The architect, scenographer and designer: «The capital has become an expanded factory that works from Monday to Friday. With the self -certification, the public body has taken place. The squares without albergs are sad ”
“I thought I was two months old, instead 38 years have passed.” Maurizio Lai looks at Milan with a mixture of bitterness and amazement, while the skyline changes under the weight of the investigation. The city appears to him, restlessly, like a small metropolis that struggles to remain in balance. Architect, scenographer and designer with international experiences, Lai tries to interpret what is happening to a city that, despite contradictions, continues to exercise a strong call for those trying to imagine the future.
What is the first feeling of an Archistar in front of this news?
«Milan is a city that inevitably changes and does it quickly. It has a unique dynamism, it is sometimes even difficult to keep them behind. Now, whether the steps are corrected or not, one cannot yet know. Investigations will determine the perimeter of the whole affair ».
Is the self -certifications system of easy licenses really a way to bypass the bureaucracy?
«The problem is another. The critical point is that this intensive urbanization does not seem a useful operation to citizens but it is a speculative maneuver, which is leading Milan to a total emptying. All this is dangerous ».
What does it mean?
«This city has become an expanded urban level factory, which works from Monday to Friday. It is interesting for companies, operators, interests of people who come from all over the world. But the effect is to see an inhumanized reality, with the compromised social fabric ».
Are you surprised by the twists and turns?
“What is coming out was in the air. What she calls self -certifications system served only to remove responsibilities from the public body and those who carried out the work in the offices. As if to tell the client: the responsibility is yours alone. But it can’t be like this. Even if I don’t see abuse but formal defects, all this is a forcing. Because we cannot forget an essential starting point: when you create volumes to put people to live inside, it is necessary to create services up to par, support structures that help these people insert yourself in the city context. And all this belongs to the public administration ».
In your opinion where did the mayor Sala be wrong?
“A net judgment cannot be given. The idea of urban regeneration makes sense and in the management of such complex operations, the public body is forced to seek and reach different compromises. Observing Milan as it presents itself today, it is clear that some errors have been made, but it should also be recognized that the strategic decisions of a mayor are never simple ».
Of things he made a mistake. Where first of all?
«The squares without trees put sadness, when for work I have to plan the demolition of a tree it comes to me badly. And the sick trees of Milan do not convince me. But in these cases it is the commissions of green and landscape that must give a judgment ».
Now do you risk the paralysis of the projects?
«The impasse determined by fear would be negative for everyone. I read that the project of Piazzale Loreto is also in the balance; In these cases, the administration closes in Riccio and no longer gives you anything. You ask the offices and the answers do not arrive. It is certainly not the best way to make a strategic sector such as construction sector work ».
Was he wanted to transform Milan into Amsterdam an act of presumption?
«The cycle paths, as they were thought, are a disaster. Given that it is right that there are and that every change always disconnects someone, the big problem is that with this strategy a cap of circulation has been created. In Corso Buenos Aires I put myself in the role of traders; In that area I never stopped in a shop because I can’t park. Among other things, the curbs are dangerous for the same bicycles. Milan will never be Amsterdam for two reasons ».
What are they?
«It does not have the same urban system, being a radial monocentro, and is inhabited by people who are not Dutch by character and civic sense. If I am in the car and I have to turn right I often find a scooter that passes me on my right to go straight. Very risky. The wild liberalization of the monopathy was a mistake ».
She said that Milan 30 years ago was the ideal place to make a young man’s dreams. Is it still?
«I arrived in Milan at 21, from Padua, with a family of humble origins behind him. From the start I perceived an extraordinary energy: it was a city that enhanced the initiative, where determination and ideas counted, not the origins. Today, that momentum seems to have faded. I see in young people less space to dream and, perhaps, even less desire to do it ».
She holds a master’s degree at the Polytechnic and touches all this. Right?
«I see disoriented guys who have lowered the attention threshold and do not have the determination to create a future because they are convinced by the narrative in force of having no space. Instead it’s not true ».
Do they resemble this Milan that loses the soul?
«Universities, like the city, face a complex challenge today: the risk of becoming too exclusive realities. Milan attracts more and more interested people mainly to invest, while many universities seem populated by privileged students, often not very involved. The danger is that, instead of cultivating real excellence, you end up leaving the talented young people behind that cannot afford access due to costs ».
Giò Ponti designed Pirellone in front of the central station to give good morning to those who came from outside to work and do Milan great. Sala placed area B to exclude them.
«Let me say, Milan remains beautiful. But today it is exclusive only because, unfortunately, it aims at exclusion ».
