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The problem statement concerns the emerging phenomenon of abandoned housing. It is estimated that more than 5 million houses are standing empty throughout the country. Ciudad Juarez is an ideal case study with one of the highest levels of abandonment estimated between 25 and 30%. The reasons for this are multiple and point towards a complex mesh of forces that transgress the scope of the built environment. They encompass entangled dimensions of political economy and socio-economic developments, which only touch the built structure of actual housing at the very last stage. Major issues on the basis of abandoned housing are the drug trafficking and the resulting violence. Inhabitants experience insecurity, extortion and human rights violations due to the ongoing drug war. The government has proven to be inadequate to solve the problems, and even worsened the situation. The ongoing problematic social and economic situation is only increasing the existing poverty. Site research in Juarez furthermore revealed a city that is struggling with lack of urban planning, municipal infrastructure and an economy that is heavily dependent on global investments in the maquilla production industry, which is at present in a state of decline. In addition to poor urban planning, there is a fundamentally flawed system in the manner in which social housing is conceived, designed, produced inhabited and devaluated in Mexico. These factors create a cycle of decay and dysfunction, from which abandoned housing becomes one of many spatial consequences. The studio developed architectural counter-proposals that seek to break these cycles of urban blight and decay. The site which is used as an example expressing the issue of abandoned housing is ‘Riveras del Bravo’. The issues mentioned above all account for Riveras as well, furthermore, Riveras is experiencing more site-specific problems. Due to its isolated location, lack of civil amenities, the municipality not taking responsibility, flooding problems, open sewerage, mono-functionality resulting in lack of employment opportunities, lack of public transport and the small size of the houses. The demographic problems concern a concentration of population with low income and low education. A group strategy has been developed that seeks to reconfigure the area spatially, socially and economically in a way that disrupts the mono-functional planning and urban isolation. More specific to my research question is the need for access to health care and education. The research question concerns how a health care clinic department with educational facilities can architecturally contribute to the needs for civic amenities, which in turn might decrease the issue of abandoned housing.

The main problématique of the site -Ciudad Juarez and the graduation studio was to investigate into the various issues contributing to the emerging phenomenon of abandoned housing in Mexico. In addition to poor urban planning, there is a fundamentally flawed system in the manner in which social housing is conceived, designed, produced, inhabited and devalued in Mexico. These factors create a cycle of decay and dysfunction of which abandoned housing becomes one of the many spatial consequences. The goal of the thesis project was to come up with a strategic proposal and interventions which can provide counter or alternative proposals to the current situation of decay and allow for a socio-economic platform to develop from within the community. The project investigates into how urban agriculture or in this case peri-urban (peripheral urban) agriculture and other related programs serve as a ‘bottom-up’ strategy to tackle the ‘top-down’ issues in Juarez. A matrix with a toolbox for production and an inventory of open space explores the possibility of creating continuous productive landscapes and new urban infills from voids and forms the first step towards orgainizing the city towards the creation of productive landscapes. This not only provides food for the community but also allows for transforming the current urban landscape in Riberas Del Bravo by transforming the ‘terrain vague’ – the abandoned houses, fallow land, unused urban spaces into productive, green spaces through urban farms, community gardens, community kitchens and greenhouses. Architectural expression of the primarily utilitarian buildings which develop during the phase-wise development of the strategy take into consideration local, easily available materials and passive climate concept. The project also looks at the role of various stakeholders and urban actors involved in the various stages of the institutionalization of urban agriculture in the site.

Historical constrains and history of environmental degradation nowadays is clearly visible in fragmentation of certain urban areas and uneven distribution of wealth. Polarization is common throughout the entire city always because of economic rather than social emphasis of development . Pockets of wealth contrast with wastelands of uniformity, homogeneity, and mono-functionality, nevertheless infrastructure keeps hierarchical poly centric city structure intact, despite the fact that it mostly serves the central municipality of Santiago. New developments are mostly profit-driven and in most cases cause faster or slower gentrification, non-directly cornering the poorest to retrieve to less favorable areas. Neo-liberal economy where market deregulation, decentralization and privatization makes on of the driving concepts in the country, it distorts time and space compression map to disadvantage of the least fortunate, as 2 hour commutes become an everyday reality, and up to 30% monthly income expenditures on transportation. Uneven distribution is also evident analyzing facilities, connectivity, quality, accessibility etc., and socioeconomic segregation as an outcome of that. Quantity of houses is sacrificed over quality and integration, as of cheap land on which they are developed; despite all the pitfalls it remains rather affordable. Inadequate and structurally unsound urban structures occupy vast areas of Santiago naturally sharing quite similar issues. Social, cultural, and naturally, economic poverty because of lacking basic facilities. All in all, excellent connectivity, strategic position on metropolitan scale, lacking social cohesion and economic pressure of the surrounding projects (Bicentenary plan in the old airport, park Aguada) without a doubt are the most powerful factors leading to inevitable gentrification of the area. Even though this process brings better quality, it also causes local population to be displaced by higher income groups. Considering the history of displacement and current trends where least fortunate metropolitan dwellers relocate themselves towards the outskirts of the city – is not the goal to strive for. Improvement of the quality with a price of displacement does not solve the problem, but postpones/relocates it to somewhat different location. The project tries to envision an alternative solution that would enable the community to climb social steps hand in hand with rising pressures.

