Informality in formal spaces through self organization: a study of the people’s processes in Puttalam town in Sri Lanka

Abstract

Informality is an inevitable ingredient in an urban environment. The ‘formally’ established urban built environments are informally shaped by people for the appropriation of spaces for their activities. Within dominant institutionalized urban planning processes, such informalities are often regarded as ‘nuisances’, ‘out-of-place’, and ‘misfits’ in urban spaces. Yet, informally organized spaces are as important as formal spaces for the vitality, equity, and sustainability of all types of urban environments. People's processes in the creation and operation of informal spaces, resisting, contesting, and negotiating the dominant formal networks, have been the subject of many scholarly works over the last few decades, but a lack of empirical work and informative case studies on the subject has distanced mainstream planners and urban designers from learning and integrating such informal space production into institutionalized urban development processes. In order to mend this gap and reorient the prevalent understanding among planning professionals, a people’s endeavor in Puttalam town in Sri Lanka to form and sustain informal spaces is presented in this paper. The paper elaborates on the ‘self-organizing’ behaviour of the small-scale retail vendors and the day-to-day users of the city to withstand interventions by the authorities on the public market space of the town.