​​Calliano-Besenello - Mon, 22.12.14
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​​For the first COMUNfARE exploratory mapping excursion we visited Besenello, the most northern comune of the Lagarina Valley. Trajectory: Nomi - Calliano (centre) - state road 12 - Mattarello entrance (gas station) - Besenello car park - Boschi Spessi sand and gravel pit - Besenello centre - Nomi
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​​https://www.google.com/maps/d/edit?mid=zCjrgLPK7_3Q.km24JfklzQVw
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​​First trip! We're excited but also nervous. It is going to be more of a derive this time. Reflecting on whether for these excursion we would need clearer aims in order to have a purpose for exploring the Valley.
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​​Moving around

​​Moving by car seems too fast and too distracting, especially for the driver. In terms of sensorial experiences and the number of thoughts that generate while moving, nothing is better than walking. We should think of the different speeds of movement we have using different vehicles as a factor that greatly influences what we perceive, how we perceive it. The car is good to get a broad understanding of the area and its potentialities. By foot, or by bike, you can explore more deeply different 'hot spots' such as a village or a certain piece of infrastructure and its spatial setting (like an industrial plant).
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​​Calliano's old part

​​Driving through the old part of Calliano, we can notice two 'tabacchini', a hotel, a pizzeria, the public library, a bed and breakfast, the empty railway station and another rail-related building, a bike shop. Why does Nomi not have something like a bed and breakfast or other infrastructure for tourists?
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​​Reaching Besenello – sand pits

​​Driving by Besenello, we notice two sand and gravel pits. One located at the northern limit of the village, next to the state road and one above it, towards the mountain, in the most elevated part of the alluvial fan. Both Pits are located nearby the small (but potentially impetuous) stream Rio Secco and the two things (stream-pit) must be connected. But it seems like the stream has been redirected, as now it flows on one side of the fan. You can see the higher-up pit also from Val. 
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User-uploaded image: cava-besenello-da-val.jpg
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​​Driving on towards Mattarello and passing the northern border of the comunità we notice more pits extracting sand from the lower part of the mountainous chain that delimits the valley. It seems like over many years the rain has washed out a lot of material from the mountain and its woods, which has deposited at their feet. Where the material (sand and earth) and the trees growing on it have been removed, the underlying rock has been meticulously 'cleaned' of all valuable stuff, leaving it scorched and naked. Sand that is apt for making concrete, like the one extracted here, is becoming a rare raw material worldwide. So this is one of the many connections between the economies of the valley and what is happening on the global marketplace.
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​​Mattarello – Murazzi – NO TAV stronghold

​​We drive towards Mattarello to tank cheap LPG (the oil price is low at the moment as Saudi Arabia doesn’t decrease its production rate) and therefore exit the comunità by driving past the so-called Murazzi (probably from 'muracci', a pejorative of walls), which is the point in which the comune of Besenello finishes and the valley narrows a bit (the road passes very close to the rather steep mountain). This place, ‘Murazzi’ is also known, mostly in past times, as a place of prostitution. Prostitution happens (or happened) here because of the particular spatial qualities of this part of the valley: a large, well-travelled road with no street lighting and a quite large strip of land close to it, which makes it easy for cars to stop.
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User-uploaded image: Presidio-NOTAV-Besenello-Mattarello.jpg
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​​After having tanked, driving back towards Besenello we notice the newly established (7th December 2014) NO TAV permanent stronghold close to the road, on a piece of land that was communally and symbolically bought by supporters of the NO TAV movement exactly on the planned trajectory for the future high-speed train through the valley. No-one is there, but this is a spot to watch. But this is not the only struggle against huge and noxious debt-funded infrastructure which is threatening this part of the valley. When we reach Besenello, at the centre of the roundabout at the northern entrance of the village a tall wood-carved sculpture of a fighter has been erected (also quite recently) and a banner reporting the hash-tag #unguerrierocontrolabirubi has been hung on a nearby wall. The battle against the Pi-Ru-Bi., (or Valdastico), a tunnelled highway connection between the A31 in Schio (Veneto) and the A22 highway which passes through the valley is not a new thing. The tunnel should depart from Besenello and the inhabitants and majors of the village have been opposing the project since the ‘80s. Recently, possibly to the renewed plans to carry out the construction of the highway, a large parade (carrying the name ‘A fighter against the Pi-Ru-Bi’, the name of the sculpture) against the project took place in Besenello.
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​​Walking towards the pit

​​Different interesting thoughts emerge as we walk up the alluvial fan, skirting the Rio Secco towards the pit we see in front of us and looking down towards the valley. Elevating the point of observation makes the different components of the landscape and the different human activities shaping and moulding it much clearer and underlying connections become evident. We also discover that a vineyard lasts for about 30 years. Then they need to be replanted.
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User-uploaded image: rio-secco-verso-monte.jpg
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User-uploaded image: cava.jpg
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  • ​​What is the general context within which COMUNfARE will operate? It would be very interesting to refer to the Anthropocene as the wider context of action and intervention. Something to always keep in mind for the different activities. It is a conceptual framework which then generates actions according to it. The driving question is "what do you do within this context?"
  • ​​What would it mean to design with the non-human? Or to do multi-species / multi-agent design?
  • ​​Are all the things that humans construct and generate and put in the world part of the non-human? For example, all these things, like infrastructure, urban agglomerates, rectified streams etc., are put in the world by humans and each new addition influences further additions and human activities and relations. Sometimes, these creations actively involve living beings, like in agriculture, forest management, or keeping animals and bees -- composing with life?
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User-uploaded image: besenello-dal-conoide.jpg
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  • ​​From the elevation it is easy to see how the many different parts of the landscape (settlements, industrial and manufacture areas, managed woodlands, the river, the road system and the motorway, agricultural areas, energy transport infrastructure, communication infrastructure etc.) are not just one next to the other, but are highly interwoven and stratified. There is also an interesting historical stratification of landscapes, both involving human-made things and way older results of the activity of the earth: mountains and wavy rock formations next to old overgrown terraced slopes next to modern gravel pits and vineyards.
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User-uploaded image: besenello-dal-conoide2.jpg
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  • ​​From here, we can mostly see economic landscapes -- landscapes that are the result of human economic activities and capital -- extending on top of the ground that has been reclaimed over centuries transforming the marshlands that were dominating the valley floor into precious land for cultivation.
  • ​​This landscape is constantly re-made. Right now villages like Besenello or Calliano are sprawling in previously cultivated areas.
  • ​​It would be interesting to organise tours that explore the valley by investigating different issues and themes: water, energy, communication, extraction, disposal, settlements, self-provision, manufacture, mobility etc.
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User-uploaded image: acquedotto.jpg
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