The project aims to reshape the approach to informal settlement upgrading by offering an innovative, accessible and inclusive methodology for the fair distribution of public space, a safer urban environment, delivery of basic services, and an urbanization scheme that combines housing upgrades with new economic and social possibilities. Informal settlement residents and local government are the immediate benefits of this approach. The long term goals are to influence a new direction in housing policy and offer much needed diversity and access to housing for the gap market. Socially, the project will have a positive impact on personal safety, gender empowerment through equal opportunities in selection of development committees, consolidation of community cohesion through preferential neighbourhood cluster selection. Informal settlements are plagued by environmental risks, predatory violence, and limited emergency services access. The combination of a fire-resistant, two-story housing prototype and reconfigured urban plan will reduce the threat of natural hazards, create demarcated circulation routes for emergency vehicles, firebreaks, and new elevated sightlines into shared courtyard spaces for routine neighbourhood surveillance. Realigned housing units allow for the retrofitting of basic infrastructure services. Finally, the potential for personal and collective empowerment throughout the act of upgrading is assured through the project’s inclusive and participatory framework. The whole process involves active participation from all community members in spatial, political and economic decision-making, guaranteeing knowledge transfer and the development of local capacity. Digital planning tools for the management and documentation of the upgrade project developed at the ETH support the transparent and fluid workflow of all stakeholders involved including land owners, municipal governments, upgrade facilitators and the community development committee. These tools in the form of an upgrade tablet application, computational analysis and planning software and an online interface support the replicability and scalability of the project.
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Urban-Think Tank, Swiss Federal Institute of Technology
Neunbrunnenstrasse 50 8093
lloyd@arch.ethz.ch
+41446339079
Neunbrunnenstrasse 50 8093
lloyd@arch.ethz.ch
+41446339079