Integration of twin cities: A Delphi investigation of the urban areas on both sides of the Strait of Messina

ABSTRACT

There are several cases of twin cities worldwide. In Europe, most of them came to attention after the fall of the Berlin Wall, when divided twin cities were still located on opposite sides of the Iron Curtain. Since then, many cases have been investigated, especially focusing on their functional and institutional integration, which turns out to be fundamental for their development. In this paper we deal with the case of Reggio Calabria and Messina, two large cities which face each other on the two banks of the Strait of Messina. Despite their proximity, they are poorly connected: socioeconomic interactions (e.g., commuting flows) are limited, and institutional coordination is lacking. However, they have a remarkable integrative potential, based on their complementary characteristics. By conducting a Delphi investigation, a technique which to date has never been used in this field, we analyze the potential, the scenarios, and the strategies to achieve the integration of these twin cities. Our findings show that integration may give back centrality to these two urban areas. This is a feasible scenario, which can be expected to materialize in a relatively short time even without full institutional coordination, focusing on transport services rather than on other infrastructural options (e.g., the Messina Bridge project).

KEYWORDS:

• Urban planning
• territorial integration
• cooperation
• policy Delphi
• Reggio Calabria
• Messina

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1. The literature on twin cities is empirical. As far as we know, there is only one theoretical contribution (Ladman, 1979), where author modeled the case of twin cities and the characteristics of their potential relationships. However, this model follows a strictly economic approach. In addition, it focuses on specific types of twin cities and interactions (i.e., the export–import relationship, and the movement of factors between neighboring cities in different countries). Therefore, it is rather far from our approach and the case under investigation here (a national case, internal to Italy).

2. According to Schultz (2002), who studied the history of several cases of twin cities, institutional integration can also be divided into different phases, based on the level of cooperation that is gradually being established. The first phase, characterized by the start of the cooperation, is based on the realization of single “easy” joint projects, to be carried out based on annual or biennial partnership agreements. Consider, for example, the agreement on the supply of drinking water from Gorizia in Nova Gorica, or on the common management of sports infrastructures decided in the 1960s by the cities of Tornio and Haparanda (Jussila, 1997) and signed in 1963 (Zago, 2000). The second phase, which started around the 1990s, refers to systematic cooperation in different sectors, and represents the evolution toward the institutionalization of the experiences which started in the 1960s. These agreements are, therefore, no longer created to manage a single problem/project but, rather, to manage specific sectors, and are therefore based on a common local governance (for example, in sectors like transport or environment). Finally, the third phase concerns those twin cities which create joint public bodies and/or bodies with the aim of creating unified cities, thus moving from a common policy to common institutions. Consider, for example, the case of Indian twin cities such as Hubli-Dharwad, Pimpri-Chinchwad, or Sangli-Miraj (Garrard & Mikhailova, 2019b).

3. Source: elaborations on 2019 Istat data (dati.istat.it).

4. Source: elaborations on 2015 Istat data (dati.istat.it).

5. Source: Istat data (dati.istat.it).

6. Source: Istat data (dati.istat.it).

7. Together with Sicily, Sardinia, Aosta Valley, Trentino-Alto Adige and Friuli Venezia Giulia are the other four regions which, due to specific historical, geographical, and cultural reasons, have a special statute. Sicily was the first region that obtained this status in 1946, before the Italian Constitution itself, due not only to its specific geographical characteristics (an island) but also to the need to contain claims for autonomy which emerged immediately after the end of the Second World War.

8. Moreover, regarding the administrative organization in Sicily, interestingly the regional administration is headed by a parliament composed of 90 members, defined as deputies, called ARS, or the Sicilian Regional Assembly.

9. See the Law 56/2014, which reformed the local authorities by redesigning the provinces and establishing 10 metropolitan cities: Roma Capitale, Turin, Milan, Venice, Genoa, Bologna, Florence, Bari, Naples and Reggio Calabria (https://www.gazzettaufficiale.it/eli/id/2014/4/7/14G00069/sg).

10. In total, there are four ports on the Strait of Messina: two ports are within the cities (the port of Reggio Calabria, on the Calabrian side, and the port of Messina—Porto Storico, on the Sicilian side), and two other ports are close to the urban areas (the port of Villa San Giovanni, north of Reggio Calabria; and the port of Tremestieri—Rada S. Francesco, south of Messina, and dedicated solely to freight traffic).

