Rome: ‘one and indivisible’ capital? A study tells of a metropolis divided into seven cities

(by Rossella Guadagnini) – Thinking of Rome as “caput mundi”, historical, architectural, urban and social ‘unicum’ is a mistake. This is demonstrated by a team of scholars who explored the theme to which he had already dedicated a first volume, “The maps of inequalities”, in which he told how the city was different and contradictory in many ways. Now the Rome examined have become even seven. “Seven cities, a number that returns like a destiny”, explain in “The seven Rome” Keti Lelo, Salvatore Monni and Federico Tomassi, the trio of authors of the volume published by Donzelli, which will be released on June 24th. Thus we discover, from their research, that there is “the historic city, full of artistic, architectural and archaeological testimonies; the rich city that unites the wealthy districts of northern Rome, the small villas of Eur, the large villas of the Appian Way. and the ‘gated community’ of Olgiata “. And then we move on to the ‘typologies’ with the city of the automobile, “arranged along the main fast-flowing roads; the city-countryside, which includes all that remains of the Roman countryside; the compact city, of residential districts intensive, built in the years of post-war expansion and therefore the city of hardship: mostly council houses and hamlets, born illegally “. Finally, to complete the picture, there is also “the city of the invisible, the most elusive, although spread over the entire municipal territory: two cities, the latter, in which the pandemic has shown its most ferocious face”. (continues) The demographic weight of the city is modest, but the urban kaleidoscope “The seven Rome” tells all this, on the basis of updated data – economic, urban, demographic and related to infrastructures and services – continuing the mapping work of the capital that started with the previous study, ‘The maps of inequality’. “An accurate reconnaissance of the Roman reality – the scholars assure us – which allowed the aggregation of seven areas, ‘city within the city’, with similar characteristics in terms of family composition, levels of education, types of employment, urban endowments and political preferences”. 29 color maps the seven cities emerge in evidence and, alongside them, the geography of the companies, which are arranged in the urban fabric, following a specific fragmentation, according to the sector of interest. And a centrifugal line that, “for some time, has characterized the growth of the capital”. The authors are also animators of www.mapparoma.info, a site where they make available the materials of their analyzes, conducted at the detailed level on urban areas, in order to x-ray the differences between neighborhoods. Rome is a capital with a modest demographic weight, but inside it contains a large “urban kaleidoscope”, underline Keti Lelo, researcher at Roma Tre University, Salvatore Monni, associate professor at Roma Tre University and Federico Tomassi, public manager. It may happen, for example, that “a road divides different worlds in terms of aesthetics, social composition, quality of life. This diversity is the result of the impetuous growth that has taken place in the last 150 years, which could not generate a homogeneous and uniform urban territory”. (continues) The crisis of Rome is above all identity identity What we continue to call Rome, therefore, has now become “a large metropolitan area, from the Tyrrhenian coast to the first Apennine reliefs, which – within it – has seen other development and take shape city”. A ‘capital of inequalities’, because the seven cities mapped do nothing but bring to light, in an even more marked way, a composite reality with very strong economic and social disparities, on which the pandemic has had a heavy impact, exacerbating the discomfort of the most fragile areas . It is no coincidence that the virus spreads more in the popular areas of the eastern quadrant of the city, around and especially outside the Gra, where the residents are growing, the socio-economic difficulties are greater and there are more families. Nor that the highest mortality rates involve the “city of the invisible”, due to the difficult hygienic conditions, lack of adequate spaces, often manual types of employment, therefore not very suitable for agile work, and the need to move by public transport. This radiograph of the metropolis offers useful working tools in the perspective of “introducing a change of direction in the face of the many changes underway and, above all, a crisis that has long affected the city, which goes beyond economic dynamics. more to an identity crisis “. Let’s just hope that, in view of the next municipal ventures, seven mayors are not needed to govern it.