No abstract

The increasing complexity of urban growth strongly impacts both on the quality of urban environment and on the effectiveness of models for development, requiring innovative approaches to face the related challenges. The proposed position paper reports the methodological approach outlined within a trans-European research project. It aims at defining a systemic urban vision based on resource loops vision in a clustered perspective, overcoming the conventional separation between urban and periurban areas. The main scope is to drive a transition from a linear ("take-make-use-dispose") to a circular approach, considering the whole city realm and aiming to close resource loops (in line with EU COM 614/2015, Closing the loop, EU COM 33/2017, Implementation of the Circular Economy Action Plan and Urban Agenda Draft Action Plan on Circular Economy 09.02.2018) while generating new market opportunities and jobs, reducing resources import, decreasing impacts on environment and climate change. The methodology includes the following steps: increasing context understanding, identifying resource flows, using economic potential of existing resources, engaging communities in loops of proximity, facilitating entrepreneur and stakeholders in co-creation of circular economy processes. This paper explains the positioning of the research within the state of the art; it describes the applied methodology and related expected outcomes, defines the main related initiatives and implementation models. This study identifies regenerative corridors (RC) as potential effective drivers to overcome the conventional separation between urban, peri-urban and rural areas in the EU context, investigating their relations and identifying driving factors for a circular equalized development among these different urban zones. This paper also reports on the impact indicators and the replication potential of the proposed systemic approach.

No abstract

The scientific literature offers a wide range of studies evidencing the progress done in the retrofit actions dealing with the current building stock; however, renovations of hospitals are still an open field of research due to their typical complexity that is usually associated with a very challenging updating processes to maintain or increase operational level. The paper provides a synthesis of a study developed by a team of the Department of Architecture for Saint Orsola Hospital in Bologna with the scope to explore innovative retrofitting strategies. The brief provided by the management unit of the hospital was connected to the general renovation plan involving the entire site and particularly some existing buildings taking into account some limitations concerning budget availabilities and everyday activities needed to ensure acceptable service level for the end users. The design approach starts from defining a basic unit (a typical hospital room) that is deeply analyzed to report the starting conditions (indoor environmental parameters) and then used to simulate the potential impacts of retrofitting actions on its performances. The results allowed to parametrically develop a step by step strategy scaled on each building sector and on the building as a whole to evaluate the global impact on energy performances while considering time and costs of each retrofitting options.