Okay, I'm not walking up a 39-story building.

Two interesting articles on Land and Home- and maybe the relationship between the two.

- The Urban Think Tank, an architecture practice based in Caracas with strong ties to the US, focuses on ways to build up slums/barrios. The approach is interesting as they aren't trying to rid cities of slums, but rather figuring out ways to enable communities to better them. (For everyone doing the cringe right now, just keep reading!) By "respecting" the growth and need for barrios they have developed various projects, arguing that slums present a would-be-standard model of living and instead of being destroyed should be improved. Recently they helped develop the Metro Cable system, a cable car system that connects barrio communities to the Caracas subway. Pretty awesome considering the alternative would be an unwieldy thirty minute climb equivalent to walking as high as a 39-story building.

True, slums are usually seen as an unwelcome byproduct of various events and the product of poor governing. However UTT argues, it gives communities a chance to proactively create their own homes and thus bear responsibility for them.

I like the idea of improving slums versus cutting them down- in the past that has just led to displacement of entire communities who inevitably will have to go and build housing elsewhere as the people who get rid of the slums rarely build apartments in their place. But I got a little squeamish when the architects seem to dismiss issues of safety:

" John Mutter, Director of Graduate Studies in Sustainable Development at Columbia University, says there is not enough focus devoted to safety in settings like Venezuela's barrios. "Earthquakes kill people because buildings collapse," he points out. The tragedy in Haiti illustrates this risk. The aftermath of natural disasters in rapidly urbanized areas makes most professionals shake their heads and point to poor planning and policy, but Mutter [The architect in question] considers this a typical "outsider" perspective, one that runs contrary to the trend in development toward empowering locals. "

-Awesome post from Tales From The Hood (Swoon!) about the fundamental importance of land to people and its place in sustainable aid/development work. Brings up issues of refugee/IDP camps and that whole can of worms.