Major sporting events, discussed legacies and host destination transformations. –Among the various interpretations with which one can look at events, one possibility is to understand their legacy, understood as what remains in the territory at the end of the event itself in terms of symbols and values, or structures and systems; and if this legacy often becomes more important than the event itself. The article aims to examine the case of the Barcolana, an annual sailing event and regatta that takes place in the Gulf of Trieste. It is one of the largest and most famous sailing regattas in Europe and the world. The regatta attracts thousands of participants and spectators, mak-ing it a significant cultural and sporting event in the region. The Barcolana is known for its unique format, which involves a mass start in which hundreds of boats of various sizes and classes participate in a single regatta. Almost eighteen hundred boats were registered for the fifty-fifth edition last year. The event lasts a week with events on land and at sea, as well as the sailing competition which takes place on Sunday. After a review of the literature relating to the topic under study, through a qualitative methodology the factors that together create those effects, often positive but not only, on the territories involved in the event were analysed. The “on the move” interviews with some event participants were useful for understanding the involvement and quality of the event itself, and how to guarantee its continuous and gradual development.

Strategic planning and local tourism: the case of Grecìa Salentina. – The XXVI edition of the Report on Italian Tourism from the Institute of Sciences of Cultural Heritage of the National Research Council (CNR ISPC) revealed that in 2022 (Marasco et al., 2023), out of the 70.1 billion euros spent by Italian tourists within the country, only 15.2 billion euros remained within the visitors' home regions. This marked a decrease of about 0.5 percentage points compared to 2019, showing a negative trend for local tourism. Despite this, proximity tourism shows strong potential, especially in marginal and inland areas, which can contribute to these places' development and cultural awareness. To achieve this, it is important to integrate local tourism into a long-term process led by the local community, emphasizing environmental, cultural, economic, and social sustainability as outlined in Agenda 2030. This approach is exemplified by the Strategic Plan for Tourism Development for the Union of Municipalities of the Grecìa Salentina, which aims to promote sustainable tourism.

Urban green spaces as proximity tourism destinations: the potential of the Maredolce - La Favara complex between care practices and heritage enhancement. – Proximity tourism allows residents to experience familiar places in new ways and to perceive otherness in an elsewhere that does not imply distance. In urban settings, green spaces offer an evocative appeal that can be emphasized when combined with interest in the presence of heritage emergencies. Therefore, it is possible to reflect on the potential of green areas in urban settings and the implications for tourism and sustainability challenges. Green spaces in cities generate crucial connections that strengthen communities while contributing to local development. This article aims to analyze the role of heritage communities in the care and enhancement of urban green spaces as destinations with the aim of promoting critical tools useful for more equitable and sustainable planning of green space enhancement strategies for tourism. This research explores the case of the Maredolce - La Favara complex (Palermo) with a qualitative methodology that included participant observation and field survey. The green space is subject to processes of care put in place for decades by a group of inhabitants who work for the enhancement and involvement of the area in the representation and governance policies of the city. The processes and dynamics related to the context under study are analyzed to highlight how heritage walks, as effective practices of proximity tourism, can contribute to sustainable urban development that enhances local in-stances of signification and affective belonging to places.

The policy of museum free admission and the enhancement of cultural sites as a potential tool for the transition of territorial gathering spaces. – The choice to adopt museum policies that provide free admission to museums could impact the increase in visitors. It could generate social repercussions on the territory and act as a tool for transforming meeting spaces, with particular attention to some European realities. The study aims to analyze the correlation between free admission, frequency of visits to museums and propensity to return. The literature outlines an overview of the current situation of the economic, social and territorial impact of the museum sector and the use of the museum as a possible new aggregation space for the younger population. The methodology used is a qualitative em-pirical approach through interviews aimed at a sample of young people, aged between 18 and 26, identified among student groups. The sample survey will make it possible to establish, specifically, how much the income of the subjects interviewed and the difference in admission policies between the various European museums and territories considered can affect the degree of use of the museum facilities.

