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A plan for building small homes in Haiti
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Andres Duany, principal and co-founder of planning firm Duany Plater-Zyberk & Co.
TEXT OF INTERVIEW
BOB MOON: More than a million Haitians are still without homes since the massive earthquake that ripped apart that country last month. Many are living in tents, but the rainy season is coming in May and hurricanes may follow. Today the Miami-based company InnoVida offered up a solution: small homes made of fiber composite panels. That's the hard stuff you've seen on airplanes around the interior walls and windows.
Herb Margolis is the CEO of U.S. operations.
HERB MARGOLIS: The 787 Dreamliner fuselage is made from composite materials. Bulkheads are made from composite materials. These things fly at 40,000 feet at 600, 700 miles an hour or what have you. The stresses are incredible.
The company's pledged to build 1,000 homes and hopes to have a $15 million manufacturing facility in Haiti by year's end.
Miami-based architect Andres Duany of the firm DPZ helped build cottages in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina. And now he's helping InnoVida design homes for Haiti. Mr. Duany, welcome to the program.
ANDRES DUANY: Thank you.
MOON: So I'm trying to envision exactly what this might look like. Can you describe these homes for us?
DUANY: Well, they're rectangular, they're 8-feet high and 8-feet wide, and they have a very large opening with a flap that opens up into a porch. So basically the house itself contains the bathroom, the kitchen, or the toilet, two bedrooms with eight beds, and they can paint it any color, they can add on to it. They can use it as a basic structure onto which to basically scab on additional rooms and materials. But I think it's something they would recognize as the kinds of place they live in.
MOON: What are the challenges you all face getting these homes built in terms of terrain and manpower and that sort of thing?
DUANY: Well the manpower is available. Haitians are well-known to be hardworking. I think the challenge is there isn't one terrain. There's flat land, there's rolling land, and there are hillsides. But the single greatest challenge is how to get rid of waste, because they don't have much water. And so you can't flush a toilet, you see. And so what we've developed or at least discovered is some very high-tech material, specifically a kind of plastic bag that is made in Sweden that you use, you seal, you know, you tie it up and in three weeks it's compost, it's usable compost. So what we have going here is a combination of very low tech, you know, no glass, no air conditioning, barely running water and very high tech.
MOON: Those images of the shanty towns down there have been really striking. Can these types of homes be sustainable in the long run?
DUANY: OK, well, that's a question, that's an interesting question. If one only provides the technical solution, which the U.N. has been doing for decades, and you study what the outcome is five years out, for example, in a book called, by Ian Davis, called "Resilient Cities." And he says, if you don't fit the culture, people will inhabit the buildings at first, because they do need the shelter, but then they'll trash them and abandon them. Even within the category called the poor in Haiti, there at least four classes, and they behave differently. Some of them eat outside, some of them eat indoors, some of them eat in front of the house, some of them cook and eat in the back of the house, some of them have windows, and some of them don't want windows because they believe the spirits enter through the windows. All these things because they're contradictory have caused us to design not one but four different houses.
MOON: Now a 1,000 shelters is a wonderful gift, but it's clearly not enough to serve the needs of so many Haitian homeless right now. What else needs to be done and how long is it going to take to provide enough shelter for all those people?
DUANY: Well, first of all, when you think of 1,000 shelters, and you think of it in terms of an American dwelling unit, that's not that much. But remember that each of our dwellings houses eight, so 1,000 shelters is 8,000 people, OK? That's a big hit. What I suggest is that everybody who has an idea, you know, there are so many clever ways to build that are fast and cheap, and so forth, I suggest that everybody have a go, because ours are dependent on donations. We can't promise more than a 1,000. That's the reality and many others have to step in.
MOON: Andres Duany is with the Miami architectural firm DPZ. Thank you very much, and good luck to you, sir.
DUANY: Thank you.
There's nothing better than steel shipping containers for housing in hurricane and earthquake areas. Sections can easily be transported to prepared sites by helicopters. Bob Vila has the talent and know -how to help Haitians rebuild a potential paradise. Bob knows housing from A-Z and has connections.
I read with interest all the comments here.
I agree, to some degree, with all of you.
I think any housing is good housing at this point.
Shipping containers, composite whatever – the more the merrier.
I also believe it should be very grassroots development and that the effort must come from the heart and have the peoples best interest at heart.
That interest would mandate that most construction should be done in Haiti by Haitians with as much Haitian produced materials as possible.
A steel recycling plant to process all the wrecked cars and steel debris in the country should be one of the first priorities. That scrap should be turned into rebar. No buildings should go up that is not engineered to specifications required to make them safe. This is not rocket science nor that much more expensive!
I have been designing a home for a client here in Oklahoma that specified concrete as being the basic material for the entire structure with a steel second floor system and a steel roof system with tin. There is no wood involved. It will never rot, is insect proof, fireproof and would withstand (in my opinion) an Oklahoma tornado.
The thought has come to me that a scaled down version of this would be a perfect fit for Haiti or now Chile or for that matter anywhere they had lots of concrete and needed thermally efficient, low cost, strong and sustainable “green†housing. The concrete is to be lightweight cellular concrete for thermal efficiency and savings on concrete and foundation costs. The cellular concrete will be mixed on site with a foam generator producing the foaming agent to aerate the concrete. This may sound complicated but I am assured by experts it is quite simple and way cheaper than standard concrete.
This would be a very simple and easy to construct building. The steel frame could be prefabricated in a welding shop and assembled on a footer. It would require a welder on site to tack the frame together. Once the steel frame was up anything at hand could be used to sheet the walls. Tin would be needed for the roof if possible or...? When it was possible the walls could be poured around the steel frame creating a super insulated shell for the home. The roof should also be poured with cellular concrete for insulation. There are ways to actually build all the furniture and cabinets with concrete but that is another story. This building system would maximize using Haitian labor and materials.
