The waterfront project for the historic centres: the case of the redevelopment of the historic port of Cala di Palermo

The Paper aims to contribute to reflection on the peculiarities of the cases of functional and morphological regeneration of the waterfront historic European cities. Since the identification of a range of issues common to these types of projects, some interventions are analyzed and characterized by approaches different outcomes. We analyze in detail the case of redevelopment of the waterfront's historic city of Palermo, whose degradation is similar to that of many other big cities of the Mediterranean and whose dynamics retraining, are believed to be a useful contribution for debate on the issue of redevelopment of the waterfront of the historic centers. Today the city of Palermo is "denied Sea" are in fact very few public spaces associated with the use or even the mere sight of the sea. In recent years the Port Authority of Palermo has initiated a process of reconnecting to the port with the city through a series of actions designed to hybridize to the port functions defining new public spaces open to the enjoyment of the community. The paper aims to describe the main phases of the project for a new waterfront historic city. The project rewrites the Old Port of Cala, which covered an area of 27,000 square meters affected by the presence of important historical monuments emergencies. In short the aim of the project, in accordance with current trends in the culture of urban waterfront project, is to bring the basin of the Cala to the role of "port city", in which the specific functions of the port, you hybridize with urban areas intended for public use and in which Palermo has rediscovered the etymological symbiotic relationship with its port system.