Rebuilding Haiti, Land Use, Density and Sprawl

 read this article this morning from an older issue of the New York Times entitled, A Plan to Spur Growth Away From Haiti’s Capital .  This article talks about a plan that was unveiled a few months ago that will rebuild Haiti by decentralizing its urban core through land use practices designed to create smaller urban and rural cores.

Based upon my American planning knowledge, the first thing I thought was how backwards does this sound? Decentralizing the city? American cities are on a rapid decline; populations in the city are decreasing while suburban populations are increasing. In Haiti, the expected growth for Port-au-Prince is targeted to hit 6,000,000 in the next 15  years. The population is expected to double from its 3,000,000 inhabitants now.

Upon further investigation, this plan is in fact very fitting giving the condition of the country and the surrounding environmental concerns:

Prepared by a group of urban planners from the Haitian government agency responsible for the country’s development, the plan is built around a bold central idea: to redistribute large parts of the population of Port-au-Prince to smaller Haitian cities, many of them at a safe distance from areas most vulnerable to natural disaster. In the process the plan would completely transform Haiti from a country dominated by a single metropolis to what the planners call a network of smaller urban “growth poles.”

As part of this plan come an array of new zoning and land-use regulations that will transform the capitol and the country, plans for a light rail system, a waterfront park in Port-au-Prince, and smaller public spaces throughout the region.

As with most plans, these ideas are great but the crucial component will be finding funding and political support in a country that is still on its knees six months later.

Minorities in Architecture and Planning

America has made great strides in equality in this country. We have more minorities than ever employed in fields that were traditionally segregated. We have more minorities in top positions in Fortune 500 companies. We even have a minority president. But does this mean that we have reached that ideal level of equality?


In the article, Blacklisted: Is failing to plan with minority architects, in fact, planning to fail?, the author discusses the lack of representation of minorities in the architecture, planning, and landscape architecture related fields. Even though it makes sense to have minority planners and developers represent their own communities that is not what is happening. Planning can be very political in nature and because of that, there exist certain barriers that are harder to overcome.

Minorities in these professions have to prove themselves worthy before they can become successful professionals. Students who attend HBCUs are faced with a different set of problems. Lack of resources, lack of professional guidance, lack of modern equipment and a host of others are all problems that are guaranteed to arise during a student's academic career at an HBCU. Tuskegee University, a program founded on the belief that architectural mastery can combat oppression, lost its accreditation.

The battle is a continuous battle to fight for architectural, planning, and development equality if there isn't a loud enough, and skilled enough collective voice within these communities.

Transferring from an HBCU Graduate Program in CREP, I experienced these same flaws and shortcomings in my program. I transferred to another institution and have seen a remarkable difference in the quality of resources given to us to work with.
My thoughts: Before we can adequately address the discrepancies in minority communities, we should address the educational foundation that is being laid for the profession.