A methodological assessment of immigrants' settlement patterns and housing typologies in metropolitan areas

Abstract

The research reported in this chapter fits into recent international researches on the relevance of immigrants for urban and regional sustainability, and on the relationship between immigrants settlements and socio-economic, territorial and dwellings characteristics. An innovative methodology is proposed in order to describe settlement and housing typologies of different groups of immigrants that live in a certain metropolitan area, according to respective demographic, economic, professional and dwelling characteristics. It consists in the setting of a management information system with different demographic, economic, professional, and location/housing characteristics, development of a simulation and cartographic display interface, then integrated into a set of "tableaux de bord" (to monitor the evolution of variables, and to compare different groups of immigrants and different territorial spaces); adjustment of an explanatory model for their housing locations (based on the methodology of hierarchical classification trees), and settlement of housing typologies, according to immigrants characteristics. This methodology is intended - through data identification, organization and structuring to support the strategic formulation and implementation of housing policies, considering the real and predictable characteristics of different groups of immigrants in a certain territory, strictly articulated with sectorial and territorial strategies. It also enables settlement patterns and housing typologies monitoring along time. It is applied, as a case study, to the Oporto Metropolitan Area (Portugal) but can be easily generalized to different metropolitan and urban realities, thus supporting the harmonization of housing policies targeted to immigrants, within the scope of different institutional and legal frameworks. This chapter further stresses - through the identification of inter-population and interterritorial housing inequalities - the importance of urban planning and management interventions in order to ensure assess to favorable housing conditions to all people living in a certain metropolitan area.