From the Redevelopment of High-density Suburban Areas to Sustainable Cities

Most European suburbs are characterized by large residential housing estates mainly built during the second half of the twentieth century. Nowadays, these estates present serious social and economic issues as well as environmental related problems. These areas are often characterized by a low quality of life of their inhabitants, repetitiveness of buildings, degraded green and public spaces. Many Countries have had to face and are still facing these issues and are dealing with them in different ways through some activities to set the buildings back to their original status or by improving the quality of the housing and the standard of living. This paper presents some considerations about the regeneration of these areas, proposing methods, procedures and technologies previously defined for an Italian case study, aiming at the renovation and revitalization of these areas and, consequently, of the entire city, based on an adaptation of the uses to the new needs and to the environmental conditions. Broadly speaking, the objective is to propose a methodology of approaches to the interventions plan scaled to the district level, aiming at a sustainable urban development, as foreseen by the European goal of "Smart Specialisation Strategy" - in view of Horizon 2020 (next EU framework program for research and innovation 2014-2020).