Architectural Body and Urban Emergencies

Our goal for Urban Emergencies is to map Urban Vitality on different scales and gather information about the incentives of natural disaster responses during the entire process. Ultimately our product is an analysis including data gathered in this field and processed to lay the foundation for further research. Especially the information gathered on the scale of liveability is complementary for our Architectural Body research. We process the observations made concerning materials and liveability in a technical perspective for Architectural Body. Our goal is to gather information about the material flow in El Salvador. Focusing on the process of extraction, the construction methods and use of materials, we analyze solutions, problems, opportunities and threats.


Organization: Work Plan

We plan to update our Architectural Body report on a regular basis. We gather information with literature, observations documented with photographs and we have the opportunity to visit places where materials are processed, accompanied by contacts from the technical staff of Fundasal headquarters.

We are able to distinct multiple housing typologies with the focus on material use. The interviews on site give us a lot of insight about the perspectives of people on the material use. For example people have more faith in the concrete panels enclosed by concrete pillars, a technique imported from Cuba. We are currently processing this type of information in illustrations which will be posted on the blog and included in this report and the Project Plan of Urban Emergencies.

To conclude this report is constantly updating with the ambition to have a weekly update available online on the blog.


Example of observation:
- Mejicanos (see Quick Scan: Mejicanos)
- Public space as incentive, initiated by NGO
- Dwellings connected to concrete staircaise
- Unused/unmaintained land
- Influence of greenery
- Example of construction typology
- Concrete grid, filled with bricks
- Steel sheet roofing: weighted down with stones

Update available, version 2.10.0. Download here

As a part of the Quick Scan phase, we've documented our personal views and combined this in the Revision, download here. This will lead to discussions and will finally result in the location(s) choice.

All Quick Scan reports combined in one report, download here

Quick Scan Report: Downtown, San Salvador
Accompanied by: Sandra and Vanessa + students (UCA)
Date: 24/03/09
Time: 09:00-16:00

Introduction

Downtown is the city centre of San Salvador with a history that characterizes the city on multiple levels. The population figures: former dominated by wealthy people who later migrated to the North. Architecture and public space: severely damaged by natural disasters and the civil war. Economic activity: dominated by small market stalls filling the streets. Abandoned buildings, issues of land rights and different views and responses concerning reconstruction illustrate the political individualism. The possibility for the location as a case study was initiated by word of mouth. The affection to the place is alive among the people, who all have a strong opinion eager to share. We visited the location for the second time, now joining a class of Sandra Poizat (UCA).

Buildings and public space

The centre is a centralization of economic flows. The migration into and out of San Salvador left buildings unmaintained and the earthquake of 1986 brought so much damage to the buildings that most are either completely or partially abandoned. The buildings were and still (partially) are shops and offices but the streets are the market. People living under the poverty line in greater San Salvador often go to Latiendonna (the food market) and Downtown for products. Whole families set up shops and stalls in order to have income. After walking through the streets, with a constant traffic flow which causes danger and an immediate noticeable pollution we can describe the street profiles. Enclosed by vacant buildings, the stoop for walking is narrow (fit for 1 person) because of the stalls. These stalls or parked cars are the boundaries for what is left for motorized traffic, including the constant flow of buses. On the other side of the road the same occupation is repeated. In some profiles with a two-way street, stalls are also implemented in the middle. It’s a different situation when it comes to public buildings like churches, the Cathedral or government buildings. These are well maintained with direct relations to squares and the absence of stalls. We visited an iconic Church, build in the late ‘60s with a construction method and raw material treatment very different from most buildings. It survived the earthquake of ’86 with only the tower outside the church being partially damaged. Next we visited a square, clean of stalls or other activity, enclosed by the Cathedral, library, National Palace and commercial shops/warehouses constructed in the ‘80s. Here we learned from Sandra that El Salvador had a strong movement in cultural development in their architecture, which stopped in ‘70s. The civil war and natural disasters caused very individual responses. The healing process from the war is continuous and the hope for a more united architectural vision on buildings and open space is strongly connected to political change.

Vulnerability

Aside from the earthquakes the area is vulnerable to floods. Multiple reasons can be given for this vulnerability, like the alert system, the drainage system, the deforestation causing mudslides etc. We visited a street, were the water reached about 2 meters in 5 minutes (1921) and this street was situated higher then a lot of other places we later visited. Such as a lower part, that has an open connection to the downhill stream of a river leading to Los Manantiales. The problem with the prevention of flooding and pollution is that the intervention has to start sooner, with the origin of the river which might be in Honduras. We talked with a couple of police officers who explained that the alert system improved over the last two years. An organization called COIN, distributed the stream in more canals, diminishing the pressure on a single canal. The problem of the pollution remains, as the smell is noticeable in this area, where steel sheet houses occupy the land. Although according to the police their number one concern is not the disaster vulnerability but the murder rate, such as 360 casualties in one month related to gang activity.

