The farmland we see today around the Milan area is the result of centuries of human intervention on the environment to regulate water, adapt the land to the emergence of new farming techniques, and to map out ownership or administrative borders.

Major anthropization of the territory today overlaps with a cultural need to restore some of the original characteristics of the area, which nowadays is of historical and environmental importance.

These areas are gradually becoming destinations for an emerging ensemble of practices, ranging from a simple stroll in the countryside to buying locally-grown farm produce from the farms that remain active.

This is why Tangenziale Esterna SpA is earmarking some of its mitigation and compensation-related measures to a wide-ranging reconfiguration of the entire area affected by the new infrastructure, planting species typical to ancient lowland forest, such as, for example, the common oak. Planting will take place at junctions along the existing cycle/pedestrian path network and its extensions.

The venture aims to help restore these areas to their origins, combating the gradual “trivialization” of significant swathes of farmed land by adding back elements characteristic of a time before not just construction of the Milan Outer Eastern Bypass, but before all of the anthropic processes to have taken place in the Metropolitan Area.