The walled cities of the Republic of Venice: a resource for s-Low reticular tourism

Abstract

In the 16th a nd 17th centuries, the Republic of Venice dominated the territories of the Italian terraferma and the eastern Adriatic coast through forms of commercial con-trol that presupposed the fortification of ports and border towns. Starting from the recently recognized UNESCO World Heritage Site of the walled city system (2017), the paper aims to analyse this network considering some coastal cities that present traces of defensive «alla moderna» buildings, in order to include these resources in a network defined «s-Low». Indeed, the enhancement of cultural and natural her-itage from an s-Low perspective favours the pursuit of actions aimed at promoting the development of territorial peculiarities, promoting a shared tourism planning in a reticular and sustainable way. This type of tourism based on the exploitation of networking resources was proposed by the Centre for territorial studies Diathesis-Lab of the University of Bergamo. Indeed, the cartographic laboratory uses mapping methods and instruments in order to disseminate and spread the aforementioned sustainable tourism model.