Work in progress

Sandra took us to a location where her office in collaboration with two other architectural offices won a design competition. The street leading to the location has a religious sentimental value; it’s a walk from one church to another (on Easter). A year ago the area used to be gang territory but now it’s a very lively street. On this moment the public space on the side of the church is being constructed, with at least 30 men working at the same time in order to finish the public space as quickly as possible. The roads where cars pass through are finished; in the future it will be a car free zone. In this area we visited a housing complex, initiated by Fundasal in collaboration with architects and inhabitants and funded by a Swedish corporation. In a process of 7 years, they first started community capacity building which took about 4 years and then another 3 years for the construction, which is now finishing. On the scale of liveability we made a couple of notes. For example 12 families that used to live there, shared a single bathroom. Now every house (family) has its own. The open court yard shows the initiative to create public open space within a closed complex. Unique in El Salvador is the typology for housing different groups of families. This complex has a dwelling for a single inhabitant as well as a duplex for a large family. They used the social organization in order to build these houses as well as the nearby shelter warehouse, where the families currently dwell. The residents have to pay a form of ‘rent’, which is 25$/month for a period of 15 years. The project was funded and so they implemented this ‘rent’ in order to have financial aid for another community project. In the end the people do not own their house and do not own their land. This is another way of dealing with the land rights.

Potentiality

For now a couple of points make up the potentiality. This was the last quick scan report and after the revision every location will be evaluated on the suitability of a case study location.

Pro’s:
- City centre: history, connectivity, metropolis
- Influences and consequences on different flows and disciplines
- Evolution of these flows: economic (market), population (migration) etc.
- Importance of public space

Con’s:
- Very challenging for 2 month period to go in specific details
- Safety issues

QS: Downtown, San Salvador

View more presentations from wpocornie.

Quick Scan Report: Mejicanos: Montreal, Iberia & Guadalupe
Accompanied by: Victor & Hector (Municipality Mejicanos) + Sofia (UCA)
Date: 17/03/09
Time: 09:00-13:00

Introduction

We visited a part of Mejicanos on Thursday, March 12th. Mejicanos is a municipality just north of the municipality of San Salvador and part of the greater San Salvador. It has a population approximately 165 thousand people, of whom mostly earn there money in the city centre. In 6 zones of the municipal, an amount of 25 000 dollars was distributed over 26 communities for the reconstruction and prevention of disasters and social programs. Today we visited a couple of communities, the main focus was on: Montreal (32 families: 4-7 persons/family), Iberia & Guadalupe.

Team

For this visit we teamed up with our contact Sofia from the student association at UCA. She helped translating while we were guided around by Hector and Victor of the municipal. At the municipal they work on reconstruction after a disaster: earthquake and yearly landslides/floods caused by heavy rain. We finished the day with a meeting reported in Meeting Report: Antonio Rodriguez.

Community house and necessities

Every community we visited is vulnerable to heavy rains, because they are enclosed by the hills. On the scale of liveability we observed the houses and accessibilities to necessities for human life. We asked around for the flows of food and medicines and learned that the communities are depended on San Salvador, while only connected with one entrance. Most of the houses are constructed with steel sheets, wooden logs and bricks. But there are also house constructed with concrete blocks. These are more resistant and a couple of these serve as a community house. Because of the repetitive floods and landslides, the community is prepared. During the rain season the municipal measures the rain fall and when necessary all the people gather in a community house. Most of the community houses are partially renovated vacant houses. In the community Montreal these vacant houses are owned by the bank but nobody is taking care of the maintenance and nobody is living in them. The municipal constructed plastic and wooden roofs for these houses, which were destroyed by the heavy rain/landslide. In the community Guadalupe a construction took place and it’s the only example where we saw public space directly connected with the community house. This is used for weekly meetings and other gathering. The community house in Iberia is the most organized in the sense of the necessities. The community made a plan a presented this in order to get international help from Germany. They implemented a sanitation system for the neighborhood, with a system of tubes where black and clean water are transported separately within one pipe. For example Montreal also has clean water system but not a sanitation network.

Incentives

While these communities are not far away from each other, the responses are very diverse. NGOs like Fundasal, Procomes, Cantizano, Oxfam and Ayuda Humanitairs helped in different fields like water, sanitation and infrastructure. While construction companies like Avance ingenieros built a gated settlement nearby. A lot of international help lead to improvement of facilities, like the Catholic school in Iberia initiated by the Spanish embassy.

Social problems

While the area is very vulnerable to natural disasters and heavy rain, the main problems seem to be social. In the communities we visited social safety is an issue because there is gang activity. The collaboration between the national government and the municipalities is inefficient, because of political differences (see Meeting Report: Antonio Rodriguez). The municipal do want they can with the small amount of finance, resulting in construction of small playing areas, walls and with help from NGO or international actors implementations like water/sanitation systems, staircases and roads.

Potentiality

QS: Mejicanos2

View more presentations from wpocornie.

We tested/used the GPS during visiting our possible Case study locations. You can also get a good idea of the map and structure of the locations we have visited by viewing the tracks.

Paraisio de Osorio, 10-3-2009


The track of Paraisio de Osorio itself is accurate, only it seemed to be impossible to shift the time in a way that all the photos found the right location. A solution to this problem will be to synchronize the times of the camera and the GPS.


