Vegetazione Parco Migliarino, San Rossore, Massaciuccoli (L. Corevi, Comune di Pisa)
Coltano estate
Vegetazione Parco Migliarino, San Rossore, Massaciuccoli (L. Corevi, Comune di Pisa)The estate, which extends for about 300 hectares, is mainly flat, and is characterised by agricultural lands and by the presence of accommodation facilities and restaurants obtained from farmhouses built starting from 1919, when Vittorio Emanuele III, following the victory in the First World War, donated this area to the Opera Nazionale Combattenti. Inside the estate there are several paths that can be travelled on foot or by bicycle and the Tamerici lake, with an area equipped for picnics. Medicean Villa of Coltano:Cosimo I de’ Medici began in 1558 to reclaim this area by building the Bocchette ditch. Starting from a residence probably built around the year 1000, in the current Palazzi locality, where a column near the church and the perimeter walls inside the building still remain, Cosimo I built this estate which was important from the agricultural standpoint for the production of cereals and dairy products. In 1586, Bernardo Buontalenti designed the villa, which functioned as the administrative centre of the area. The construction is characterised by the presence of fortifications, with four turrets at the corners, and was often used as a hunting lodge, so much so that the estate was later included among the eight ducal bandite, together with Poggio Imperiale, Casine dell'Isola, Cafaggiolo, Migliarino, San Rossore and Tombolo. The Lorraines, who came into possession of the Medici patrimony in 1737, enlarged and embellished the building, also using it as a place of representation. For a certain period, the breed of highly prized horses, commissioned by the Grand Duke Pietro Leopoldo, was practised on the estate, which was however mainly kept as a hunting reserve. After belonging to the Savoy family and later to the Italian State, it was donated, together with other estates between Pisa and Livorno, to the Opera Nazionale Combattenti: it was this body that completed, between 1920 and 1933, the reclamation of the area for agricultural exploitation. Later the villa was sold, and it is currently owned by the Municipality of Pisa. The villa has undergone a recent renovation, which has restored the white colour of the external plasters, in the style of the well-established tradition of Medicean villas. The villa is open to the public and numerous activities take place in its park. Marconi radio station:on 19 November 1911, the first radiotelegraphic communication was transmitted from this place: Guglielmo Marconi (Nobel Prize for Physics in 1909), in the presence of King Vittorio Emanuele III, sent his regards to Glace Bay, in Nova Scotia. Marconi chose this area precisely because it is characterised by a marked depression in the ground, which makes it a large natural satellite dish. For this reason, after the war the Americans also installed a large radio centre called 'The ear of the Mediterranean' in this place. In 1921, following radical expansion works, the Marconi radio station became the most powerful transceiver station in Europe and was used for intercontinental communications. From 1919 to 1924 the station was used by the Italian Royal Navy to extend communications to boats at sea. The management was then entrusted to a private company, 'Italo Radio', until 1930, when the radio station passed under the direct management of the Ministry of Postal Services. In that period, the Centre experienced its maximum splendour; in 1931 the radio signal that turned on the lights of the Christ the Redeemer statue in Rio de Janeiro departed from the centre, as a demonstration of the reliability and importance of intercontinental radio communications.
