Project Title & Location
BALINTAWAK TEACHERS' VILLAGE CONDOMINIUM PROJECT
Quezon City

Client
National Housing Authority

Project Completion
1983

Associated Firms
GALHIA Architects
Design Management and Development Corp.

Services Provided
- Feasibility Study
- Site Development Planning
- Architectural and Engineering Design

Following the success in providing housing opportunities for civil service workers, the National Housing Authority focused its project at Balintawak to teachers of Metropolitan Manila.

A 50-hectare site close to the intersection of the North Luzon Expressway and Quirino Highway is selected as a viable place to develop. It is in an accessible location to most of the prospective beneficiaries in the northern part of the metropolis. Furthermore, the National Housing Authority has an on-going sites and services project proximate to what later is called the Balintawak Teachers' Village.

The project consists of 511 dwelling units with floor areas ranging from 50 square meters to 60 square meters. The village has also 34 shops with ground floors functioning as household factory floors. There are also 24 shop houses along the western side of the property. In the entire project has a dwelling density of 122 dwelling units per hectare. Community facilities available to the residents consist of school and offices, chapel, an NHA social services building and play courts. At times the latter function as parking areas.

The National Housing Corporation factory at Tala provided the components. An experimental design strategy was introduced to give variety to terraced row housing facades. Considering the expediency of constructing repetitive housing units that require speed and economy, these became uniformly monotonous; indistinguishable one from the other. Opportunities for diversity are thus explored in facade treatment. However with the absence of development guidelines, which homeowners can follow upon occupancy of the dwelling units, regulating what can be introduced to the facade proved difficult. This has resulted to kitschy arrangements to the extent that these became hazards to livability. The long-term objective of visual quality similar to those in European cities was not achieved. A study on cultural conditions for environmental quality is thus essential in designing built forms.