The MIT FEMA Trailer Project considers how the nearly 150,000 temporary houses deployed to Hurricane Katrina victims in Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and Texas could catalyze positive change as opposed to the social and health risks they are associated with. They have initiated a call for proposals for the FEMA Trailer Challenge, seeking to prompt innovations in answer to questions such as:
How could trailers be envisioned as something other than housing?
If the trailers remained as housing, what kinds of changes could be adopted to provide better housing?
How could trailers address psychosocial concerns of trailer residents resulting from disasters–poverty, trauma, job loss, etc?
How could trailers address ongoing problems in disaster areas? These include the lack of fresh produce and other healthy foods in disaster areas, environmental contamination (e.g. the oil spills in the Gulf Coast as a result of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita), trauma among disaster victims, access to mental and physical healthcare, etc.
MIT teams are eligible to win $1,000 and inclusion in a FEMA trailer publication TBA, while outside teams can submit proposals for the publication. Hopefully the winning proposals can be realized using the FEMA trailer parked here at MIT and the ideas generated can help guide a new administration’s approach to real disaster relief.
