The rehabilitation investigation of a historical urban area

The analytical description of the rehabilitation procedure of an urban area which includes a large number of completely abandoned, historical industrial buildings, located in Legnano, a city close to Milan, is presented in this paper. The restoration procedure is based on the combination of the individual buildings design and of the urban bioclimatic architecture. For this purpose, all the natural, environmental and man-made factors are taken into account. Moreover, the interrelations between the environmental aspects and the artificial are investigated, while a design and urban planning methodology is developed giving priority to the environmental protection. Finally, an investigation of the thermal performance of one of the above mentioned buildings, including passive heating and cooling techniques, such as earth-to-air heat exchangers and night ventilation techniques, is described in the present paper using a transient system simulation program. © 1997, Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.