms of living and dwelling the territory.
In 2000, the European Landscape Convention defined the landscape as
an area, as perceived by people, whose character is the result of the action and interaction of natural and/or human factors
This shared evolution of the concept makes it more difficult to understand its role in territorial and urban transformation: as the many “-scapes” emerging everyday demonstrate, landscape is becoming the synonym of a pure suggestion, the product of many different readings of the territory, hardly considerable as the basis of shared actions and projects for the transformation. The plurality of points of view reflects, moreover, the plurality of the professionals and the stakeholders involved in the governance of the landscape, with a social and cultural role, in accordance with the UNESCO “cultural landscape”.
To interact with this scenario, the concept of “narration” might play a relevant role, according to its etymological meaning that leads to an interpretation of the space emerging as the consequence of the stratification and merging of multiple views. This process can draw on the traditional forms of representation of the territory — literature, cinema, photography, painting— putting them in relation with the new theoretical and scientific references developed with the concepts of “atmosphere”, “cultural landscape”, “multisensory”, “environmental design” etc.
In this wide sense, “narration” could become the point of connection between a sharable background and an individual and emotional perspective — essential for the interpretation of the territory — fostering a multilevel dialogue among different players. This reveals some potentialities also in relation to the issue of “participation”, which nowadays represents a crucial point for starting transformations with a good balance between preservation and development, private and public interests.
This article shows the strengths of this method through a specific example, narrating a part of the city of Milan between Rogoredo railway station and Lodi square. Over the last decades, this axis has been at the centre of debates and design hypothesis, due to its strategical position in relation with the Metropolitan City Area. The narration highlights the presence of “multiple landscapes”, which become part of the individual experience, expressing the relations between the urban space and the exploration, movements and comprehension of the citizens. The two terms “decadence” and “expectation” summarize the core of the experience, expressing on the one hand the former industrial vocation of the area — still emotionally active — on the other hand the awaiting present that anticipates future changes.
An urban narration
[1] Rogoredo railway station
The visit of the urban axis “Rogoredo-piazzale Lodi” takes place in a February morning, not particularly cold, with a threatening grey sky and a brilliant light, at times spectral, in one-word poetic. I reach Rogoredo by train, along a way that I pass every day, travelling from Pavia to Milano Lambrate.
As soon as I get off the train, I realize how much even a so familiar place could reveal a number of details that I have never considered in a conscious way. Maybe it’s because I’m not wearing my usual headphones, or because I don’t have a specific destination to reach quickly, but the place looks very chaotic and noisy, flattened down from the canopies that cover the binaries, whose effect is anything but light and transparent, even if they are made mostly of glass.
Once finished the movement of the train, the station silence. It’s 11 o’clock in the morning — not a rush hour, definitely. Few people are waiting for the trains, killing time in now traditional way: playing with the phone or smoking a cigarette. What surprises me is the lack of perceptive permeability in the horizontal development of the station. The view is constantly interrupted by vertical elements like signs, billboards, screens, clocks, benches, garbage cans, walls. Everything tries to communicate a message, so that the distracted eye of the viewer is bombed by a lot of information, in which the useful indications for the railway services are equally mixed with the advertisements and the self-aggrandizing slogans by “Ferrovie dello Stato”. In general, this creates a redundant situation, almost impossible to be selected, continuously reiterated by the ubiquitous messages reproduced by the acoustic speakers.
… I always wondered why a passenger taking the train for Piacenza should be informed of the delay in the railway for Saronno… Why the change of the binary for Mantova should be communicated to the passengers travelling to Rome? And even more so: what reason leads to communicate to all the users of the station that “everything’s fine. The train is coming exactly in the place and time which was expected”? The redundancy of these messages clearly detached the “signifier” — in Umberto Eco’s words — from the useful information that contains, making it an uninteresting element, without any importance for the public. A lot of possible strategies could be identified to solve this issue, starting from the different tools nowadays available for the communication — lights, bright signals, controlled speakers etc.
I’ve never paid a specific attention to the perceptual relation that the station establishes with the city. Staying in the middle of the platforms, the most attractive part of Milan seems undoubtably the one I see looking at the Sky buildings and Santa Giulia district. However, the connection with this urban area is solved through a concrete fence — not very beautiful even in a pure aesthetical perspective — which stops any communication between the parts. The station pushes in the opposite direction, towards via Cassinis, which I perceive as a “back side” of the city. Once I reach the open space above the station — which is very hard to define a “piazza”, despite its name — the sensation is confirmed.
