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The reuse of abandoned public buildings : an answer to housing crises? An investigation on the city of Rome
No full textBook of proceedings: Annual AESOP Congress, Spaces of Dialog for Places of Dignity, Lisbon, 11-14th July, 2017The recent financial crisis had a strong impact on housing affordability. To the European Observatory on Homelessness the number of homeless has increased in all countries along the last ten years (Housing Europe, 2015). The current Europe refugee crisis is feeding this population, making proper policies more complex and urgent. Regrettably, the public support for housing in EU has decreased along the last ten years. In metropolitan areas’ peripheries, where there is a default in infrastructures and services, new residential buildings have been built. The Italian capital city well epitomizes this national framework. Between 2012 and 2015 Rome has consumed 160 ha. In this context, squatting has been often the only one solution for people who is waiting for a public house. Along these years, the movements for the housing right supported many people to have a quality dwelling. The research explored the re-use of public abandoned buildings as a possible solution for housing crisis investigating the case of the so called “Casilino 900” camp and of Roma people living there. Can the self-help housing for abandoned public buildings respond to the increasing housing demand? Employing municipal data on state-owned buildings, the paper proposes in its results a housing capacity map. The map shows the empty public properties in the city of Rome and identifies for each building its housing capacity. In the conclusions, considerations from the case study are drawn considering the broader national situation on re-use for housing of abandoned public space.Published versio
A socio-juridical criticism to urbanistic law for a new urban strategy in natal/rn/Brazil
No full textBook of proceedings: Annual AESOP Congress, Spaces of Dialog for Places of Dignity, Lisbon, 11-14th July, 2017The principle of the dignity of the human person is a moral, social and juridical value inherent in the person, that is, every human being is endowed with this precept, and this is the highest principle of the democratic state of law. While it is a right the idea of dignity in a collective dimension concerns tolerability per temporal, spatial and cultural circumstances. Thus, the city must be the place of the exercise of the dignity of the human person. Based on this idea and based on a dialectical perspective, the research proposes to discuss the effectiveness - notably ineffectiveness - of the norms of urban law, through the confrontation between the Federal Constitution, the City Statute, the Metropolis Statute, and the Municipal Master Plan in the State of Rio Grande do Norte located in Brazil. For purposes of this work, effectiveness is understood as the conformity of the actual situation to the legal situation granted or determined by the standard. In this sense, the first stage of the work consists in the revision of the literature focused on the legislation and legal instruments of urban law that regulate the urban space in the municipality of Natal. Next, we intend to criticize the illusion of urban law and the predominantly positivist conception that predominates both in the elaboration of legislation in Natal-RN and in the application of such norms. In addition, to investigate the causes of noncompliance with norms of urban law, it is necessary to study the city and society in which we live, the relation of identification and belonging of the individual with the city in which he lives, what mechanisms of participation Effectiveness of such individuals. In other words, we must understand in depth the ideas of democracy and justice, from the precepts of freedom and equality to the understanding of our reality. In this sense, the objective is to evaluate if the usual means and procedures used in the city of Natal-RN in the legitimization of public decisions in the sphere of urban policies, are backed by social legitimacy, once we experience the daily practice of civil disobedience in relation to the laws in the coexistence of the legal city and the illegal city.Published versio
Revisiting the concepts of scale and rescaling in relation to the EU macro-regional strategies
No full textBook of proceedings: Annual AESOP Congress, Spaces of Dialog for Places of Dignity, Lisbon, 11-14th July, 2017Seeking to contribute to a more nuanced understanding of the processes of rescaling in European macro-regional strategies, this paper aims to develop and test a conceptual framework to explain the underlying processes of rescaling. In an attempt to draw on the conceptual gateways in the main debates of scale and rescaling, we observe a mismatch with empirical observations on how stakeholders construct scale. As a result of a structured literature review, and based on empirical observations in the Danube region, we suggest that the key to understanding rescaling processes is the conceptualization of scale as a construct, constantly contested through multiple dimensions. Drawing upon recent developments within planning literature arguing for a co-existence between relational and territorial spaces and our empirical information, the paper suggests a multidimensional conceptualization of scale of four dimensions: (i) regulatory/jurisdictional; (ii) funding/resources; (iii) knowledge/values and (iv) network. We argue that scales consist of four co-existing dimensions which have impacts on social and economic relations as well as policy-making. Through the analysis of the Danube Region example the paper concludes that processes of rescaling often occur indirectly. We observe that case stakeholders make use of networks and knowledge at the macro-regional level in order to influence decisions in the funding and regulatory dimensions of the national and EU level.Published versio
Challenges for the future of smart cities from a gender perspective
