Housing Institute of the City of Buenos Aires
The Pitch
In Buenos Aires, the capital and most populous city of Argentina, the city’s Housing Institute tackled the challenge of providing safe, climate-resilient housing to informal settlements through a voluntary process, demonstrating that participatory, resilience-focused development can integrate housing security, economic opportunity and ecological preservation.
The Problem
Residents of Rodrigo Bueno were physically and socially disconnected from adjacent neighborhoods and the urban economy, with precarious housing, hazardous flood risk, multi-dimensional poverty and lack of access to basic urban services.
The Process
- Hosted routine meetings with residents, social organizations and government agencies to consider different ideas, from design to implementation and operation; information gathered at these meetings was then synthesized through the Participatory Management Board
- Offered a forum, the Technical Participatory Board, to dispel any specific doubts that neighbors may have about the process
- Allowed families to present their individual situations via Consultation Tables
- Accompanied families throughout the moving process to their new homes and organized their mortgage payments: New homes were financed with a minimum term of 20 years, in accordance with the payment capacity of each family, with fixed installments that do not exceed 20% of the family income and low interest rates
- Created an organic nursery, run by local residents, that enabled the 14 women operating the nursery to sell their harvest to local businesses
- Constructed a gastronomic patio, an area for food vendors to offer their products, for visitors of the Ecological Reserve and South Coast
- Remediated a canal that bordered the old neighborhood and constructed a flood retaining wall
The Impact
- Improved residential conditions by relocating families and demolishing old, precarious houses—allowing new streets to provide better airflow, mobility and public lighting
- Created access to ambulances, police cars and other vital urban services like water, sewage, electricity, gas and communication networks for the entire community
- Created sustainable housing: The local government constructed 611 new homes equipped with solar water heaters and public gardens
- Earned the Sustainable Housing Seal from the Argentinian national government
- Developed better public spaces: The Housing Institute created two new public squares, a children’s playground, a community kitchen, a health center, “Green Points” for waste disposal, and expanded existing green and public spaces
- Strengthened the local economy and improved residents’ financial stability: The Housing Institute built 57 commercial spaces on the ground floor of new buildings, an organic nursery and space for food vendors
- Integrated the neighborhood into the rest of the city, opening up new opportunities for work, education and socialization
- Increased climate resilience: Homes located below flood level were demolished, families were relocated and a coastal edge was built
