Italian architects are urging to reduce the risk of future pandemics by encouraging people to leave cities and repopulate abandoned villages in the mountains and countryside.
Simply returning to life as it was before the new coronavirus ravaged northern Italy and forced a nationwide lockdown would be foolish, said architect Stefano Boeri, who is known for his ecologically friendly skyscrapers in Milan.
"Normality is one of the causes of this disaster. It's time to take courageous and pragmatic decisions," said Boeri, whose tree-covered, high-rise apartment blocks dominate the skyline in the capital of the Lombardy region.
According to AFP, Boeri has joined up with other architects, sociologists, anthropologists and town planners to draw up suggestions for how the emergency can be used to change the way people live and prevent cities from becoming "contamination bombs."
Massimiliano Fuksas, one of Europe's most renowned architects, said he predicted a sharp jump in people leaving the cities for the countryside as the lockdown gradually lifts, just as happened in Italy in the 1970s.
"Young people fled cities beset by terrorism, the economic crisis and drugs. It'll happen again," he said in an interview with the Repubblica daily.
"Scientists say the virus is weaker in the countryside, not just because there are fewer social contacts but because the wind blows, there's less metal and plastic, and if you're close to the sea the air is full of iodine," added Fuksas, who is behind the Zenith music hall in Strasbourg and Milan Exhibition Center.
Italy has 5,800 villages with fewer than 5,000 inhabitants each. More than 2,300 of those villages are virtually abandoned, according to Boeri.
From the mountaintop hamlet of Ligosullo in northern Italy to the medieval village of Casalvecchio Siculo in the Sicilian south, numerous already-small territories have shrunk by over half in the last 50 years, official figures show.
The government could "adopt" them and lure new residents there, thus relieving pressure on cities, by providing tax incentives as well as improving transport links and installing broadband to allow working from home.
Italy's culture ministry is mulling the idea of subsidizing holidays to help the tourism industry recover once the lockdown ends, and hopes to prevent overcrowded beaches by persuading some Italians to visit historic hamlets instead.
