Mapping informal housing practices in Lombardy Region. Reflections from InfoHousE research project

As a Mediterranean country, Italy has experienced different practices of informal dwelling, inside both public and private stock. However, research has mainly focused on “self-made” built suburbs and single units in the central and southern regions or squatting practices of empty public and private buildings in the densest urban areas. Since 2008, both the local building sector and the households have been severely affected by the economic crisis, enhanced more by the current pandemic. Owners and renters experienced difficulties maintaining housing properties leading to a broader diffusion of informality in the private sector. However, data on the extension of the phenomenon are missing, and informal housing situations often remain invisible. Moreover, Italian private housing stock is highly fragmented, with many small properties scattered all over the territory. Within the research project “InfoHousE –Informal Housing Experiences” (May 2020-March 2021), a multidisciplinary research group mapped more than 100 examples of informal housing around the Lombardy Region, with a specific focus on situations of marginality, but also on interventions of regeneration of areas and properties. While the research confirmed the similarities among different territories in terms of profiles of those living informally –very low-income households, mainly immigrants -it found differences in the spatial forms of the phenomenon depending on the economic and social dynamic occurring in specific areas and the conditions of their urban fabric. Even in a wealthy and dynamic region as Lombardy, informal dwelling is becoming an ordinary and structural phenomenon, reflecting struggles and strategies of unrecognised subjects to root. At the same time, the fragmentation of the property and the local regulation protecting private ownership prevent local governments from intervening, leaving informality ignored or treated as a security issue.