Confronting Challenges
Asynchronous - Online Only
Killer Smoke in the Kitchen: Indoor Air Polution View Digital Media
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session Uwe Reischl
Rural families in Kenya depend on burning biomass for cooking. These fuels consist of wood, dried dung and crop residues, all of which produce high levels of smoke. Exposure to this smoke leads to serious respiratory health problems. The persons most affected are women and their children who spent much of their time in these kitchens, but traditional African kitchens do not utilize natural ventilation principles to reduce the high indoor smoke concentrations. Scale models were used to conduct airflow tests to determine why natural ventilation principles to reduce indoor smoke concentrations were not used and to explore new design solutions that could improve indoor air quality without the use of expensive technologies. Based on the results of this study, it was determined that introducing natural ventilation into the kitchens will make the smoke conditions worse. This explains why traditional kitchens did not use windows for ventilation. However, development and implementation of a of a new design solution effectively reduced build-up inside the kitchen without requiring significant modifications to the traditional kitchen. Incorporating the new design into traditional kitchens will provide a healthier environment for the women and their children in the future.
Spatial Analysis of Households Sanitation Practices in Lagos Megacity, Nigeria View Digital Media
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session Peter Fosudo
The study spatially analyzes households’ sanitation practices in Lagos megacity Nigeria. Primary and secondary sources of data were used for this study; one hundred and seventy-two (172) questionnaires were randomly administered in the study area and analyzed using descriptive statistics such as frequency and percentage distribution and inferential statistics. The study found that a significant proportion of respondents lacked basic sanitation facilities in their households, 67.9% lacked access to water within their households, 23.8% and 44% of the households depend on unprotected dug well and local water vendors as sources of water for their households, 23.2% lack access to kitchen space, 39.9% had poor drainage. The households’ satisfaction index (HSI) on the satisfaction of the users of sanitation facilities revealed that an insignificant proportion of the households were satisfied and fairly satisfied, while a substantial proportion of the respondents were dissatisfied and highly dissatisfied about the present state of sanitation facilities which subject the environment to high level of infectious diseases. The study posits that sanitation regulations and strict enforcement must play a crucial role in ensuring good hygienic and sanitary conditions. It recommends the need for strategic implement of all existing sanitation regulations and laws, provision of more functional sanitation facilities in the urban centers.
Integrating Historical Data Coming from Flooding, Extreme Rainfalls, Droughts and Risk Atlases for Studying Climate Change in Northern Mexican Cities View Digital Media
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session Elfide Mariela Rivas Gómez, Carlos Estuardo Aparicio-Moreno
Characterizing severity, frequency and flooding extent is a key for implementing prevention measures, facing social and economic impacts associated with climate change phenomena. The objective of this paper is to analyze information on rainfall from the 18th century to the second decade of the 21st century, in the city of Durango, Mexico, through historical documentation contrasted with meteorological data. The methodology includes: floods’ historical study and hydrometeorological data observation. Historical information, as a product of documentary sources and interviews with historians, was co-linked with official sources. Among the results, a flood zone map shows 100 years return periods, describing the severity. The findings allow to characterize damages and risks associated with floods, in addition to their description, development and causes. Also, we propose some guidelines for starting this methodological process for the main metropolitan area in Northern Mexico: Monterrey. Among the conclusions, we stand out that the Natural Risks Atlases must include evidence documented in historical archives or from historians’ wisdom.
Understanding Place-cultivating through Justice in Planning and Design View Digital Media
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session Joongsub Kim
Various approaches to constructing place exist in the literature. In this paper, we explore what approach is appropriate for and beneficial to underserved communities. We used literature, case studies, interviews, and service-learning projects we conducted at our community-based studio in Detroit. The COVID-19 pandemic and racial tension in recent years have revealed various barriers to enhancing health, well-being, and quality of life for underserved populations of color. As a result, they experience various types of traumas in their built environment. In response, we investigate place cultivation as an appropriate approach to construction of place in disadvantaged communities. We aim to understand the practice of place cultivation in planning and design using social justice as an analytical framework. We identify three approaches to creating place: place-taking, place-making, and place-cultivating. We suggest that place-cultivating is a more effective way to address existing trauma in the community. We identify four elements of social justice as an analytical framework to examine place-cultivating: relevance, equity, governance, and participatory engagement. We believe that ideal place-cultivation addresses all four elements. We studied ten examples that support place-cultivating and compared them based on the social justice analytical framework. Our study outcome suggests that although the referenced cases seem to promote place-cultivating, they tend to emphasize relevance and participatory engagement over equity and governance. Our findings show more work is to be done in practice to promote equity and governance in place-cultivating to make it a more effective approach to addressing structural disparities and associated traumas in underserved communities.
