Alejandra P. Bonilla Mena

Alejandra P. Bonilla Mena

Ph.D. student at the Pennsylvania State University. Ecuadorian. Interested on Real Estate Financialization in Latin America.

Publications

Vivienda social en Ecuador: violencias y contestaciones en la produccion progresista de periferias urbanas

Published in Revista INVI, 2021

Social housing production was one of the emblems of the Ecuadorian policy of the Citizen Revolution chaired by Rafael Correa for 10 years. From the case of Ecuador, it is analyzed how progressive governments applied policies in the field of social housing and urban development. This article tracks the scales of application these social policies had regarding neoliberalism, from the point of view of the violence and responses that the process provoked. In Quito, families organized to obtain the promised homes after years of waiting. In Guayaquil, police violence displaced entire neighborhoods to achieve urban renewal through an ecological plan. In Portoviejo, from the earthquake of 2016, the center was converted, and the houses were moved to the periphery. From an historic, spatial, and qualitative methodology, this analysis shows the limitations of the proposals of the progressive governments, and the popular organization to avoid displacement towards the peripheries.

Recommended citation: Duran, Gustavo, Manuel Bayon, Alejandra Bonilla Mena, and Michael Janoschka. 2020. Vivienda Social En Ecuador: Violencias y Contestaciones En La Produccion Progresista de Periferias Urbanas. Revista INVI 35 (99): 34 to 56. https://doi.org/10.4067/S0718-83582020000200034. https://revistainvi.uchile.cl/index.php/INVI/article/view/63302/66833

Ecuadorian housing resettlements five years after the 2016 earthquake: A critical analysis

Published in Habitat International, 2021

In the past decades, earthquakes have left millions of people without homes across the world. Safe housing is crucial for the long-term wellbeing of the affected population. This article analyses the Ecuadorian housing reconstruction developed after the 7.8 magnitude 2016 earthquake, taking as case study the cities of Portoviejo, Manta, Bahia de Caraquez and Pedernales, located in the Manabi province, which jointly accommodate more than 90% of the resettlements built by the central government.The research aims to understand the implications of the top-down management reconstruction process and its impacts, five years after the earthquake, using as critical lens the inhabitants, the UN-Habitat principles for adequate housing and the Build Back Better principles of the Sendai Framework for post-disaster reconstruction. The work combines policy review, risk spatial analysis, semi-structured interviews, and constructive and architectural analysis. The article is the outcome of a transdisciplinary multi-scalar approach that analyses key long-term social implications, the quality and the spatial adaptations of the built environment. It finally offers some crucial recommendations for the long-term wellbeing of post-disaster housing strategies.

Recommended citation: Testori, Giulia, Michael Janoschka, Alejandra Bonilla-Mena, and Ornella Iuorio. 2021. Ecuadorian Housing Resettlements Five Years after the 2016 Earthquake: A Critical Analysis. Habitat International 117: 102433. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.habitatint.2021.102433. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0197397521001223

Generating and Mapping Amazonian Urban Regions Using a Geospatial Approach

Published in ISPRS International Journal of Geo-Information, 2020

Urban representations of the Amazon are urgently needed in order to better understand the complexity of urban processes in this area of the World. So far, limited work that represents Amazonian urban regions has been carried out. (2) methods: Our study area is the Ecuadorian Amazon. We performed a K-means algorithm using six urban indicators: Urban fractal dimension, number of paved streets, urban radiant intensity (luminosity), and distances to the closest new deforested areas, to oil pollution sources, and to mining pollution sources. We also carried out fieldwork to qualitatively validate our geospatial and statistical analyses. (3) results: We generated six Amazonian urban regions representing different urban configurations and processes of major cities, small cities, and emerging urban zones. The Amazonian urban regions generated represent the urban systems of the Ecuadorian Amazon at a general scale, and correspond to the urban realities at a local scale. (4) conclusions: An Amazonian urban region is understood as a set of urban zones that are dispersed and share common urban characteristics such a similar distance to oil pollution sources or similar urban radiant intensity. Our regionalization model represents the complexity of the Amazonian urban systems, and the applied methodology could be transferred to other Amazonian countries.

Recommended citation: Cabrera-Barona, P., Bayon, M., Duran, G., Bonilla-Mena, A., & Mejia, V. (2020). Generating and Mapping Amazonian Urban Regions Using a Geospatial Approach. ISPRS International Journal of Geo-Information. 9(7):453. https://doi.org/10.3390/ijgi9070453 https://www.mdpi.com/2220-9964/9/7/453