I feel in a resulting place, where the parking lots for the scooters are confused with the areas for buses stop and the services for the station. The ticket office — which also exists — is not clearly visible, and is totally missing a waiting room, benches and other facilities for passengers. In short, I experience a purely service-space, poorly adjusted to carry out some functions for the public, mainly attributable to the presence of automatic tickets machines. The traffic system and the interchange among the many means of transportation — train, subway, bus, taxi, car and bike sharing — is organized in a very confused way, producing an overall feeling of uncertainty and insecurity.
[2] First digression
Under the circumstances, my tour come through fast to via Cassinis. Walking along the sidewalk, I immediately realize that this space is not meant for me. The relation with the street, the size of the carriageway, the parked cars clearly express dimensions and distances not ideal for pedestrian. What different means of transportation could I use — or should I use — to move along this way? A bus passes at my side… I wonder about the difference in travelling the same place by car, by scooter, by bike. I’m just facing a “mobike”, precisely, but I refuse also in this case. I’ll keep walking.
At my right side, the street is defined by urban fabrics without specific stylistic coherence. On the left, I see a chaotic interchange, with a roundabout made “green” by the presence of few blades of grass, quite hard to consider “nature”… In a few dozen meters, I’m attracted to something unexpected. Meeting via Lacaita, the background that blocks the view to the binaries has a strong emotional impact.
A big unfinished building shows its body in reinforced concrete, without any perimeter wall and without any other element inside. In its dramatic appearance, the structure creates big holes that look like hungry mouths calling my name. The columns — even in concrete — give the impression of a big skeletal animal with thin legs, searching for food. The dark colour of the building, almost black in some points, the warped irons that come out from the concrete, give the impression of a fire, which probably was not. The chromatic character of the structure, the condition of the sky and the environmental light create an effect in contrast with all the surroundings: as if a part of the world today is coloured in “grayscale” mode. Approaching the building, the impression is confirmed. Spatial intervals and volumes appear in their essence. A too drastic form of Brutalism, maybe, but surely fascinating.
According to some books I read, it suddenly comes to my mind a reflection on the aesthetic and poetic role of materials…
Around the big structure, rusty gates, grids, metal plates reveal the presence of the hole of the railroad tracks, and behind it Santa Giulia district. I start to be aware of a trait that is going to become the common thread of the whole experience. Sometimes masked by recent transformations, in all the area survive a number of buildings and characters coming from the industrial past of the place, shaping a “decadent urban landscape” made of concrete and iron, straight lines, right angles, rational solutions, which fight against the contemporary practices of the project and the colours, the technical and morphological solutions of the more recent buildings.
Despite being the product of elements that undoubtably need a physical and functional update, the “decadence” embodies also a positive meaning, related to a collective memory that persists.
In this sense, the urban landscape seems to express in a real and visible way the dialectic between “remain” and “ruin”, as stated by Marc Augè.
[3] Cassinis Street
After the unscheduled detour, I come back to the main street, which produces the same impression as before. The space is designed with dimensions that appear not appropriate for walking, probably more in tune with car and vehicular transportation. Feeling in the wrong place, my attention is constantly taken away from the main street for the surroundings. Meeting via Pallia, I’m pushed to walk in this direction, and the same happens with via Livinallongo, where I see industrial buildings down the street. The background is more attractive than the foreground, expressing a stronger character.
The sidewalk along via Cassinis is quite wide and clean, with commercial activities looking on it — mainly bars and kebab shops — demonstrating a human presence that get away any feeling of insecurity, despite the few people around.
Passing next to a gas station, I perceive new elements in the context: human voices, gasoline and tire smell introduce a break from the dull sound of car traffic and the smell of exhaust gas. Right beside the gas station, a homemade trompe l’oeil, painted of the blind wall of a building, makes me smile. It clearly expresses the “aesthetic necessity” of dwelling, it appears as a product of a spontaneous “care” of the territory, becoming a common part of the urban experience. A mix of thoughts — between Heidegger and Rosario Assunto — comes to my mind. And, somehow, they encourage me.
Reaching “Porto di Mare” underground station, the urban layout significantly changes. The beginning of the overpass breaks the horizontal perception of the street, the sidewalk widens, the overall feeling gets closer to a more traditional urban situation, where the presence of pedestrians coexists with cars.
