Public / Private spaces
Density
Thursday, April 16, 2009
Sobradinho
The “sobradinho” cortiço, is a house near Av. 23 de Maio that has been abandoned for almost 30 years, and something like 15 years ago they started to occupied. There´s 20 rooms there, 13 upstairs and 7 in the ground level, where live 70 people over there. They are finishing a reform now that they entered with a “usucapião” process. They connected the lights, and for that payed almost R$30.000,00. Also, they are fighting for water supply and sewage system.
It´s a in the heart of the city of São Paulo, so they have public transport, school, and hospitals for all them.
Most of the people who live there came from Pernanbuco, and most of them work in informal jobs in the center, about 90% of them are ambulantes. They have a strong sense of community and organization, since they got together to solve the cortiços problem it got a visible improvement, each resident reformed they room, which are big if compared to other cortiços, each one has a bathroom and a kitchen only for the unit. So, as they see that the place is really getting better they resolve to improve their rooms.
They have a common space that is a long corridor, where you find the unit doors, and where the kids usually play. There´s a door in the front, and each resident has a key, this door is usually open during the day and closet at night.
Interview: Ana Claudia
She is 21 years old, lives with her daughter (6 months) , her husband and a brother. It´s almost 3 years that she is living at this cortiço. She and her family are from a city called Orobó in Pernanbuco.
She came here to work, so now she´s working at a shop in the center, and so are her husband and brother. Her husband came first and it´s been 5 years that he lives in SP and in this cortiço. They came here looking for a job, and she intends to come back to Pernanbuco in 10 years, so they are saving some money to came back there and buy a house. She likes SP but said that is a city for a job, and not for family, she miss her parents in Pernanbuco.
Her little daughter stays with a neighbor when she is working, and this is the thing she likes of this cortiço, everybody is friendly and helps each other.
In Pernambuco she studied to become a teacher, and maybe when she returns there she´ll teach in some school.
They ´ve been improving their unit, and now with the little girl she has plans for the next improvements for the children safety.
She likes the place, it´s comfortable and near everything, and with the guarantee and they´re staying there more improvements will be done to let the cortiço and her house with even more self identity.
It´s a in the heart of the city of São Paulo, so they have public transport, school, and hospitals for all them.
Most of the people who live there came from Pernanbuco, and most of them work in informal jobs in the center, about 90% of them are ambulantes. They have a strong sense of community and organization, since they got together to solve the cortiços problem it got a visible improvement, each resident reformed they room, which are big if compared to other cortiços, each one has a bathroom and a kitchen only for the unit. So, as they see that the place is really getting better they resolve to improve their rooms.
They have a common space that is a long corridor, where you find the unit doors, and where the kids usually play. There´s a door in the front, and each resident has a key, this door is usually open during the day and closet at night.
Interview: Ana Claudia
She is 21 years old, lives with her daughter (6 months) , her husband and a brother. It´s almost 3 years that she is living at this cortiço. She and her family are from a city called Orobó in Pernanbuco.
She came here to work, so now she´s working at a shop in the center, and so are her husband and brother. Her husband came first and it´s been 5 years that he lives in SP and in this cortiço. They came here looking for a job, and she intends to come back to Pernanbuco in 10 years, so they are saving some money to came back there and buy a house. She likes SP but said that is a city for a job, and not for family, she miss her parents in Pernanbuco.
Her little daughter stays with a neighbor when she is working, and this is the thing she likes of this cortiço, everybody is friendly and helps each other.
In Pernambuco she studied to become a teacher, and maybe when she returns there she´ll teach in some school.
They ´ve been improving their unit, and now with the little girl she has plans for the next improvements for the children safety.
She likes the place, it´s comfortable and near everything, and with the guarantee and they´re staying there more improvements will be done to let the cortiço and her house with even more self identity.
Wednesday, April 15, 2009
Process vs. Space
Edificio Rua Solon 934
Definition Cortiço (Prof. Maria Ruth):
- squatted
- several families / units
- shared sanitary rooms
Squatters of Galpão Conde São Joaquim 140 working as clothing street vendors
Registration of squatters in community center
Self-organization and the ability of political mobilization of squatters is one of the key factors in the formalization and integration of informal settlements. Funny enough architecture in this regard (the spatial arrangement of the unit) seems almost insignificant. But an architect may function as an external advisor to help self-empowerment.
