Zingonia year 2019
Between May and June 2019, Vitali Group was commissioned by ILSPA (Infrastrutture Lombarde) to demolish the Zingonia Towers. The 6 buildings in the Anna and Athena compounds, that had been badly affected by degradation and squatting for years, were demolished in just one month and a half.
A time frame fit for a sprinter only 50 days to make tabula rasa of the Anna and Athena compounds. Work is now underway to remove the rubble, but we can still speak of a real record time, considering that the projected deadline to complete the work was 270 days.
The construction site covered an area of about 20,000 m2. A total of 6 buildings each with 9 floors approximately 30 meters high. Altogether, we are talking about 53,700 cubic metres above ground and 8,300 cubic metres below ground.
The first step was removing the waste from the buildings, then the removal of asbestos, and subsequently the preliminary strip out of balconies, gratings, fixtures, partitions, sheaths, etc.. All asbestos was then removed, taking all legal precautions, and disposed of.
The six buildings to be demolished have been brought down one by one. Due to their height, a 120 ton demolition machine with a 47-metre long boom equipped with a brick crushing grapple was used.
A selective demolition process allowing all different types of waste to be differentiated during the demolition process. To prevent rubble from falling outside the construction site area and to minimise dust dispersion, a protective tarpaulin, as tall as the buildings and held up by a crane, was placed on the road front.
Client: ILSPA (Infrastrutture Lombarde S.p.A.)
BUILDINGS IN DEMOLITION:
- 6 (n. 3 Anna towers + n. 3 Athena towers)
Zingonia is an area encompassed by the municipalities of Ciserano, Boltiere, Verdellino, Osio Sotto and Pontirolo Nuovo in the Province of Bergamo, which became known as a degraded area, where drug dealing and squatting were predominating. Developed in the 70s by the entrepreneur Renzo Zingone, hence the name of the area, it was a great dream originally, intended to be a residential area for workers employed in the nearby industrial centres of the Bergamo province. But the development never reached the initial occupancy expectations and the area soon became unsafe and degraded.
The towers, symbol of degradation, 8 storeys high, had been for some time a haven for those living on the margins of society and those who used them as a base for illicit trafficking.