Social Superblocks

The question

Home-care teams need service areas that fit both local demand and the geography of their work. Administrative boundaries do not necessarily produce compact, connected territories, so I investigated how the social-superblock model could support a different allocation.

My contribution

For my double master’s thesis at UPC and my internship at BCNecologia, Barcelona’s urban ecology agency, I developed a territorial proposal for the city’s home-care service within the Superilles Socials programme. I grouped mobility superblocks around access to neighbourhood services, then aggregated blocks into functional care areas that targeted 1,400–1,800 monthly service hours; the thesis records the areas that fall outside that target. I characterised the proposal with indicators of demographic and economic vulnerability and of urban context.

How I approached it

1. Frame care and proximity

   I combined service demand with district boundaries, accessibility and neighbourhood services to define the territorial requirements.

2. Work at two scales

   I grouped mobility superblocks around proximity and services, then aggregated blocks into functional care areas. Genetic-algorithm trials could not meet the required restrictions.

3. Characterise the proposal

   I assembled the indicators from existing vulnerability research and the agency’s ecological-urbanism framework, and mapped the proposed territories in my thesis.

What exists

A deposited master’s thesis, a two-scale territorial proposal for Barcelona’s home-care service and maps of its neighbourhood context.

• A thesis record in the Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya institutional repository, under its original Spanish title; the full text is restricted by the author.
• A two-scale territorial proposal: morphological grouping of mobility superblocks and functional aggregation of blocks for home-care planning.
• 26 indicators: 13 for demographic and economic vulnerability and 13 for urban context.
• The original proposed-boundary map on thesis page 29, with its legend, district labels, scale and north arrow retained.
• A second thesis map, page 31, shading each proposed area by home-care service hours against the 1,400 to 1,800 monthly target: under, within or over.