ABANDONED WATER TREATMENT PLANT RECONVERSION

The connection with the dismissed industrial area will trigger a transformation to recover these landscape through the intervention of the entities in charge of the mantainance of these structures

In the space separating the purification plant from the river banks, three gravel-covered strips of different diameters and granulometry will be introduced for the filtration of rainwater and the creation of a bed favourable to the taking root of phytoextractive herbaceous species

The project proposal envisages the decontamination of the area through a phytoextraction action by means of spontaneous pioneer vegetation and introduced species in order to increase the biodiversity of the coppice area that separates the building from the railway

In the ponds, similarly, phytodepuration of rainwater will be utilised through the use of rooted elophytes and floating hydrophytes.

The punctual introduction of trees will provide shade and cooling in an area characterised by low reflectance, which causes the so-called ‘heat islands’. The depavelling process will also increase the drainage surface at the expense of the permeable one

Through a process of depavenging, the private area is made accessible and suitable for point and random herbaceous emergence. The introduction of phytoextractive plants will operate a process of decontamination of the soil now completely covered by a concrete blanket

The deprogrammed area will be open to a wide variety of activities, removable temporary structures will be able to host events and open-air cinemas

The infiltrative action will propagate, through a unique movement, into the adjacent ‘ladders’ area, culminating in a strip of high and medium vegetation and into the tertiary area on the opposite bank of the Olona

A hybrid HF-VF+FWS (horizontal flow - vertical flow + free water system) type system will be proposed within the park, i.e. a hybrid series of horizontal, vertical and free-flowing phyto-purification tanks. The system’s water will be taken from the Bozzente stream, which flows into the Olona river in this very area, often discharging sewage that makes this area particularly polluted and smelly

The area also proves to be important from an urban point of view. Surrounded by schools and residential areas, it is a strategic area to start a process of education and bringing the community closer to the Olona river

Educational activities could be proposed as part of school curricula to make the youngest aware of environmental issues and the importance of water, a resource, now more than ever, that is increasingly precious and unavailable

PHYTODEPURATION SYSTEM