The new military road system in the Tridentine Front: projects and building yards of the Italian army from Mt. Adamello to Lake Garda (1915-1918)

Until the outbreak of the First World War, the upland areas of the Upper Garda and Mt. Adamello were uninhabited, apart from the lower areas of Lake Garda, where small villages had developed over time. These - all connected - were lived in only by local inhabitants. Due to the presence of the imposing glacier, in the area of Mt. Adamello, the inhabitants were clustered in the valley line villages of the Valcamonica, and the deep valleys which connected the valley line to the glacier, had mostly been used for seasonal pasture and, from the end of the 19th century, by pioneers of mountain tourism. After the outbreak of the hostilities, the Italian army realized that the impressive military barrier of fortresses and other military constructions - which the Austrians had built along the valleys which lead to Trento - would bring about the shift of war activities to Mt. Adamello and the Upper Garda mountains. For this reason, a diffused road system had to be realized to facilitate military actions and to handle war materials and troops. The essay analyses this important activity managed by the military Engineers Corps, who designed roads, trenches, dumps and other constructions which could ensure secure access to those impenetrable areas. With a huge effort, a diffused road system was realized. The characteristics of each route were related to the position of the main front line or the secondary defensive lines, following projects which considered the use of local building materials and of simple constructive practices. The massive infrastructural system which was then realized, completely changed the way of using, and the perception of, those mountain areas, which, until the outbreak of the War, were lived in only by local inhabitants. Those places, once inaccessible, became tourist destinations and those constructions, built to survive over time and today converted to new uses, have completely changed the relationship between man and landscape

Keywords: Mt. Adamello Lake of Garda Military Engineers Corps Military road system

Davide Sigurtà, La nuova viabilità militare sul fronte Trentino: progetti e cantieri dell’Esercito Italiano dall’Adamello al Garda (1915-1918) in "STORIA URBANA " 149/2015, pp 39-68, DOI: 10.3280/SU2015-149003