No full textBook of proceedings: Annual AESOP Congress, Spaces of Dialog for Places of Dignity, Lisbon, 11-14th July, 2017The finding, on the one hand, that the future of cities will have important social and economic consequences due to an urban design implemented by information and communication technologies and, on the other hand, the gender perspective as the principle chosen to support social and economic progress based on equality in Europe (Horizon 2020, article 15), prompts us to propose a study that integrates a gender analysis and research around parameters and variables of the innovative design of the city's public space. The question about the ways in which the genre of the subject modifies the conceptions and representations of (public) space is an indispensable question. In a previous publication me made reference to the more performative and interactive feminine behaviour in comparison with the typical ontological metaphysics of the masculine "fact" and the authorship (Trachana, 2012: 121-122) The current work of the woman is diluted in the family, in the group. Its essential condition is that of an off-centered subject, of an extended body, of "being" in front of the central myths, of "the action that resists acts" (Agamben, 1998). The performative behavior is closer to manual craft than to scientific attitude, and is imbued in the action-reaction time, in everyday life within a given context where implication and commitment acquire an important dimension. The ways to interpret space and to create relationships in space are, consequently, a subjective and critical positioning. Their way to act, we maintain, is through an instinctive knowledge. This implies an awareness of the environment in which sensations and reflections, images and concepts can be correlated. It is a kind of biological and anthropological knowledge, which involves the senses, desires and physical limitations. This type of experience of the reality constitutes a cognitive state much more complex than rationalism, than the dominant capitalist and masculine thought.Published versio
Challenges for urban planning teaching: possible paths through community outreach university projects
No full textBook of proceedings: Annual AESOP Congress, Spaces of Dialog for Places of Dignity, Lisbon, 11-14th July, 2017In Brazil, experts involved with urban planning -planners, architects, urbanists, economists, lawyers, etc. - have a constant challenge to confront two divergent realities: a legal city, consolidated by the implementation of official (legalized) urban settlements, generally located in central areas, designed for middle and upper classes housing; and an illegal city, with lower classes dwellings as favelas and illegal (or irregular) settlements located usually in the peripheral portions of the municipalities. In large cities and metropolises access to housing by the lower income population usually occurs through housing in favelas or through self-built residence in illegal peripheral settlements. According to the 2010 Census 84% of the Brazilian population lived in cities (161 million inhabitants), at least one third of this population lives in precariousness or irregularity conditions. In a country with continental dimension, Brazilian urban planners have the constant challenge to deal with a reality with specific and peculiar characteristics that differ widely between its various regions and metropolitan areas. In this sense this paper wants to bring to the debate the following question: how teach urban planners and urbanists to be able to face the challenges presented by an urban reality of extreme irregularity and inequality? Based on the analysis of recent community outreach experiences carried out in Porto Alegre -Faculty of Architecture of Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul (FAUFRGS), and in São Paulo -Faculty of Architecture and Urbanism of University of São Paulo (FAUUSP) this paper intends to explore the teaching potential of the urban projects operated outside the classroom. We understand that on the search for the construction of a sustainable habitat the teaching of urban planning has to pass through a knowledge based on real experiences and direct observation of the complexity of the urban phenomenon.Published versio
Мetropolitan governance approaches in developing sustainable European cities
No full textBook of proceedings: Annual AESOP Congress, Spaces of Dialog for Places of Dignity, Lisbon, 11-14th July, 2017Metropolitan areas involve several jurisdictions at different levels of authority and different interests. National policies in political and economy systems might influence the distribution of power and resources among territorial authorities in steering the metropolitan area development (Nicholls, 2005; Boudreau et al, 2006). Furthermore, other actors besides the government typically have conflicting interests among them. Consequently, some policies are formulated and implemented without coordination among related actors and without sufficient consideration on sustainability (Nicholls, 2005; Boudreau et al, 2006; Firman, 2008; Islam, 2014). In dealing with complexity of metropolitan area characteristics, individual actors within metropolitan areas obviously cannot work independently. Coordination among them is required, especially in addressing negative impacts of economic and social activities on environment and the provision of public goods and services. Institutional improvement of metropolitan areas through examining governance models is inexorable (Firman, 2008). Institutional changes are needed to make urban governance more effective in achieving sustainable city (United Nations Human Settlements Programme, 2009). In addition, transformation through social and political action is required in managing city to be sustainable (Hopwood, et.al, 2005).Published versio
Socio-spatial justice: the social struggle for the access to basic rights such as housing or supplies in Spain
