The Emergent Urbanism(s) of Suburbio, GuayaquilA spatial ethnography of incremental grassroots development in times of a changing society and environment

Guayaquil – Ecuador’s main port and largest settlement – is a 70 per cent self-built city located amidst the most biodiverse estuarine complex of the South Pacific: the Guayas River Estuary. The city’s first suburbs proliferated in ecologically fragile zones in which the urban fabric and public spaces were crafted incrementally by various generations and through a multitude of design decisions. These now consolidated low-income neighbourhoods – home to 40% of the urban population – are facing ‘new’ challenges in relation to the many years of densification and inhabitation as well as their extreme vulnerability to climate-change-related events. This research looks into the past and the future of consolidated riverbank settlements. It enquires the extent in which longitudinal practices of community-led incremental development in self-built neighbourhoods have constructed convivial, sustainable and resilient urban spaces and to what extent they are able to take up new social and ecological challenges. The project elaborates the historical layers of Guayaquil’s incremental urbanisms at different social and spatial scales. This community-based knowledge informs a prospective research-by-design study for housing and neighbourhood rehabilitation as well as long-term adaptation strategies through the construction of urban design scenarios.