The emergency of resource flow management in Palermo, Italian Capital of Culture for 2018. A proposal for a circular management integrated in its old town center

Abstract

The present study aims at examining the gap between both the exponential openness of Palermo to the international scene, causing a wide acknowledgement of its cultural attractiveness, and itsunflappable management of city services that will face after the consequent increase of tourist andurban flows to the historical and cultural areas of the city. Our interest is especially focused on waste to be intended as resource flows in a circular management system. Compared with the other urban areas, the management of city services in the old town center is characterized by some operative issues to be faced: its specified morphological urban texture and its immaterial, psychological, and symbolical values acquired over the centuries.The overall situation of the old town center of Palermo is featured by a delayed reply to the current emergency that, of course, cannot be considered as a sustainable reaction to the difficulties met.The circular re-organization of a service - such as the management of material flows - is the idealopportunity for a landscape regeneration: in this case, landscape is not just a mere protected site but itis involved in circularity becoming a resource, an attractor, and an active component playing an important role for the local economic development. In other words, it is a resource to be enhanced through a longterm planning and led by a systemic vision where both tangible components(technologies and infrastructures) and intangible ones (socio-cultural identity and relational factors) are boosted and complementary.