PSI - Issue 78

Gianluca Fagotti et al. / Procedia Structural Integrity 78 (2026) 2070–2077

2071

1. Introduction Every time that a large earthquake occurred in Italy, but also in other countries that like Italy are characterized by the presence of historical cities or villages with highly vulnerable buildings, the consequence is that entire towns are heavily damaged or completely destroyed, as reported in EERI (2009) and Mazzoni et al. (2018). This can be typically due to the overlap of various causes: poor characteristics of original materials and construction methods; deficiency or absence of earthquake-resistant details; material decay and cumulative damage related to the building age and the suffered attacks; lack or insufficiency or even harmfulness of maintenance works. For the case of Castelluccio di Norcia the situation had been described, many years before the earthquake that destroyed it by Valluzzi et al. (2007). In any case these aspects are not the focus of this paper. This paper deals with the urban regeneration associated to the post-earthquake reconstruction of destroyed towns. In this regard two distinct schools of thought can be identified that have been applied in the past. The first one provides for rebuilding a new town in a different site, typically characterized by a reduced seismic risk with respect to the original site. The second one provides for rebuilding "where it was, as it was". The second option has been, and still is, generally preferred in Italy, within the preservation philosophy dominating the Italian culture and with the purpose to restore the social and economic fabric. This reconstruction thinking actually configures a special type of urban regeneration in a post-earthquake situation. The concept of rebuilding "where it was, as it was" often results in a reconstruction that is affected by the same, or at least, by a part of the original seismic vulnerability. Therefore the main objective in the post-earthquake reconstruction should be a urban regeneration capable of returning old settlements, with the same aspect and the same social and economic life, but with a seismic safety adequate to current needs. Urban regeneration is defined (Wikipedia) as "a program of land redevelopment often used to address real or perceived urban decay" . Moreover, it "involves the clearing out of areas deemed blighted, often in inner cities, in favour of new housing, businesses, and other developments" . The general concept of urban regeneration arises from the need to modernize city infrastructures. Indeed the increasingly stringent mobility requirements and the need to make cities more "habitable" bring to the forefront the need for a new way of understanding and conceiving the urban area. Therefore, urban regeneration consists of a set of actions aimed at the recovery and redevelopment of an urban space. The regeneration process occurs through recovery interventions at the level of infrastructures and services, limiting land consumption to protect environmental sustainability. Regeneration also allows the community to reclaim and relive the regenerated spaces, with evident improvements in the quality of life and in the social, economic and environmental spheres. When talking about regeneration, it is not referred to the mere reconstruction of a crumbling building or any renovation project. Regeneration occurs through the meticulous and creative recovery of disused built-up areas, redeveloping them in compliance with environmental sustainability and encouraging the use of eco-friendly materials. In the last years, urban regeneration has made progress, establishing itself as an opportunity to promote social participation policies, encouraging employment and local entrepreneurship. It is also an opportunity to give cities not only a new look, through a relaunch of the territorial image, but also a reason for relaunching from a cultural, economic and social point of view and clearly with attention to environmental aspects. Regeneration is a process that has no predefined rules and must adapt to the specific case. The particular case of the post-earthquake situation is that the clearing out of areas has been due to the destruction caused by the earthquake itself and that land redevelopment coincides with reconstruction of destroyed buildings and infrastructure. An important factor in an urban regeneration program is certainly the involvement of social actors. In fact, regeneration must not only favour the physical-spatial transformation of the territory, but must also contribute to the improvement of the social and environmental context. Therefore, it is not only necessary to involve the construction actors, but also all the social components. The project conceived and currently implemented for the post-earthquake reconstruction of Castelluccio di Norcia represents a sample of this type of urban regeneration. Most of the buildings of the village was practically razed to the ground by the earthquakes of October 26 and 30, 2016. The village has a small size and most of its buildings do not have heritage relevance, but it has a series of landscape, agro-food, tourist and cultural factors that synergistically determine a symbolic importance with a significance and notoriety that make the village as world renown. All the factors, both material and immaterial, represent elements that make contributions and require solutions in the regeneration process.