Urbanization at Pag-Asa Olongapo, City and the slum dwellers\u27 \u27right to the city

Being considered as one of the rapidly urbanizing countries in Asia, the Philippines is confronted with challenges of adjusting and finding solutions to rising demands on housing, transportation, and basic services at the quickest possible time. Failure to address such will result in the proliferation of the marginalized urban Filipino- the urban poor, the slum dwellers, and the informal settlers. Since, the 1970’s discrepancies regarding the number of informal settlers in the Philippines ranging from as low as 470,000 families to as high as 2.5 million families, remain evident. Despite these differences, figures still showcase an exponential growth in the population of the urban poor in the country.The usually stigmatized informal settlements have for many years, been a pervasive feature of the Philippine urban landscape and have become part of the popular consciousness of the Filipinos. Unfortunately, despite being considered as a large component of the urban population, informal settlements and informal settlers are increasingly sidelined and made invisible. In rare cases that they become part of an official local policy, they are “treated more as problems in the midst of cities attempting to become modern” (Lagman 2012).Pag-asa is Part of Olongapo City a lowland area located near the head of Subic Bay. In 1959, it became a city and in 1966 it became a chartered city. The rapid growth of the city is due to the presence of the United States Military Base in the second half of the 20th century. When the US evacuated, it has been developed into a special economic zone and free port. Manufacturing plants and malls were established inside the Subic bay Metropolitan Authority ( SBMA ) . The facilities created employment thus, the economic growth of the city attracted migrants. ( Olongapo.gov.ph