There are made many locations points at a place we didn’t mean to. Maybe the button was pressed without knowing it, next time no sitting on the GPS!

Santa Tecla, 11-3-2009


The track was pretty accurate, only when we entered a building there was some distortion.


The photos made in Las Collinas, our most important site to visit, configured with the right location points. Later on, travelling by car, the photos and the location points are not exactely put at the same place. It is probably even more important to have the time of the camera synchronized with the time of the GPS when travelling with a higher velocity.

Manantiales and Mejicanos, 12-3-2009



The track of Manantiales shows distortion at the places we stood still, this problem can be solved with the configuration, to log only when you have a minimum speed. In the Mejicanos track you see the exact same problem.

The camera was set on a different time zone then the GPS. We divided the project into two different projects, Manantiales and Mejicanos, because the time shifting gets easier with two different time frames for placing the photos accurate.

San Pedro Nonualco and Santa Maria de Ostuma, 13-3-2009



When we were in a building the track shows distortions. Next time we have to turn of the GPS when we are in a building.

The information of the GPS could be written easily into the pictures of the camera of Barbara's telephone, because the time of this camera is synchronized with the GPS.

Mejicanos, 18-3-2009



The GPS track is very accurate. The GPS information was written in the photos and they were are immediately correct placed. When we are in a building you see a little distortion. We booked a lot progress after doing all the tests and are ready to start mapping.

It’s ‘Domingo Quince’ meaning Sunday the 15^th: the day of the presidential elections. There was no escaping the suspense with all the political campaigning on the streets, TV/radio and off course in everyday conversations. The rivalry is between FMLN, the left, and Arena, the right party.

As we try to stay neutral and understand as much as possible about the context, we are mostly surrounded by FMLN supporters, the left party. According to a lot of people the left has never had a candidate as strong as Mauricio Funes. From the military rulers and two decennia of the right calling the shots, the left has never been in power. In the polls the left was winning, so the anticipation about this historic change was huge. As we learned more and more about the history; fraud, repression and tricks implemented during elections we began to realize the possibility of a big anti-climax.

The government, businesses and the people organized a lot of options for people to vote, like free public transportation, discounts in different restaurants for the voters, etc. So on this Sunday everyone was gone for most of the day. In the evening the results started coming in. The final result was the FMLN winning with a close 51%.

We were invited by our friends from the hotel to the celebration of this historic day in El Salvador. A gathering at Plaza Masferrer could best be described with visual aid.

We’re entering our second week with this historic event,
Keep on checking our blog, Salut!

This is the first week of our Quick Scan/Inceptive phase, meaning visiting different locations in order to select our locations for the Case Study.

We started off on Tuesday with a visit to Paraíso de Osorio accompanied by people from Fundasal. We drove up a mountain for quite some time and had opportunities to enjoy the view of the big lake.


When we arrived at the location we began talking to people about the natural disasters that occurred and the vulnerability of the place. It’s obvious that interviewing offers a lot more information that we imagined. We focused on the process and the solutions and/or possibilities for the future generation. We experienced a lot curiosity in the sense that we tried to make pictures while young girls were sniggering and making pictures of us as well.

Read more about Paraíso de Osorio in our Quick Scan report.

On Wednesday we visited Santa Tecla, with our friend Roberto from Fundasal who lives there. While we did not talk to anyone specific we drove around different places which had meaning in the response process. For example a partially deserted place where people were not able to return because of economical & political reasons, to a big open football fields where the shelters were placed.


Read more about Santa Tecla in our Quick Scan report.

Thursday was the day of Los Manantiales & Mejicanos. We already learned a lot about the programs of Fundasal and we could switch from generic to specific questions in the interviews. The weather on this day was the hottest of the entire week and we experienced a little envy to the children of Los Manantiales playing in outside swimming pools. Both places, Los Manantiales & Mejicanos, showed potential for case studies, but these as well as every other location we visited were mostly affected by the earthquake of ’86. We might have to reconsider the UE-norm of a 10 year timeframe for when the last natural disaster happened.



Read more about Los Manantiales & Mejicanos in our Quick Scan report.

We round up this week with a visit two more locations in La Paz, San Pedro & Santa Maria Ostuma. Here we met keyfigures of the response process, a community leader, a local priest and City Hall council. These interviews were very productive. We were able to learn a lot about the process, social networking and plans, provided that a lot of the key information was bodied in negativity about others. We round up the day by meeting a contact from UCA, during ‘Salsa night’ in the bar next to our hotel. We might have to brush up on our salsa skills as well as our Spanish.


Read more about San Pedro & Santa Maria Ostuma in our Quick Scan report.

This is it for this week,
Please check the Quick Scan reports for a detailed description of these visits

Quick Scan Report: San Pedro Nonualca
Accompanied by: Jorge y Manuel (Fundasal)
Date: 13/03/09
Time: 11:00-12:00

Introduction

San Pedro Nonualca is a municipality in the North part of the La Paz region, a rural area with a population of just over ten thousand. The main town of San Pedro Nonualca contains 2 percent of the area and has 35 percent of the population. The town was heavily damaged by the earthquake on 13 February 2001. Several roads, schools and infrastructure were damaged and 95% of the houses were destroyed.