11. The last hydrofoil ride leaves at 20.20 from Messina and at 20.55 from Reggio Calabria (see https://www.blujetlines.it/oraripasseggeri-reggio.html).

12. There are no tolls on Sicilian and Calabrian motorways.

13. All these shortcomings in terms of lines and frequency across the Strait of Messina do not concern maritime freight traffic, which mainly uses the port of Villa San Giovanni on the Calabrian side and the port of Tremestieri on the Sicilian side, and which has almost its entire origins and destinations outside the two metropolitan areas. Maritime freight transport services are much more frequent and include night services (36 daily round-trip ferry rides that connect the two ports, both on working and non-working days). Freight traffic across the Strait is very relevant: about 800,000 trucks and over 5 million tons of goods cross the strait every year (Ministero Infrastrutture e Mobilità Sostenibili, 2021).

14. The importance of the facilitator emerges in several cases of Delphi investigations. See, for example, Hirschhorn (2019).

15. Preserving their anonymity, the Delphi technique allows a group of people to express opinions on an issue as if they were working in a group, but without the distortions caused by simultaneous presence in the same place, like the “spiral of silence” (people who tend not to make their point of view explicit in public, in particular when they believe they are in the minority, or remain isolated), and the “leadership mistake” (when the highest person in a hierarchical organization expresses his/her opinion during a meeting, and generally the others tend to support him because they are afraid to appear in conflict with him/her; Bezzi, 2016).

16. Most of them work in the local universities. However, we also decided to involve some academics working in other Italian universities, as they have proven knowledge and experience on this issue (e.g., based on their publications and projects).

17. Many of the experts’ profiles identified, particularly those who joined the survey, were mixed profiles, i.e., experts with skills and careers that wind through different fields. Think, for example, of experts who, linked to academia and/or research, have, or have had, important political/institutional roles, or business positions, or vice versa. This is a fact which clearly makes their expertise stronger (these are not only scholars, but also people who have known and experienced “on the ground” the issues under investigation), although it clearly does not allow their precise area of expertise, i.e., their unambiguous allocation to one or more of the activities mentioned above.

18. This qualitative measurement technique has been chosen because of its known strengths, suitable for our investigation. First, it is generally used for rating a set of items (predefined) concerning the topic under examination; second, the degrees of the scale can refer to the degree of agreement toward a statement (importance of an event, satisfaction with the quality of a service, and so on); third, a noticeably short time is required for filling in the questionnaires based on this scale. Lastly, it is simple to deal with and to apply to the analysis.

19. The Special Economic Zone (SEZ) of Gioia Tauro was created by law in 2017, together with other SEZs and Simplified Logistic Zones in Italy (https://www.gazzettaufficiale.it/eli/id/2017/06/20/17G00110/sg), in order to enhance the attractiveness for direct investment of some regions, especially in Southern Italy.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Dario Musolino

Dario Musolino is a Researcher in Economic Geography. He is a lecturer in Economic Prospects at the Bocconi University and at the Università della Valle d'Aosta. He has a PhD from the University of Groningen. Dario’s academic interests include territorial attractiveness and competitiveness; the socioeconomic impact of natural disasters; the development of peripheral, marginal and rural areas; industrial clusters; and the agri-food value chain. He is an author of more than 130 national and international publications, including books, as author and editor, and articles in international journals like Science of the Total Environment, Applied Geography, Natural Hazards and Earth System Sciences, The Annals of Regional Science, Journal of Cultural Geography. He has been a board member of the Italian Regional Science Association and editor and co-founder of EyesReg, the Italian online journal of regional science.

Luigi Pellegrino

Luigi Pellegrino is a policeman at the police headquarters in Aosta with 14 years of meritorious service. In 2003–2008, Luigi served as a volunteer of the Italian army, participating in the UN peacekeeping missions in Lebanon. In 2020, he completed his Master’s degree in Economia e Politiche del Territorio e dell’Impresa at the Università della Valle d'Aosta. Since then, he has continued researching the Strait of Messina area.