Upgrading of substandard housing in Portugal : planning strategies for the technical improvement of marginal settlements, case study, the Casal Ventoso

Abstract

The primary scope of this thesis is to deal, from a technical standpoint, with the implementation of the upgrading concept in marginal settlements in Portugal. It consists mainly of two parts: The rationale of the concept, and technical strategies applied to a chosen prototypical case study area in Lisbon. A thorough explanation of the upgrading policy is given in Chapter 2.0, where social, political and economical issues are dealt with. The core of the thesis is found in Chapter 4.0, where intermediate technologies for sanitation are exposed and compared, after which a number of options are chosen as suitable for the case study. Included also is an economic comparison of technologies based on investment and recurrent costs. This work acknowledges the policy factors associated with the concept, yet, does not focus deeply on these, but rather on technical approaches to housing improvement.