We gather the information about the earthquake and its responses by observation and having an interview with Eugenio Lindor Ingles, who is a community leader of the urban part of the municipality.

Emergency phase

Within the emergency phase the community received help from all different local and international organizations. Ready made food was brought in from San Salvador, Honduras brought oil and beans, the Catholic Church distributed clothes and blankets etc. Next to the schools, which were used as shelter, most of the people build up a shelter themselves, by using ruble and receiving plastic sheeting. After two weeks the community started to clean the rubble with financial help of the government; 45 dollars a person.

Reconstruction

The reconstruction projects were initiated within the 2nd and 4th month after the disaster. Four institutions mainly worked in the reconstruction: GTZ Germany, Madre Cria El Salvador, GBC Italy and Samaritan Pours UK.

There were two types of responses within the reconstruction of the houses. The first was initiated by the GTZ, who build and paid for about 100 new houses out of 500-600 in total for people with legal land rights. The second was the supply of building materials, accessible to all, legal and illegal landowners. Some of the affected people had enough money to build back their house with their own money.

Observations

As we walk around the urban area of the municipality the roads, made out of natural stones, seem old and a lot of the new houses are decorated with traditional wood carving, under the roofs and window frames. Within the reconstruction there has been a sense of bringing back the old atmosphere within the town. Eugenio tells us that the GTZ introduced workshop in wood carving as an opportunity for new economic input.
Within our observation we see new build brick houses, next to steel sheet vulnerable houses. The reason of these differences is found in the legislation and landownership. People who didn’t have any legal land rights were not able to receive any help from the institutions that supplied the reconstruction.
Before the reconstruction most of the buildings were made of adobe (mud). Some of the buildings around the market place in the city centre have remained standing, but are severely damaged. It seems that some of the buildings that are only partially damaged didn’t receive any reconstruction help at all.
Next to the problem of land ownership, there were some problems with the distribution of materials for the new houses. Political and communal leaders had the task of distributing materials and reconstruction or relief products. Some of the leaders started selling them instead of giving the products for free. Therefore some people had no chance of building a new home and others build three. Within the rural areas some people still live in there temporary steel sheet houses.

Basic services

Eugenio said the reconstruction process was a long process. The first water projects started in 2005. Not every community had access to water in their houses yet. For the more rural communities there are some tab points along the road. At this moment several water and sewer projects are still in the making. These projects are initiated by the local social networks: SDL. These networks focus initiate and get money for different development projects within the municipality. These networks didn’t exist before the earthquake.

Future

The duration of the project is worth the effort, because liveablitiy has improved for most of the inhabitants. The problems they had with the community leaders, who tried to earn money out of the responses, were the instigators to set up the social networks, the networks which initiate different new development projects and create a stronger community. To improve the local economy these networks started festivals where people of the community sell products and food. In conclusion, Eugene would like to see the same incentives (sanitation network for example) in the neighborhood of Guadalupe as he experienced in other neighborhoods.

Potentiality

This location has proven to be very unique in the sense of preserving history, insisghtful contacts of different positions, but is also rural. After the revision we'll put the pros versus the cons.

QS: San Pedro Nonualca

View more presentations from barbara.oldebijvank.

Quick Scan Report: Santa Maria Ostuma
Accompanied by: Jorge & Manuel (Fundasal)
Date: 13/03/09
Time: 13:00-15:00

Introduction

The municipality of Santa Maria Ostuma is situated in the far north part of the La Paz region. The epicenter of the second earthquake of 2001, 13 February, was in this municipality. The total population of just over 6000 people lost their homes and had to survive three days without any help, water or food from the outside world.
30% of the population is living in the urban area of the village of Santa Maria Ostuma.

In El Salvador it is common that a disaster response is coordinated either by the national/local government or by the (Catholic) Church. The responses on the earthquake in Santa Maria Ostuma were coordinated by a collaboration of those two institutions, and therefore rather special. Within our visit to the town, we speak to both parties, first we have a interview with the local priest on the corner of the street and afterwards we sit down in the city hall to speak to Deisy, who is working in different redevelopment projects.

Collaboration between government and church

After three days the first emergency help did reach the town and was coming from the central government, the municipality of Valencia (spain) and the catholic churches from the United States. In order to create a good distribution out to the beneficiaries, the local government and the church putted up a distribution center next to the church. The municipality was divided into 8 ‘cantones’ in order to control the distribution. People could make a list of necessary items and give this to there ‘canton’ in order to get the products they needed. At the start of the reconstruction process the help was given in the same way. Building materials were stocked in the distribution centers and the beneficiaries made a list of necessary building materials that they could get from the stocks.

The collaboration between the church and the municipality didn’t last very long. The priest stepped out, when he found out about different people within the local government were not equally distributing the help. The 8 ‘cantones’ kept on working together without the Local government. The inconvenience and anger of the population did the priest look for a new mayor who was elected in the local elections of January 2003. This mayor plays an important role in the reconstruction and development process.