My question is what would be an adequate square footage for a “starter†home suitable for people to get in out of the rain? With the understanding that additions could be made easily. Maybe even pour the footer to accommodate at least one addition?
The answer to the sewage problem you are talking about is easily solved. Construct composting toilets for every home. Research will show that this technology is inexpensive, low technology that works. Don't take my word for it there is lots of information out there.
It sounds like there is a lot of knowledge about Haiti on this site.
I would greatly appreciate any input.
You can see what I am working on at: http://www.greenearthstructures.com/rebuildinghaitigreen.html
I look forward to hearing any opinions about my dream.
If you think it sounds interesting I would appreciate any pointers to where I should try to get this from paper to reality. ASAP!
Hey Guys, Mr. Rachna said it about the "plastic bag" thing. Now, let's get serious, Haiti has a cement plant already working, Haiti has aggregate that does not pollute,Haiti has plastic extrusion plants that produce PVC pipes for water and sanitation installations, and perhaps Haiti still has an electric wire plant(?). O.K. - Haiti needs re-bars and some light technology.Haiti has companies that can and do build roads, Haiti has the talent to build sewage systems and sanitation processing plants. What does Haiti need? Allocated funds that do not go "MIA" (stolen?). Haiti would not be as it is had someone in power formed a group of dedicated citizens to say and enforce "NO MORE" of the past misbehaviour. Haiti has been financially "raped" for the better part of two centuries. It is time to STOP this practice! It is now time to organize, build steel forms, lay in the rebars & conduits, pour the concrete and then transport the wall to the site and build! We have been muddling along for almost two months now! Let's get the show on the road and start the future now! The "composite" and "bag" thing DO NOT BELONG in Haiti. Thanks - start emailing! start pushing!
Haiti, P-a-P:Circa 1981/2,a French small home builder attempted to launch a housing development program for steel re-enforced concrete dwellings of 80 to 100 sq.M. All with running water & sanitary facilities.(No plastic bags).
IMO,"Plastic" is the scourge of the earth in Haiti-there has never been a co-hesive & lasting waste & recycling service. The State failed to support and enforce many attempts by the private sector to install a process of waste recycling. (Another example of administrative failure.)The "Plastic bag" toilet, IMO, just won't survive. Based upon two defications daily, a family of six to ten in the same dwelling, in ten days will generate 100 or more "bags" in progressive stages of decomposition.Multiply this by the thousands of residents in the community
and the "recycling" or "compositing" effort becomes a quagmire that may bring on even more health challenges. Whatever shelter that may be proposed and set into place would be well founded to have a "flush" system to carry waste to a central sewage processing facility. Otherwise the endemic and old problem of sanitation, or the lack of it, simply manifests forward in a different but equally dangerous mode. The composite housing appears to be an excellent idea as long as waste materials from such housing are not toxic to the environment and groundwater. Communities for the less favored population in Haiti have been proposed before. The failure of these projects were due to lack of State organization and support. Sufficient land, potable water, EDH-electrification,sanitary controls & systems, communications and enforced codes & zoning, all were failures attributed to the State's llack of mandated involvement on all counts.
Let's do the job the "Right" way this time and not build communities that will breed future problems that may lead to abandonment and migration back to the "old" ways.
Example: Venezuela's state sponsored high-rise apartment housing complexes in Caracas, 1960's; failed. "WHY". Reportedly the inhabitants wanted to have their chickens, goats, et all in those towers leading to a dirth of health & sanitation problems. The towers were abandoned, the people returned to their over-populated hill-sides to further exacerbate the density and sanitation that until today remains one of the most concerning points for health and safety. As Haiti, Venezuela entertains siesmic events of the most devastating magnatude, unless we have forgotten September 1967 when Caracas was almost levelled. For Haiti, the housing structures must be environmentally "green" before any importation of any sort be undertaken. At this point, the challenge to "clean-up" the environment in Haiti is more than a noteable challenge. Let's not add to the problem. The housing can be and must be provided A.S.A.P. but in the correct format and setting.
Thank you.
I'm great full the Innovida company for reaching out to the Haitian people. Yes the steel shipping containers is a proven ideal that have a proven result and there are million of it out there at low cost. The only problem is to transport it to the location of choice that will not be an easy task because Haiti a country of hill sided with few major road access for heavy equipment. That is why I think the option for composite houses is a better choice it will provide beauty and safety to the people. Haitian people are traumatize they want live in houses to can pause no serious danger to his/her family. If any other company have a better ideal put it forward, now Haiti need action not talk and no experimentation please.
Mr. Howell, from Virginia is correct. Shipping containers have been successfully utilized before. Duany's reference to 787 composites is absurd! They are carbon fiber & epoxy: high cost & petroleum dependent. A $15 mil. plant, to build 1,000 shelters!!!??? Get Real! The Swedish plastic bags he touts for waste...they only cost $4. ea. or 10 for $30. (Sailors have been forced to use them for years.) But what can we expect from someone whose arch. firm has squandered 10 years pretending to get sensible zoning & planning accomplished in Miami. 'Charette' is almost a cognate for "Charade" isn't it? He specializes in it.
How about asking some Haitians , those who have demonstrated tremendous wisdom in organizing their own people in the face of these challenges, what kind of housing they want to build for themselves and how we can make sure that they are employed in rebuilding their houses and their? How about it? Haitians are so often spoken about as opposed to being spoken with. They are an essential part of the marketplace.
"Composite materials" just means several materials put together. Most of our clothes are now made from composite materials. In fact, I think most houses some places in the medieval era would fit the definition of "composite materials." So if you're trying to convey information about the composition of these houses, rather than avoid explanation by using a buzzword, you'll have to be rather more specific.
