Third Pass: the go-ahead has been given for 58 million to regenerate three neighbourhoods in Genoa
Deputy Minister Rixi and Commissioner Mauceri: “Excavation work for the Genoa–Milan high-speed rail link will be completed by spring 2027”
The go-ahead has been given for 58.6 million in investment to regenerate the Certosa, Rivarolo and Sampierdarena districts of Genoa affected by the construction work for the Terzo Valico project – the Genoa railway junction. The Government’s Special Commissioner, Calogero Mauceri, authorised the works by signing two separate decrees at the Prefecture in Genoa. The event was attended by the Deputy Minister for Infrastructure, Edoardo Rixi; the Governor of Liguria, Marco Bucci; the Mayor, Silvia Salis; and Carlo Castellano, President of the Ligurian Association for Children. Mauceri and Rixi also gave assurances that ‘the excavation work on the Terzo Valico’, that is, the Genoa–Milan high-speed, high-capacity railway line, ‘will be completed in the spring of 2027. We are 97 per cent through the excavation work’. From there, the commissioner added, ‘we will be able to draw up a programme with Ferrovie and Cociv (the general contractor for the project, ed.) to complete the line within a year’.
A framework programme agreement has also been signed to establish an Educational Innovation District in Valpolcevera, on the former Facchini site, which was transferred free of charge by Ferrovie dello Stato to the local council. The country’s first experimental technological sixth-form college will be built on this site, with the aim of launching the pilot scheme from the 2027–2028 academic year.
The first decree allocates 42.2 million for the Certosa and Rivarolo neighbourhoods, where expropriations, demolitions and urban regeneration projects are planned, ‘contributing – as a statement from the commissioner explains – to mitigating the environmental, urban planning and landscape impacts of the railway infrastructure’. The funds “will enable the launch of the first operational phase of the urban regeneration programme in the areas most affected by the Campasso railway upgrade and the completion of the Terzo Valico”. They will also pave the way for the extension of the underground line to Rivarolo.
The second decree allocates 16.4 million to build the urban park on Via Ardoino in Sampierdarena, one of the priority projects identified under the Urban Regeneration Programme. The project will cover an area of approximately 8,000 square metres, stretching for around 295 metres, ‘returning to the public a space currently dominated by railway infrastructure and transforming it into a place dedicated to social interaction, green spaces and urban quality’.
The aim, said Mauceri, is to ensure ‘opportunities for development and a better quality of life for local communities’. The Government, added Rixi, ‘is honouring the commitments it made to Genoa. Not with words, but with resources, infrastructure projects and construction sites’. As Bucci clarified, this is “a project that began three and a half years ago and is now entering its operational phase. We are delighted; this is a major step forward for Genoa, which is being given the opportunity to extend the metro line as far as Rivarolo”.