No full textBook of proceedings: Annual AESOP Congress, Spaces of Dialog for Places of Dignity, Lisbon, 11-14th July, 2017About one million and a half families live in Spain in self-built housing with an informal access to the supplies, to which more than 700,000 families have been added after being evicted from their homes after the crash of the real estate market in 2008. The response of Spanish local communities has been the emergence of a networked social movement called Plataforma de Afectados por la Hipoteca (PAH; the Spanish Mortgage Victims Group) that aims at building a sustainable future by claiming the right to housing and other rights like electricity supplies. This networked movement has been fueled by its ability to create a hybrid space between communication networks and occupied urban space in which face-to face assemblies and protests take place. The modes to operate of the PAH have been replicated by other movements, and their logics have contributed to transforming institutions and their political agenda. In this work we want to show the impact of the economic recession on the access for communities and families to the basics rights as housing or the electricity supplies, as well as the dissemination of the PAH's logics to other actors as the way to address the challenge. In this paper we are willing to unpack the concept of hybrid space, developed by Manuel Castells and informed by the dynamics of the PAH and to other movements emerged by imitation of the PAH. We will also analyze the impact of the struggles of these movements in the transformation of the political agendas made by the new institutional spaces such as in Madrid or Barcelona. All of this will be done by a close look of the PAH and other movements, via participation in assemblies and the observation of other activities such as their use of social networks as well as by interviewing other actors and observing the new policies proposed in the medias regarding the right to housing or to electricity supply. Finally, we will discuss how networked urban social movements as PAH have the ability to create spaces of citizenship that challenge the taken-for-granted principles of capitalism, such as the powerful discourse about the primacy of property rights over the right to housing.Published versio
Influence of urban morphology on the use of BRT transport system
No full textBook of proceedings: Annual AESOP Congress, Spaces of Dialog for Places of Dignity, Lisbon, 11-14th July, 2017Urban planning has the responsibility for defining the territorial and urban models of cities, this determines the distribution of the demand for mobility in the cities. Hence, it is important to affirm the character of the two-way relationship between the spatial distribution and public transportation systems. Using the primary and secondary data with multiple regression model, the present study analyses the relationship of the built environment with the number of passengers registered in the year 2014 in the Bus Rapid Transit in the city of Quito, Ecuador. The delimitation of the service area in the built environment of stops is carried out with the support of the Geographic Information System (GIS). The results show the importance of no-resident population density and diversity of land uses and road density at the time of explaining the number of users of the system at each stop. Research allows to estimate both the future transportation system demand, as well as the impact that can have urban variables on the use of the Bus Rapid Transit in future growth of the urban area.Published versio
Research on the human settlements construction wisdom of Zhashui phoenix ancient town in China based on natural landscape
No full textBook of proceedings: Annual AESOP Congress, Spaces of Dialog for Places of Dignity, Lisbon, 11-14th July, 2017China has a vast territory in which the settlement areas, after more than 5,000 years of civilization development, have gradually evolved into the living environments with different characteristics, rich traditional oriental cultures and unique constructing methods and wisdom, showing their own styles in the history of city construction in the world. However, the rapid development of urbanization in China has posed a certain impact on the local traditional space, and the historical context and spatial features of many traditional settlement areas has been submerged in the tide of rapid urbanization. Under this background, it is somewhat unusual for Phoenix Ancient Town of Zhashui County located in the hinterland of Southern Shaanxi Qinling Mountains to retain the whole living environment of the traditional characteristics. Here the traditional street space is integrated with the surrounding landscape, which is a precious historical and cultural heritage, and implies the Chinese wisdom in the construction of the traditional living environment.Published versio
Utilizing spatial and landscape planning to promote ecological conservation on university campuses
No full textBook of proceedings: Annual AESOP Congress, Spaces of Dialog for Places of Dignity, Lisbon, 11-14th July, 2017Universities globally have committed themselves to behaving as responsible citizens in addressing global ecological challenges through physical planning and management of their campuses. At the Technion – Israel Institute of Technology, a comprehensive, two-year planning effort was made to revise the vision and physical plans of the main university campus in Haifa to meet emerging 21st century challenges facing the academic community. Defining and addressing ecological challenges was integral to this effort and an ecological advisory team worked closely with campus planners to envision an ecologically sustainable campus. This paper reflects upon this process, from its first stages of problem definition and goal setting, through a multifaceted ecological survey and the integration of architectural and urban planning students into the planning process, to production of the final statutory zoning plan and strategic master plan. The study highlights the particular challenges of a campus that sits on the interface between urban and natural ecosystems and one that demands rapid development with a concurrent desire to preserve ecological integrity. Conclusions highlight the universality of the ecological responsibilities and challenges that universities face, suggest general strategies for exploiting the planning process towards ecological sustainability goals, and advocate for the integration of students into campus design activities.Published versio