What is Wind?
A Vento project was created to connect Venice to Turin thanks to a 679-kilometer cycle route, the longest in Italy, which unites four regions, 13 provinces and over 120 municipalities, and which would welcome the approximately 400 thousand visitors that pass on average for those areas each year.
An incoming tourism project that translates into a cycle path that sometimes runs along the Po river, with lots of possibilities to appreciate those environments, landscapes, natural realities that too often take second place, blurred as they are by the attractive power of big cities of the north.
The tender to create a long-distance cycling infrastructure was issued last September. In fact, today Vento is a project and is one of the four "national priority cycle routes", tomorrow it will become a reality thanks to the Memorandum of Understanding signed by the regions, the Ministry of Infrastructure and Transport and the Ministry of Cultural Heritage and Activities and Tourism . Let's get to know him better.
The video-tale of Vento, the northern cycle route
Here is the video-tale of Vento, of a project dedicated to the bicycle, of the people who are part of it and of its territory.
In fact, as explained well by the official website, it would be a matter of completing a light, secure, interconnected and continuous infrastructure for cyclists, cyclists or simple enthusiasts of green and ecological tourism; it would also involve creating new jobs, new facilities to accommodate potential tourists, as well as new widespread and sustainable economies, all of which revolve around the "bike economy" principle.
In fact, the wind already exists, but only partially: the existing and pedaled sections in safety correspond to about 15% of the route, just over 100 kilometers. To complete the missing parts, about 280 kilometers pedaled but to be improved and about 290 that need more or less complex interventions, about 130 million euros are needed. To act in particular on these 290 incomplete kilometers it is estimated that, apart from bureaucratic and administrative difficulties, it will take no less than three years.
Traveling the Wind today is difficult : it is still a project for two wheels, you cannot actually have a downloadable map or a GPS track, it does not yet fit into the social networks of the bikes ; if you decide to venture into such an undertaking, it is good to know that you will encounter many discontinuities, dangerous intersections, rough and poorly made roads. What you can do instead is to follow its growth closely, participating in various initiatives and promotions.
Ride with you too!
How can individuals participate in all this? First of all you can support the project for free, simply by giving your consent to the email indicated here; furthermore you can take part in Vento riding along the partial route, or by participating in Vento Bici Tour 2018.
These are two appointments in two weekends to be an active part and visit the places that will one day be part of the long ridge: the first appointment at the end of May sees the departure from Turin and the arrival in Pavia in a couple of days; the second appointment another two days from Mantua to Venice in early June .
From Monday 28th to Thursday 31st May many punctual events will be held along the route of the future cycle route. On the website indicated above there are indications to register.
Curiosity: Vento is also a book, "VENTO - The light revolution with pedal and landscape shots", Paolo Pileri, Alessandro Giacomel, Diana Giudici (Corraini ed).