From reconstruction to development

Next to over 1000 houses that were build with international help of Germany, Caritas and Habitat. The new mayor started to work with the central government and the program Fisdl. Another 300 houses, 4 schools and new infrastructure were built. The new mayor did see the potential of the 8 ‘cantones’ as a social network. The reconstruction process created a lot of willingness to contribute within the local community. The standard of live has gone up, and the hunger for further development has grown. The quality of houses is a lot better, new schools are built, the infrastructure did improve, and there is a community garbage disposal, there is a communal playground and they are even building a small park at the back of the church.

With the conversation at the city hall we found out that after the reconstruction process they used the community feeling and organization to develop the community. Different development programs were initiated and eventually funded and implemented. The community organizes festivals to attract tourism to give an economical input. Due to education there are different environmental projects implemented, the community works with children to create awareness of the danger, for example on deforestation by organizing tree planting activities. Another interesting education program is how the municipality is implementing a garbage separation program by letting high school kids teach the primary school children and inform elders themselves. The intent to reach the families through the (young studying) children.

Due to the earthquake of 2001 the people of Santa Maria Ostuma had to work together to built up their lives again. Where they were used to mostly think of their own, they created a social networks and a communal way of thinking. Due to the national and international help it became clear that they could develop further if they wanted to, Deisy explains. The new inputs, a social network and a good mayor created the opportunity for the municipality of Santa Maria Ostuma.

Smo Binder1

View more presentations from Dieuwer.

Quick Scan Report: Los Manantiales
Accompanied by: Claudia & Rosaria (Fundasal)
Date: 12/03/09
Time: 08:30-10:30

Introduction

‘Los Manantiales’ is a group of communities within the municipality of San Salvador, just 1 km out of the outskirts of the city centre. There live about 1481 families, with a total population of 6400 people. With 47% younger then 19 years old, the population living under poverty line is 68% and generate an average income lower then 72$/month. The communities settlements are build on the north slopes of the river Acilhuate. The name of the place ‘los manantiales’ literally means rich source of water, a name given because of the good quality and big quantity of the ground water which comes out of springs. Next to the clean ground water, the municipal is basically the sewer dump of the entire city of San Salvador. Indentified as black water, this waste flow used to be dumped directly in the clean water. The communities were struck by the earthquake of 1986 and experience repetitive floods of the river Acilhaute in the raining season.
Fundasal only works with the most poor and vulnerable people, for this reason the south part of the river bank is not part of the project. We travelled with Fundasal and mainly learned about the responses initiated by Fundasal.


Public space

Fundasal developed a project of new urban settlement (1) 2003-2005 were they worked in revitalizing public space and (ego)liveability by waterprojects. They situated a network for water waste disposal within the communities, dividing the black water from the clean water and leading it to the river. The pipes run under the new public spaces that used to be open canals of black water. Fundasal improved public space, water and sewage systems and roads but did not change the layout of the existing structures and the houses, resulting in interesting open spaces. The primary open spaces of the area were damaged by the earthquake and the floods, and these areas are improved by ingenious solutions. For example an old public swimming pool which was damaged in the earthquake of 1986 and used as a waste dump after. Within the project the government created a football field out of the orthogonal structure. The new public spaces cover the old dump areas, so they follow geology and the old morphology of the houses. These open spaces were secondary, but used primary. For example the clean water swimming pools are formed around the existing boundaries. These pools were crowded on a Thursday morning, showing us that the youth has a place to hang out resulting in strong social relations and use of public space.
The open spaces created around these swimming pools furthermore work as coverage of the sewer system. Most part of the public space is created for the youth: Playgrounds, basketball and football courts, skate parks and the swimming pools. Next to these playgrounds little gardens with sits, basic community centers and washing spots are created. Next to its recreational function the springs also give an opportunity for micro-economic activity. Women provide a little income for themselves by offering washing services.
Due to steep slopes without vegetation the places were prone to landslides. To reduce the risk and protect houses and public spaces from landslides the slopes were covered with a layer of cement.

Family life

On the scale of liveability we had some interesting interviews with inhabitants. We met a woman called Maria Emille Solia at her home with her daughter. Her family consists out of eight people, dogs and pigs. In another visit we saw a whole family working in bakery, with a dog and at least 8 pups. We heard from Claudia that this large family life is very common, were people take care of multiple children and animals (dogs). While Maria also earns money making clothes it is common that only the man works. The children go to school nearby, some part-time and if they work they keep the money for themselves. They buy their food at the market, La Tiendonna, nearby. While for merchandise they go downtown to the center of San Salvador.
Maria lives just next to the river and experienced multiple floods; while the house withdrew the pressure she had situations where she lost all her possessions. The house is build just a few meters form the river. Last year Fundasal build up a concrete river bank which creates a buffer when a flood is coming. At this moment the municipality of San Salvador is building up a block wall on top of the river bank to create even more safety. Behind the wall a canal functions as a buffer, in case of a flood this needs to guide the water back down to the river. We have our doubts about the security, since the wall is only a 10 cm wide and the canal leads in to a small opening in another wall.
For the inhabitants it gives the feeling of more security though, tells Sonia, the community leader.

