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Public Spaces and Critical density, a preliminary study proposal for Baseco
informal settlement in Manila

Conference Paper · September 2017

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 Public Spaces and Critical density, a preliminary study
proposal for Baseco informal settlement in Manila

Francesco Rossini
School of Architecture, The Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK)
Shatin, NT, Hong Kong. E-mail: rossini@cuhk.edu.hk

Antonio Rinaldi
Dipartimento di Ingegneria elettrica e delle Tecnologie dell'Informazione
Università di Napoli Federico II, Via Claudio 21, 80125 Napoli
E-mail: antoniomaria.rinaldi@unina.it

Valerio Di Pinto
Dipartimento di Ingegneria Civile, Edile e Ambientale
Università di Napoli Federico II, Via Claudio 21, 80125 Napoli
E-mail: valerio.dipinto@unina.it

Abstract. This paper introduces a preliminary study on the informal settlement of

Baseco. The district is among the most populous areas in Manila and is affected by
several problems, lack of infrastructure and public facilities, river flooding,
overpopulation and poverty. Some countries, such as The Philippines, are
experiencing an unprecedented urbanization and the existing concepts of urban
development may lead to an explosion of two opposite situations: high-density
clusters of high-rise buildings and informal settlements. Apparently this contrast
generates a twin-city where the formal and the informal are strictly related. The
scope of this research is to analyze the social and spatial characteristics of Baseco
compound in order to develop short- and long-term strategies to address the
community’s needs. The spontaneous growth of informal settlements based on
several social actions as business activities and inhabitants’ cognitive perception
of urban space need of innovative methodologies to define efficient territorial
planning strategies. In this perspective configurational analysis could be a useful
approach in the representation of our context of interest. The information derived
from configurational analysis will be integrated in a Geographic Information
System to better represent and analyze urban and social data. This proposed
research aims to conduct a pilot study to develop alternative urban regeneration
strategies which are socially, economically and environmentally sustainable,
offering a model for other informal settlements in Manila.

Key Words: Baseco, Informal city, Public Space, Manila,

Spatial Analysis

Introduction

Manila is the political and economic center of the Philippines and is one of the major
metropolitan regions in Asia-Pacific. The metropolis is the 18th largest urban agglomeration in
the world in terms of population size, and according to the World Health Organization, about 35
percent of the capital region's 14 million population live in slums.
Slums are scattered over 526 communities in all cities and municipalities of Metro Manila,
housing 2.5 million people on vacant private or public lands. Although there are relatively large
slum communities, the settlement pattern of the Metro Manila urban poor is generally dispersed,
located wherever there is space and opportunity. (United Nations, 2003)
In the last decades The Philippines has experienced a fast urbanization of his territory, and in
the future nearly 70 percent of the Philippines’ population is expected to be living in cities and
towns. Despite the rate of urbanization are comparable with other countries in East Asia, the
country has not experienced the same level of economic development that usually follows
increased urbanization.
The needs of housing and the pressure for the rapid urbanization make problematic to establish
a long-term and sustainable planning strategy and during the years this condition has generated
a large amounts of spontaneous informal settlements along rivers, near garbage dumps, under
bridges and beside industrial establishments. Beside the question of integration and
development of these spontaneous urban agglomerations in the city structure, there are also
problems of hygiene and safety associated with the lack of planning of these areas.
This urban explosion does not mean, however, the general improvement of the living conditions
of citizens, but rather presupposes the accentuation of inequalities of the living conditions in
cities. The high population growth rate has put under an incredible pressure the basic
infrastructure and municipal services, leading to an overcrowded and environmentally
unsustainable urban areas.
The Government of Manila is taking several actions to face these issues, but in most of the case
the natural disasters, which the country is frequently affected, the lack of political coordination
and the difficulties to relocate the population from risk areas, compromise the efforts to conduct
any long-term plan.
The long-term vision is necessary but at the same time there is a need to plan short-term actions
to improve the everyday living conditions of these unsettled areas.
This proposed preliminary research aims to study the area of Baseco compound, one of the
densest informal settlements in Manila. In the last ten years the district has suffered natural
disasters and high levels of crime and poverty and due to its proximity to Manila Bay is
particularly vulnerable to river flooding and storm surges.
By analyzing Baseco compound, this paper intends to provide a general reflection on the
conditions of the informal settlements in Manila, in order to propose a methodological and
sustainable approach to be implemented through long and short-term actions with the aim to
address the urgent needs of the community.