Ecatepec, Mexico City presents the challenge of uniform, low-density peri-urban sprawl in the form of privately developed gated communities for the lower income groups. The main objective of this project is to propose alternatives to low-income housing, amplifying local skills and cultural consciousness, facilitating autonomy through local production and trade, as well as creating the possibilities of political manifestation through the strengthening of communal facilities. The wasteland in between the Las Americas gated community and the dried-out Lake Caracol is zoned for industrial use as in its current condition, it is not fit for housing developments due to soil and dust pollution. The proposal is to improve the environmental condition by making the 900 ha former lake productive through water-based agriculture with related processing facilities along its border. The proposed agricultural model is based on chinampas, a pre-Hispanic agricultural system with productive fields within a large body of water, which is still practiced in contemporary Mexico City. This will allow to urbanize the wasteland in order to propose an alternative model for urbanization with 14 000 units, approximately the same as Las Americas. The aim of the architectural design proposal is to develop a new model for urbanization that will counter previously mentioned urban problematics, based on higher urban density, meaning not only volumetric built density, but also mixed functions, less open space and rather more usable public space which will ultimately lead to an increase in density of social relations. Specifically, housing typologies will be developed that relate closely to the production and processing project mentioned above as well as other small-scale commercial activities. Seeing the low density and the mono-functionality of Las Americas, densification and introduction of new planned land uses within its suburban fabric becomes a key strategy. As the priority given to cars is what provides this low density, the proposal is to invade excessive public space of roads through the addition of housing as well as commercial functions. The final objective is to link the existing suburban fabric to the new mid-high density urban development that is proposed above.

The main problematic of the study area -the neighborhood of La Victoria in Santiago de Chile- in spite of its many positive characteristics- is facing social-spatial segregation and fragmentation. Instead of proposing an urban design intervention project for the area a series of alternative strategic planning instruments are proposed that have been specifically designed for the urban situation of La Victoria and its immediate surroundings, that are to be implemented on the decision-making levels of urban and spatial policy. One of the most interesting elements in the Master thesis is the integration of all the involved parties: from the state and politics on all scales to the local inhabitants, who adopt a highly pro-active and participatory role within the decision-making processes, the implementation of specific urban interventions, and the maintenance of the built and social environments. The project aims at changing existing power-relations into more inclusive, integrative formations capable of producing a sustainable transformation. The contribution to the field of strategic urban and spatial planning is that it proposes alternatives to the conventional ‘top-down’ approaches to social housing in developing urban areas and if developed further- may be promising at the level of actual implementation.

The project's aim is the implementation of urban, architectonic and social strategies for mutual improvements of neighborhoods in Santiago de Chile.

The main problématique of the site -Ciudad Juarez and the graduation studio was to investigate into the various issues contributing to the emerging phenomenon of abandoned housing in Mexico. In addition to poor urban planning, there is a fundamentally flawed system in the manner in which social housing is conceived, designed, produced, inhabited and devalued in Mexico. These factors create a cycle of decay and dysfunction of which abandoned housing becomes one of the many spatial consequences. The goal of the thesis project was to come up with a strategic proposal and interventions which can provide counter or alternative proposals to the current situation of decay and allow for a socio-economic platform to develop from within the community. The project investigates into how urban agriculture or in this case peri-urban (peripheral urban) agriculture and other related programs serve as a ‘bottom-up’ strategy to tackle the ‘top-down’ issues in Juarez. A matrix with a toolbox for production and an inventory of open space explores the possibility of creating continuous productive landscapes and new urban infills from voids and forms the first step towards orgainizing the city towards the creation of productive landscapes. This not only provides food for the community but also allows for transforming the current urban landscape in Riberas Del Bravo by transforming the ‘terrain vague’ – the abandoned houses, fallow land, unused urban spaces into productive, green spaces through urban farms, community gardens, community kitchens and greenhouses. Architectural expression of the primarily utilitarian buildings which develop during the phase-wise development of the strategy take into consideration local, easily available materials and passive climate concepts. The project also investigates into the role of various stakeholders and urban actors involved in the various stages of the institutionalization of urban agriculture in Ciudad Juarez to develop a multi-stakeholder platform for implementation of urban agriculture.