The work of Fundasal has been on the scale of the urban conditions within the community, especially within the disciplines of water and waste management, public spaces and mitigation and risk management.
On the scale of sustainability there was a mutual desire to see the houses improve, with stronger materials used in the other projects.


Potentiality

After the revision we wanted to summarize the experience in pro’s and cons for the possibilities of the definitive choice of the case study location(s).

QS: Los Manantiales

View more presentations from barbara.oldebijvank.

Quick Scan Report: Mejicanos
Accompanied by: Claudia & Rosaria (Fundasal)
Date: 12/03/09
Time: 10:30-12:30

Introduction

Mejicanos is a municipality just north of the municipality of San Salvador and part of the greater San Salvador. It has a population approximately 165 thousand people, of whom mostly earn there money in the city centre.
We visit three communities form a triangle: ‘Julio Vient y cuatro’ (July 24), ‘Mayo Quince’ (May 15) and ‘Progresso’, divided by a large open space, a football field, in the middle. We visited areas where houses are informally situated on steep hills of a valley. These areas are vulnerable to landslides, which happen regularly.


Paths

Fundasal is working in Mejicanos for the first time, focusing on creating free basic services. This means they supply the neighborhood with water and sanitation, a sewer system and build cement paths and staircases to improve the open spaces. Next to these basic services and improvement of connectivity a community center is being build and people were offered micro credits to improve their houses.
Although the building process is still going on the influence are noticeable from far away. The formal planned open space versus the informal settled houses illustrates the hills. The people who are not working use these places to hang out and children found all kind of ways to play on the staircases.

Capacity

Speaking to a group of people from the community, we find out that the micro credits to improve the houses are not being used. The inhabitants don’t want to use this, because the loan is too much, for example 40$/month. In most families the husband is the only one working. There is very little economic activity in this neighborhood; just one store with some candies, sodas and basic groceries. The people work in the center and get their supplies in the center.

Future plans

The settlements are illegal and Fundasal is currently assisting the locals in their fight for legislation. Beside the political plans, Fundasal is also planning to start a neighborhood improvement program (3) to raise awareness about the possibilities and to be social organized.

Disaster

The three neighborhoods, build up on the valley slopes of little rivers are very prone to disaster, floods and mudslides occur, but haven’t been disasters yet.

Potentiality

After the revision we wanted to summarize the experience in pro’s and cons for the possibilities of the definitive choice of the case study location(s).

QS: Mejicanos

View more presentations from barbara.oldebijvank.

At midnight a coalition of the constantly underground moving plates resulted in a little earthquake, apparently very common in El Salvador. The house was only shaking for a mere ten seconds and we were able to continue our sleep. We now understand that this dynamic is interpreted as a source of energy. It was clearly a sign of the day ahead of us.

We had a meeting at the Fundasal headquarters at 8:30 in the morning (AM). Our driver Ramon, from Fundasal, picked us up and guided us during the trip, pointing out impressive areas and architecture. We saw some very dense living areas and houses build up with concrete, bricks and metal sheets. Approaching the headquarters we entered a slum area with a track running through and finally climbing a closed complex on top of a hill, enclosed by the barrio. For us this complex is a very impressive working place with a view of the mountain and a build up settlement vaguely visible.


The meeting with Fundasal was very insightful, resulting in a couple of important possibilities for the research. We introduced ourself, were introduced to the team and presented our Project Plan 4.0. While the Fundasal team and we put a lot of work load on the translator we had a positive back and forth about our quick scan. This resulted in a planned tour across ten areas for the coming week, driven and accompanied by a member of Fundasal. On the downside we experienced a lot of difficulty pointing out the essence of our case study and the flexibility. After the meeting Ramon brought us to our next appointment at UCA with Sandra Poisat. This trip we reflected at our approach in explaining the case study.




The meeting with Sandra Poisat was very productive. We were able to explain the UE aims of study in detail, same goes for the Tool Box and our Incentive-Map. The feedback was remarkable, quickly understanding our graphic illustrating and aiming at the main goals of our research. It resulted in new contacts with expertise in architecture and urban planning with disasters as a theme, literature, working places and an invitation to participate in lectures.



We round up this hectic day with a good feeling and are continuing to process our work and simultaneously translate the essence to Spanish. For a overview of the established network and locations we refer to the notules or our meeting summaries still in process, accessible to Urban Emergencies affiliated.

This is it for today,
Please keep checking the blog and, let’s keep this dynamic

Quick Scan Report: Santa Tecla, Las Collinas
Accompanied by: Roberto (Fundasal)
Date: 11/03/09
Time: 09:00 – 12:00

Introduction

Las Collinas is a community within the municipality of Santa Tecla. Santa Tecla is populated by 131 971 inhabitants is situated in the very south west of the greater San Salvador. Santa Tecla is seen as one of the richer and more developed parts of San Salvador. The urban morphology follows the geography of the surroundings. The north part is enclosed by a volcano and the south part by a group of steep hills. Las Colinas was build on the bottom of one of these hills.
The earthquake of 13 February 2001 instigated a big landslide which destroyed a big part of the Las Collinas neighborhood. Over 400 homes were destroyed and 800 people lost their live in this event.
Roberto of Fundasal showed us Las Collinas and other parts of Santa Tecla to get an understanding of the context. Fundasal did not respond to this disaster, because their policy is to focus their time on helping only the poorest and most vulnerable.

