Mediagua, is the name given in

Chile Chile, officially the Republic of Chile, is a country in the western part of South America. It is the southernmost country in the world, and the closest to Antarctica, occupying a long and narrow strip of land between the Andes to the east a ...

to a type of

prefabricated house Prefabricated homes, often referred to as prefab homes or simply prefabs, are specialist dwelling types of prefabricated building, which are manufactured off-site in advance, usually in standard sections that can be easily shipped and assembled. ...

, constructed of wood panels, which can be erected in less than a day. The traditional model has an area of . They are traditionally used to provide emergency housing solutions after

natural disasters A natural disaster is "the negative impact following an actual occurrence of natural hazard in the event that it significantly harms a community". A natural disaster can cause loss of life or damage property, and typically leaves some econo ...

, or to give an inexpensive house to homeless people.Gobierno y Un Techo para Chile cumplieron meta de 40 mil mediaguas
. ''La Nación (Chile)'', 05/18/2010. Because they are designed as temporary solutions they are commonly installed without sanitation or electricity,
''La Nación (Chile)''. 04/18/2010. but often they become permanent homes.

Elements

A standard mediagua, such as those installed by the housing foundation Un Techo para Chile ("A Roof for Chile") is of long by wide, which is designed to house a family of 4. There is also a model of half the area of the former, for single people and couples. They are made of 8 panels (2 floors, 2 sides, 2 front and 2 rear), two windows, one door, 8 sheets of zinc for the roof, plus 15 support logs of long to isolate the house from the moisture of the soil. The house is divided in two rooms.

History

In the mid-nineteenth century the first slums began to appear around Santiago de Chile, where unskilled workers lived. The sanitation, safety and housing were deplorable. The houses were built with waste materials.Marginalidad social en Santiago (1840-1920)
Memoria Chilena. 2004. The conditions had not changed by 1960. At that time groups associated with the Jesuits began to build mediaguas for poor people. In 1962 the ''Hogar de Cristo'' (''Home of Christ'') Foundation (founded by St. Alberto Hurtado) built 1000 mediaguas, and by 2010 they had built over 400,000 mediaguas in total. Mediaguas were built by the government to house the victims of the earthquakes in Valdivia (1960), La Ligua (1965), Santiago (1985) and Tocopilla (2007). After the

2010 Chile earthquake The 2010 Chile earthquake and tsunami ( es, Terremoto del 27F) occurred off the coast of central Chile on Saturday, 27 February at 03:34 local time (06:34 UTC), having a magnitude of 8.8 on the moment magnitude scale, with intense shaking la ...

the housing foundation Un Techo para Chile ("A Roof for Chile") started a national campaign that raised the money to build more than 40,000 mediaguas for the victims.

Elements

History

References

External links