Laura Bliss & Aarian Marshall ~ How High-Tech Maps Could Help Urban Slums Plan Better Streets

In slums, buildings are often so densely packed that many are cut off from streets and pathways. This creates a literal roadblock to much-needed public resources.

“In South Africa, governments will often say that informal settlements are too dense to install adequate services,” Charlton Ziervogel, deputy director at the Communities Organization Resource Centre, a Cape Town-based slum advocacy and support NGO, tells CityLab. “So you’ll find municipalities that install toilets, but only at the edge of a settlement, because they perceive that there is no space inside.”

It’s a serious matter. Across the global south, hundreds of millions live in slums lacking piped water, proper drainage, and sanitation—ideal breeding grounds for virus-carrying insects and other types of disease. To fight epidemics such as Zika, experts warn, living conditions for the urban poor must be improved. But to do so, many slum communities first need to open up space.

Read more: http://www.citylab.com//high-tech-map

You May Also Like

Redesigning Cities Could Solve Our Biggest Problems. But We're Hardly Talking About Them.

Jordan Heller ~ One Of America’s Poorest Cities Has A Radical Plan To Remake Itself

Rebecca Dalzell ~ A City To Grow Into

Anna Kučírková ~ Millions Face The Life-Threatening Dangers Of Poor Sanitation

Susan Parnell ~ Urban Planet

Maeve McClenaghan ~ A Hundred Homeless People Have Died Since October But No-One Is Asking Why

Comments