Dr. Alonso Ayala
Senior Expert in Housing and Human Settlement Planning

Alonso Ayala is an architect and urban planner specialized in the fields of affordable housing and sustainable human settlement planning. He is a senior academic staff at the Institute for Housing and Urban Development Studies (IHS) and assistant professor at the Erasmus University School of Behavioral Sciences in Rotterdam, The Netherlands.
He holds a joint-MSc degree in Regional Development Planning from TU-Dortmund, Germany and the University of the Philippines (2002), and a PhD in Engineering from the Spatial Planning Faculty of TU Dortmund, Germany (2008). With over thirty years of working experience, he has conducted post-graduate education, professional training, research and consultancy work in strategic planning, human settlement planning, housing policy, affordable housing and social housing in Latin America, Asia, Africa and Eastern Europe.
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The countries where Alonso Ayala has working experience include Argentina, Bangladesh, Brazil, Belgium, Chile, Ecuador, Ethiopia, Germany, Ghana, Guatemala, India, Indonesia, Ethiopia, Italy, Myanmar, Nigeria, Philippines, Russia, Senegal, South Africa, Sri Lanka, Sudan, Sweden, Thailand, Turkey, The Netherlands, Venezuela and the Western Balkans.
Alonso Ayala’s main research area of interest is the relationship between housing adequacy and housing justice through the application of the 5 A’s Principles of Adequate Housing analytical framework. These principles are Availability, Accessibility, Affordability, Acceptability and Adaptability.
Publications
Czischke, D. and Ayala, A. (2021). Housing in the global north and the global south. In A. M.Orum, J. Ruiz-Tagle and S. V. Haddock (Eds.) Companion to urban and regional studies (pp. 579-604). Hoboken: John Wiley & Sons. https://doi.org/10.1002/9781119316916.ch27Opens external
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Ayala, A., Bosco, S. D., Eerd, M. van and Velayutham, C. (2020). Housing aspirations of resettled communities through a gender lens : an analysis of drawings by women from Perumbakkam in Chennai, India. Shelter, 21(2), 66-76.
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Ayala, A. (2019). Informal housing in Venezuela. In: V. Bharne and S. Khandekar (Eds.) (2019). Affordable housing, inclusive cities (pp. 151-156). Navato: ORO Editions.
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Ayala, A. (2019). Urban blueprint : Venezuula : informal housing. My Liveable City, (Jan-Mar), 40-45.
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Ayala, A., Eerd, M. van and Geurts, E. (2019). Affordable, available, accessible and acceptable housing in African new towns. In: R. Keeton and M. Provoost (Eds.) (2019). To build a city in Africa : a history and a manual (pp. 410-418). Rotterdam: nai010 publishers.
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Ayala, A., Eerd, M. van and Geurts, E. (2019). The five principles of adequate housing. In: V. Bharne and S. Khandekar (Eds.) (2019). Affordable housing, inclusive cities (pp. 94-99). Navato: ORO Editions.
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Ayala, A. and Geurts, E. (2018). [Opinon] confronting informality. In: R. Rocco (Ed.), (2018). Confronting informality : preserving communities and creating public goods in informal settlements : reportOpens external (pp. 57-58). Delft: Delft University of Technology, Faculty of Architecture and the Built Environment, Department of Urbanism.
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Ayala, A., Rabé, P. and Geurts, E. (2013). [February 2014] Best Practices for Roma integration : regional report on housing legalization, settlement upgrading and social housing for Roma in the Western BalkansOpens external. Warsaw: OSCE Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (ODIHR).
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Ayala, A. (2011). The relational universe of Ayigya. In: The transformation of the urban structure of Kumasi : Studio Ghana 2010-2011 (10 architectural and urban proposals for the city of Kumasi) (pp. 40-41). Delft: Publikatieburo Bouwkunde ,TU Delft.
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Ayala, A., Geurts, E. and Ahmad P. [et al.], (2010). Urbanising Africa : the city centre : experiences with inner-city revitalization from Johannesburg (South Africa), Mbabane (Swaziland), Lusaka (Zambia), Harare and Bulawayo (Zimbabwe). (IHS working papers series, no. 26). Rotterdam: Institute for Housing and Urban Development Studies (IHS).
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Ayala, A. (2009). The integration paths of the Barrios of Caracas, In A Hill and K Weiß (Eds.) Spatial planning with obstacles : 40 years of spatial planning in crisis regions and developing countries, (Dortmunder beiträge zur raumplanung : blue series, no. 133) (pp. 105-122). Dortmund: Institute of Spatial Planning (IRPUD).
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Ayala, A. (2009). Community organisations, misiones and integration of barrios of Caracas : the Case of the CAMEBA Upgrading Project (IHS working papers series, no. 21). Rotterdam: Institute for Housing and Urban Development Studies (IHS).