Abstract

On Friday 27th February 2010 at 3:40 am, a terrible earthquake measuring 8.8 on the Richter scale rocked the central territory of Chile. Hours later a terrible Tsunami hit a large part of its coastal region. This event spanned a longitude of 630 km causing damages in at least six regions of the country which concentrate 75% of national population. Besides the destruction and all the panic, the quake caused an instantaneous black out for more than four days. As a result of this black out, cities suffered severe difficulties related to provisions, communication and safety, to name a few. This situation
demonstrated the vulnerability of Chile electrical grid and the people’s dependence of energy. According to data from National Reconstruction Plan (2010) the number of damaged houses reached 370,051 generating enormous work in rebuilding not only houses, but entire communities and town, each of which had particular way of life. It is important to mention the destruction of many major historic centers with low density residential communities that had taken dozens of years to consolidate their cultural wealth (Letelier, 2010). That cultural richness is characterized by the diversity in its
population, including people of various social classes having accesses the same services and facilities. Also, this proximity to services produced a low dependence on automobiles, keeping walking as a basic system of transportation.
As these current events imply a lot of work, questions are raised about what kind of cities can be rebuilt or what kind of neighborhoods can be developed.