The controversial role of actors in Italian and Sicilian waterfront areas management and planning

The paper investigates the relationship between planning tools and formal/informal subjects involved in Sicilian waterfront areas management and it focuses on the relation between port plans and other (local and regional) planning instruments and policies. This relationship is explored through an examination of some results of The “Waterfront” project (Water And Territorial policiEs for integRation oF multisectoRial develOpmeNT), developed under the PO 2007-2013 Italia-Malta, that aimed to explore the field of “waterfront” in a different sense from the simple concept of urban or peri-urban coastal areas. The waterfront, in the Project approach, takes a wider identity that refers to the complex relationship between "sea-port and town" and includes physical and environmental components of human settlement, urban fabric, infrastructure, productive and recreational activities that are concentrated along the urban and peri-urban coast. The contribution aims to critical describe approach and methodology developed to analyze the issues of subjects in waterfront Atlas of Palermo, Trapani and Malta. It underlines how the interrelation between the local and regional plans is often problematic, due to the difficult integration between planning instruments managed by different actors and interests.