We visited the Edificio Rua Solon 934 with Prof. Maria Ruth, an unfinished appartment building that was squatted in the 70s. With the advice and contact of Maria Ruth and the consideration of professionals for a bottom-up embellishment process this building changed from a precarious high density slumlike highrise to an acceptable, cleaner and hygienic living environment for fourty families. The formal appropriation of the building is still pending juristicially, but thanks to the extensive public exposure and a 'best practice' award at the 'Urban Age' conference in December 2008 the political pressure for integration is rising.
This self-organization process is currently being initiated by some of the inhabitants at Conde São Joaquim. Partly forced through the authority, a registration of inhabitants is taking place. This might be a first step in direction of legal appropriation, but it might also fail. The municipality has other plans for this specific area.
What could be the role of the architect within this multidimensional political chessboard be? Do architects necessarily have to act more like political players confining themselves to an advisory role? It seems that these bottom-up movements and the organic growth or do-it-yourself transformation of places can deal with basic human needs in a more efficient, more flexible and especially in a more agreeable way than any planned unit. If the organic growth and transformation as a spatial process can be understood, then it might be influenced. This spatial understanding could contribute to the political game, redefining the architect as a proactive player instead of just a mediating figure.
Tuesday, April 14, 2009
Information on Cortiço in Galpão
The cortiço we visited in Liberdade, Rua de Corde São Joaquim 140, is about 6 to 10 years old, or at least that is how long the first person to have squatted it lives there.
The cortiço started out as a parking lot, a galpão to store cars, where one woman decided to settle and build a little house, all in the back of the parking lot. Later she brought her family over to join her.
The occupation of the galpão thereafter did not happen in an organised way or with any hierarchy. At first there was just one community, the family of the first lady, who all lived together using the same kitchen and washing place. But with more people entering and claiming a place, the need to subdivide the galpão grew. This subdivision happened randomly, where everybody claimed a spot of their preference, even taking up the washingroom and bathroom as their piece.
Many of these who enter new, lived in a pensão before, which is alo a kind of cortiço, but a little better equipped.
The municipality prohibits more people to settle in the galpão, but this happens nevertheless. This means that the administration of the municipality, where they numbered all the baraquas to document who lives there, is not up to date. This is a risk for the people who came later, beccause the municipality will give financial aid onlu to those whom are registered, when the inhabitants of the cortiço are to be evicted.
This help of the municipality comes down to the choice between money or a new home. When you choose money, you will get a ‘carte de credito’ for 2400R$, and then you are on your own to organise a dwelling. When you choose for a new house you will have to wait for the municipality to relocate you.
People who are by themselves, and do not form a family, are not offered the choice of money, but an exeption has been made at times for women on their own.
The cortiço is most busy during the day and in the weekend, because most inhabitants have a night job. The equipment in the cortiço does not suffice for all these people. There is onlu one shower, one toilet and one sink that serves for washing dishes as well as laundry, present.
In the morning and evening there is always a long line of people, waiting to make use of the bathroom. The bathroom they are waiting for is in abominal condition, it is said to be a nest of diseases. The mothers will not let the children go there unattended, but will rather have them go on a potty trainer in the unidade, and later dispose of it in the fossa. A fossa is a septic tank, but a rather unprofessional one, which overflows often.
These, plus the lack of privacy, are all reasons why everytime you ask people in the cortiço what they miss, a private bathroom is mentioned.
The equipment which is also in very poor condition, is the electricity network. It is selfmade and improvised, using ducktape and other inappropriate materials.
It happens now and then that the wires catch fire, and the whole cortiço is in danger of burning, but then the inhabitants rip of the wires to stop the fire from spreading.
It only rarely happens that people invest in improving their piece, sometimes they will expand their unidade by building a second floor ontop the first. Sometimes two pieces are combined to make a bigger one, and seldomly the wooden boards functioning as walls, get replaced by bricks. The reason no such investments are made often, is not necessarily the money, but the insecurity of being evicted very soon. The average time of living in one particular cortiço before moving hardly surpasses five years. The inhabitants tell that they rather save up extra moneyto get their own place, instead of investing in an insecure piece in a cortiço.
The cortiço started out as a parking lot, a galpão to store cars, where one woman decided to settle and build a little house, all in the back of the parking lot. Later she brought her family over to join her.
The occupation of the galpão thereafter did not happen in an organised way or with any hierarchy. At first there was just one community, the family of the first lady, who all lived together using the same kitchen and washing place. But with more people entering and claiming a place, the need to subdivide the galpão grew. This subdivision happened randomly, where everybody claimed a spot of their preference, even taking up the washingroom and bathroom as their piece.