Mortgage

Las Collinas is nowadays a green lawn at the foot of the hill, with plots fenced off and not much is being built. The affected people still own the land, but due to the mortgages which were not remitted by the banks, they first have to pay off their houses before building a new one. The people got supported by the Taiwan government, which donated 2 million, which comes to 10 000 dollar each. This help does not come near their debts; the houses were worth around 40 000 dollar. The affected people took the case into court but despite their efforts they didn’t received more money.

Contemporary situation

The contemporary situation in Las Collinas shows that after 8 years just a tiny little is being rebuilt. The plots are visible and most of them are fenced, which shows they are still owned by different people. On the boundaries of the landslide, on the Westside we see a closed wall. This closed wall is formed by the backside of the houses that face another street. On the east side of the landslide there are ruins of half destroyed houses, next to rebuild houses, where people seem to have enough money to rebuild, that have the view over the empty space that cuts the neighborhood in two.
Next to these houses on the side, there is just three other activities. Alongside the ongoing road which passes through Las Collinas there is one building which contains a small cafeteria, a house and a garage for a public bus. On the other side of the road there is a small wooden house where they fruits and vegetables. It seems that these people managed to get their money back or sold the plot.

Emergency shelter response

Direct after the landslide the central government gave the permission to set up an shelter camp at Cafetalon, which is an big open-public place in the middle of Santa Tecla. It has the capacity of 5 football fields, enough open space to build up a camp for the survivors of the landslide. OXFAM, Plan and Care supplied tents, food, medical and psychological help. After 4 months the emergency camp was closed and all the beneficiaries found a place to live.

Transitional settlements

It is not exactly clear where al the people ended up. Roberto gave us a few different scenarios. The first is that the broken families started to live with their relatives. The second is where the family could effort another cheap house where they started to work on repaying there debts. The third is where people settled themselves in informal settlements on the outskirts of the town. Roberto shows us a neighborhood where Fundasal helped to construct a few houses. At the time they were build the government gave permission for temporary use of that specific ground. Due to the bad financial situation of the people they didn’t have any opportunity to leave this place.

Potentialities

This will follow after the Revision

QS: Santa Tecla (Las Collinas)

View more presentations from wpocornie.

Quick Scan Report: La Paz, paraíso de osorio
Accompanied by: Manuel and Alejandra (Fundasal)
Date: 10/03/09
Time: 13:00 – 16:00

Introduction:

La Paz is a rural area situated in the southwest of San Salvador, its main economy is agricultural and it contains villages populated by 1000 to 4500 people. Paraíso de Osorio is situated in the north of the La Paz region, a 35 km drive from San Salvador. The La Paz region was badly hit by two earthquakes, within a month, in 2001. 13th of January the first earthquake of 7.6 on the scale of Richter struck with the epicenter just out of the coast. The second on 13th of February an earthquake of 6.6 on the scale of Richter had the epicenter in the north of the La Paz region.

The village exists out of 500 to 600 families. It is mainly build around two parallel streets ending at the church and the village square.

Fundasal

Fundasal has four different development programs; one of these programs is focusing on ‘rural settlements’. The program has three important aspects. The first is to improve houses, the second to stimulate the economy by implementing ‘secome’ (economical development seed): a program where an education and micro credit is given to start up a small business, and third, setting up a social network.

Paraíso de Osorio was damaged severely by the earthquake; over 90 percent of the houses were destroyed. Fundasal took this opportunity to reconstruct, and implement their development program at the same time. Next to building new houses, they initiated a sanitation project. A new technology was implemented for the latrines, which helps the disposal water from getting contaminated.
The ‘secome’ project gave the opportunity start new businesses. For the reconstruction after the earthquake Fundasal added an extra rule within this project. In order to create a base for social networks, the application for the micro credit or building materials, had to be done by a group of at least 8 people. This rule played a very important role in contributing to the appearance of the social networks.
Nowadays the people have the feeling that they are a community that is helping each other. This is instigated by the social program but maybe by the size of the village and the way it’s connected to the outside world as well. The only road which connects this village with the ongoing road network has a big entrance portal which gives the sign of a communal feeling within this village.

Three organizations, FISDL, USAID and FUNDASAL, helped with the reconstruction of the houses in PdO. We get an insight of the changes after the reconstruction by having an interview with Rosi Diaz, who is the head of the cultural department, and Ilda, who lives just by school and offers the children free Paturnas at lunch.
At Ilda’s house we can see the different stages of the reconstruction. She tells us that she lived a few blocks away, but had to move after the earthquake because her old plot was to risky to rebuild. She was provided with shelter materials, sheets of steel and plastics, from which she build a temporary house. The materials still seem to be in use within the construction that creates shadow in front of the house. After eight months the construction of the definite houses started. The house was build with the block panel method. The method is easy to learn and makes it easy for the beneficiaries to participate in the building process. Women are involved by rebuilding the houses. Fundasal targets to include women in all the rehabilitation progresses and educate people about equal rights between men and women.

