Milan is increasingly smart, thanks to the milestones achieved in economic innovation, environmental sustainability, mobility and civic participation. The reasoning behind ICityRate 2016's choice, explained.
Transforming a city into a smart city is a complex process, as it requires a profound overhaul of infrastructure, the way people live, territorial regeneration, the design of urban spaces, the economy and institutions; above all, it requires a rethinking of policies in order to give rise to a community capable of living and competing in a globalised world. Within this horizon, numerous actors are now at work — multinationals, universities, research centres, small and medium-sized enterprises; within this context, public institutions, especially at local level, can play a fundamental role in facilitating, connecting and coordinating.
For the second consecutive year, ICityRate confirms Milan as Italy's leading smart city for liveability and urban vitality, second for quality of human capital and third for accessibility and mobility. Its lead in the economic dimension is very clear: the Lombard capital ranks first in absolute terms in three out of twelve indicators: productivity (value added per unit of labour exceeds 74,000 euros, against a national average of under 59,000), activity and managerial capacity (there are more than 20 companies with over 250 employees per 10,000, compared to fewer than eight at national level) and number of patents (90 filed per 10,000 units of labour, against a national average of 23.5 patents), but it also features in the top ten for the qualifications of the employed, the intensity of the flow of foreign visitors for work purposes, the dynamism of credit and the concentration of research and development activities, as well as being the city that has seen the highest number of Fablabs (digital fabrication laboratories) and maker spaces (design spaces for sharing, learning and collaborating) established in recent years.
Digital artisans choose Milan, and the city chooses to invest in a new model of urban innovation that shifts the axis of its development strategy towards new forms of collaborative economy and social innovation; a model realised through the granting of spaces, financial support for projects and businesses, the creation of networks of innovators and the definition of articulated urban policies. It also performs well for connectivity, both in terms of quality (the highest average speed recorded for consumer ADSL users) and cultural internationalisation, as well as scoring very highly for the spread of the sharing economy.
ICityRate is the annual report produced by ICity Lab, which describes the situation of Italian cities on their path towards smarter cities — that is, cities that are closer to the needs of their citizens, more inclusive, more liveable. To produce this report, ICity Lab selects and analyses various urban dimensions, such as mobility and economic activities, and from these establishes variables and indicators on the basis of which it is able to draw up a final index (ICity index). Already since last year, in addition to the six dimensions of economy, living, environment, mobility, people and governance. The new addition is the dimension of legality: a set of twelve specific indicators designed to measure the level of territorial legality. An important but necessary change that expands the structure of the work to seven (rather than six) dimensions.
Milan has always been a laboratory of ideas, ahead of the rest of Italy. It is from here that solutions to certain problems emerge, which all other cities then take as a model. Among the future projects Milan is promoting, Rotaie Verdi deserves a mention: a large nature oasis conceived to connect the disused railway yards of San Cristoforo, Porta Genova and Porta Romana. The project, developed by WWF Italia with the support of Fondazione Cariplo, in partnership with the Municipality of Milan, Cooperativa Eliante and Rete ferroviaria italiana (Rfi), is based on the idea of exploiting the strip of railway embankment to create an ecological corridor along the tracks, envisaging the creation, on part of the areas, of nature oases with a more "wild" character that integrate and interact with areas designated as public green space.
Another innovative project is the Nido Verticale, the new sustainable tower designed by architect Mario Cucinella that will be built in Porta Nuova. The building will be approximately 96 metres tall, oval in plan, and will have a cladding of wood, metal and glass. A sort of vertical nest, as the name suggests, structured around a rhomboidal lattice. The interior will feature a large hall connected to the pedestrian square in front and to via Melchiorre Gioia; the space will be characterised by a series of elliptical terraces overlooking the entrance, forming a striking "courtyard" that will run the full height of the building, complete with hanging gardens. A functional building, highly sustainable and innovative in terms of energy efficiency. The skeleton of the building is formed by a double layer that allows the envelope to breathe — a double skin "that insulates it from the cold in winter and protects it from overheating in summer", as Cucinella has stated. Moreover, thanks to the solar panels installed at various strategic points and the rainwater collection systems integrated into certain design elements (such as the mirror sail above the entrance), resource consumption is reduced to a minimum.
Also worth mentioning, finally, is the Nuova Bovisa project — the largest urban development intervention ever carried out in Milan, destined to drive the future growth of the city and of the entire Italian economic and industrial system. On an area of 850,000 square metres, with over 740,000 square metres still to be designed, the first truly international hub dedicated to research and innovation in energy and sustainable mobility will take shape: an ecosystem that will unite universities and industry, attracting investment from abroad and making knowledge, facilities and resources available, as already happens in major international science parks. In keeping with the cosmopolitan vocation of the project, EuroMilano has entrusted the development of an initial concept for Nuova Bovisa to Rem Koolhaas's OMA studio, which specialises in the urban design of large-scale areas. Universities and businesses together for research into energy and sustainable mobility. The ambition is to reshape the territory starting from its history, the local context and neighbouring presences, enhancing its potential in harmony with the characteristics of the area, in order to create an ecosystem based on creativity, innovation and knowledge, capable of growing and developing over time.