The document proposes developing multi-functional eco-infrastructures in Belize City through inhabiting mangrove forests. It suggests evolving the existing "palafito" housing typology to conserve mangroves while producing renewable energy, sustainable water and food. This would help mitigate risks from hurricanes, flooding and sea level rise while providing housing and transforming risks into development opportunities. Diagrams show how the typology could create neighborhoods within mangroves as climate-adaptive infrastructure.

1. multi-functional eco-infrastructures
for COHABITATION
with climate change
INHABITING the mangrove forest so as to conserve
it through a home for the production of renewable energy,
sustainable water, and tasteful food
Carlos h Betancourth
chbetanc@msn.com
16/05/2015

2. beauty
Belize City is a very beautiful Caribbean and central
American historical city located in a very beautiful country.
Carlos h Betancourth
chbetanc@msn.com

3. Risks and impacts
Belize city is exposed to the risks of hurricanes and of flooding
from three main sources:
1. the sky, its clouds, and its rain
2. the Caribbean sea
3. the river
Carlos h Betancourth
chbetanc@msn.com

4. The mangrove forest
The mangrove forests have historically played an important role
in helping to mitigate and adapt to these risks. In a way it has
helped to avoid costly investments in grey mono-functional
infrastructures
Carlos h Betancourth
chbetanc@msn.com
http://blog.nature.org/science/2013/08/08/mangrove-sea-level-rise-climate-change-
adaptation/

5. Rapid urbanization
The rapid process of urbanization as well as plans for the expansion of the city (See proposal by The World Bank), are
destroying this system of multi-functional eco-infrastructures for climate change adaptation (e.g., the last remaining mangrove
forest). The challenge is then to transform these risks into a development opportunity. How?
Carlos h Betancourth
chbetanc@msn.com
It is proposed that The Burdon Canal Nature Reserve be used as
a space for sub-Urban expansion plan for Belize City,
2010-2050 (The World Bank)
The Burdon Canal Nature Reserve in Belize is a low lying basin, comprising the backswamps of
the Belize River/Haulover Creek delta. It is permanently waterlogged, with a gradient of saline to fresh
water arising from regular tidal inundation at the seaward fringe and freshwater flooding from inland.
During the dry season, parts of the reserve may become hypersaline. The site's elevation is generally sea
level, but rises to approximately 4 ft (1.2 m) along river banks. It receives approximately 75 inches
(1,900 mm) to 80 inches (2,000 mm) of rain per year. The tide in the Canal is semi-diurnal, and the water
level at the Canal Bridge lags about 2-3 hours behind the centre of Belize City.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Burdon_Canal_Nature_Reserve
List of protected areas of Belize http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_protected_areas_of_Belize

6. proposal
Inhabiting the mangrove forest
The local population and the Central American immigrants are responding to the lack of space for housing by inhabiting
the mangrove forest
Carlos h Betancourth
chbetanc@msn.com

7. Proposal
Through inhabitation the locals create a housing typology with a potential to conserve and transform the
forest into a multifunctional eco-infrastructure for adaptation to climate change
In their exploratory interaction with the forest, they have evolved a “housing typology” of a productive home that has the
potential to conserve the mango-forest as a multifunctional Eco-infrastructure for climate change adaptation
Carlos h Betancourth
chbetanc@msn.com
EXISITNG PALAFITO HOME
(living with water)
First improvement
(living with water)

8. Proposal
We propose a further development for
the existing typology
Conserving the mangrove-forest through
inhabiting it with a home for The
production of energy, water and food
Carlos h Betancourth
chbetanc@msn.com

9. Proposal
Evolving typology
Carlos h Betancourth
chbetanc@msn.com
Further improvement
PALAFITO HOME ENERGY/SUSTAINABLE
WATER/URBAN AGRICULTURE
(closed-loop urbanism)
EXISITNG PALAFITO HOME (living with water) First improvement (living with water)
LEVEL 1
LEVEL 2 LEVEL 3

10. Proposal
variations
Carlos h Betancourth
chbetanc@msn.com

11. Proposal
Creating the street
Carlos h Betancourth
chbetanc@msn.com

12. Proposal
Creating the neighborhood-I
Carlos h Betancourth
chbetanc@msn.com
fase 1 fase 2 fase 3

13. Proposal
Creating the neighborhood-II
Carlos h Betancourth
chbetanc@msn.com
fase 1 fase 2 fase 3

14. multi-functional eco-infrastructures
for COHABITATION
with climate change
INHABITING the mangrove forest so as to conserve it through a home for the production of renewable energy, sustainable water and food
Carlos h Betancourth
chbetanc@msn.com
16/05/2015
REFERENCES
• Strategic master plan for Belize City
• urban development scenarios for belize city 2010-2030
belizecitycouncil.org/resourcesmodule/.../@random4dc1b261cfd1d/Jan 1, 2011
• HOUSING POLICY IN BELIZE: DIAGNOSIS AND GUIDELINES FOR ACTION Dr. Shlomo Angel
Housing Policy Advisor to the World Bank, Prepared for the Government of Belize and the
World Bank New York, January 2010. http://sollyangel.com/wp-
content/uploads/2013/11/2010-Housing-Policy-in-Belize.pdf
• The Burdon Canal Nature Reserve in Belize,
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Burdon_Canal_Nature_Reserve
• List of protected areas of Belize
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_protected_areas_of_Belize
• Convenient Solutions to an Inconvenient Truth Ecosystem-Based Approaches to Climate
Change. 2010 The International Bank for Reconstruction and Development / The World
Bank.
https://openknowledge.worldbank.org/bitstream/handle/10986/2686/518380PUB0Clim1
01Official0Use0Only1.pdf?sequence=1

15. Thank you
Carlos h Betancourth
chbetanc@msn.com
fase 2 fase 3
multi-functional eco-
infrastructures
for
COHABITATION
with climate change
INHABITING the
mangrove forest so as to
conserve it through a
neighborhood and a home for
the production of renewable
energy, sustainable water and
food
16/05/2015