Combining conservation and community development: An example from Malaga, Spain

A case study of the impact of changing architectural conservation policy in Andalucia, southern Spain is examined. The example highlights a fundamental issue of contemporary debate on cities, namely the future of residential and non-monumental buildings that, nevertheless, represent a distinctive genre of building typology but which are frequently judged to be unsuitable for contemporary housing needs and aspirations. An historical but rapidly disappearing Andalucian residential building type - the corral or corralon - is identified and its traditional features described. This residential type continues to play a particularly significant role in the housing of the elderly. The measures taken by various departments of the Malaga city local authority to not only conserve examples of this distinctive architectural type but also to link this to community development through various measures of enhancement of community cohesion are examined and assessed.