..............................................................................................

Manila

The main aspect that limits the improvement of the social and spatial conditions in the slums is
certainly the lack of a genuine political action focus on addressing the problem in a
comprehensive and sustainable approach.
The government of Manila has been tolerant to the illegal occupation of undesirable areas
considering that it has not offered them much alternative and nowadays the situation is in fact
worsened by a lack of a structured and long-term strategy for addressing urban growth.
However, as Edita Abella Tan noted in a Philippine Daily Inquirer article published on August
16, 2015, there is a law that allows slum demolition only if an alternative residence is available
to the affected families. There is no substantial national or local government program for
solving the slum problem through relocation and housing improvement.
In this regard, we should not be surprised to realize that every non-structured attempt has failed
in its proposals, and often those interventions have caused a decline in the living conditions of
the inhabitants of the slums. The solutions proposed have focused more on the provision of
shelter or dwelling units and relocation projects than on slum upgrading.
The attempts to re-house slum dwellers along the riverbanks into distant locations has not been
a success and most of the beneficiaries, finding that they cannot make a livelihood on the edge
of town, are back in place in a few months. (United Nation, 2003)

During the past decade Metro Manila has gone through a number of natural disasters, typhoons,
earthquakes, and volcano eruptions, which have compromised the country's infrastructures and
its economy, but in 2014 the Urban Land Institute’s (ULI) Real Estate surveys of Asia-Pacific
cities hailed Manila as the region’s 4th most investment-competitive city. This trend motivated
the local government to implement new policies and plans for urban redevelopment.
Most of the poorest area of Manila will be targeted to increase the city attractiveness and bring
new private developers and investment, bringing a dramatic shift in spatial pattern of the city.
The Government, is focus on accommodate new flood-mitigation plans, considered critical to
the city’s safety, bat the relocation policy of informal settler families (ISFs) which are living in
danger and high-risk area is assuming a crucial role.
One Safe Future Program (1SF), one of the housing projects established by the Department of
Interior and Local Government (DILG), involves different stakeholders offering a people-
centered and community-driven action with the objective to build secure, resilient and
sustainable communities. But as always in this type relocation programs, taking the inhabitants
away from the risk zone is only the first step of a more comprehensive strategy. Relocating
them in a new context and far from their original neighborhood will affect their social
relationship and their daily income built up in the informal settlement. There is a need to
implement post-resettlement actions focus on the creation of a new community’s structure
where the inhabitants can re-establish a reliable network with new sources of income they used
to have in their former settlement.
Unfortunately the relocation project tends to legitimize the annihilation of informal spaces and
the displacement of the urban poor to make way for new globalized spaces. (Ortega, 2015)
In this regards an important factor in this transformation process is to control and preserve the
public character of the new developments. Serving the public interest is the fundamental
mission of governments and public institutions, but unluckily the strong pressure of the private
sectors influences directly the decision-making process affecting the urban regeneration of the
city.
In the near future one of the major urban transformations of the city will be the cleaning of the
heavily polluted waterways that feed into Manila Bay. This important regeneration, under a
five-year, $1.2 billion USD mandamos from the Philippines’ Supreme Court, will relocate
104,000 families from the contaminated city’s canals and rivers. This urban regeneration
established a significant change from previous policies, the Government is aiming to resettle
these family on-site instead of relocating them outside of Metro Manila. (Next City, 2013)

These on-site schemes strategies that attempt to explore the city’s relationship with its informal
settlements, have become the preferred solution to slum improvement transforming the city in a
living laboratory of slum solutions.
Often these slum-upgrading initiatives are promoted by non-governmental organizations (NGO)
whit the support of private donations. Community-managed mortgage schemes are the formula
to implement in situ-development allowing the inhabitants to own their house. For the
repayment, in addition to the monthly fee, the residents have to contribute with manual labor or
sweat equity of an established number of hours. The amount of the repayment is in the order of
three to nine US dollars per months. These solutions are in-between formal and informal, and
are upgrading entire sectors of these informal settlements with the aims to preserve and involve
communities in the development of their districts.