Landscape and proximity fruition in the Euganean Hills context: reflections from an educational experience. – Tourism-recreational practices are often framed through dichotomous concepts such as near/far, familiar/unfamiliar, tourist/local, and everyday/exotic. With this awareness, we proposed a didactic laboratory within the Master’s degree program in Landscape Science at the University of Padua to address the following research question: What role does the experience of landscape play in reconsidering these dichotomous approaches? We analysed the Euganean Hills area in the Padua province exploring four specific contexts, two historical houses and two museums, where the relationship with the landscape is defined by practices of proximity and specific connections with natural and cultural heritage values. The research was based on desk analysis of demographic and tourism data, strategic and promotional documents, visits and interviews. Dialogue with local operators, their perspectives on local communities and the direct immersion in the landscape unveiled the multiple ways in which the Euganean landscape is understood and promoted for leisure purposes. What emerged is the plurality of discourses and images, places and initiatives, often co-created ‘from below’, that define and redefine the landscape. Tracing the variety of proximity visits, experienced similarly by residents and tourists through an interesting hybridisation process mixing roles, motivations and space sharing, allows to overcome dichotomies and open up new spaces for reflection and local planning.

Hydric resources as patterns for a community regeneration: the Gleno dam between memory and innovation in Scalve Valley. – Geography offers tools for territorial analysis and planning which, by integrating field research with geographic information technologies, propose innovative approaches to support re-generation processes. This is strategic in mountain contexts where, over time, water resources management has been at the core of a delicate co-evolutionary relationship between humans and non-humans and, sometimes, has caused catastrophic fractures induced by anthropic action, like dam collapsing. The essay presents the case study of the Gleno Dam in the Scalve Valley, province of Bergamo, where, since the collapse centenary (1923-2023), the geographers of the Imago Mundi Lab at the University of Bergamo have been carrying out research aimed at reconstructing the territorial stratification generated over time, focusing on the role of water and the disastrous results of the dam collapse on the entire valley. Many places abandoned after the disaster can today be regenerated through co-design processes using mapping systems and placing water at the centre of new symbolic meanings, cultural functions, and production practices.

Urban regeneration and tourism in peripheral neighbourhoods: the case of Bagnoli (Naples). – This article deals with the relationship between suburbs, urban regeneration and tourism development by addressing the case of Bagnoli, a former industrial district on the western outskirts of Naples. Bagnoli is a coastal neighbourhood which preserves the dismissed facilities and the social landscape from its industrial past and is still struggling to fully implement a regeneration process that would allow it to regain its ancient tourist vocation. However, the new debate and the new planning ferment that seem to be developing around the issue today perhaps justify cautious optimism: If good intentions are followed by concrete facts, it could actually be possible to get out of this thirty-year impasse and enhance the territorial resources of Bagnoli, which range from sea bathing to thermalism, from traditional to innovative kinds of cultural tourism.

Agreements on the use of water, cooperation, policies and conflicts: river contracts in Italy. – The paper aims to explore the concept of river contract as a tool for participatory management of water resources, analyzing in this context the key role of conservation and management of their naturalness. The main objective of the research is to understand how river contracting can facilitate the conservation, enhancement and transmission of cultural heritage while promoting the sustainable development of local communities. The methodology is based on a review of the available literature on the river contract concept, its role in cultural heritage enhancement, and the need for the geo-mediation phase as an important moment of shared and participatory planning. The results of the research, in addition to highlighting regional differences in the application of River Contracts in Italy, indicate that the river contract although not widespread can act as a catalyst for the management and enhancement of cultural heritage, actively involving local communities in the conservation of their territories. The implications of the research may be useful for scholars, practitioners and institutions interested in the conservation and enhancement of water resources through the implementation of planning strategies by identifying the figure of the geomediator as a facilitator of performative processes.

Transhumance and landscape conservation in Northeastern Italy. An open question – With Apparent relic of a world close to extinction, the practice of transhumance is today reconsidered because of both its own important cultural heritage, and the role played in landscape management. While roaming and crossing complex landscapes as those of mountains and lowlands, animals and shepherds become actors of micro-processes of maintenance and regeneration, creating relationships between rural and urban systems. But this role is far from being socially recognized everywhere, and often transhumance practitioners are left alone, or even obstructed, by political and administrative structures. Starting from the results gathered during the Erasmus+ project TRANSFARM, employing field research, mapping and policy analysis, this article focuses on the constantly changing relational space of the North-Eastern regions of Italy: in this complex context the practice of transhumance and its issues become an opportunity for highlighting the deep inter-connection between mountains and lowlands and a still scarce consideration of the importance of transhumance in landscape management among herders, administrations and planning practice.

