Built Agricultural Landscape Conservation and Valorisation Project

The Majella National Park territory is marked by artefacts which have modified the appearance and the composition of the landscape: an uninterrupted sequence of trails and ex-farmlands which are contained and delimited by uncemented walls, piles of stones and huts, shelters for animals and tools. This is evidence of the patient job of clearing stones from the land to be destined for cultivated fields and pastures, which for centuries has concerned the mountain slopes of the park.

The Built Agricultural Landscape Project, which is financed by the Abruzzo Region (Urban and Landscape Planning Council) is born from a need to recover the uncemented stone wall artefacts through their localising and cataloguing with the desirable prospect of renovation by using traditional techniques and skilled workers who have been re-trained on ancient methods of construction. The project offers Park visitors, through various means, from the classic (paper catalogues, educational brochures, conferences) to the more modern (websites, GPS tracings, maps which are navigable online), detailed information from which to obtain, useful directions on how to independently organise a guided tour or simply a virtual itinerary. In this way, not only does one become acquainted with the local spontaneous architecture, but at the same time is made aware of the problem of recovery and enhancement of the landscape which characterises the Majella and the other Abruzzo mountains which otherwise risks disappearing forever..

After an initial phase of data collection, which has led to the cataloguing of 700 elements comprising of huts and walls, which will be updated as necessary in years to follow, the Park has passed onto the popularising phase with the following initiative:

 

 

• the development of a WebGIS application on the Built Agricultural Landscape, which is already available on the Majella National Park’s mapping portal (www.gisst.eu\tholos);
• the distribution of GPS resources on the stone huts which have been better preserved (downloadable from the above-mentioned portal) for the visitor who has an auto or touring satellite navigation system;
• the production of an educational brochure on the subject;
• the publication of a book-catalogue on the most significant emergencies;
• the organisation of a conference which informs the general public but, at the same time, puts together all the administrations and research institutes which are interested in the problem of preservation and enhancement of such a heritage.