Naples: Smart Roads and Digital Narratives – Beyond the Stereotypes?
Two recent news items, which should not be overlooked, paint a significantly different picture of Naples than the traditional one. Indeed, both the certification of the Tangenziale as Italy’s first ‘smart road’ and the ‘Napoli. Mare, magma, metamorfosi’ initiative, where the Tourism Department promotes a ‘content creator tour’ to showcase contemporary Naples, speak of a city reaching for the future. It’s a city that successfully appears to be seeking technological and narrative transformations. In short, in both cases, also united by the widespread use of English, an image is conveyed of a city that has become a laboratory for innovations, changes, and unprecedented opportunities.
This is likely also how contemporary Naples, by experimenting with unconventional forms, seeks to overcome its well-known challenges. And in a city and a country that have always owed so much, even in terms of international appeal, to their image, it would be unfair to disregard and underestimate the great power of symbols. The fact remains, however, that both journalistic chronicles and literary narratives concerning Naples are still dominated by negative images of the city, certainly based on the undeniable persistence of an urban and metropolitan experience that strongly clashes with the hypothesis of the city as a laboratory for positive changes.
The First Smart Road in Italy: Naples’ Tangenziale
Such a poetic, meaning innovative and creative, image, when reduced to the usual prose of daily reality, can, at best, constitute a perspective or a project. Therefore, to avoid witnessing yet another disillusionment, it seems appropriate to temper enthusiasm and look at the facts. Well, it is certainly a fact that the Tangenziale of Naples has been recognized as the first ‘smart road’ in Italy. This may be due to investments made by Autostrade per l’Italia (i.e., sensors and digital infrastructures, which, by facilitating communication between road and vehicles, should increase safety and allow for more rational traffic management), but it is undeniable that this happened in Naples. And it is also an undeniable fact that the Municipality of Naples is investing in a communication strategy that appears more attractive because it aims to spread an unconventional narrative of the city by successful influencers, with the aim of generating skilled jobs, new investments, and greater opportunities for young people.
The implicit message these news items convey is that Naples is changing. It is no longer just a city to be described through its ancient emergencies; instead, it is about acknowledging the ferment of transformation that runs through it, which, of course, does not suddenly make the problems of the past disappear. In short, however much one may rejoice and be proud that the Naples Tangenziale has been declared ‘smart,’ whatever positive that may mean, our necessary coexistence with unpredictable and often chaotic urban traffic persists. And however promising and attractive the choice of Naples as digital content may appear, one cannot help but wonder if and how much the concrete conditions of the city truly improve simply by having a higher number of followers.
Marketing or Genuine Transformation?
In conclusion, the two news items we started with are fundamentally marketing operations. And the whole problem lies in determining if and how much marketing can have positive consequences on concrete urban life, since the coexistence of innovations and critical issues is not to be excluded. But it is also not the case to conclude that technological and narrative innovations are entirely false. Even if the image of Naples they convey is not complete, even if symbolic modernization is faster than real modernization, even if episodes of this kind do not erase many structural problems, it would be short-sighted not to recognize that the city now produces many images of innovation, creativity, and international attractiveness. A significant part of the infrastructure, public services, and social conditions continues to reflect historical problems, but the two news items we started with are not a mystification. Certainly, Naples is not yet the city that its new image describes, but it would also not be fair not to acknowledge the innovative and creative nature of the direction taken to overcome its traditional critical issues.
Sources: Analysis based on data from the Municipality of Naples, Autostrade per l’Italia, and local news reports.
