The rebirth of the resurgence belt: the floodplain as a complex human-water system
A. Balletta (TU Delft - Architecture and the Built Environment)
L. Cipriani – Mentor (TU Delft - Landscape Architecture)
N. Katsikis – Graduation committee member (TU Delft - Urban Design)
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Abstract
The Po Valley is a floodplain, also known in the past as the “The Garden of Europe”. It owes its agricultural, industrial and cultural wealth to the rich system of resurgences and to the irrigation network connected to them.
Due to their suitability for agricultural activities, floodplains are preferred areas for human settlements. The fluvial landscape development was altered by the water and land management activities to create cultivable land, while simultaneously protecting communities from the risk of flooding events, which are still the most common natural disasters worldwide.
With the increasing urbanization and climate change, the territory (already densely populated and exploited for agricultural and industrial uses) is facing a difficult water shortage situation.
The focus of the research is the resurgence belt in the Po Basin, more precisely in the Piedmont region, and the understanding of the origin of the water system: the Alps and Apennine, the high plain, the resurgence belt and the low plain.
In the area of the resurgence belt, it is possible to control the mountain floods that flow downstream, causing the severe flooding phenomena that we are seeing more and more often in recent years. These traits also have the pre-eminent function of governing the waters of violent and sudden precipitations that the current rain disposal systems are unable to manage effectively. The slopes of the paths lead the waters towards wetlands and hold them for the time necessary and then gradually release them.
The resurgence belt, in addition to playing an important role in the natural water management and the ecological protection of vegetation and an fauna, is still fundamental today in the economic-agricultural context as it is the basis of the irrigation activities necessary to support production in many meadows and ricefields.
It constitutes a precious and unique natural heritage, which unfortunately has reduced in dimensions due to various factors: economic, social and environmental. It is clear that we will increasingly have to learn to live with the two extremes of long droughts and intense rainfall and consequent floods, which only a more natural territory and hydrographic network can cope with simultaneously.
By studying the area of the resurgence belt, the project seeks to imagine an alternative future for North Italy and explore a strategy to face the retreat of the resurgence belt and the water crisis. Furthermore, the project aims to imagine an alternative future for an area that is highly exploited by monoculture and has a linear economy, based on the consumption of fossil fuels and non-renewable resources.