Flexible refugee shelter

Abstract

In recent years, there has been a great number of disasters such as natural disasters and wars. Wars occur, mostly, due to political, religious and economic confrontations. Calamities or natural disasters, which are considered as inevitable manifestations of Mother Nature, become uncontrollable and unpredictable. When they happen, they leave thousands of people in emergency conditions since they have lost everything they owned and are left without support. The emergency architecture lies in creation of temporary shelters to receive and protect the victims of these limit situations. This happens due to the need of minimum conditions of habitability these people have until being relocated. Disasters/wars, apart from the direct impact they have on the victims, also affect one of the main human factors: The Habitat. This type of architecture is perceived as transitory which requires fast solutions, cost-effective and easy-to-execute systems, thus focusing mainly on prefabricated or standard materials that enable a quick and low-cost assembly. However, in this type of architecture, one cannot only think of the quick solution of building/assembling shelters. Notwithstanding, it is also necessary to take into account that it functions as a humanitarian service, in which human needs must be meticulously thought about. On the basis of this last statement, it is intended to meet, in the best possible way, the needs of the refugees who are victims of the wars that come into their lives and who are not likely to return to their territory. These victims are sent to refugee camps - controlled and delimited spaces with the minimum equipment - usually with random tents provided by the UN which do not provide comfort to these families while they try to organize their lives. The lack of comfortable shelters and the minimum housing conditions are essential for these victims who see their lives change drastically from one day to the other. However, while designing a temporary shelter, one has to take into account the fact that it is temporary, transitory and that people only take advantage of this space for a short period of time. Faced with this primordial factor, the transience, the proposed space corresponds to adequate and comfortable minimum areas which allow a good quality of life for a short period of time. This proposal lies in the creation of an emergency shelter, as previously mentioned, through the development of a modular system that is flexible and temporary. It can be allocated in different ways on the ground, thus allowing the creation and adaptation to different spaces according to the needs of the people. This model unit will have a primordial base structure which will facilitate the adaptation to the terrain and the stability of the shelter. The construction method was designed to be as easy as possible by using lightweight materials, so it can be implemented on the ground and having good thermal and acoustic capacities so that it can be adapted to different climatic scenarios.