Landascape of Decay. Landscape of the Camorra: Characters, Perceptions and Storytelling. – For a reading of the landscapes of the Camorra, the peculiarities of a territorial nature should be analyzed: economic, urban planning, social, criminal and narrational of these particolar landscape scenarios of degradation. By practicing a critical analysis of the relationships that are established between organized crime and the landscape. In its physical forms and in those of individual and community life. The Camorra landscape is produced by a system of community relations achieved by a range of widespread illegal attitudes and behaviors, converging in actions of laceration of the civil fabric. The perception of this set of negative values is a fundamental component of the generation and perpetuation of this landscape. The individuals and communities of those territories have the perennial cogency of an "underlying" landscape present to their sensorial and cultural perception, based on disvalues distorting every action and behavior, therefore every feeling of them. The territory, its use and its governance, is strongly characterized by uses, practices, meanings and a particular storytelling. Made up of values charged with social and criminal negativity, but also fully perceived by the communities. Communities are forced to undergo this particular territorial connotation, which becomes fundamental in the emergence of this landscape of organized crime.

Considerations on the regional landscape plan of Sardinia: a contribution from internal areas. – The concept of landscape is at the core of many geographical studies and is rich in different meanings that over time have given rise to numerous interpretations. According to the European Landscape Convention adopted by the Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe in 2000, landscape is a combination of natural and cultural elements in continuous transformation. Transformations that, if not planned attentively, can give rise to processes of deterioration and loss of quality of landscape configurations. In a Europe where there is still a significant dualism between urbanized and rural areas and in an environmental, economic and social era marked by the objectives of sustainability dictated by the 2030 Agenda, it is therefore necessary to adopt and strengthen policies and strategies for a more cohesive development and planning of the territory. The contribution, after a brief review of the literature on European and national policies on the landscape, wants to focus on the ability of regional realities to activate reconstructive interventions and environmental improvements from the adoption of Landscape Plans. In particular, the attention wants to focus on the Sardinian regional context, the first reality in Italy to have adopted a Landscape Plan in 2006. A plan that, to date, has identified only in the coastal areas the areas to be protected and enhanced. However, in the light of the priorities for a sustainable future, the Plan needs to be reviewed and a new plan that can also include the internal areas that are still not sufficiently integrated in the development process of the island.

The valorization of the natural and cultural heritage of the territory of Grassano and Grottole in Basilicata for sustainable tourism: geomorphological and GIS analysis for planning sustainable tourism itineraries. – The recognition of Matera as European Capital of Culture 2019 will certainly serve in the near future to channel more effectively part of the tourist flow towards the inner areas. Therefore, a study of a significant portion of the inner area of Matera was undertaken, aimed at collecting elements of the physical landscape that would act as a landscape “frame” for the formulation of hypotheses of routes with “multiple” values. In fact, the study area includes the villages of Grassano and Grottole, which have elements of cultural interest that are useful for valorising the itinerary to be proposed. The knowledge of the geographical elements of the study area, the accurate analysis of the forms of the physical landscape and the geomorphological processes that have generated them, the inventory of the main cultural attractions of the two villages located in the study area, as well as the use of a geographical information system, have made it possible to design the route proposed in this article.

For a model of governance of Cultural Routes: Territorial Business Systems. The case study of the Via Francigena between Monti Prenestini ed Ernici. – Cultural routes and way are gradually assuming a leading role in territorial planning policies because on the one hand they are capable of responding to the criteria of environmental, social and economic sustainability and, on the other, of favoring an expansion of the tourist offer with a strong connotation identity. The study aims to support the hypothesis that a geographical approach by aggregates can represent the indispensable premise for the development of a governance model which, through the itinerary and the way, guarantees the implementation of actions aimed at enhancing and managing extended coherent territorial areas.

“Metamorphosis of the city”: Resilience and Interculturality. – With the advent of urban sprawl, the places have changed its physical structure by influencing the social and urban fabric. New Urbanism is a decisive movement for America and Europe, through it was possible to draw new planning visions. A current that would currently shooting for the operation, which has been show to improve the livability of neighborhoods and cities.
The methodology of resilience thinking and participation tools could improve the strategic planning and management of change and transformation of the social and urban systems, helping the administration to manage the urban policies.

The European Mediterranean region. Management and valorization of landscape transformations. – If on the one hand, many Mediterranean landscapes show the signs of an upset of ecological equilibrium and of a loss of identity-making peculiarities, on the other hand we see a renewed social demand, centered on the cultural, social and environmental values of each landscape, which induces to a reconsideration of politics as well. Hence, we have an increasing of regulative documents, agreements, projects and measures about all the different territorial scales. The main objective of this work is to analyze some of these planning proposals and programmatic documents which have been produced in Europe, to discover sustainable ways of territorial regeneration. The leading thread of this paper consists in investigating the meaning and value assumed by some instruments within a territorial planning directed towards innovation and collaborative planning.