The quality of live did increase after the disaster the two women tell us. Especially the block houses give more comfort and a safer environment relating to future disaster Before the earthquake struck parts of the families were living in ‘mesones’, tenant houses where multiple families live together. The destruction of the houses by the earthquake gave the opportunity to build back an own house for every family (Rosi Diaz, head of culture department).
Old sand roads are hardened by using old floors and other cement blocks. They are protected against flooding; by little cement canals next to it.

Education

The government had built an extra primary school after the disaster. The school is situated just outside the central part of the village and attracts more people to start up a living in this area. Furthermore there is just one other primary school in the area. For the secondary school the children have to travel to another municipality.
After school children can play on the formal streets, introduced by the program of Fundasal, it’s healthier for them to play on a hardened underground.

Potentiality

After the revision we wanted to summarize the experience in pro’s and cons for the possibilities of the definitive choice of the case study location(s).

Pro:
- The location is rural and the situation is isolated, there is some kilometers distance to the nearby villages, so we can see very clear all the effects of one response.
- The government and various NGO’s have had responses with a long term effect, we can research (the effect on) sustainability of the responses.

Con:
- We have not seen yet a lot of responses by the affected people, it seems to be organized mostly by NGO’s, could have been in a earlier stage of the response.
- It’s a rural village and connected with one road to the ongoing road, so we can’t do a lot of research about the effects on higher scale (the urban scale).

We have tested our GPS during our trips last week. We’ve been to the market La Tiendona and to downtown.



The tracks are clear but can be improved, for example when we are standing still the GPS makes many measurements (you can see in downtown) that distort the image. With a new configuration we proceeded testing, see the track made in Santa maria de Ostuma.


Here you see distortion during entering buildings, so we have to turn it off from now on when we’ll be under a roof. But the problems of the first tracks are solved and we will proceed testing and improving the results!

After a good night sleep in this comfortable climate, the sun rises and wakes us up for the first experience of San Salvador by day. We made plans with our hostess Carmen and Werner to visit the market, Latiendonna, to stock up on fruit and fish for the coming days. We took the bus and were immediately reminded about the upcoming elections. The FLMN planned a parade, touring through the city, and the preparations caused delays and made our bus and all other traffic take a detour. The presidential election literally colors the streets. Cars with Arena or FLMN flags hanging out cruise the streets honking their horns. Poles are painted in the colors of the Arena party and everywhere you look, you see posters with the candidates.

The market is crowded. Whole families work and shop around. All kind of food is prepared fresh and salesmen try to sell anything from phones to nail clippers. There’s fruit in abundance, for example we bought 20 little mangos weighing around two kilos for two (US) dollars.

In the spirit of duality, Arena/FLMN night/day San Salvador, we visited the shopping local shopping mall, Metrocentro. Prices are way higher then the market, comparable to Dutch supermarket prices. It’s the familiar vibe of looking at and being looked at, flirting and showing off your status, all too familiar with the Downtown cities back home. We tried to buy some local chips for our phones, which we’ll receive tomorrow. We’ll post our local numbers on the blog for direct communications with you.

During our trips, we’ve tested the GPS. The results are pretty accurate and we’re organizing our working methods to use this tool to efficiency.

This is it for today,
Please keep checking the blog and we appreciate the replies.

Friday morning it finally was our turn to fly of towards our adventure in El Salvador. The flied was pretty smooth and due to our own energy level maybe even relaxing. Every time we tried to read or watch a movie we felt asleep again. Even a little three our long screaming Salvadorian child couldn’t keep us awake on the last flight from Houston to our final destination El Salvador.

At the airport Roberto Aguilar, who is chief of promotion at Fundasal, and his daughter Maria picked us up and drove us to the city. Arriving at night is always a bit strange, no views, just some lights and dark silhouettes of buildings and landscape. You get this image in your head, and the next day it seems to be a whole different story.

Having the image of google earth fresh in mind, the city seems less organized then it looks in 2d. Even though I can investigate a map for hours this is a little more exciting.

The wife of Edin, chief of Fundasal, is waiting for us at our Hostel and gives us a warm welcome. By not speaking English she makes us clear that we have to stress learning Spanish the coming days. Although the understanding is goes pretty well, throwing the words out of your mouth seems to be a lot more difficult. We are lucky to have Werner around, who works as a translator for the moment and is the boyfriend of Carmen, who runs the guesthouse. Afterwards we sit down with down and have some conversation over a beer. The safety situation is always a topic, the police station is right a across the road and the whole neighborhood is good to go, every shop is secured by a guy with a shotgun though. But that’s giving some comfort.

Comfort we find back in the bathroom by intimately showering while the cockroaches make out. Haven’t spoke about the bar next door where the local band plays American pop songs till deep in the night.

Project plan 27 feb

View more presentations from barbara.oldebijvank. (tags: urban emergencies)