Open spaces and environmental design

Abstract

The urban fabric of any human settlement can be analyzed at two levels: the built fabric and the system of empty spaces. Graphically, the two levels are contrary to each other. The first is the structure generated by the aggregation of the elementary unit that represents its governing and invariable element. It is a component that can be managed and its spatial, functional and structural entity can be controlled due to its “box like” structure. The empty system consists of public and private open spaces that form a network of relational, representative and social spaces but also an interconnecting system. So, the identification of the methods to analyze the environmental characteristics of these empty spaces and, therefore, the criteria to improve the comfort conditions of the users, is the aim of this research. The survey follows the branch of research that studies the methods of intervention in historical centers. The need to carry out project interventions in historic urban fabrics pushes the researchers to find the methods to introduce the comfort levels required by contemporary users and, at the same time, to respect the values to pass down to posterity The choice of a strategy involving a certain degree of invasiveness and reversibility depends on the designer's knowledge of the particular context of intervention For this reason, the project carried out in a context having important values, as it is a minor center, requires a detailed cognitive analysis of the site under study that, inevitably, will limit the designer's freedom. The study area is located in the Abruzzi Region, full of minor historical centers rich in deep cultural values.