TYPE: • Infrastructure
• Subway/Railway CURRENT USE: • railway station HISTORICAL USE: • railway station LEGAL STATUS: • public property PLAN AND CONSTRUCTION 1958 - 1961• Pier Luigi Nervi |
When the Genoa to Savona railway line was built in 1868, Savona station was planned close to the Letimbro torrent. In 1882, the original wooden shed was replaced on the same site by a 2 storey brickwork building with a platform shelter in front of it. In the mid 20th century, with the project to lay a second Genoa-Ventimiglia coastal line (built only as far as Finale Ligure), it was planned to move the railway layout and build a new station in the Mongrifone district. 
This was built to the design of Pier Luigi Nervi, who together Antonio Nervi won the competition announced by the Ministry of Public Works General Ordinary Road System and new Railway Building Department. July 1959 saw the laying of the foundation stone and the new station was opened in September 1962. However, for a number of years it housed only the Commercial Traffic Department and the Professional School for newly-hired railwaymen, as the old station continued to absorb the railway traffic because the second line was not built until the late 1970s. In 1977, Letimbro station became disused and was soon demolished and replaced by the new Mongrifone station. The system is now made up of over 20km of platforms and a new freight park at piazza Doria, with 26 km of platforms and the port junction line.
The station was built by the Nervi & Bartoli firm and comprises two separate building bodies. The main passenger services (ticket office, restaurant, bar, traffic offices and post office) are to be found in the first one, to the west facing Piazza A. Moro. It is accessed from a system of platform shelters, lifts and stairs in the body of the building in the east at the platform level. This second building (which is also rectangular with a reinforced concrete frame, but swung round compared to the first, as it is parallel to the platforms) houses the waiting rooms, the bar and the first floor offices.
The entrance is characterized by its reinforced concrete 'wave' roof which stretches out on the square with a platform shelter which projects 7.50m along its entire 75m length. The solution adopted for the design of the 7m high columns is interesting from the structural and compositive viewpoint: the rectangular section with its main axis parallel to the front, has at the top been swung around 90° from the base, so that it houses the main beam which bears the side beams that trace out the “wave” roof. The same swung around column solution was adopted in the platform shelters, where the columns have an elliptical section. Over the course of time, a number of internal actions have been necessary in order to use the large areas rationally and render them more practical to service and staff needs.
How to get there: By car, A10 Savona-Ventimiglia motorway, exit at the Savona Vado toll then continue towards the city centre, go under the railway and immediately turn left into via Luigi Pirandello which leads to the station.
By rail, Savona station.
Sources: P. L. Nervi, Nuove strutture, Edizioni di Comunità, Milano 1963
P. Desideri, P. L. Nervi jr, G. Positano (a cura di), Pier Luigi Nervi, Zanichelli, Bologna 1979
P. L. Nervi, Costruire correttamente. Caratteristiche e possibilità delle strutture cementizie armate, Hoepli, Milano 1965
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