Ali Akbar Rahimian Mashhad - Oikodomos

EASTERN MEDITERRANEAN UNIVERSITY
Housings by the participation of
low-income people and government
in Mashhad, Iran
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Arch 570 – Informal Studies on Housing II
Assist. Prof. Dr. Beril ÖZMEN MAYER
Aliakbar Rahimian
Spring 2011-2012
Abstract
In recent decades, smart urban development has been considered. Therefore infill
development is a part of it. Current society’s policies are responding to the immediate needs
of the society ignoring its future consequences. Therefore an appropriate foundation must
be provided for its localization. This survey aims to reinvestigate the Maskan-e-Mehr
project’s policies and present a scientific critique for it based on the necessities and
limitations of urban development. We desire to suggest an option called “infill development”
as an appropriate solution. The general results of this survey show that in cities where infill
development is feasible, locating Maskan-e-Mehr units on a region far from the city requires
additional costs for providing the necessary urban infrastructures and services. By rectifying
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governmental investments for low-income housing toward infill development, besides
utilizing the available capacities inside the city, the costs of urban development outside the
city margins would be considerably diminished (2) .
This paper studies housing for low-income people in Mashhad, Iran. It consists of
three sections. The first section tells us about low-income people who make houses
independently for themselves on city margins. This part presents the disadvantages and
reasons of the reference of low-income people to this housing style. The second section
examines housing by the government for low-income people and providing its budget
besides its advantages and disadvantages, while the third section compares both methods.
Finally a logical conclusion is presented to reach an optimum method to address this
challenge.
Introduction
The history of housing for low-income people began when unemployed people
migrated to big cities in order to work, while due to the high price of houses in cities and
their necessity, they made buildings for themselves on city margins in illegal ways on nondivided
lands which had mainly agricultural usages. This movement resulted in some
problems on city margins. Consequently the government participated in housing for lowincome
people to solve these challenges.
This paper tries to recognize land localization policies to find an appropriate place for
locating Maskan-e-Mehr units to see if it can find suitable places inside the city rather than
outside it. For this reason, the following steps are examined:
• Finding the appropriate solution for infill development in Mashhad city
• Evaluating the necessity of growth and development of the urban appearance
Methodology
There are several methods to reach this purpose including historical, experimental,
comparison and documental ones. We want to use the last method, since despite
observations and interviews, the necessary data are available. Different types of documents
are texts (e.g. books, newspapers, archives, etc.), numerical documents and other
documents that are neither texts nor numerical.
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Concept of infill development
Infill development has different definitions all of which share a united concept:
• Infill development focusing on building residential units, employment centers
and small-sellers inside the urban area. This development may be in various categories
(Wheeler, 2003): (1) housing on empty spaces, (2) reusing abandoned spaces, (3)
reinforcement and development of available spaces.
• Infill development refers to new development in prioritized spaces in terms of
investment as well as on empty/abandoned spaces.
Figure 1: Infill development before and after implementation
Urban infill development is a way of preventing the city growth to its suburbs and rural
areas while rather developing abandoned spaces inside the city that somehow renews
urban life (EPA (Environment protecting agency), 1999). In infill development, historical
textures are protected (Kienitz, 2001).
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There are three ways to develop a city:
• Development inside the city
• Development outside the city
• Development far from the city
Factors
Development inside the city
Development outside the
Development far from the
(Infill development)
city (extended development)
city
(separate development)
Environmental Maintaining environmental
values and natural views
Ignoring environmental values
Ignoring environmental
values
Economical Low-cost provision of
infrastructures and urban
services, making different
functionalities and improving
optimization, lowering the high
price of urban lands
High-cost provision of
infrastructures and urban
services, lower land price, high
transportation costs
Extra-high cost of providing
communications with the
main city, High-cost
provision of infrastructures
and urban services, lower
land services
Appearance
Presenting patterns conforming
Ignoring the residential
Ignoring the residential
to the bio-environment and
patterns of the main city
patterns of the main city
residence according to the
texture, maintaining and
improving appearance values
Social
Maintaining and improving the
Ignoring the city’s identity
city’s identity
A) Low-income housing built by people arbitrarily:
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Housings by low-income people whether in a legal (with license) or illegal way neither
with a governmental permission nor according to national building regulations and standards
In this scenario, most low-income people build houses for themselves in an illegal
way without the municipality permission on mostly agricultural lands outside the city
margins. These buildings are mainly built from reused/non-standard materials. They are
mostly non-Iranians, i.e. immigrants from suburbs to big cities living on city margins. Since
these regions lack urban planning or design, there is no servicing usages such as
hygiene/health-care or educational spaces or are at the minimum levels. Neither the paths
are not completely equipped nor are the leisure-time spaces planned well. In this situation,
documents are joints related to extensive agricultural lands.
Figure 2: Low-income housing has built by people themselves arbitrarily.
B) Low-income mass housing built by government participation with
people:
Housings according to national building regulations with the financial participation
of the government and the people so that low-income people are able to own houses by
using governmental financial aids and low-interest loans
In this scenario (Maskan-e-Mehr Project), first the land is devoted freely by the
government to implementing co-operations who receive payments in two timely parts (about
25% of the total house price) from buyers, i.e. low-income people. They progress the
housing up to the final skeleton building. Then the government donates some money to
banks to give it to implementing co-operations to finish the project. After the project is
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finalized and its dedication to buyers, this money is received from the bank to be given to
buyers as long-term loans to deliver the document partitions to them.
In this situation, all buildings are located in their urban place according to a welldesigned
design to plan servicing spaces such as educational, hygiene, leisure-time and
health-care parts on these lands design. It is important to mention that all buildings are built
according to sound measures and the low-income residents’ needs in whether terms of
meters or inter-units performance relationships according to the users’ culture. Besides, all
national building regulations are considered to build the houses according to standards. Of
course there is no space for non-Iranian immigrants in this design, since even selecting
people for presenting such loans is done with special considerations so that jobbers could
not misuse this divine scheme.
Figure 3: Low-income mass housing built by government participation with people
Conclusion
Since most of the independent housings of the first type are made on agricultural
lands located on city margins, there is no urban planning in terms of the building position
and the region lacks any welfare or servicing facilities, (by low-income people on illegal nonstandard
lands), most users of services and city centers servicing spaces just satisfy their
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housing needs, while in the governmental system, most lands dedicated to the implementing
co-operations are located outside the urban limits at a distance far from city centers. Since
the residents’ work-places (who are mainly workers working in cities) are far from their living
regions, despite the qualities and facilities available in the participatory package, some
people still build houses on city margins in illegal and non-standard ways. Consequently it is
better for the government to build houses in regions near to city centers as much as
possible so that people would not make for themselves independently on city margins.
Therefore, as mentioned in this paper, by rectifying governmental investments for
low-income housing toward infill development, besides utilizing the available capacities
inside the city, the costs of urban development outside the city margins would be
considerably diminished.
References
1. Participation of housing cooperation members (Mehr) and Explication effective
factors on it in 1388 at Mashhad city (M. Mazloom Khorasani and M. Noghani, 2009)
2. Recognition within the Framework of Infill Development in Criticizing the
Current Policies towards Housing Development (Maskan-e-Mehr) (Case Study: Natanz City)
3.
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