Project developing housing and marketplace for Aqabat Jaber, a Palestinian refugee camp in the West Bank:

Palestinian refugees constitute the largest portion of the world’s growing refugee community, with a population of 3.6 million. One-third of this population live in the United Nations registered camps in Jordan, Syria, Lebanon, the West Bank, and the Gaza Strip. Refugees in the camps suffer a complexity of problems from unresolved conflict over land and property that has led to overcrowding, poor housing conditions and a general lack of public amenities. The University of Kansas School of Architecture and Urban Design is working on architectural improvements in the Aqabat Jaber camp for the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA). The refugee camp Aqabat Jaber was selected for study because of the information on existing conditions that UNRWA made available. The objective of the project is to offer an analysis for the redevelopment of the camp where it is the most needed with the purpose of improving the refugees’ overall living conditions. For housing, previous sem ester analysis sought to give Aqabat Jaber a sense of identity and urbanity. From this concept the goal of new housing options is to define the relationship between public and private space in relation to the family unit, use natural sustainable energy through traditional methods, and develop a scheme of bringing organization to housing and the camp as a whole. The effort to view the project from these directions seeks to develop a cohesiveness and continuity to the camp and the everyday life that occurs within it.

Unit Organization: The scheme for ordering housing units is based on factors of ventilation and lighting for every room, creating private, semiprivate, and public space, and developing a core unit that allows for expansion with time as family households grow. Housing units are above venue space for artisans and community programs such as an Internet café, grocery store, and coffee shop. The ground floor marketplace is an effective tool for relocation, potentially allowing each family to run a venue. The site for new housing is chosen as the spot causing the last amount of demolition, only relocating the camp services office, police department, and a minimum number of mud brick homes in the 1950s. The location of housing along a main promenade leading from the entry of the camp to the mosque mixed with shops and craft vendors is seen as a better alternative for residential life and the identity and revenue of the camp as a whole.

Tradition+Place: Research into vernacular methods of sustainability attributes to an architecture sensitive to culture and place while providing a physical and psychological comfort through decoration in natural lighting and passive cooling. The influence of traditional building methods is incorporated to provide micro-climates throughout courtyards, balconies, stairwells, and market entrances. It is intended that residents themselves would design their own patterns, build and maintain the elements that make up their architecture.

Before and After Images: