Uploaded on 2020-08-06 by Laura Martinez

The photo I uploaded is the southeast of Caracas. It was taken from my apartment (Floor 23) and as you can see we have three main building typologies: single-family houses (below), multifamily houses (left) and informal houses (above). Venezuela is a developing country with an urbanization index so high that the city is not prepared to meet the demand for housing in the city and therefore more than 50% of the population lives in informal housing as shown in the photo. On the other hand, between the 50s and 80s most of the large-scale buildings in the city were built imitating the international modernity of the time: large-scale buildings, highways, new developments, which meant a great importation of construction materials such as concrete , steel, aluminum deteriorating the national economy. Thus, the new population that migrates to the city, due to housing shortages and high construction costs, builds their home with more economical materials such as clay bricks, wood, mud, building buildings up to 5 stories high. So if the more disadvantaged and less-well-off informal population can adopt more sustainable ways of building, why can't the formal city do the same?