Recupero e rifunzionalizzazione degli edifici ferroviari dismessi. Un'occasione per la ri-generazione del Parco Lineare tra Caltagirone e San Michele di Ganzaria

In 2001 the railway line “Caltagirone - San Michele di Ganzaria (Sicily)” has been converted into a Linear Park. Nowadays both this important greenway and the decommissioned railway buildings are neglected. The aims of the paper are the preservation of the railway buildings and the relaunch of an extraordinary rural area, to show how the recovery and reuse of this built heritage constitute an important opportunity for economic growth, as well as the most effective tool to protect the collective historic memory. Both the cognitive and the design phases have been developed according to a systemic approach and putting in relation different scales of observation: the rural territory and the railway buildings. The design proposal faces up to the delicate balance between the preservation of historic buildings and the integration of new technical elements or volumes. The new use for the buildings has been identified taking into account the cultural value of built heritage, the material and immaterial resources existing in the territory and the environmental, cultural and economic needs of the contemporary society; it should allow to re-generate the Linear Park and to enhance a territory where the rural landscape represents, for sure, an added value.