Pedestrian Connectors

Matías & Mateo Pintó

Currently more than 40% of Caracas’ inhabitants live in informal settlements or shanty towns know as barrios. The massive exodus from rural areas to the city as a consequence of the oil boom in the 50’s largely influenced the origins of these unplanned neighborhoods of uncontrolled growths.

Located at the South West of the city, with an area of 400 ha and 95,000 inhabitants, the Barrio La Vega y one of the most extensive and lived-in informal settlements in Caracas. As many other barrios, La Vega, is characterized by having levels of precarious urbanization that are reflected in the lack or inefficiency of basic services of infrastructure, urban amenities and public space, as well as limited accessibility and geological risk due to its extreme topological conditions.

The “Pedestrian Connectors” seeks to establish a ‘study system’ and a ‘project system’ as a process of general interventions recognizing singularities as well as repetition of conditions and problems present in every barrio and its stairs.

As new techniques of urban analysis, the preliminary plan is developed akin to a storyboard of pictograms that depict quantitative site conditions: slope, number of houses reached, landings, stair width; as well as perceptive conditions: meanings identified, program and activities to support.

Based on the ‘study system’ of the preliminary plan, the project itself is generated as a catalog of typological solutions grouped in 10 themes that include basic conditions of the future Pedestrian Connectors. This ‘project system’ is categorized as well in two groups, one resulting from the implicit conditions of the stair as a typology and connecting space: access, stairs, intersections, places and uses, space and limits; and the second group defines the stair as outfitted street connected to the urban system: public lighting, sewer network, trash management, urban furniture and safety and information.

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