Hong Kong, informal sitting arrangements (M. Wolf)

See the complete collection here.

Climate Change Solutions: Architects Look To Slums As Models For Sustainable Living (P. Ross)

"[...] large, densely populated, impoverished neighborhoods are in many ways on the cutting edge. Innovation comes of necessity, not because it's trendy, and due to the likelihood the future will bring larger, more densely populated slums, an unusual realm of urban planning has begun to take shape -- one that looks at making slums sustainable, rather than simply blights to be eradicated.

Mumbai (www.ibtimes.com/)

As urban planners seek eco-friendly ways to house a projected 1 billion more slum residents worldwide in the next 35 years, they’re focusing on concepts like gondolas, rainwater catchment systems and vegetative walls that can be easily replicated -- in some cases across other economic zones. What works in the slums may be equally useful in high-rent neighborhoods, or in densely populated, middle-class high-hrise "towns" that are being built in Singapore.

One of the reasons such slums are useful to study is they are indicative of what a consumer society forced to grapple with declining resources could look like. And because the slums consume less than more affluent districts, residents' demands for transportation and water supply infrastructure are often easier to address."

Keep reading.

Ross, P. (2014) "Climate Change Solutions: Architects Look To Slums As Models For Sustainable Living". International Business Times, July 14, 2014.

The Informal City (E. Duhau)

"Dwellings are built and improved step-by-step, depending on household savings and informal loans, and often in response to changes in family size or the incorporation of another, related household unit (usually formed by a male child). In this latter case it is common to build a small new dwelling on a still-free portion of the original plot. Many times, housing incorporates commercial or workshop uses, or the original household builds one or more rooms or small rental apartments at ground level or on a second story. In fact, the combination of housing with commercial, service, or workshop uses, or with the production of rental units, is one of the main factors responsible for the improvement of average socioeconomic conditions in the informal city over time. Other explanatory factors include access to high school and college for many of the initial inhabitants' children and the gradual arrival of better-off households as the colonia upgrades.

Besides housing, new land uses are gradually incorporated in response to growing demand for retail commerce, consumer services, and public facilities (grocery stores, churches, schools, medical clinics, and so on). The spatial distribution of these activities is usually oriented by the emergence of some local commercial districts, mostly corresponding to one or more main streets and to the paths followed by public transport.

trasfondoinformativo.blogspot.com

In spite of the rather low quality and reduced variety of most public spaces, they are usually intensively used and traversed, most of all by housewives buying staples and bringing their children to and from school, or by kids and teenagers playing and socializing. This markedly contrasts with what we can observe in the formal city, where, with the exception of some areas of the old central city, most people avoid public walking as much as possible, and kids are usually not allowed to stay and play in public streets. Additionally, in many colonias populares, local streets are from time to time the scenes of family parties, where neighbours usually are welcome if not expressly invited. And one or more wider streets are converted into a weekly market place, where a tianguis (street market) is set out, and people from the colonia or nearby ones not only buy a wide range of goods but also, especially during the weekends, go for a stroll, eat popular dishes at antojitos (snack) stalls, and socialize. The other side of the coin is that the uses of public spaces are regulated by customs of urbanity that suppose, in order to avoid neighbourhood conflicts, the acceptance of different kinds of mishandlings concerning the uses of the streets and sidewalks."

Duhau, Emilio (2014) "The Informal City". In: Cities from Scratch. Poverty and Informality in Urban Latin America. Durham: Duke University Press. pp 155-156.

Building with books: ISU design students construct micro library with Peruvian students

From the Iowa State Daily, published Thursday, March 27, 2014.

The ISU students collaborated with the Peruvian students from the beginning of the spring semester until about a week before the trip. The students researched micro libraries around the world for inspiration for about a month before they started developing designs for the micro library in Peru. "We would propose a design; they would give us feedback and then they would take that proposal to the community organization who would give them feedback. And then they would come back to us," [Kellen] Pacheco said. "We went through that process about two or three times."

[...]

"As a profession, architecture operates in so many ways, I think that this is one of the ways we have to be humbled as students of architecture, because not everything goes according to plan, especially in these kinds of environments."

Construction of the micro-library. Video by Fraktal.

Workshop 2014: Micro-library, construction

Workshop 2014: Micro-library

In joint efforts with Iowa State University and the neighbours at El Carmen, Comas, we will start building a library unit.

We invite volunteers to participate in the construction, between March 4th and 15th.

Book donations are also welcomed!

Informal Housing: Conventional Wisdoms Reappraised (P. M. Ward)

(www.texashousing.org)

"Since the mid-1970s self-help housing policies have entered the mainstream of international planning conventional wisdom. Prior to this period self-help advocacy was limited largely to academics or research workers concerned to identify the natures of squatter or irregular settlements, the characteristics of their populations, and the processes whereby theses areas were physically upgraded and became part of the urban fabric. They argued that the self-build and the mutual-aid activities in these neighbourhoods should be stimulated through supportive government intervention. This would include the provision of essential services which the residents could not organise themselves or readily afford, and the provision of some sort of tenure security (invariably outright ownership) that would stimulate investment in the dwellings.

[...] the incorporation of self-help philosophy into planning has not been without criticism. Emerging practices are criticised on several grounds. It is said to be an abrogation of government responsibility insofar as housing construction is placed firmly in the hands of the worker rather than those of the industrialist, local or central government. Labour is, therefore, exploited twice over; first in the workplace where wages are low; second, in the home where householders bear the burden of life in poor dwelling conditions with inadequate services and have to use their spare time and labour to build or improve their dwellings. This is a primary means whereby labour is reproduced cheaply. Others have suggested that self-help romanticises and confuses freedom of choice to construct one's own home with no choice at all (Harms, 1976). Politically it is seen as inherently conservative; the acquisition of home ownership through a bootstraps self-help approach fosters a petty-burgois mentality (Harms, 1976). [...] In is increasingly apparent that self-help functions to the advantage of a range of interests: it offers politicians opportunities for patronage and social control exercised through vote catching and negotiation over services and land. The construction industry benefits through an enhanced market for materials; while industry, commerce and the rich in general benefit through being able to pay low wager. Lastly, it is argues that successful consolidation achieved by low-income groups in the past is seriously threatened as economic growth declines, inflation increases, real wages drop and, as self-help policies require, a commitment to pay the costs of land and legal recognition, together with the costs of service installation and land taxes."

Ward, Peter M. (1982) Informal Housing: Conventional Wisdoms Reappraised. Built Environment, Vol 8, No 2. pp. 84-94.

Informal Settlers in Lima (I. Olórtegui)

"The first invasions started in the Forties. Before long the urban popular organisations leading them started an autonomy movement at the State and dominant class which peaked in 1979-80 with the formation of the Federation of Young Towns and Popular Urbanisation of Lima and Callao. The first major group of spontaneous settlements in Lima were originally characterised as “urbanizaciones clandestinas” (clandestine urbanisations), and in 1953 they were officially designated “barriadas” by the National Bureau of Planning and Urbanism. As Ludeña indicates, the criteria to define this qualification were related to the materials of the constructions (brick, adobe, cane or waste materials), the level of advance of the building construction and the supply of services and equipment (stable or slow development, moderated advance, violent development), and mainly the ownership of invaded lands (State land, private property or rented plots)."

Read the whole article.