Segregation in Housing and Urban Forms: An Issue of Private and Public Concern

Rui Ramos,Sergio Dias Silva,Eliseu Gonçalves

doi:10.3390/socsci7090145

Abstract

The Mapping Public Housing investigation project (MdH), based at the University of Porto, Faculty of Architecture, Centre for Studies in Architecture and Urbanism, is building a database of State-subsidized residential architecture in Portugal designed between 1910 and 1974. An ongoing survey of laws directly or indirectly influencing housing construction, and of their concretization, allows for a reading of the influence of the State in housing architecture. This paper will focus on two scopes of segregation through housing design in the Portuguese 20th century, both in private initiatives—the “Ilhas”, low rent housing built in the backyards of Porto in the first half of the century—and in public investments—using the example of the “Affordable Houses”, a housing programme created by the Portuguese dictatorial regime in 1933 in which the buyers of the houses were subjected to surveillance by the State. An ongoing context of market pressure caused by speculative real estate investing and mass tourism, suggests an evolution of the original processes of segregation into systems of gentrification, transforming the cultural and social fabric.

Highlights

As is generally the case in Western European countries, at the start of the 20th century, the main urban centers in Portugal suffered a fast surge of population through demographic hikes caused by accelerated industrialization of national production
Since 2013, the Mapping Public Housing (MdH) investigation project has been developing a database of state-subsidized housing architecture in Portugal built between 1910 and 1974
We find that the stigma of urban segregation is still present in the population of some estates or as even worsened, multiplied as it was by a liberal policy of urban growth that would transform specific estate locations into desirable real estate land for investment with a view on a population with larger incomes

Summary

Introduction

As is generally the case in Western European countries, at the start of the 20th century, the main urban centers in Portugal suffered a fast surge of population through demographic hikes caused by accelerated industrialization of national production. Some of the most profound impacts of this population hike were the lack of housing and an overload on city infrastructure. With no sewage or water supply, with shared toilets, the “ilha” was made up of houses of a single room and a small façade with a door and a tiny window facing the central exterior passageway. These sets of houses were located in the back of a building where the developer lived, concealing the access and creating an urban façade for the “ilha”

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Conclusion