26/05/2024
The ‘seven cities’ of Rome
The first area is the historical city, associated in popular culture – to the point of cliché – with Rome. It encompasses the ancient city within the Aurelian walls, an area with less than 100,000 residents that represents only one percent of the municipal territory, visited every year by millions of tourists and pilgrims.
Secondly, we identified the affluent city. This encapsulates some of the northern districts, EUR’s business center and the mansions along the ancient Appian way. With about 440,000 residents, this area includes many university graduates, highly qualified professionals and students. Unemployment rates are low, as are the levels of social hardship.
The third city identified through our mapping is the compact city. This includes the first intensive belt of neighborhoods built around the city center during the first half of the 20th Century, as well as the seaside neighborhood of Ostia.
Fourth comes the hardship city, which includes large areas of public housing and informal neighborhoods (borgate) . About 440,000 residents live in these places, often trapped in a vicious cycle of childhood poverty, low education levels, unemployment, health problems, crime
The fifth one is the car-dependent city, or the second extensive peripheral belt developed during the second half of the 20th Century beyond the compact city, along the ring road (Grande Raccordo Anulare – GRA) and highways . This area is home to about 610,000 residents and its population is progressively increasing.
The sixth one is defined as the rural city: it consists of Rome’s most distant outskirts situated in the Agro romano (the historical agricultural surroundings of Rome). This area has about 180,000 residents, rapidly increasing by +80% since 2001.
Finally, an unaccounted-for seventh city exists too. This is the invisible city, which spans the whole area Rome. It is the city of homeless people, migrants, squatters, Roma settlements, imprisoned people, as well as socially and economically disadvantaged individuals.
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https://www.donzelli.it/libro/9788855221597