The Area of the Strait Reading Theories and Strategies for a Metropolitan Dimension

Extending across a peninsular strip going from Gioia Tauro to Melito Porto Salvo on the Calabrian side, and from Milazzo to Giardini Naxos on the Sicilian side, the Strait of Sicily sees theAspromonte massif and the Peloritani mountain range as two facing stage sets of land sketching in the gulf a water piazza of a landscaping room. Described in the proposal by Giuseppe and Alberto Samonà, Ludovico Quaroni, Antonio Quistelli, Sergio Musmeci, Paolo D’Orsi Villani and Leonardo Urbani, it outlines, in the county seats of Reggio Calabria and Messina, the prevalence of a Euclidean space, identifiable in the exact metrics given by the recurrence of the measuring step of the blocks drawn in the reconstruction plans. The geographical dimension and the human nature of the district identify into the longitudinal extension the characterizing element of a territory and with it the main issue of its own logistics coverage. In this scenario the water piazza of the Strait is cut through on a daily basis by the network linking the two sides, like strings of commuter traffic between two strips of land whose distance has always been too small to make out their separate destinies yet too broad to facilitate their joining. It follows the need to reflect upon the infrastructure of the entire surrounding area which, while proposing a study on the themes of accessibility and crossing, also outlines a strategy running on harbours and airports as gateways to the entire area to scale with nature and the size of its traffic.