The 13th edition of Lisbon Urban Regeneration Week ended on Friday with around 2,400 attendees.
The event, organised by Vida Imobiliário, was held at Lisboa Social Mitra in the city’s latest regenerated district of Marvila and was supported by Lisbon City Council and Santa Casa da Misericórdia de Lisboa.
All told there were 24 sessions and events with over 120 speakers from different public and private institutions in the sector.
Over the three days that the event took place, more than 60 entities and partners took part in the various conferences, debates and visited the exhibition area.
Housing, the rental market, sustainability, decarbonisation, technology, licencing and legislation were some of the topics under discussion.
Participating in the official opening of the event, Patrícia Gonçalves Costa, Secretary of State for Housing, referred to the importance of urban rehabilitation in responding to the housing challenge, remembering that this “is the quickest response to providing supply to families, reconciling environmental efficiency and economic rationality”, and that “Portugal has more than 1,500,000 buildings over 50 years old”, so the opportunity is also to improve seismic safety.
She recalled that the Government had viewed housing as a priority from the start, and framed the current moment within a European trend of refocusing housing as a strategic priority.
“If we want to discuss housing in Portugal, we cannot ignore what is being done in Europe. We are participating in the design of what is being planned for the coming years”, particularly with regard to the European plan for affordable housing.
“We have a social urgency to implement housing responses in the shortest amount of time.” And she warned that “we have to plan for the future, and be prepared. Failing to prepare is preparing ourselves to fail. We count on everyone’s knowledge to overcome this great challenge of the crisis in access to housing”, she concluded.
Also present at the official opening, Carlos Moedas, Mayor of Lisbon and President of the City Council, highlighted housing as a priority in the new Municipal Master Plan that the municipality is preparing.
“The goal is to create a strategic document that brings clarity, reduces bureaucracy and materialises a new vision of the city, based on mobility, better circulation and greater sustainability”.
Only after this structural basis “will it be possible to consistently increase the housing supply”.
He highlighted the new urbanization plans for Vale de Santo António and Vale de Chelas, with the construction potential of thousands of homes, and recalled: “Nobody has a magic wand, and we have to solve the problem together, with everyone present here. We need supply, access and renovation”.
For his part, Manuel Reis Campos, president of the Portuguese Confederation of Construction and Real Estate (CPCI), stated that Portugal needs to build around 30,000 to 60,000 homes per year to respond to current housing needs, and there are measures that can mobilise private parties for this response, such as reducing the tax burden, simplifying bureaucracy or speeding up licensing and boosting the rental market. “rennovation is more than preserving heritage, it is regenerating cities and articulating environmental, social and economic policies. It is necessary to build more, rehabilitate more. That is the true paradigm”, he concluded.
SOURCE: Vida Imobiliária