While walking, I see some other “decadent” elements along the way: an abandoned car dealer with a rusty red canopy, clearly aimed at being innovative, which nowadays appears as totally outdated. The overpass itself gives the context an obsolete aspect: “decadent”, properly. Once again, this word has a double meaning, revealing critical implications but also positive ones, tracing back to an emotional past still alive in the place. Despite its heavy and “grey” impact on the surrounding, the overpass expresses its own personality, producing powerful effects and suggestions on this part of the city.
[4] Second digression.
A few steps ahead, I meet a building with a porch at the ground level…
It pushes me to reflect on the value of this urban element. All that sometimes I read on books, appears very clear in a perceptive way. The porch immediately defines a breaking point in the relationship between internal and external, public and private. Here the space is sheltered, my instinct brings me to assume a more controlled attitude, paying more attention to my movements and expressions, as if I am a guest at other people’s home. I stop the audio recording, I don’t take pictures. It is no coincidence that — in all day — here I meet the only people seated at an external table of a bar, with a temperature range between 2 and 6° C.
Among discarded papers and garbage on the ground, I see a lot of coloured confetti, clear sign of the Carnival just passed. I wonder how even these dirty elements could become symbol of happiness and joy. And how, on the contrary, sometimes the excessive cleaning and order of the territory might flatten it, cancelling its more vital traits and identity. Where is the golden mean between these alternatives is not easy to say, but I guess it’s important to pose the problem, without accepting the boring cliché according to which “the cleaner, the better”. Imagination takes me to the movement of children on the sidewalk, dressed up like magicians, princesses or cavaliers. I think I hear the voices and sounds of a mindless funny afternoon. I remember my past Carnivals — not so many, actually. I keep walking with a smile.
[5] Corvetto square
The many commercial activities along the way clearly express the multicultural origin of the local citizens. I pass beside a help desk for green cards procedures, a service centre for tax and fiscal matters, a public laundry. It is a point that I hadn’t perceived yet, even if I knew the social character of the area. This comes with the recognition of some elements that drive to “traditional” urban decay: garbage on the ground, damaged buildings, public spaces in bad conditions. Despite the situation, I never feel unsecure. It’s Monday morning, most of the shops are closed, but the streets are full of people of different age and nationalities, creating a sort of local control.
Even from a long distance, Corvetto square expresses an evident break in the urban axes I’m on. It’s quite clear that the urban experience is going to change significantly, after this node. The curiosity for the new dimension leads me not to dedicate much attention to the square itself — which appears quite chaotic — for focusing on the new avenue.
With the beginning of Corso Lodi, most part of what characterized the previous experience disappears. The simultaneous presence of different architectonic languages and urban models, the lack of a clearly perceivable direction is solved into a total coherence in the conception of the city. The horizontal development of the road is characterized by the presence of a pedestrian tree-lined street in the middle, with bike lane, benches in “Milano” style and well-organized public spaces. At the borders of the central partition there are two-lane carriageways, including a space for car parking, and the sidewalk. The street is contained on both sides by homogeneous urban fabrics, creating strong margins that don’t allow any visual exploration, except in the linear direction of the street. The orientation, therefore, is very clear, the perceptive excursions that characterized the previous experience disappear, the attention is concentrated on the main direction. Also the presence of a “secondary” landscape vanishes, leaving room to a very rational urban image, which seems to exclude any different interpretation.
[6] Lodi Avenue
From “decadence” to “order” recaps the experience I’m living. All the previous conflicts and contradictions of the city are now solved in a clearly perceivable linearity.
The pedestrian has a new position, the relations with the surrounding assume a proper human scale. After few steps, a billboard catches my attention, suggesting me the opportunity to visit “The Museum of Innocence by Orhan Pamuk”. The information is communicated in a very comprehensible and accessible way. The soundscape constantly reiterates the monotonous symphony played by cars passing in the street, more interesting suggestions come from the sense of smell, which allow me to establish a relation with the ethnical origin of some shops along the way.
Reaching Brenta Avenue, a supermarket breaks the unity of the urban fabrics, showing a wider context. The real change comes a few meters later, when the street starts to go up. Near to the beautiful red building whose project involved BBPR studio, the sidewalk widens, the central trees become tinier, the street pavement passes from asphalt to blocks of stone. Everything generates an expectation for what could be found at the top of the ascent.
