**2. Study Area**

The study area is the Corso del Popolo district, located in the historical city centre of Terni, Central Italy (Figure 1). Terni (city centre coordinates 42.56◦ N, 12.64◦ E) has about 112,000 inhabitants, covers an overall area of 212 km2, and its average altitude is 130 m above mean sea level. The city is quite far from the sea, and is located in a flat valley surrounded by mountainous areas; it has a temperate climate typical of mid-latitude regions, with hot, humid and poorly ventilated summers. The selected zone of Corso del Popolo (Figure 2) covers a surface of 300 × 300 m: The Universal Transverse Mercator (UTM) WGS84 coordinates (33T zone) are: longitude range (m E): 306,690–306,990 and latitude range (m N): 4,714,300–4,714,600.

Terni is an average Italian city characterized by an industrial texture at the top of the national table in the manufacturing of iron and steel and the production of electricity. From the second half of the 19th century, Terni underwent a transformation from a historic town, still structured along the lines of the urban layout of the ancient Roman town, into a dynamic industrial city.

The analysed district is an example of urban texture change planned in the framework of the regeneration of the ancient part of Terni following urban sustainable criteria (projected by Mario Ridolfi and Wolfgang Frankl architects) [27]. The construction interventions, between the Nera riverside and Corso del Popolo Street, started in 2006 and were completed in June 2014. Before 2006, a paved car park (with light-coloured asphalt) with perimetral trees was present. The new zone consists of a private area (seven buildings for residential, commercial and managerial end use) and a public area (a three-level underground car park with 1036 parking spaces, a building of 7000 m<sup>2</sup> with parking used as municipal offices, subway, green areas, underground roadway and a pedestrian bridge).

**Figure 1.** (**a**) Terni location (city centre coordinates 42.56◦ N, 12.64◦ E); (**b**): the new built-up area of Corso del Popolo, picture from [27].

**Figure 2.** (**a**) Regione Umbria (RU) image of Corso del Popolo district on 2005 [28] selected area of 300 × 300 m; (**b**) Google Earth (GE) image on 2015. Universal Transverse Mercator (UTM) WGS84 coordinates (33T zone): longitude range (m E): 306,690–306,990, latitude range (m N): 4,714,300–4,714,600.

The main idea of this operation, embracing an area approximately 4 acres large, is the regeneration of the historical centre of the town integrating it with the neighbour river zone (named "Città Giardino") through both the partial covering of the local roadway and the construction of a pedestrian bridge. The Municipality of Terni chose the project financing system as the most appropriate way to realize

the interventions, applied for the first time to an urban area (with both private and public buildings) instead of a single public work. Some environmentally friendly materials were used in the building construction [27]. Figure 3 reports the main external materials employed in the new area.

**Figure 3.** Main external materials used in the new study area.

The brown zones in Figure 3 (lawn finish) correspond to the green spots of Figure 2b.