Many of these who enter new, lived in a pensão before, which is alo a kind of cortiço, but a little better equipped.
The municipality prohibits more people to settle in the galpão, but this happens nevertheless. This means that the administration of the municipality, where they numbered all the baraquas to document who lives there, is not up to date. This is a risk for the people who came later, beccause the municipality will give financial aid onlu to those whom are registered, when the inhabitants of the cortiço are to be evicted.
This help of the municipality comes down to the choice between money or a new home. When you choose money, you will get a ‘carte de credito’ for 2400R$, and then you are on your own to organise a dwelling. When you choose for a new house you will have to wait for the municipality to relocate you.
People who are by themselves, and do not form a family, are not offered the choice of money, but an exeption has been made at times for women on their own.
The cortiço is most busy during the day and in the weekend, because most inhabitants have a night job. The equipment in the cortiço does not suffice for all these people. There is onlu one shower, one toilet and one sink that serves for washing dishes as well as laundry, present.
In the morning and evening there is always a long line of people, waiting to make use of the bathroom. The bathroom they are waiting for is in abominal condition, it is said to be a nest of diseases. The mothers will not let the children go there unattended, but will rather have them go on a potty trainer in the unidade, and later dispose of it in the fossa. A fossa is a septic tank, but a rather unprofessional one, which overflows often.
These, plus the lack of privacy, are all reasons why everytime you ask people in the cortiço what they miss, a private bathroom is mentioned.
The equipment which is also in very poor condition, is the electricity network. It is selfmade and improvised, using ducktape and other inappropriate materials.
It happens now and then that the wires catch fire, and the whole cortiço is in danger of burning, but then the inhabitants rip of the wires to stop the fire from spreading.
It only rarely happens that people invest in improving their piece, sometimes they will expand their unidade by building a second floor ontop the first. Sometimes two pieces are combined to make a bigger one, and seldomly the wooden boards functioning as walls, get replaced by bricks. The reason no such investments are made often, is not necessarily the money, but the insecurity of being evicted very soon. The average time of living in one particular cortiço before moving hardly surpasses five years. The inhabitants tell that they rather save up extra moneyto get their own place, instead of investing in an insecure piece in a cortiço.
one resident of the cortiço...
Maria Helena dos Santos
Lives in the cortiço for 4 years, before that she used to live in other cortiço with her husband and 4 children. The municipality gave the family an apartment, where the older daughter now lives with her husband and children. So Maria Helena moved to this cortiço, but first she had to buy the place that was R$300,00, and then she moved with her husband and children.
The older son called Jeferson works in a factory mostly in the nights, and her husband works during the day, so she does the laundry, takes the kids to school, sometimes she collects some cans in the street to sell it.
The thing that most bothers her is the only one bathroom for all of the people who live in the cortiço, in the morning and at night, people make a line to use it. Her kids most of the time don´t use it alone because of the dirt and the diseases, the sewer goes to a septic (not so septic) that sometimes overflows.
The sink where they do the laundry is the same one they use to do the dishes. Other problem that really worries her is the electric network that sometimes catch a fire, and they have to be fast to stop it, before it gets worse.
She is saving money to someday buy a better place to live, but if she had the opportunity she would buy a new refrigerator, a washing machine and a closet.
The most interesting things that she showed was a little plant, she said that was the thing that represent her better, and she would like to have a lot of plants, but because of the space and the children she doesn´t have that.
Lives in the cortiço for 4 years, before that she used to live in other cortiço with her husband and 4 children. The municipality gave the family an apartment, where the older daughter now lives with her husband and children. So Maria Helena moved to this cortiço, but first she had to buy the place that was R$300,00, and then she moved with her husband and children.
The older son called Jeferson works in a factory mostly in the nights, and her husband works during the day, so she does the laundry, takes the kids to school, sometimes she collects some cans in the street to sell it.
The thing that most bothers her is the only one bathroom for all of the people who live in the cortiço, in the morning and at night, people make a line to use it. Her kids most of the time don´t use it alone because of the dirt and the diseases, the sewer goes to a septic (not so septic) that sometimes overflows.
The sink where they do the laundry is the same one they use to do the dishes. Other problem that really worries her is the electric network that sometimes catch a fire, and they have to be fast to stop it, before it gets worse.
She is saving money to someday buy a better place to live, but if she had the opportunity she would buy a new refrigerator, a washing machine and a closet.
The most interesting things that she showed was a little plant, she said that was the thing that represent her better, and she would like to have a lot of plants, but because of the space and the children she doesn´t have that.
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