..............................................................................................
Baseco Compound

The Engineer's Island established in the mid-1950s under the former President Ferdinand
Marcos, and informally known as the Baseco Compound, is part of the Barangay1 649. The area
has an entire extension of 1,1 Km. sq. but the area of Baseco occupy half of it.
In 2001, after the proclamation2 as Barangay 649, the population growth from 20,214 to 50,928
becoming one of the biggest urban poor communities in the Philippines. Nowadays, Baseco
with nearly 60.000 inhabitants is the most populated area among the five Barangays within the
Port Area of Manila.

This massive population growth has a clear explanation, once declared as Barangay, Baseco
became an official administrative district of Manila. This means that the former illegal
settlement would become an area included in the improvement programs of the local
Government.
As explained by Mr,Diocelio B. Candano, resident of Baseco and board member of the people’s
organization, after the proclamation many families invited relatives and acquaintances to reside
and live in the new administrative district.3
In the last ten years this area has been affected by a series of fires, in 2002 a blaze left some
15,000 residents homeless, and in 2004 the most devastating one, razed shanties of 25,000
people.
At that time, the Government collaborated with two NGO to provide new homes for the affected
population. One of the first on site was Gawad Kalinga (GK) followed by Habitat for Humanity
Philippines (HfHP). With a participatory process, residents and volunteers built approximately
4000 houses. The solution adopted was a regular grid plan formed by access streets of housing
(4 meters wide) and secondary service alleys (1.5 meters wide). Each alley serves two lines of
row houses, which in turn make up one block. Each line of row houses is subdivided in plots of
6 x 3.5 meters. (Carracedo, 2015)

The Pasig River Environmental and Rehabilitation Sector Development Program supported by
the Asian for various reasons, has been only partially implemented. Under this development
Program, several areas were selected for urban renewal and Baseco has been assigned a high
priority among them. (Asian Development Bank, 2008)
To prevent relocation, the People’s Organization in Baseco redacted with the help of local
planners the People’s Plan. One of the objectives of the Plan was to define new areas of
development with a minimum of reblocking and relocation protecting the families affected in
case of the establishment of environmental preservation areas. (EPAs)
Recently in 2015 a Government ordinance established that micro- to medium-rise building will
be built in the area to provide permanent settlement to the 225 beneficiary-families under the
DILG’s Assistance to Informal Settler Families (ISF) program, which intends to reduce disaster
vulnerability and displacement of urban poor communities. (DILG, 2015)

Despite the efforts and support from local government and NGOs, Baseco Compund is still an
extremely problematic area with a number of difficulties to be solved. The People’s Plan has
been a good starting but it should be implemented in order to develop alternative urban
regeneration strategies.
There is an urgent need for a comprehensive action that involves the community, NGOs and
local Government in order to establish a long-term vision for the future of this urban area.

1
The Barangay is the basic unit of government in the Philippines
2
Ordinance 7931 declaring 52 Hectares of land be awarded to the Baseco residents.
3
Interview realized on February 14, 2017 during the research field trip conducted by the PI.
Methodology
The proposed methodology is expected to address existing weakness in current regeneration
programs in the informal settlement of Baseco. This research plan has three interrelated parts,
entitled ‘Configurational Analysis’, ‘Community Engagement’ and ‘Baseco Compound
Strategic Plan’ (BCSP). Each part details several key tasks combining quantitative and
qualitative methods to fulfil our research objectives. The total area surveyed will be
approximately 56 hectares, covering the entire district. The initial survey will be organized by
walking through different sections of Baseco to obtain an overall picture of the sites under
investigation and classify the different types of urban settlements and open public spaces. The
digital map realized previously will be used to establish the survey routes and record the on-site
visits.

