Green Highway: the new northen ring road of Milan

The new SP46 – Northern Ring Road – crosses the northern outskirts of Milan within urban contexts with high population density. In Paderno, Dugnano cuts through the town for a length of about 4 km, with an almost entirely embanked route and 3 large junctions. It is also flanked, for a stretch of over 1.3 km, by an already existing motorway which it finally crosses. The impact on the city is devastating and, on the initiative of local citizens’ committees, the implementation of a particularly innovative landscape insertion project was requested and obtained. 

The heart of the project is to transform the so-called ‘vacant lands’ of the motorway infrastructure, often perceived as areas of waste and degradation, into spaces of nature that contribute to urban regeneration. This occurs through the creation of a green forestry infrastructure along the motorway system. The project aims to redevelop the landscape, increase biodiversity and provide significant visual and acoustic mitigation, reduce pollution.

Important land movements, including armed ones, are carried out to improve landscape and environmental inclusion. The tree and shrub species are also carefully selected in relation to respect for the road infrastructure and are complemented by vast ready-to-effect areas made with large plants. The intervention also involves large neighboring areas of municipal property, becoming nervous within the town. 

Urban forestation plays a crucial role in combating pollution and mitigating the effect of heat islands, especially in densely populated and highly infrastructured urban contexts such as the Milanese peri-urban one, thus improving the quality of urban life and contributing to long-term environmental sustainability. 

The project has received important awards and recognition. E’ has been published and presented in various chairs and presents itself in the Italian context as a model for the conscious inclusion of road infrastructures in urban and non-urban contexts.