(Urban) sustainability in practice : insights from the Veneto region

Since the 1980s the Veneto region has been pointed out as the engine of the Italian economy. Its spatial and governance structure is the outcome of a multiplicity of individual/joint/organizational behaviors, which generated a set of very complex "perverse effects" (first of all environmental). Moreover, its paths of modernization, which were still effective in the '80s, are now undergoing rapid transformation (due to globalization and internationalization of business, erosion of social ties, Europeanization, environmental issues, different populations, the crisis of traditional systems of representation etc.), and it is still not clear what the emerging configurations are. Certainly, sustainability emerges as a keyword in regional and municipal planning documents as well as in local people’s claims within environmental conflicts. Within this framework, this paper is based on research work drawn on a pragmatic notion of sustainability. It investigates how a medium-sized city of the Veneto region (Vicenza) is dealing with sustainability issues emerging from different tiers of governance. Urban transformation will be analyzed from a multiscalar perspective, taking into account: the main decision-making processes concerning environmental issues (in particular the most significant measures and policy of containment of land consumption) as well as urban and regional plans and policies; mega-projects significantly shaping urban transformation.