Maia: Participatory Project in Disadvantaged Communities in the Promotion of New Public Housing Developments

The main aim of the project is to develop a participatory process under the 1st Right Programme to Support Access to Housing, corresponding to the promotion of new social housing developments in Maia with a view to rehousing and improving the living conditions of disadvantaged communities living in the precarious areas of Anta (Castêlo da Maia), Ardegães (Águas Santas) and Lagielas (Vila Nova da Telha),

The aim is to build participatory processes for designing housing solutions that involve the households to be rehoused in a community context, in the same location or in other nearby locations, including the organisation of training and integration actions aimed at residents and other trainees, and the joint preparation of technical architectural projects corresponding to new housing developments for these communities.

The methodology focuses on three complementary dimensions:  

• Participatory design process: which aims to involve families and technical teams in a close working relationship to incorporate family preferences into architectural solutions. 

• Technical process: encompassing the response to all the design, financing, project execution, contracting and construction procedures.

• Capacity building: combining different types of knowledge by integrating academic training and local learning.

In this way, this project seeks to demonstrate that public housing, developed through the construction of a participatory and co-creation process with these communities, makes it possible to simultaneously involve and empower their usually excluded and precarious members, but also to promote the social diversity of the wider society, contributing to the deconstruction of stigmas and prejudices, promoting social interaction and spatial integration. The entire project is subject to evaluation and monitoring, under the terms defined in the cooperation contract, and the respective processes are therefore ongoing.

Considering the work already done, we are certain that the experience is absolutely decisive for the social integration of the disadvantaged communities covered, assuming precisely that architecture can and should be a bridge to social and cultural evolution, as well as to an effective medium and long-term, more holistic response.

• https://ceau.arq.up.pt/pt/research/projects/habitacao-participada-na-maia-anta-lagielas-e-ardegaes