Archinect - News

In Lagos the poorest are paying the price of progress

2013-03-05T14:00:00-05:00

The Lagos state commissioner for housing, Adedeji Olatubosun Jeje, provided a different version of events. “It’s a regeneration of a slum,” he said. “We gave enough notification. The government intends to develop 1,008 housing units. What we removed was just shanties.

Adam Nossiter covers recent slum clearance efforts led by the governor of Lagos, Babatunde Fashola. As Lagos aims to become a premier business center, the city’s poor and homeless are becoming the government’s enemy. Last week, parts of Badia East (with perhaps 10,000 residents) were demolished while last summer the floating neighborhood of Makoko (which was home to perhaps 30,000). In total activists estimate upwards of a million people have been forcibly ejected from their homes over the last 15 years.

Medellin's Outdoor Escalator Part of Plan to Remake City

2013-01-02T13:07:00-05:00

The Colombian city of Medellín was once the murder capital of the world and ground zero for Pablo Escobar’s cocaine cartel. But Medellín has lately emerged as a hotspot for urban planning and innovative mass transit. The projects are part of a long-term plan to fight poverty and remake the fortunes of the city.

Another hopeful Medellín design initiative previously featured on Archinect: Student Works: INSITU Medellin

“Working with the 99%” Wins a Future Cities Prize in Venice

2012-08-31T19:13:00-04:00

Three winning projects were announced in the Future Cities, Planning for the 90 per cent competition: ateliermob (Portugal), Municipal Housing Secretariat of São Paulo (Brazil), and Interazioni Urbane (Italy). The projects are part of the exhibition Future Cities: Planning for the 90 per cent in Venice during the 13th Architecture Biennale. Ten projects were selected for the exhibition from more than 100 participants from several countries.

Portuguese practice ateliermob presents one of the three winning projects, "Working with the 99%," a case study of the progress and community work of Lisbon's self-built PRODAC neighborhood.

Click here to see more Archinect News posts related to the 13th International Architecture Exhibition of the Venice Biennale.

We live on that knife-edge...

2012-07-31T10:16:00-04:00

He is one of the experts commissioned by the government to produce a "master plan" to overhaul the city's infrastructure. Singapore is his role model, and he favours big projects to clear slums and build bridges, roads and out-of-town settlements.

Joe Boyle visited Dar es Salaam, Tanzania one of the world's fastest growing cities. The dramatic influx has pushed the city's population up from roughly two million two decades ago to four million today, which has led to a huge growth in "informal settlements". As well as economic division in Tanzania's lop-sided economy, between a tiny super-rich elite and a vast poor majority.

Design with the Other 90%: CITIES Opening October 15 at the United Nations

2011-10-03T20:24:57-04:00

“Design with the Other 90%: Cities,” the second in a series of themed exhibitions by Smithsonian’s Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum that demonstrate how design can address the world’s most critical issues, opens October 15 at the United Nations and runs through January 9, 2012.