The mystery is revealed in few steps: the overpass on the train tracks shows a totally new landscape and a totally new urban dimension. The view is much wider, allowing a visual contact with very distant elements.
Looking down at the railway yard, seems to emerge industrial traces under the ground, coming from an old past, like the nerves of a buried body that doesn’t give up: iron rails, stacked crossbars in concrete, the poles of electric wires. All is cover by a glaze of moss and rust, which underlies the belonging to a distant time. All around those elements, spontaneous vegetation, grass and few bushes alternate the presence of ballast and garbage, much more related to our present days.
The traces of the industrial past appear quite different from before. I don’t perceive any “decadence” in these rests, but a sort of standstill, an immobilism, as if all stopped at a specific moment. In one word, I can call it a “waiting landscape”, so helpless and bleak, so silence and vacuum in its appearance. Thinking to the ongoing urban debate, I wonder about the difference between the “real fact” and its projection, the distance between these rusty binaries and the visionary images of the city of the future, able to attract political and economic powers, the 2026 winter Olympic Games…
The large view on the surroundings gives me a sense of freedom. I stop at the railing at the top of the overpass, contemplating the urban landscape. I feel myself the master of the situation. I like to lose the gaze in distant spaces and then returning to the foreground. I like to establish relations with the further buildings, get my bearings around the unknown spaces, as if I’m travelling across the city.
After a while, I notice some signs inside the abandoned area, which reveal a human presence. They are traces of lives that grow up on the walls, in the landscape of “tags”, in cut fences, in broken glasses at the windows of buildings. I feel a strong pity for this humanity that grows in the folds of our society and we don’t want to see, or we need to forget. But this is a different story…
[7] Lodi Square
Lodi Square confirmed as a very chaotic node: the intersection among too many different situations unable to give a specific character to the context. The continuation of Lodi Avenue towards Porta Romana produces the same feeling as before, the effect of a very clear urban conception, which defines a perfect directionality. The pavement in blocks of stone — whose effect tended to get lost in the open field on the rail yard — reveals its proper peculiarities. The reflection of the sky on the reddish colour of granite creates a warm light. The sound of cars has a stronger impact, also because of the presence of the tram lines along the street. The commercial activities that look on the street make it clear the higher economical level of the citizens.
Again, I’m led to exclude any digression. The only possible direction is the one defined by the street, which stops any perceptive exploration beyond its margins.
I wonder which is the best experience between the two alternatives: is it better a prescriptive order, able to communicate to the public a specific and clear idea of the city? Or is it better a more chaotic situation, which gives the users the opportunity to explore and discover their own world? Is it better a unitarian approach, aiming at reinforcing the social control and security of the population? Or is it better a more fragmented one, where people are left free to organize and to know each other?… (continues)
Perspectives
The considerations presented in this article don’t pretend, obviously, to solve the wide problems around the perception of the city, which has to deal on the one hand with individual factors — related with the personal reading, comprehension and fruition of territory — on the other hand with the collective horizon of the urban projects and strategies. The theme, after all, is at the centre of the debate from a long time, as Kevin Lynch studies demonstrate.
The paper, moreover, represents a contribution for highlighting the urgency of deepening the role of perception in relation to the specific aims and interests of the city-users. The individual impressions coming from the aimless travelling of a contemporary “flaneur” are surely different from those of the commuter, the street dealer or the local citizen.
To get through the unavoidably “episodical” dimension of the narration, it could be interesting to program similar periodical explorations, involving different users in different moments of the day/year: for encouraging and collecting comments and impressions of the local people, for better understanding the characteristics of places and for fostering more informed projects and actions for future transformations.
This reading of the territory is open to establish a dialogue with the more traditional indicators of wellness — like visual-acoustic-heating comfort, safety etc. In this sense, “narration” may bridge the distance between a purely environmental approach and a mere functional one, allowing the definition of articulated projects able to meet both the perspectives.
This article is the English translation of the Italian version written by me and Raffaella Riva, published in
L.C. Piccinini, P. Giordano, T.F.M. Chang, M. Taverna, L. Iseppi (eds.), Mind Scenery in the Landscape-cultural Mosaic. Palimpsests, Networks, Participation, Proceedings of the 22nd IPSAPA/ISPALEM International Scientific Conference.
