Aqeel Bilgrami, president of Pakistan's Institute of Architects, emphasizes pre-fab is a "ridiculous notion" for long term rebuilding, and asserts four typologies of housing reconstruction in a 'do-it-yourself shelter guide' that is being handed out to victims. He believes that getting people directly involved will not only give them skills and technology, but is a crucial step to completing the monumental task of rehousing 3 million homeless people in the region. go figure. ips
3 Comments
Good on Aqeel!
This is about self-empowering communities and utilizing local materials while implementing earthquake mitigation.
I will post about the AFH response late next week... hint. it's very much along the lines of this article (and mentions a couple of our potential partners).
What about the next comp: rethinking tent city? when is that happening?
the future depends on encouraging and creating new models of self-mobilization (even in general), where in lots of scenarios (maybe even most in the future) the people will naturally take the lead (or will even be expected to), and it will be up to the government to follow and asist (and boy will that be hard for the US Military to swalllow), and the architect to recognize a role as a sort of builder-interpreter rather than the sole solution provider.
so many architects i talk to just want to get over there with their plans, test them out and do some good. but it's about the people enabling their own plans, showing them the tools and resources at their disposal for doin' that.
anyway, as usual, i pretend like i know what i'm talking about. but designers should be rethinking their approach to disaster relief. that's my $.015c
AFH-Boston is doing a earthquake resistant housing call for ideas and Rethinking Tent City will launch in the summer of '06 (and you are dead on about the point of RTC).
In the spring we are doing a project for the gulf states... more on that next week...
I'm sending you an email in 15min. which is going out to all our Pakistan collaborators...
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