Water as Agent restoring communities displaced by war
infrastructure | gulu , uganda by erica bright
water displacement community structure sustainability
The impact of war on cities conjures up images of smouldering city fabric and buildings in ruins. A longer- lasting impact is the temporary settlements that emerge to provide shelter for those displaced by the war. Dis- placement disorients and uproots people, plunging them into chaos without familiar support systems. In Africa last year, ongoing conflict continued to internally dis- place 11.6 million people. 1 Two decades of rebel warfare uprooted almost two million people in northern Uganda. Gulu, its second largest city, more than tripled in size as 100,000 displaced people flooded urban displacement camps. For many of these people, the war has irreversibly severed their relationships to their land and community. Because of this it is estimated that over half the displaced people will remain permanently in the squalid camps, in an unsustainable relationship with their surroundings, placing considerable stress on urban systems and infra- structure. There is a crucial need to integrate these dis- placed people into the social and economic fabric of the city through permanent settlement.
above: a congested internally displaced persons camp in Northern Uganda below: ‘Industrial Area’ (enclosed by a dotted line ) on the map of Gulu is a displaced persons camp, the site for this incremental design strategy proposal
On Site review 22: WAR
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