Today I drove from Affi to Nomi, passing through some of the villages in the southern part of the Lagarina Valley and stopping and exploring the villages of Avio, attached to Sabbionara, and then a bit of Ala.
Important thoughts
Again, these places are really quite far and it is difficult to find an emotional attachment to them, having never really been here or knowing people who are from here
However, visiting them and exploring them a bit makes different commonalities and connections to other more familiar places obvious. This is more the case in Avio and Sabbionara than in Ala, which, being way larger, has many features of a small town, which also becomes obvious through the many links to flourishing trade activity and aristocracy
In any case, it is difficult to imagine how a prolonged kind of engagement with these places could be imagined. For sure it makes sense that they are part of the area that is involved in the research, but how can an exchange be sustainable in time?
We should manage to talk to migrants and their children to understand their perspective on the area and ideas on the future
Important observations
As a location, the whole area south of Rovereto is rather'cold' and'uninviting'. It has to do with the conformation of the plain and the surrounding mountains, the fact that the mountains for the most are in crass contrast with the plain(there is very little hilly landscape and the flanks of the mountains are quite steep). In many ways it is similar to the landscape that can be found around Aldeno and Romagnano.
This physical configuration is the cause for how and where villages were built(on little elevated areas on the sides of the plain) and where agriculture takes place(in the plain, with only very little terraces or hill culture).
The low valley, looking south:
The low valley, looking north:
Towards Avio, the most southern comune of the Comunità and Trentino, the valley opens up slightly (from Avio the valley and road which take to Sav Valentino and Polsa, on the Brentonico plateau depart)
Avio from above:
Avio and Sabbionara are more and more growing together
In this lower part of the valley you can sense influences from Veneto/Pianura Padana and the Lake Garda area: in agriculture(quite a few olive plantations); in the built environment; in the fact that here there are seemingly more animal farms. In Sabbionara, for example, there are farms with chicken, pigs and cattle. There is also a co-operative cheese factory in Sabbionara, established at the beginning of the century, when also most co-operative wineries were established in the valley. All this can be linked to the closeness of mountain pastures on the Brentonico plateau.
Animal farms north of Sabbionara:
Walking around Avio, there is the house of the Vicar. Avio used to be one of the"Quattro Vicariati", with Ala, Brentonico and Mori, a juridical form of the 1700s, when Venice was dominating the area, and which was dismantled by Napoleon. Still, today this kind of'alliance' is still alive, for example inter-comune structures and initiatives, for example the'Piano giovani 4 Vicariati'
Avio has a small industrial area and a new complex that is a mixture between a shopping mall, a design and production venue(socks), a business meeting place and an office building. One of the employees of the Calzedonia outlet says that their small production venue is located there(in Trentino) because the Provincia financially supports them with new high-end production machines.
Sabbionara is pretty much the same as Avio, with less facilities and services. Avio seems to be quite well-equipped in terms of basic services, like elementary school, kindergarten, post office etc. and also restaurants and bars, hotels etc. In Sabbionara I could only find one small supermarket and a clothing store nearby(but there must be more, also because of the tourist flux to the castle
Ala is truly a small town, and seemingly also one of the richest comuni in the valley. Most notably, there is a middle school(which must get most pupils from surrounding villages), library, museum, sportello giovani(coordinating the Piano Giovani 4 Vicariati), swimming pool and gym, different small to medium shops, a shopping mall etc. But still I think that for some generations Rovereto is still the main place of attraction.
Important thoughts
Important observations