Co-Creation of an URBiNAT Healthy Corridor for Siena

According to the Local Diagnostic, the Healthy Corridor for the Ravacciano neighbourhood has been defined, connecting potential areas for the implementation of additional NbS to sites of potential interest within the green valley and the urban context. 

Different access points have been identified for the Healthy Corridor:

• Public: via Martini through Fonti d’Ovile, largo Sassetta through the stairs from via Valdambrino, via Boninsegna in front of Mattioli school, strada di Busseto through bosco di Busseto, fonte di Follonica through ancient wall door; 
• Private: via Federighi, via Peruzzi from the entrance of the landowner, via Peruzzi at the bus stop “Peruzzi”.  

The corridor forms a closed loop, which can be divided into sub-urban and urban. The sub-urban part essentially crosses the Ravacciano valley from the access point in Fonte d’Ovile (Ovest) to the access point close to Mattioli secondary school (East), where  the  urban part starts and crosses the Ravacciano neighbourhood following, from East to Ovest, via Duccio di Boninsegna and via Valdambrino. 

Critical points for the accessibility and the continuity of the Healthy Corridor have been also already mapped, considering the lack of safety pedestrian/cycle connection from the parking lot in Viale Peruzzi to the nearest access point and the crossing of private lands within the Ravacciano Valley (dashed green lines), for which the City of Siena has planned to find solutions by the end of 2030.

The main objective of URBiNAT in the Municipality of Siena is to identify a Healthy Corridor for the Ravacciano neighbourhood, as a way to develop the neighbourhood as well, and to make the green spaces present more viable and accessible. 

The local diagnostic has allowed the identification of the population's greatest needs, both in terms of mobility and connection with the city's historic centre, and of access to green areas, considered as places of sociality and wellbeing.

To this aim, within the actions foreseen by URBiNAT, the Municipality of Siena has planned to develop a Masterplan for the Healthy Corridor of the Ravacciano neighbourhood, subcontracting the codesign activity to a company, IRIDRA Srl (www.iridra.com), that had already experience in both NbS codesign (codeveloper of the StartPark approach - www.startpark.org - with the association Codesign Toscana - https://codesigntoscana.org/) and NbS planning and design. 

Details via the URBiNAT Website

The Ravacciano valley is expected to be accessible by 2030, thanks to the agreement on the access points with privates; it is also expected to be safely enjoyed, thanks to a series of the interventions already identified by the local project RigenerarSI. In this way, the Ravacciano citizens could easily access and enjoy the NbS already existing within the valley, thanks to the new pedestrian and cycling paths close to the restored Ravacciano stream, permitting to cross the wildlife park. The NbS implemented in the area owned by Legambiente and managed in collaboration with WWF could be visited by the Ravacciano citizens, including NbS such as the tasty garden of learning, the beehive provision and adoption, and autochthonous forests. Finally, Ravacciano citizens could access the urban farms and the Busseto forest, for which the Health Corridor foresees restoration interventions, such as safe pedestrian accesses, labels and posters describing the most interesting trees. 

On the other hand, the Healthy Corridor foresees new codesigned NBSs, closer to the citizens of the Ravacciano neighbourhood. Thanks to the implementation of new NBSs and minimal restoration works, the Montagnani garden is planned to become the new centre of social cohesion (Montagnani “square”) at the heart of the neighbourhood. The codesigned NBSs will give back to the neighbourhood a central sportive and cohesion area for the younger citizens, the Garden close to the Mattioli Secondary School.  Two residual, and almost forget areas, Fonti d’Ovile and the Green space in via Federighi, will be lived as an almost new NbS, playing the crucial role of connection between the neighbourhood and the valley. Finally, the potentially bigger urban park of the Ravacciano neighbourhood, i.e. the Green roof on via Duccio di Boninsegna, is planned to be codesigned in the future, following the URBiNAT example and methodology.

The co-creation process of the Healthy Corridor for the Ravacciano neighbourhood has been developed in 7 activities between October 2022 and December 2022, following all the objectives and the actions of co-design stage framework developed by URBiNAT, as described below:

• 1st October 2022, opening event;
• 15th October 2022, first co-design workshop with citizens and associations;
• 29th October 2022, first co-creation workshop with citizens and technicians of the Municipality of Siena;
• 6th November 2022, second co-design workshop dedicated to the specific target of elderly citizens and family with children;
• 8th November 2022, second co-creation workshop with students of the secondary School P.A. Mattioli;
• 29th November 2022, meeting with technicians and authorities of the Municipality of Siena for presenting and discussing the results of the co-design activities;
• 12th December 2022, final event for the presentation to the citizens of the co-designed Healthy Corridor for  Ravacciano neighbourhood.

Transversal activities have been also done for general involvement, integration and interaction with citizens and associations on the NbS topic in general and the URBiNAT project.

In particular, during the summer the project team has organised informal meetings with citizens and attended events and gatherings in the neighbourhood

Mariapiera Forgione, Ananse Communication

Iuri Bruni, Municipality of Siena

Riccardo Cilia Iridra Srl

Anacleto Rizzo, Iridra Srl

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