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In this paper we study how the legal subject "homeless" (habitante de la calle) was created in Colombia, and how it allowed certain ways of governance in contemporary cities. Focusing on the Colombian case, we argue that contemporary forms of control were only possible when the subject 'homeless' was distanced from other concepts such as lazy, indigent or mad. Furthermore, we make an analysis of the legal frame and academic discourses that developed the new subject of government, and studied how they legitimized new forms of crime control and new ways of organizing urban spaces. In order to do so, a case study of Bogota has been conducted focusing on national and local regulations on the matter, as well as on the discourses on security, crime control and government of problematic populations in both scales of the state administration. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Natural stone has been an important element in Colombian construction since the hispanic period, especially in Bogotá city capital from Colombia. Sandstone and limestone rocks are ornamental and structural elements on heritage buildings and new constructions, and their use is important to revitalization of urban spaces for the enjoyment of the population. This paper shows the results of some technological characterization tests of two rock types widely used in construction, commonly known as Piedra Muñeca or Piedra Bogotana and Marmol Royal Bronce, used in historical buildings as well as modern ones. Petrophysical and mechanical properties of these rocks identified in a preliminary way were: Petrographic analysis, physical properties (bulk density, bulk porosity and water absorption), compressive strength, flexural strength, weathering resistance and impact resistance, as shown in the Brazilian technical standard ABNT NBR15845. The obtained results allows to determine, in an early way, that the two varieties (yellow and pink) of the Piedra bogotana stone can be used as a structural element (walls, columns, beams and foundations) and also as a dimension stone for buildings, floors and squares. It´s recommended the use of yellow variety specially on interior spaces. Marmol Royal Bronce can be used in finishes and also in any type of facing, floor and as a structural element in highly traffic streets. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines how the decentralization of state power and, advent of mayoral elections in Bogota, Colombia, enabled municipal government, with the help of a cadre of professional planners and designers, to transform the city socially and physically by reinventing civil society and public space. Three contiguous mayoral administrations used public space as a setting and tool to reinvent a culture of citizenship as well as to demonstrate competency on behalf of the mayors. The mayors' strategy was largely successful as Bogota has experienced a move from individualism to collective spirit, and citizens report improvements in civility, friendliness and quality of life. Much of the city's success derives from the vision of the mayors and the important role urban planners and designers provide in implementing that vision. By examining Bogota's transformation, it is possible to better understand how local politicians and planning and design administrators are key to that change. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper I seek to move beyond understandings of Colombia as a failed state or qualified democracy by exploring how the state continues to govern despite widespread shortcomings. I argue that two technologies of governance are central to contemporary rule in Colombia: state fragmentation and citizen education. These technologies are exemplified by the recovery of public space from street vendors in order to preserve it as a privileged site for citizenship. This process is made possible by the proliferation of state agencies, policies, and plans which define the problem of public space as one of its invasion by ambulant vendors, and the solution to this invasion as the relocation of vendors to spatially marginalized and state-regulated markets where they are taught to overcome their `culture of informality' by participating in political and economic transactions in state-prescribed ways. I argue that the recovery of public space and relocation of street vendors is a spatial technology of governance that codes structural inequalities as a question of culture while producing new forms of segregation in which citizens and street vendors have differentiated places and rights to mobility. This study analyzes the relationship between state and citizen construction while considering the pedagogical work implicated in the resilience of both democracy and neoliberal economic policies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The present paper attempts to measure empirically the externalities generated by the street vendors in four zones of the city. Given the lack of information censuses and surveys were carried out during December of 2004 and January 2005. The descriptive statistics show that the established commerce is less formal than expected; whereas the street vendors are mostly stationary, exhibit reduced scale and low space rivalry. The econometric estimations show that the congestion of the public space generated by street vendors has a negative impact on both sales and employment of established retail commerce. The simulations of a reduction of street vendors pinpoint that although street sales account for just 2% of total sales in the four areas under study, they reduce 14% and 16% sales and employment of formal retail commerce respectively. Finally, some limitations of the methodological strategy are raised and some public policy proposals to face the phenomenon are presented. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper is an exercise on the ethnographic interpretation of the "paseode olla", an urban practice observed at a traditional park in bogotá, the "Parque Nacional Enrique Olaya Herrera". The text combines ethnographic descriptions and reflections about the urban public space as well as socio-spatial analyses of human interaction. The text emphasizes in the importance of space practices analyses as forms of culture materialization in urban contexts. It also shows the persistence of the family in contemporary urban practices. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• A new hybrid approach for Green Infrastructure planning is presented. • The method consists of a surrogated drainage model and integer programming optimization. • The optimization method was demonstrated through the case study of Bogotá (Colombia). • The method rapidly builds the Pareto frontier for different area constraints. Green Infrastructure (GI) location planning involves multi-objective spatial analysis considering simultaneous benefits. Fast optimization results are often required (e.g., collaborative modeling exercises and stakeholder involvement workshops), while the simulation-optimization approach is impractical for these cases if it relies on time-consuming simulations of complex drainage system models. This paper proposes a new method using a surrogated model based upon targeted executions of a more complex urban drainage model. This method uses a piece-wise linear interpolation to predict the hydrological impact of individual impervious-to-pervious area changes and the Mixed Integer Linear Optimization to find the optimal location of GI practices. We applied the methodology to the capital city of Colombia, Bogotá, with the objectives of reducing runoff, combined sewer overflows (CSOs), and separate sanitary overflows (SSOs). Two multi-objective optimization approaches (i.e., a lexicographic and a weighted-sum model) were explored, showing the high efficiency of this approach in building Pareto Fronts and rapidly suggesting alternative solutions for different budgets. It was found that by implementing GIs on one-third of the city's GI-feasible public areas (2.2% of city area), under a 10-year 6-h rainfall event, the total reduction on runoff, CSO, and SSO are 0.9%, 1.8%, and 2.4%, respectively. These results show the importance of promoting GI among private-land owners, especially in cities with land predominantly private-owned. This new approach is particularly useful for applications under data scarcity and high-uncertainty scenarios. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper addresses the factors underlying the shift of public space management Bogotá's Historic Center from one neglect by presidentially appointed mayors to an aggressive public space recuperation campaign led by Bogotá's elected mayors from 1988 to the present. Faced with the high barriers to public space recovery-the potential loss of needed political support from vendors and the power of vendor unions to obstruct their removal-this article holds that two factors enabled elected Bogotá mayors to recuperate public space. These are: 1. a democratization of the Bogotá Mayor's Office which made elected mayors responsible to the electorate for their neglect of public space, and 2. the political-economic marginalization of traditionally obstructive Bogotá vendor unions. Field work was carried out in metropolitan Bogotá to determine the impact of the public space recuperation on vendors who were relocated by the Mayor's Office of Bogotá. When compared to data from the street, results of the randomized surveys illustrate improvements in working conditions but lower income and fewer clientele for relocated street vendors. The study similarly documents how more benefits accrued to relocated vendors in markets that specialize in the sale of one product instead of more generalized markets. The conclusion points to the importance of public space recovery for the reinstatement of public order and for downtown economic revitalization. These benefits are described parallel to the disadvantages of the intensification of vendor-government conflict and the large-scale abandonment of costly markets by relocated street vendors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]