Faced with mounting urban challenges, Rome approved a regional plan for the creation of new satellite cities around the "eternal city." This is the first such plan that has been approved in over fifty years and its aim is to relieve many of the pressures that currently plague the capital by carefully decentralizing Rome and establishing viable peripheral communities. The largest of these is Acilia Modonnetta; located South-West of Central Rome. Commissioned to develop the master plan, Asaf Gottesman and Gottesman Szmelcman Architecture's core objectives were to encourage diversity and human interaction, to stimulate growth, ensure environmental sustainability and instill a new sense of identity where currently there is none. Traffic and circulation considerations, a coherent urban plan, resolving structural deficiencies were the most obvious objectives. Suspicious of architectural dogmas and utopian visions,  we have learnt to re-evaluate the qualities of traditional urban structures, their scale and diversity, rhythm and human proportions. Successful cities are typified by multiple layers and unexpected forces. It is the richness and diversity of human individuality tempered by Man’s inherent need to interact and communicate that ultimately embroiders the fabric that defines successful communities.

Envisioned as an extended campus, our program aimed to create a high-tech, academic center that would ensure that the new community of Acilia Madonnetta will not evolve into a dormitory community. The plans were submitted in 2007 but the financial crisis of 2008 and the complexities of getting any plans approved in Rome means that it may take many more years before the future of Acila Madonnetta with be addressed.