Abstract

In spite of the dramatic images broadcast from the US/Mexican frontier, the border still remains porous. Illegal migration continues northward while piles of waste moves in the other direction to be recycled, and to be re-used in the construction of a counter-urbanism that includes numerous tunnels that pass under this border and make up this illegal inhabitation. In reaction to urban segregation, an urbanism of transgression is developing via specialised enterprises and their alternative prototypes. It is in this context that the non-governmental organization Casa Familiar works in the border neighbourhood of San Ysidro, California. A zone of alternative affordable housing has been designed including a serie of « open air rooms » that contain electricity, serving as site for a variety of neighborhood activities. On the border a new housing programme is developing : affordable and socially sustainable