Urban morphology & environmental performance : a masterplan of Farini’s disused railways in Milan via IMM methodology

Due to fast urban growth, cities face a lot of problems more than past. In order to solve these problems, to design more sustainable city is one of the first steps. Before the design process; to use an objective, scientific methods to understand what does the city really need is vital. Complexity is the concept of this study, the case of Farini in Milan will be evaluated as a complex system which includes subsystems (volume, void, types of uses and transportation). The thesis ‘Urban Morphology & Environmental Performance: A Masterplan of Farini’s Disused Railways in Milan via IMM Methodology’ is a project which is based on IMM methodology. IMM is the acronym of Integrated Modification Methodology and is a multi-scale, holistic, model based approach. Regarding to scales, three main scale is interested: city scale of Milan, intemediate scale which includes surrounding and the local scale which interventions will be proposed. According to the methodology four phases has been applied: Diagnostic, Formulation, Tranformation and Retrofitting. In the first phase, it is tried to be understood how the subsystems in the whole system interacts with each other. In the second phase, the most problematic and weakest part of the system is defined. This weak part is called ‘Catalyst’. In Farini case, it is links horizontally and permeability in vertical plane. After the decision of catalyst, it is tried to transform to a sustainable city by relevant interventions. However, even the interventions are mainly based on catalyst, there is a chain reaction since everyhing in the system is connected with each other and if one change, all system is going to be effected by this action. Last phase, which is retrofitting, is to understand how the new complex adaptive system is organized and evaluate the environmental performance, compare it with the previous CAS’ performance.

Morfologia urbana e prestazioni ambientali: un piano generale della ferrovia in disuso Farini a Milano via metodologia IMM