02/12/2024
The ‘seven cities’ of Rome
Rome is the most populated Italian city, with more than 2.8 million people, and the country’s largest municipal territory, measuring 1287 km2. The area within the ancient city walls is recognised by UNESCO as a World Heritage Site for its outstanding universal value. Rome is nevertheless affected by strong socioeconomic divides and growing inequalities fuelled by an incessant urbanisation process often rooted in speculative practices. Polarisations are clearly visible in terms of health, education, employment and income.
It is possible to identify “Seven cities” within Rome.
The first area is the historical city, associated in popular culture – to the point of cliché – with Rome.
Secondly, we identified the affluent city. This encapsulates some of the northern districts. 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. About 440,000 residents live in these places, often trapped in a vicious cycle of childhood poverty, low education levels, unemployment, health problems.
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 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.
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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