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.

Questo numero di documenti geografici si focalizza sul tema degli eventi nel loro rapporto con il territorio. In fisica, un evento è un “punto nello spazio tempo” e questa definizione ci sembra ben si applichi anche al modo in cui in geografia e in altre scienze sociali è andato consolidandosi l’ambito degli “Event Studies” con sotto-ambiti di specializzazione per caratteristiche delle manifestazioni (mega-eventi o eventi nazionali e medio-piccoli; ambito tematico: sport, cultura, politica…), nonché tempi (prima, durante e dopo) e prospettive con cui guardarli (considerando le diverse valenze e impatti culturali, economiche, politiche, ambientali e territoriali per le località ospitanti).

Comparative Experiences of Equestrian Sports Events in the Metropolitan Area of Rome. – Sports events offer an opportunity for regeneration, visibility, and international repositioning for the hosting territories as they can lead to the creation of cultural districts, displaying the territory’s self-representation and specialization. While these events require significant organizational and financial commitments, they also present strategic opportunities with various effects, such as economic diversification and cultural enrichment. This study examines the territorial impacts of two equestrian sports events in the Rome metropolitan area: the 2022 World Equestrian Games and the Piazza di Siena horse show. Despite
performing the same sport discipline, these events have different economic, social, and environmental impacts, as well as varying dynamics related to managing territorial conflicts. The reflection aims to analyse how to reconcile the goals of tourism-economic development and environmental protection in areas with significant natural value, by identifying programmatic actions and best practices.

The Rome of “great events”: mapping and diachronic analysis at the city-territory scale. The impact of a century and a half of extraordinary interventions. – This survey offers an accurate analysis of the major events held in Rome since the beginning of the 20th century. The time under review starts with the 1900 Jubilee, when the organization of hosting activities was for the first time under the responsibility of Italian authorities with specific economic support for reception facilities, and with the 1908 Olympics, where the planned venue for sporting events anticipates some of the choices made for Rome 1960 Olympics. The latter were strongly advocated by Pope Pius X, but in the end canceled by decision of Giolitti with similar motivations to the “no” expressed by Monti for the Rome 2020 event. The time spans up to the next Jubilee to be held in 2025 with the PNRR- financed projects.
Through a GIS mapping of planned and/or implemented interventions, and a comparative analysis with official ante quem and post quem cartography, the pilot survey aims at highlighting how much and how the “extraordinary” influences the “ordinary”, that is, how much targeted interventions in the city specifically needed for a major event impacts and directs its transformation, pointing out how the “extraordinary” is binding for the “ordinary” in individual case studies.

Nature, landscapes and sport. One hundred years of cycling with the Giro d’Italia. – The paper aims to examine the impact of the Giro d’Italia event, analyzing the importance of the bicycle both as a sporting, amateur, and tourist activity, and as a form of sustainable mobility that contributes to the ecological transition. The applied qualitative methodology focuses on the significance of documentary analysis, but primarily on the study of narratives in the promotional media of the event. The analytical tool, Nvivo12 software, was utilized. The green projects associated with the Giro d’Italia are designed to raise awareness and promote sustainability, demonstrating that sport is a lever of considerable value. However, there is likely a need for greater emphasis and dissemination of these narratives.

Territorial and geopolitical dynamics of the international professional tennis tour. – Major events, and in particular sports events, play an important role in contemporary society, mobilising huge amounts of resources and helping to delineate political, social and territorial phenomena of great interest. In this sense, just think of how many actors are involved in the organisation and management of competitions that, although they often take place in local contexts, are part of broader and more complex relational networks that often reach the international level. This contribution focuses on the territorial and geopolitical dynamics that characterise the major events of the international professional tennis tour. In particular, an attempt will be made to identify the logics underlying the geographical distribution of the different locations in an attempt to understand whether the choices depend on geopolitical reasons or are instead essentially linked to territorial characteristics or whether they depend on a mix of motivations. In addition, we aim to investigate whether and with what effects climate variations has already influenced or may influence the organisation of events on the international professional tennis tour in the future.

