Roots and future are currently disconnected. A discussion must be opened on the economy and development in Siena
The city of Siena needs a new development hub that is not just tourism. Which is important but has no impact on the entire community. And it doesn’t even need vain words about it pharmaceutical centers never born. And everyone must understand that we can no longer talk about the city, thinking of the intra moenia and excluding the real territory.
Wandering around the province of Siena you discover that, put together partly for fun and partly out of desperation, the new forms of market or employment – that is, new jobs – are already here.
Rental of Vespas and Lambrettas, e-bikes and vintage utility cars on holidays for tours along unforgettable roads that you can also retrace from home with augmented virtual reality tools… The Uber of car parks… Not to mention short stays in fascinating historic residences and farmhouses. And do we want to talk about the “revisited” poor cuisine that no longer throws away anything, not even onion peels?
Everything for exclusive experiences in enchanting places, apparently frozen in time, far from the wear and tear of modern life. If Ernesto Calindri with his unstable little table is no longer there, Siena remains in theory immortal.
Yet even if with a click on a smartphone or workstation you can share everything and everything can become yours… Until it lives in a story… However, nothing convinces us that this is a permanent situation. I am alone temporary swabs for a sleeping beautythe city, which however has not always been like this.
These places have experienced development and decline, but are now facing the saddest of fates: the social desertificationThe demographic decline and the aging population. A public and social ship that if it sterilely takes on the responsibility of the initiative and does not recover the ability to discuss it with the rest of Society, has drifted towards a unknown horizondefinitely not rosy. It is not a new dawn but a slow sunset.
Partly for fun, partly out of desperation… But it will be possible to attract enough to reverse this tendency towards depopulation that seems inexorable? Of course we should ask ourselves questions about the reversibility of the process and what future we want. The problem is that I don’t see which component of the Society could be willing to take on the initiative of analyzing possible solutions in the meantime.
There is nothing on the horizon that I can go back to fill the many abandoned warehouses, often hidden, which made manufacturing flourish in other eras. But probably all to be reclaimed. Nobody wants to spend money unless the ban on consuming more public land becomes total.
Drinks, sandwiches, gourmet dishes, delicious wines, stays from a thousand and one nights, they will produce the GDP needed to repopulate and give life back to villages, towns and cities? Above all the city that sets the table for a hundred thousand and collects the bill for forty thousand.
Or will everything help adults age better and teenagers gain useful experiences to find their path elsewhere?
Maybe this is our excellence; and for now we have not been able to define and strengthen it. A place for old people who want to age well, a place for very young people who want to prepare for the future. A place to have roots to return to. A good identity. The valley of well-being. Yes, because life is good here. The air is clean, the climate is mild, the spaces are plentiful. Longevity is the highest.
Italy – source Sapere.it – is third in the world for the longevity of its inhabitants (82.9 years). Followed by Hong Kong (83.5) and Japan (83.1). In Italy, Siena is the first city in terms of liveability of the child population and excels in longevity data.
Studying, walking, playing sports in the land of the Etruscans, bathing in the spas dear to the Roman lords. A place for rich people? Well, difficult otherwise. Here the consumption of land for new buildings is now zero. Recovery and regeneration cost money. Immersing yourself in a world heritage site, merging into a community with centuries of history is priceless. The isolation, which the inhabitants complain about in order to reach the modern centers of metropolitan development, becomes an exclusive privilege.
Which models should you choose? Popular or aristocratic… hit and run or slow and long? And then… can you choose? Really?
Partly for fun, partly out of desperation, it would be worth talking about it. SienaPost it’s not the best place, but perhaps it’s good for welcoming and disseminating some qualified opinions.
Yes, because in the end we will need infrastructural choices, service networks, fiscal choices and investments. Does anyone remember how innovation occurred in the countryside after the sharecropping crisis and depopulation. The choice of quality was the consequence of long innovative processes of which the inclusion of new professionals represented the essential component.
And… yes, let’s face it, the future must be sought, helped, chosen.
