A protected area for over 150 years
The beauty of the natural promontory that commands Grignano bay has been known for centuries. However, it was in 1855 that Maximilian I of Augsburg during a boat trip in the Gulf of Trieste decided to build its house there. Following Maximilian’s will, the charming Miramare Castle (designed by the architect Carl Junker from Vienna) was also surrounded by a wide botanical garden, where the plants collected during his travels would grow and flourish.
Before the works on the interiors of the Castle were finished in the winter of 1860, Maximilian of Habsbourg and his wife Charlotte of Belgium lived at the Castelletto, which reproduces the external shape of the Castle, placed on the sea shore, only in smaller dimensions. Charlotte of Belgium stayed in Castelletto also for a few months in 1867, after her return from Mexico, when the signs of her madness were already evident.
Indeed, even after Maximilian’s death in 1867 the Castle remained a favourite destination of many European noble families, that were attracted by its charming location. During the stay of Duca D'Aosta in the Castle (1929-1943), Castelletto was used as a museum and furnished with some of the furniture that belonged to Maximilian. After the II World War, the Allied Military Government settled into the Castelletto for a few years, because of its strategic geographical position in the Gulf of Trieste and various cultural and scientific initiatives took place in Castelletto before it became the office of Marine Reserve (1988).
For all these reasons, the waters around Miramare have always benefited of a special regime of restriction of the human activities. Hence, when it came the time to designate a coastal protected area in the Gulf of Trieste, it was immediately obvious that Miramare was the most suitable one.
However, it was only in 1973 that such an area was designated as a “marine park” in State concession, and subject to proper environmental protection regulations, thanks to the efforts of a group of naturalists from Trieste. The existence of the protected sea area in Miramare had certainly an important role in convincing the government of the need to create the protected sea areas all along the coast of Italian peninsula. In fact, the Trieste experiment in the seventies is believed to have contributed in some way to the passing of the law No. 979, 31.12.1982. "Disposizione per la difesa del mare" and in particular to the elaboration and promulgation of its fifth paragraph that provides for the creation of twenty areas of protected sea, considering them essential for the protection of sea and coastal environment.
Ten years later the national legislation identified several coastal and marine areas to be safeguarded, and on 12th November 1986 Miramare was included among them as "Miramare Marine Reserve" by the Ministry of Environment and Merchant Navy. The management was entrusted to WWF-Italy which proved the validity of the way it had been run until then. Miramare and Ustica, established at the same time, thus became the first protected areas in Italy. It was only in 1989 though, that the Miramare Reserve could start preparing the structure and the equipment necessary for a modern marine reserve, after the Ministry had sent the first money contribution.
The actual transformation in state Natural Marine Reserve took place only in 1986, and nearly at the same time the Castelletto became the official site hosting the structures dedicated to the Visitor Centre, the educational activities and the experimental laboratories.
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