CPID Design-Build in Ecuador, Summer 2017
CPID is now accepting applications to the Ecuador program!
In 2016 Chamanga, Manta, and many other fishing villages in the Esmeralda province of Ecuador suffered a severe earthquake and tsunami. The destruction has challenged Ecuador at a time of political (presidential election), and economic uncertainty. A remote area in the Northwest coast of Ecuador, Esmeraldas is famous for the co-existence of native and Afro-American communities living in co-existence with one of the earths most diverse ecologies, and one that remains relatively untouched. In recent years the encrouchment and destruction of the mangrove habitat and much of the coastal ecology by commercial shrimp farming has affected both the traditional small boat fishing that characterized the local economy as well as created the conditions of coastal deterioration that magnified the impact of the earthquake and tsunami.
The PSU program will embed PSU graduate students and advanced undergrads in architecture and planning in the heart of the impacted communities to work side by side with the community to plan, design and begin the physical reconstruction of the coastal area. Specifically the village of Chamanga, one of the most impacted will be a case study for reconstruction opportunities and the possibility to use the reconstruction to restore mangrove habitat and engage native ecological practices long in use to reconnect the native fisherman and women as stewards of this effort. This program will coordinate and share faculty and teaching with University of Tokyo faculty and graduate students, as well as graduate students from the University of Pennsylvania and Europe's Erasmus Mundus Program.
Learn More and Apply HERE
Location
Chamanga, Ecuador
Partners
University of Tokyo; University of Pennsylvania; Universitat Internacional de Catalunya (UIC) School of Architecture; Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology (RMIT); Pontificia Universidad Católica de Ecuador (PUCE), Facultad de Arquitectura, Diseño y Artes