Haiti Place Man with a plan

Article Information

  • ARTICLE_POSTED_BY: Marcel Wah
  • ARTICLE_POSTED_ON: Mar 21, 2010
  • Views : 558
  • Category : Other
  • Description : Having helped Turkey, New Orleans, and Honduras rebuild after natural disasters, architect and MIT professor Jan Wampler, 70, heads to Haiti.

Overview

  • Your plan? A self-sustainable village in Arcahaie, about 20 miles north of Port-au-Prince. Last year, my team and I began designing a place that provides shelter, medical treatment, education, an arts center, farming, job training, a cafeteria, and government offices. With the number of people fleeing Port-au-Prince, shelter is now priority one. Plus, we’re in a race against the rainy season. Our goal is to house 1,000 people after 100 days of building.

    Why rural Arcahaie? Port-au-Prince never provided a great quality of life for its people. It’s time for a new model. We have to abandon the Industrial Revolution idea of needing to be in a city to prosper. The Internet can create a global village. With it, you can get an education, learn a trade, and sell goods from a place that offers the sort of community and cost of living a city can’t. I’ve seen that model work in Ecuador, Turkey, India.