A summary of the fieldwork done in Bangkok, Thailand, working with slum communities living alongside the city's canal system, to enable the to up-grade and redevelop their settlements successfully.
Completed at University College London.
This district we worked in, the communities we visited and collaborated with, a bit of the broad context, and how we moved about.
Our Methodologies in the field, how we interacted with members of the communities, and how we collaborated with them to move forward with the settlement plans for redevelopment
Diagramming the land tensions between the communities, the government, and the private landowners along the city's canals.
Existing networks amongst the communities living along the canals, typically brought to life in the aftermath of a natural disaster such as a flood.
The potential to expand the networks to include canal communities across the whole of the city, and to utilize this network for a variety of issues, not only after floods.
Communication between members of the community, as well as between the different communities themselves, was an issue. It was stunted and not fully realized. Ideas to expand the communication and exchange of ideas were proposed. These would enable community members to know when there was a meeting to attend, become aware of proposals being made, and promote the cohesiveness that enables successful participatory development.
The existing plan of the canal community we focused on, and the community designed redevelopment plan. This plan could not move forward because not all agreed on it. There were two houses that did not want to undertake the reconstructions and adjustments this plan would require. Instead of meeting and coming up with alternatives to this plan which were agreeable to all involved, forward progress stopped and nothing was done for months.
By sitting down with all community members (both for and against the proposed redevelopment plan), we sketched out some alternatives to be considered. These ranged from a slight shift in their original proposal to accommodate the wishes of the hold-outs , to a range of slight upgrade, structural upgrade, re-construct, and leave alone, to a complete redevelopment of the community, with all houses being replaced with new construction. Envsioning all the different alternatives allowed the community to rethink their apprach to redevelopment and devise a forward thinking plan for the future.
We focused on the opportunities the communities already had existing on the ground, and how they could be expounded upon and focused to reach very attainable goals. This would in turn enable the upgrading along the canal that was so desperately needed.
Below: Renderings of the possibilities of redevelopment to get people thinking about what they could do if they were able to work together. [Illustrations not mine, but of a group member.]
