Abandoned industries in Bovisa (north of Milan)

The Bovisa is a gold mine of abandoned industries. Wherever you turn your head, you can see one. Listening to the keeper of one of them i found out that they almost are all of the beginning of the past century: many firms producing different products, but all set up on the same area. Now everything belongs to Esselunga, an italian supermarket chain, which probably is waiting the right moment to tear everything down, to enlarge it’s own empire. Next to the train station the slaughter had already begun. During the 5 years of university I’ve always admired, from a granted point of view, the old buildings, more than just abandoned and old, but almost ruins, completely covered with plants and weeds, broken windows, or with no windows at all. A point of reference was the big chimney, so imposing to brace the whole neighbourhood, welcoming the busy students arriving from the station, reminding of a past of workers efforts. Last year, in front of our eyes incredulous and enchanted at the same time, part of the area, with the cimney and other buildings surrouning it, has been demolished. The enormous steel arm would penetrate inside the brick walls, as if they were made of butter, emphasizing the precarious state, giustifying in a way such a painful gesture, for the ones who at the end felt a sort of affection to the place left to itself. Now in that portion there isn’t one brick left, not a weed nor a brocken glass, to remind what has been. Will the same treatment be reserved to the rest of the area?