“We are abandoned, the town is dying and yet not a leaf is moving: if it continues like this, in a little while, instead of shops there will be desert in the square.” It is the cry of alarm that comes from the traders of Bagnaia, the most populous district of the municipality of Viterbo, worried about a future that seems to offer less and less certainty. They blame “twenty years of lack of investment and the total disinterest with which the country has been treated since the abolition of the constituencies, which guaranteed a voice to the residents”.
A long list of administrators which includes, lastly, the mayor Chiara Frontini from whom: «we ask for greater listening and dialogue». A dialogue which for now has struggled to get started and which has disappointed some of the 70% of voters who, in the district, had trusted her in the run-off, much preferring her to Alessandra Troncarelli.
“We need a new commercial plan, they add – we see that in other situations, even smaller than ours, businesses manage to stay on their feet without encountering all the problems that the traders of Bagnaia find themselves facing.” Among the requests is also that of having a greater number of free parking spaces «near commercial activities because those that exist, even if nearby, are not convenient especially for older people. Nobody expects that this will be the key to helping businesses relaunch, but it is an attempt and it would already be something.”
The trade crisis in Bagnaia has, moreover, very deep roots. Over the last 30 years the economic fabric made up of small artisan businesses and neighborhood shops has progressively disintegrated. The crisis started from inside the historic center, where only two businesses remained compared to seven in the mid-1990s, and then overflowed outside the walls. A collapse that has been more rapid in the last decade, driven by the growth of e-commerce and the ever-increasing number of retail parks that have sprung up in the capital; parks with “food and non-food” shops inside capable of charging much lower prices due to the large loads of goods purchased.
The trade crisis is not the only cause for concern, in fact it runs in parallel with the problem of depopulation of the historic center, a jewel increasingly covered in dust. In less than 25 years the number of the population living in the village has dwindled almost to the point of disappearing. A problem on which politics has little room for maneuver, common to many other Italian centers and for which there is no valid medicine (even the famous houses for sale for one euro seem to give more problems than solutions). “At times – say some historic residents – it is difficult to recognize the town: sometimes we have the impression of living in a long agony”.
And the initiatives put in place to resurrect a now truly bare center of activities and residents seem to have been of little benefit. «Here the only time you see people – they still say – is the day of the “focarone”. A tradition that we are proud of and in which everyone, bathers and non-goers, really participates. Too bad for the rest of the days of the year.”
The situation, as described by the residents of the hamlet, seems dramatic and with no way out at the moment: “we just hope that politicians notice us and what is happening, perhaps not just close to the elections”.
Luca Telli
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© ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
