As for the contents listed in the plan in Figure 2, the proposed links should be realized,
above all, along road routes through populated centers initially, centers in which the
presence of significant historic-cultural and/or ethno-anthropological features has been
identified, together with equipped parking areas that constitute access to the routes in the
real sense7.
These itineraries, in their turn, could be footpaths, bridle-paths and cycle paths and could
provide food and recreational services along the way, perhaps housed in rural buildings
and their dependent structures. Offering these routes to tourists might coincide with sea-
sonal events in the cities and town of the area, such as religious feasts, produce festivals,
agricultural fairs, and they could provide opportunities for cultural meetings such as
courses on local cuisine, flora and fauna, agriculture, history, Etnean speleology, and so
on. Meetings of this type could take place in the tourist-reception structures of the park's
C zones, in those cases where the itineraries allow for a link.
It is clear that rural tourism activities are not relatively passive, such as viewing land-
scape and gentle hill walking, but active, such as mountain biking, hung-gliding or free
climbing. This situation depend from nature of the new rural users that are a reflection of
changing (urban/global) society, and are one of cause of change in rural society.
4. Methodological approach
The lines of project intervention proceed through the methodological plan illustrated in
Figure 2.
4.1. Structural analysis of the area and evaluations
The analysis is carried out subdividing the area studied into five sub-areas, homogeneous
as far as populations centers, historical, orographical and climatic characteristics are con-
cerned (see Figure 3):
-the hill towns bordering the provincial capital (city of Catania);
-the southeastern hilly slope;
-the southwestern slope;
-the northern slope;
-the Ionic coastal strip.
For each of the sub-areas a complex evaluation is made, regarding the possibility of ful-
filling the project hypothesis while respecting the initial theses: potentiality of rural tour-
ism and an economic development of the endogenous type as far as the agricultural space
is concerned8.
There is not enough space here to provide a synthesis of all the evaluations carried out. It
is easy, however, to understand the exclusion of the hypothesis of the sub-area made up
of the towns bordering Catania due to their virtual integration with the urbanization of
the capital. As for the exclusion of the southwestern hilly slope, apart from the town of
Belpasso, the most significant reason lies in the widespread urbanization and in the
scarce presence of residual rural areas between its urbanized strips.
7 Di Simone I., Papale S., Integrated Rural Routes: a Methodological Model of Rural Planning, XII
CIGR Congress and AgEng '94 Conference on Agricultural Engineering, ref. 94-B-013, Milan, 29
August - 1 September 1994.
8 Ibidem.