The Reconstruction of L’Aquila: A New Role of Ancient Walls

The reconstruction of the cities stricken by the earthquake is generally an accelerated process of transformation that returns an urban structure and form different from the original one. It is the case of L’Aquila, a city hit by the earthquake in 2009, which has undergone a profound social change and also the way of living the city. Work on ancient walls, express precisely this desire for change through the enhancement. An University of L’Aquila research on the Urban design role for reconstruction has addressed this issue, focusing their experiments on some parts of the city, and particularly on the issue of new public space dimension. This dimension has also concerned the role of the ancient walls in an effort to understand how contemporary society may change the original characters of the walls (those of closure, limes, defense), trying to make a usable cultural heritage and mediating element between the historic city and the suburbs.