Organisation “Material Bank” acts as a mediating organisation between individual inhabitants or their groups; outside (non Riberas) sources, other projects inside the strategy, local workers and producers, becoming a point of exchange of materials, labor, information and money. Developing over time from scrap buying and information point to manufacture facility, producing prefabricated units for housing extension, organization works on local labor power, it uses locally produced and collected materials, combining social and economic aspects in tackling constructional and architectural flaws of Riberas del Bravo and offering an alternative to existing social housing system. Construction of the building is implemented in stages, from an information wall to facility where production of prefabricated housing extensions takes place and main storage spaces are located. The building should be able to be transformed into housing over time enabling alternative understanding of social housing to appear.

This project is based on the research of the Studio which looked at the phenomenon of abandoned housing in Mexico, focusing on the Border City of Juarez where there is the highest percentage of vacated, foreclosed, abandoned and vandalized (social) housing. The main problems was identified as the flawed process of housing production and distribution, its emphasis on ownership alone, and lack government accountability as well as lack of effective structures of governance in neighborhood scale. The researches lead to a collective strategy to focus on the “Riberas Del Bravo” District as a prototype and address the cycle of decay creating and feeding the abandoned housing phenomenon (social decay, economic decay, urban/physical decay) The urban plan for this prototype site consists of several startup project both architectural and infrastructural. The urban strategy for the Area was devised in 3 main phases of enhanceing and empowering communities, Densification (along with de-densification and agricultural production) and formalization. This project is located on the border of the proposed de-densified area with the densified area. Within the Urban plan this project is a secondary and higher education facility which addresses the need for secondary educational facilities as we figured out through the urban design and as pointed out by the PDU (municipal development plan). The school is meant to function as a “Community managed School” which in the later stages also functions as a community center. The Vocational Training aspect of the facility is developed at the same time as the infrastructural projects in the Urban Plan in order to train a portion of the unemployed in Riberas del Bravo for participation in the other development projects such as the Material bank, the water infrastructure and agriculture.

Alternative urban development strategy for Newark, N.J.

Graduation thesis investigating the interrelation between water infrastructure, landscape and public space in Ciudad Juarez, Mexico. The project was developed as part of the DSD Urban Asymmetries Ciudad Juarez Studio.

Met als bijlage: A0 poster. Graduation project combined with the mapping methode. The form of the project is based on the combinations of the perspectives and textures of the city.

The project is an attempt to counteract the current neoliberal developments within the city, by strengthening the local means of production in strong relation to housing and education. Making use of the wastelands within the city and transforming them into productive areas.

Ecatepec, Mexico city. Through the analysis of the water process the WTN will be able to effects social and built environment.

Through the history, architecture, urbanism and production of space in general have always been a reflection of the political economic and socio-cultural processes of the society where they occurred. Therefore architects and planners have been consciously or unconsciously related with dominant modes of production and political powers, by executing spatial programs of their clients. Architecture has rarely taken political initiative itself, except of some points in the history, (beginning of the 20th century) when avant-garde political projects and progressive art and architecture movements worked in a close collaboration to imagine different worlds. Today, in the post political condition, the urgent necessity emerges of rethinking the way space is produced and the role of urbanists, planners and architects in the society.

A project about the processes and conditions that produce uneven and asymmetrical development in contemporary urban environment. Case study: Socioeconomic and spatial integration strategies for La Victoria, Santiago de Chile. A public space network -enhancing endogenous development- that can encourage the permeation of borders around La Victoria.

The conditions of uneven asymmetrical development in Santiago de Chile are explored through the concept of urban thresholds: the divide between the neighbourhoods of La Victoria and San Joaquin, the transition between public and private space, a collaboration between autoconstruction and controlled development, and the boundary between appropriated and designed space. An architectural response is proposed on the transition between these conditions, which addresses each aforementioned quality.

Essential part of the research process, since the beginning of this studio, was a thorough investigation and documentation, covering both wider and specific social, economic, urban and architectural aspects. Positioning a common ground for understanding and explaining the complex social issues taking place on a city on the edge such as Ciudad Juarez was the conceptual and methodological base for moving into a specific site design. Analyzing the various issues, on many different levels, and focusing on their economic and social side effects as expressed in the build environment, made clear the need for addressing these issues (at least their most evident parts) into the very core; the everyday life of the inhabitants, the dwelling model in which they formulate the narration of their existence. With the intention of amplifying the everyday experience of residents, we aimed in a versatile model, able to introduce variations in labor, public and inhabitance space, setting the ground for a gradual transformation of a passive inhabitant to an energetic agent.

The Urban Asymmetries studio is an intensive, theoretically and empirically driven research and design studio that aims at the understanding of Neo-Liberal processes and conditions that produce uneven developements in contemporary urban environments. This urban-architectural landscape project is situated in the notorious (barrio) neighbourhood La Victoria in Santiago de Chile. Collectively four strategies have been developed to tackle the problems of asymmetrical development. Individually a multifunctional park has been designed which will operate as an area of green stitching (healing/buffering) by improving the quality of site, by initiating a process of permeation an integration on neighbourhood/ municipal scale; in such way protecting La Victoria's heritage and inhabitants against future metropolitan development projects.