CITIES TO BE TAMED? Standards and alternatives in the transformation of the urban South SECTION 1 PLACES OF INFORMALITY by Planum. The Journal of Urbanism ISSN 1723-0993 | n. 26, vol.1/2013 Proceedings published in January 2013 CONFERENCE PROMOTERS Spazicontesi/Contestedspaces Francesco Chiodelli Beatrice De Carli Maddalena Falletti Lina Scavuzzo SCIENTIFIC COMMITTEE Alessandro Balducci, Politecnico di Milano, Italy Camillo Boano, University College London, UK Bruno De Meulder, University of Leuven, Belgium Jorge Fiori, AA School of Architecture, UK Nabeel Hamdi, Oxford Brookes University, UK Agostino Petrillo, Politecnico di Milano, Italy Antonio Tosi, Politecnico di Milano, Italy KEYNOTE SPEAKERS Bruno De Meulder, University of Leuven, Belgium Nabeel Hamdi, Oxford Brookes University, UK Erez Tzfadia, Sapir College, Israel with the support of DiAP - Department of Architecture and Planning and School of Architecture and Society, Politecnico di Milano in collaboration with Laboratory of International Cooperation, DiAP, Politecnico di Milano These Proceedings include the papers accepted for presentation at the Conference ‘CITIES TO BE TAMED? Standards and alternatives in the transformation of the urban South’ held in Milan, Politecnico di Milano, on November 15 to 17, 2012. Only the Authors who were regularly registered for the Conference and agreed to publish their contributions were included in the Proceedings. For further information on the Conference programme and a complete list of speakers and presentations, please visit www.contestedspaces.info. Proceedings edited by Spazicontesi/Contestedspaces. CONTACT www.contestedspaces.info [email protected] © Copyright 2013 Planum. The Journal of Urbanism Via Bonardi 9, 20133 Milan, Italy Registered by the Court of Rome on 4/12/2001 under the number 524-2001 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic mechanical, photocopying, recording or other wise, without the prior written permission of Planum. The Journal of Urbanism. Contents Section 1. Places of informality Practices Chair: Maddalena Falletti. Discussant: Nabeel Hamdi, Oxford Brookes University The Transnational Dimension of Contemporary Urban Landscape in Morocco Alice Buoli Pragmatic Planning. Extending Water and Electricity Networks in Irregular Settlements of Lima, Peru Laure Criqui Lessons From ‘The Other Side’. Post-colonial Ideals and Everyday Inhabitation in the Michenzani Blocks, Zanzibar Annelies De Nijs Collective Activity as a Traditional Knowledge behind the Physical Design. The case of Urban Kampungs in Indonesia Adiyanti SutandyoBuchholz Policies Chair: Lina Scavuzzo. Discussants: Colin Marx, University College London, and Agostino Petrillo, Politecnico di Milano The Mischievous City. The Kolkata poor and the outsmarting of Neoliberal Urbanisation Antarin Chakrabarty (Ir)rational U(dys)topias? Sites and Services in Nairobi Bruce Githua Re-envisioning Informal Settlements and HIV and Aids Together Colin Marx (Re)designing Land Tenure to Meet Housing Needs of theUrban poor. Implementing Community Land Trusts in Kenya Emmanuel Midheme Informal Growth of Housing in Belgrade under the Impact of Transition to Global Economy Sanja Simeunčević Radulović, Biserka Mitrović, Miodrag Ralevic, Mladen Ðurović Design principles Chair: Beatrice De Carli. Discussants: Camillo Boano, University College London; Viviana D’Auria , University of Leuven Visioning How Small Scale Projects Could Be Strategically Extended to Large Scale Long Term Interventions. A Lesson from Uganda Elena Archipovaite Socio-spatial Patterns: The Backbone of Informal Settlement Regeneration Carmen Mendoza Arroyo The Power of the Informal Settlements: the Case of Dar es Salaam Maria Isabel Rasmussen Context in Urbanism. Addressing the Intrinsic Aspirations for Strategic Urban Design in Small Cities in Bangladesh A.K.M. Sirajuddin Using Parametrics to Facilitate Collaborative Urban Design. An Attempt to Overcome some Inherent Dilemmas Nicolai Steinø, Karima Benbih, Esben Obeling Development Aspects of Formal and Informal Urban Types Dick Urban Vestbro Abstract Section 1 As a growing number of regions are presently embroiled in the process of urbanisation, informal settlements develop unabated in the territories of the ‘global South’. In the last fi fty years, design-related disciplines have informed a multitude of practices and conceptual frameworks exploring ways to qualitatively transform these sites. An enduring and highly disputed problem, however, has remained the diffi culty in assessing within which processes, and to which extent, the production of design strategies can acquire agency and have signifi cant leverage effects within the informal sectors of contemporary