Reggio Emilia is a welcoming town, with pedestrian streets and few cars, thanks to the limited traffic area. Outside the shops in the centre you can see the sign "Non sono perfetto ma sono accogliente” (I'm not perfect but I'm welcoming) with a call button: just press that button and a removable platform will be brought from the shop to make prams and strollers enter more easily. A "family" space with a toilet and sink for children at a suitable height and a folding changing table was recently inaugurated at the public toilets in via della Croce Bianca.
For the blind, the central railway station is connected to the town centre with tactile paths, surfaces with reliefs especially created to be felt by foot.
In Reggio Emilia it is possible to present the Disability Card for access to public or private goods and services for the disabled. The Card is a passport-sized document, similar to an identity card, and replaces paper certificates and reports.
Palazzo San Giorgio, building of XVIII-century origins born as a Jesuit college, now houses the main library of the town dedicated to Antonio Panizzi, originally from Brescello, who became director of the London-based British Library.
There are platforms for wheelchairs at every point, with much attention to every type of disability: books in CAA ("Alternative Augmented Communication"), tactile books, for the blind and partially sighted and in Braille.
In the children's section there is a room with a "baby pit stop" service with a breastfeeding chair, mattresses and children's books. In the same section is a bathroom dedicated to children with properly sized bathroom fixtures and a changing table.
After crossing Piazza Prampolini, the beating heart of the town centre, you reach the Tricolour Flag Museum, which illustrates the history of the Italian flag and the political events of Reggio Emilia, from the birth of the Cispadane Republic to the national unity. The museum is spread over three floors served by both a lift and stairs.
You can visit the museum by listening to the free audio guides.
Piazza Prampolini is connected to Piazza San Prospero from Vicolo Broletto, a passage with an arched ceiling created in 1488 by opening the wall of the Canons' garden. The square was recently redeveloped to enhance and make more usable one of the symbolic places of Reggio Emilia: differences in level and barriers were eliminated to create a single space also accessible to disabled people and red porphyry flooring was chosen, with references to the XIX-century layout.
The Basilica dedicated to the Patron Saint of Reggio Emilia overlooks the square. At the edge of the churchyard are six characteristic lions in red Verona marble, the true symbol of the town.
After crossing the Via Emilia, your gaze opens onto a large space, interrupted by the gushing of jets of water. To the right of the Municipal Theatre you cannot fail to notice the Museums Palace, former Franciscan convent which has housed the private collection of the great naturalist Lazzaro Spallanzani since 1830.
To access in wheelchairs, just ring the bell: an operator will accompany the disabled to the dedicated lift on the side of the building, where it is also possible to admire the work Curiosa Meravigliosa (Curious Wonderful), an extraordinary ceramic peacock created by the artist Joan Fontcuberta during Covid. The works exhibited inside the museum are provided with captions for the visually impaired: nobody is excluded. The second and third floors, reachable by lift, were recently redeveloped by the architect Italo Rota: a tour through the centuries, the protagonists and the excellences of our territory, from the founding consul Marco Emilio Lepido, to the poet Ludovico Ariosto, from the history of the Tricolour Flag to the photographic work of Luigi Ghirri and the valorization of the European Photography Collection, the entire tour is characterized by spaces for comparison and contamination.
We continue to the most important church of the town centre. The construction of the Church is linked to the miracle of the healing of Marchino, which occurred April 29, 1596. Within a short time the place became a great pilgrimage destination, and the numerous offerings led to the rebuilding of the sacred building, decorated with an extraordinary cycle of frescoes and altarpieces executed by the best artists of the XVII century in Emilia: Ludovico Carracci, Lionello Spada, Alessandro Tiarini, Carlo Bononi, Luca Ferrari and Giovan Francesco Barbieri, known as Guercino, author of the wonderful “Crucifixion of Christ” commissioned by the Municipality to decorate the town's altar.
To access there is a metal ramp with handrails and parapet on both sides. By downloading the free app you can visit the church on your own: by scanning the QR codes around the pillars you can delve into the historical-artistic aspects and observe the paintings in a new perspective.
The construction of the Palace dates back to the second half of the XVI century, as a representative residence for the town. Characterized by the beautiful two-faced Janus, created by Prospero Sogari known as Clemente and placed in the south-west corner of the building as a figure of protector and guardian of the family, in the XIX it was renovated with a complete renovation in neoclassical style. In 1917, after several changes of ownership, the property passed to Luigi Magnani, art collector, musicologist and man of culture.
It is now home to the homonymous cultural foundation, which pays attention to the needs of fragile people: the dedicated tours include visits to exhibitions, workshops, reproduction of tactile works, augmentative and alternative communication, guided tours with LIS (Italian Sign Language) interpreters and much more. The exhibition rooms are accessible to everybody with the aid of a lift.
Past Piazza Fontanesi, a small French-style square with several coffee bars and restaurants where you can stop for a break, go on to the San Pietro Cloisters, a Benedictine monumental complex which, following a recent restoration, has received several architectural mentions and awards.
Both the monumental complex of the San Pietro Cloisters and the Open Laboratory are accessible to the disabled, thanks to the help of dedicated lifts and ramps. All floors have spaces that allow the comfortable use and viewing of the exhibited works by a person in a wheelchair or anyone who moves with aids.
The tour ends up with two buildings located outside the town centre. The Polveriera was built in the 1940s as a military deployment and then a public warehouse, and became a property of the Municipality at the end of the 1980s. The wide space can be used by everyone; even in the toilets, starting from the mirror, everything can be used by everyone, whether in a wheelchair or not. The several activities of the almost fifty cooperatives, associations, banks and foundations find space here.
During the week it is possible to visit, upon reservation, the large mural work created freehand by the artist Hu-Be.
The last stage of the tour is the new technological innovation hub. The Loris Malaguzzi International Centre was created in place of the historic Locatelli dairy company and its Parmigiano Reggiano warehouses. Pedagogist, teacher and journalist, Loris Malaguzzi was an important scholar of the world of childhood: already in 1963 he favoured the opening of the first municipal nursery schools and, in 1971, the first kindergartens (another world record of Reggio Emilia). It is from his innovative vision of the concept of education, led to enhance the resources present in the "hundred languages of children", that the Malaguzzi Centre and Reggio Children were created.
On the ground floor, open to the public, you can visit several workshops, as Malaguzzi called them, places where you have direct experiences using the senses: touch, sight, hearing. We go on to the former Officine Meccaniche Reggiane, now Reggiane Parco Innovazione, a European hub of services and functions with very high innovation potential. Some decades ago an emblematic workplace of modernity and Italian industrial growth of the XX century, and now, after the restoration of the original structures, a scientific-humanistic technological hub, which brings together universities, research centres, businesses, public administration in a charming location, between past and future. The warehouses are also accessible for wheelchairs, the Warehouse number 18 is always open to the public, and outside it is possible to admire the many murals that have made this area famous throughout Europe.