Configurational Analysis
At the first glance, an informal settlement seems developed spontaneously and in an unplanned
way. However, a careful analysis of the physical space organization of informal communities
shows that there are spatial patterns of organization, on underlying order and a "spontaneous"
hierarchy, which are not immediately perceived. (Carracedo, 2015)
The “spontaneous" hierarchy of informal settlements based on several social actions as business
activities and inhabitants’ cognitive perception of urban space need of innovative methodologies
to define efficient territorial planning strategies. In this perspective configurational analysis
could be a useful approach in the representation of our context of interest.
The configurational analysis to the study of urban space encompasses a wide set of tools and
techniques, sharing as their fundamental basis the assumption of the urban space as the primary
element in its actual use; in other words, the way the urban space is spatially arranged and the
way its single elements are geometrically disposed and mutually connected does strongly
influence the way the space itself is actually used, both in terms of distribution of movement
flows and in activities location (Hillier, 1996).
In such terms, configurational analysis was pioneered as a general attempt to relate urban
physical dynamics and social process.
One of the founding ideas of configurational analysis derives by an attempt to understand how
the topology of the urban environment influences the movements of the people inside it.
Configurational analysis, in other words, could be accounted as a quantitative approach to
understand, estimate and govern the way people interact in (and with) the public space.
The spatial data and the configurational analysis idexes together with other information about
the informal settlement (e.g. business activities, social and religious buildings,) and statistical
data on population will be integrated in a ICT infrastructure based on Geographic Information
Systems. (Laurini and Thompson, 1996; Burrough and McDonnell, 1998)
This tool will allow the representation of urban settlements and the analysis of its evolution
considering different choices on urban planning process.
The use of detailed spatial analysis can be applied to prioritize areas for intervention, and
identify specific actions at the scale of the individual plot. The aim of this project is to develop
solutions, which are socially, economically and environmentally sustainable.

Community engagement
The design and planning of better community spaces demand effective engagement and
communication with a range of citizens and stakeholders. Regular contact with the local
community can be achieved in various ways, but in every case the objective is to ensure that
citizens see themselves as problem-solvers in their own districts.
Community representatives, members of the Barangay 649, and representatives of non-profit
organizations will be engaged to provide a more comprehensive understanding of the areas
under study. A series of workshops with different topics will be organized to establish working
groups, foster team spirit and develop and evaluate creative ideas and suggestions for improving
the specific conditions of the district.

Baseco Compound Strategic Plan

The BCSP will be built on the findings of the stages of analysis outlined here. The BCDP, in
form of a report and a new updated version of the People’s Plan, will provide a comprehensive
planning strategy that aims to covers recommendations for more complex and longer-term
improvements. These recommendations will be implemented with a series of short-term actions
focused on providing practical solutions to the most urgent community needs.
The report will help to guide the 'on-site upgrading' approach, increase understanding of open
spaces resources and their potential role within the settlement’s structure, and offer
recommendations for eliciting and strengthening local advocacy. A digital map of the PSDP
will be created from Global Positioning System coordinates and other data using software such
as ArcGIS and Carto-DB.

Concluding Remarks

Almost 1 billion people, or 32 per cent of the world’s urban population, live in slums, the
majority of them in the developing world. (United Nations, 2003)
Large areas in Metro Manila, specifically in downtown, are occupied by informal settlements
that will be affected by the undergoing urban redevelopment of the city.
Manila is experiencing a globalized form of gentrification. This new model of transformation is
using urban renewal projects, in partnership between public and private sector, to realize the
vision of a globally-competitive and modern metropolis. (Ortega, 2015)
This significant urban revitalization will bring dramatic shift in the composition of economic
activity and the spatial pattern of land use in the urban structure, and the informal settlements
will have to redefine his role within these important transformations/challenges.
The bulldozer approach and the relocation programs of the urban regeneration projects in1950’s
and 60’s did not bring substantial improvement due to the complex social and economic
problem in the informal settlements. (Zhu, 2009)
In the late 1970s, the British architect John Turner promoted a new approach based on the view
that self-help settlements assisted by NGOs had to be seen as a potential solution to improve the
condition of slums. According to Turner, slums are a solution and no problem, thanks to their
(supposed) adaptable constructive solutions related to the site context and to their economic
efficiency.
The pioneristic theories of Turner have led to rethink urban regeneration policies in informal
settlements. According to Carracedo (2015) recent approaches are evolving into strategies
characterized by improving the existing conditions, minimizing relocations of their inhabitants.
These ‘on-site schemes’ strategies, are more effective in proposing sustainable alternatives that
facilitates the urban regeneration of informal areas. These improvements are not only proposing
new homes but are focusing on the development of the streets, public spaces and other facilities.

This proposed research project is expected to address existing weakness in current regeneration
programs in the informal settlement of Baseco. This pilot study will help to understand how to
guide the 'on-site upgrading' approach in order to establish a long-term vision for the future of
this important area of the city.
Specifically through use of detailed spatial analysis this project aims to study the spontaneous
hierarchy of informal settlements to develop alternative urban regeneration strategies, which are
socially, economically and environmentally sustainable.

.................................................................................................
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