cities – thus effectively contributing toward the feasible amelioration of living conditions for their inhabitants. What role do design-related disciplines currently play, in relation to the self-produced transformative logics that shape informal cities across the world? What place might be accorded to design products and processes, at the crossroad between the social and spatial dimensions of urban poverty and inequality? Under which conditions and at which scales can design have a strategic function, and contribute to producing structural modifi cations on the longer term? The Transnational Dimension of 1 Contemporary Urban Landscape in Morocco Alice Buoli2 The paper intends to provide a critical overview of contemporary urban landscape in Morocco from a transnational perspective, by addressing: (a) the role of the State and international investors in the current governmental development programs and mega-projects; (b) their effects on local communities (processes of urban renewal involving informal settlements); (c) bottom-up transnational practices and flows (of people, remittances, goods) affecting the micro-urban transformations (e.g. the appropriation of colonial leftovers). The transnational dimension is the interpretative ‘lens’ through which these issues will be addressed. A historical and trans-scalar approach is assumed: from a general overview of the Euro-Mediterranean borders and the Spanish-Moroccan region, to a brief touch on to some specific urban contexts. What emerges, as a possible conclusion, is a complex system of different levels of 'negotiation', involving various geographical contexts and a larger network of actors. Keywords: Transnational processes, Euro-Mediterranean borders, Morocco, Post-colonial city, Urban landscape, Bottom-up practice. 1 This paper presents the first outcomes of a side topic of the PhD research thesis by the author (PhD program in Territorial Government and Project – DiAP, Politecnico di Milano). 2 PhD student, Department of Planning and Architecture, Politecnico di Milano (Italy). E-mail: [email protected] Introduction During the last decades, cities in the Maghreb area have assumed a decisive role, both at a local scale and in relation to the European Union (EU) neighbourhood policies (e.g. The European Neighbourhood Partnership Instrument - ENPI), as 'gateways' to the region and as main nodes of a network of economic and cultural relations within the Mediterranean (Staley 2005). Moreover, in the light of the recent political events related to the 'Arab Spring', cities seem to have gained even more relevance in the MENA (Middle East and North African) area. In this context, Morocco is playing an even more remarkable role: as an important actor involved in a border region (the Spanish-Moroccan one) and as a member of the Euro-Mediterranean Partnership (EUROMED3), it has become the 'hinge' between different political and cultural systems, as well as different economical interests4. As in other border areas, the condition of Morocco is exemplary of the intertwining of a series of different phenomena: transnational production processes, global migration movements, gender inequities, security concerns, new colonialisms. Within this dissertation, the transnational dimension is assumed as a common condition to various territorial 'materials', experiences and processes observed at different scales; at the same time, as a key- element and the interpretative tool for the comprehension of the on-going territorial and urban processes in Morocco. From this perspective, two main issues will be addressed: at an institutional level: state interventions, development mega-projects, related to the presence of international / transnational actors; at a bottom-up level: transnational practices and flows (of people, remittances, goods) affecting the micro-urban transformations, such as the forms of appropriation of public spaces and modern- colonial heritage, carried out by different populations. The aim of the paper is to ‘draft’ a possible research trail on the effects of transnational processes over territorial and urban contexts. Moroccan urban areas are assumed as exemplary cases, to look at the outcomes (both physical, social and cultural) of the complex interaction among different institutions and subjects, acting at the local scale, at the regional level (Spanish-Moroccan region, Maghreb area, Mediterranean countries) and within a global framework. To this extent, the paper will assume a multi- scalar approach in order to look at the complex relationships that involve the Moroccan territorial and urban phenomena. In order to exemplify the direct effects (from various viewpoints) of the transnational processes at stake, two