Processes of Commercial Territorialization in the Polycentric Region of the Marche. New Commercial Hierarchies in the Doric Capital

Abstract

The gradual modernization of commercial activities during the past 20 years has had a deep impact on the urban landscape of Ancona and has strongly affected the stable relationship that for decades had marked the city center and its suburbs. The traditional hierarchy of commercial areas has undergone a new configuration due to suburban territorialization processes brought by a large-scale polarization of the city’s suburbs. Understanding these new commercial hierarchies represents a valid tool for planning proper territorial policies and boosting more resilient-based processes which aim at restoring the primary role of a city center that has slowly lost its social appeal and its functional status-quo within the city’s metropolitan area and in the urban network of the Marche.