Eventi e festival nella promozione delle città secondarie da una prospettiva cognitivo-culturale: le grandi cinque città secondarie di eventi. – Nell’attuale contesto della New Economy e del Capitalismo Culturale Cognitivo, le città non competono esclusivamente per l’attrazione di flussi economici, ma sono piuttosto necessarie particolari forme di capitale culturale strettamente legate al turismo e al tempo libero, che ne enfatizzino prestigio, reputazione e identità. Si ritiene che eventi e festival culturali siano diventati indicatori statistici rappresentativi per valutare il sistema urbano globale da una prospettiva cognitivo-culturale. Seguendo una metodologia quantitativa implementata nella ricerca precedente, anche se ora ampliata e perfezionata, i risultati corroborano alcuni fatti significativi: i) la necessità di studiare il sistema urbano globale da una prospettiva multidimensionale, al di là dei criteri economici; ii) la necessità di concentrarsi non solo sulle principale città globali ma anche su quelle secondarie con particolare attenzione alle cosiddette “Big Five Secondary-Eventful Cities” che, grazie a questi eventi, sono culturalmente radicate nel panorama globale palcoscenico; iii) si conferma l’efficacia degli eventi sportivi e culturali in termini di posizionamento per le città ospitanti in una prospettiva cognitivo-culturale.

Textures and scalar relationships of transhumance between tradition and innovation. The Sportumanza project for a slow and responsible tourism. – Recalling the importance of transhumance as a territorial process and as the demonstration of the three attributes of space - scale, metric, substance – we can reveal the power of this ancient practice: it proceeds by multiscale relationships, foresees multiple metrics and it shows all its richness in substance, through the three characterizations of inhabiting (relational, functional and temporal). Through the case study of the vertical transhumance of the Orobic pre-Alpine context, we investigate how it generates relationships between human and non-human agents, functional practices for pastoral activity and for other ecosystemic services, care and preservation of biodiversity sites, enabling the shepherd and his animals to become sensors of environmental changes on a global scale. We then move on to the analysis of transhumance as an opportunity for innovation in the forms of living and doing tourism, especially in areas defined as peripheral and internal, by presenting the “Sportumanza” project.

Geopolitics and sport

Gli impatti ambientali delle attività sportive. Le buone pratiche di sostenibilità. Il caso del golf. – Lo studio intende evidenziare l’intensa e difficile relazione tra sport e ambiente prendendo in esame il caso del golf, uno sport che richiede una pianificazione e gestione dei percorsi più attenta e consapevole degli impatti ambientali, non solo per fronteggiare le pressioni esterne esercitate da coloro che denunciano gli effetti negativi sull’ambiente del golf, ma anche per ragioni economiche e pratiche di gioco. Efficienza energetica e uso di fonti rinnovabili, risparmio idrico, riduzione di prodotti chimici, limitazione dei rifiuti; conservazione della biodiversità; sensibilizzazione del pubblico sono obiettivi determinanti per l’affermazione dello sport sostenibile, una dimensione che esige, da un lato, l’impegno delle organizzazioni sportive, dei responsabili di eventi e di tutti gli stakeholder a vario titolo coinvolti di perseguire dette finalità e, dall’altro, un costante interesse e sostegno della ricerca scientifica per promuovere nuove conoscenze e comprendere le dinamiche del rapporto tra sport e ambiente.

Sport, Tourism and environment: rethinking local development in the times of Covid-19. – The contribution aims to try to imagine possible territorial development paths starting from the relaunch of individual and team sports, from sporting events driving tourism and from the environment, parks and biodiversity. The costs, in social and economic terms, that Covid-19 is causing on sport and tourism, can only be absorbed if we can quickly identify new forms and new methods of practice and social consumption. The organizational reconfigurations that will concern three major sporting events such as the Tokyo Olympics, the Winter Olympics in Cortina, the Ryder Cup in Rome can serve as a laboratory to rethink a new local development that serves as a basis for rebuilding trust in a global dimension that today it seems tarnished.

 

The depth of the changes taking place in the area object of the present study is of such importance as to ask questions about the features that this urban space should take in the process of growth of the Capital city. In the perspective of this evolution even more importance is given to what happens in the suburb area, which pertains to and is managed by the University of Rome “Tor Vergata”. The difficulties faced by the local authorities bring to the attention a new need arisen from the interest in finding resources to proceed with and accomplish a project of functional redefinition, which seems hard to be implemented. The 2009 World Aquatics Championships seemed to be a good opportunity, since it was thought that the construction of the sport structures would let to resume the project of urban requalification of the areas of Tor Bella Monaca and Torre Gaia, which are known to be dominated by lack of planning that has its roots in the Fifties of the last century and in which the influence of organized crime is overbearing. A new occasion, always connected with a major event, seemed to emerge to relaunch the possibility of implementing this project. All involved institutions and local authorities seemed to agree that the 2020 Olympic Games could be the right chance to reorganize this territory. In this direction, the size of the planned measures continues to change and, consequently, the disorientation of residents, while an investigation on different scales of the potential and of future possible difficulties seems to be essential.
difficulties seems to be essential.