Integration of Flexible Water Infrastructure with Local Building Systems for Emerging Small Towns of Ethiopia
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Date
2020-12
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Publisher
A.A.U
Abstract
The recent rapid urbanization and boom of building construction in Ethiopia has
outpaced provision of water and sanitation infrastructure creating unsuitable working and
living conditions in buildings. The general objective of the study is integration of flexible
water infrastructure in local building systems to improve the standard of buildings and the
livability in the emerging small towns of Ethiopia by taking Danissa Goro town as a case
study area to design and demonstrate. The study area is located in Eastern Showa Zone,
Oromia regional state, 125km from the city of Addis Ababa. The study investigates the
negative impact of absence of water and sanitation infrastructure on housing
developments, identify methods of integrating flexible water and sanitation infrastructure
with local building system and assess feasibility of integrating flexible water harvesting
and utilization infrastructure to the local building systems.
Primary and secondary data collection methods are applied to collect quantitative and
qualitative data and applied stratified interviews with 45 participants.
The result of the study shows that underutilization of water sources, the absence of
water infrastructure and sanitation infrastructure has a direct correlation to low quality of life,
and degradation of buildings systems. Decentralized and flexible water systems are not
technically complicated to integrate in local building system.
Finally, the research concludes that integrating of rainwater harvesting, water
conservation and wastewater disposal systems into the existing local buildings will improve
the quality of life of dwellers in the emerging small towns of Ethiopia. Besides, planning and
design regulations have to integrate optional spatial standard for integration of flexible water
infrastructure systems as a precondition for the future development of small towns in
Ethiopia.
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Keywords
Rapid urbanization, water harvesting, Sanitation, Decentralization & urban water system