Growing Future Haiti: Integrating emergent spatial demands into a community-supportive Post-disaster development strategy

After the 2010 earthquake in Haiti, the world attention shifted towards the country. The event offer the unique opportunity to redesign the post-disaster redevelopment strategy of the informal settlement, housing the large portion of the urban poor population in the devastated capital of Port-au-Prince. This thesis aims at the formulation of a development strategy for the informal settlements in Port-au-Prince. The problems of lack of basic facilities, informal development and a lack of governmental support create the underdeveloped conditions the communities are living in. Helping to overcome these problems enables a potential development of these areas. The strategy developed provides the opportunity to empower the community in the formation of a local development vision in cooperation with other stakeholders. In the light of the local development framework, the development of single communities can be brought together, strengthening the output of the process. The development of the settlement itself focuses on the enabling of urban agriculture. The need for water, fertilizer and productive grounds offer the possibility to link the basic development (sanitation, water management, etc) together. The combined program creates links that can be implemented into the urban environment thereby structuring the settlement. The strategy has been tested in the community of Tisous, one of the many informal settlements inside Port-au-Prince. Located in the western fringe of the city, the community need to be developed. Not just to overcome the current underdeveloped state it is in, but even more so to prepare itself for future developments and disastersUrban emergencies/ Complex citiesUrbanismArchitectur