L’Aquila (meaning “The Eagle”) is a city and comune in central Italy, both the capital city of the Abruzzo region and of the Province of L’Aquila. It has a population of 70,500 inhabitants. Laid out within medieval walls on a hill in the wide valley of the Aterno river, it is surrounded by the Apennine Mountains, with the Gran Sasso d’Italia to the north-east. L’Aquila is approximately 100 kilometres (62 mi) east-northeast of Rome, with which it is connected by an autostrada through the mountains. The mountains block the city off from warm humid air currents from the Mediterranean, and give rise to a climate that is cool in comparison to most of central Italy, and dry. It has been said that the city enjoys each year 11 cold months and one cool one.
L’Aquila sits upon a hillside in the middle of a narrow valley; tall snow-capped mountains of the Gran Sasso massif flank the town. A maze of narrow streets, lined with Baroque and Renaissance buildings and churches, open onto elegant piazzas. Home to the University of L’Aquila, it is a lively college town and, as such, has many cultural institutions: a repertory theater, a symphony orchestra, a fine-arts academy, a state conservatory, a film institute. There are several ski resorts in the surrounding province: (Campo Imperatore, Ovindoli, Pescasseroli, Roccaraso, Scanno).
Although less than an hour-and-a-half drive from Rome, and a popular summer and winter resort with Romans hiking and skiing in the surrounding mountains, the city has not yet been heavily affected by foreign tourism. In the highest part of the town is the massive Spanish fort (Forte Spagnolo), erected by the Spanish viceroy Don Pedro de Toledo in 1534. It is currently home to the National Museum of Abruzzo. The church of Saint Bernardino of Siena (1472) has a fine Renaissance façade by Nicolò Filotesio (commonly called Cola dell’Amatrice), and contains the monumental tomb of the saint, decorated with beautiful sculptures, and executed by Silvestro Ariscola in 1480.
A well-known city landmark is the Fontana Luminosa (“Luminous Fountain”), a sculpture of two women bearing large jars, built in the 1930s. The local cemetery includes the grave of Karl Heinrich Ulrichs, a 19th‑century German gay rights pioneer, who lived and died at L’Aquila: every year, gay people from all over the world meet at the cemetery to honour his memory. The surrounding area boasts Roman ruins (the important Roman city of Amiternum), ancient monasteries, and numerous castles. The best-known of these is Rocca Calascio (used in the 1980s as the location for the movie Ladyhawke), which is the highest castle in Italy and one of the highest in Europe.
[responsivevoice_button voice="UK English Female" buttontext="Listen to this Post"]Energy performance certificates not only provide citizens with accurate information on their homes' energy savings, but they also have a clear impact on homes value, showing a green premium of 2.8% in the Dutch housing market, according to the latest research commissioned by RICS.
With this study, RICS provides one of the first evidences to demonstrate that homebuyers are willing to pay more for homes that have been labeled as more energy efficient in the European residential market. Findings are based o...
