Building Boom Backlash

Yesterday, local Bloomberg writer Eliana Raszewski had an intriguing piece on a subject of constant conversation between us and our local, older Porteño neighbors: the downside of the building boom in Palermo (and other nabes) on the quality of life, and infrastructure, in the city. An extreme-but believable--example of what happens you put a residential tower in a neighborhood with services designed for two-storey houses:

Adriana Plodek, a housewife, said the basement of her apartment block was flooded in June. The laying of foundations for nearby towers had caused the water table to rise, she said.

Plodek and owners of the other apartments in her building had to buy four pumps that run 24 hours a day to draw water from the basement. This contributed to an increase in her monthly condominium charges to 320 pesos in October from 271 pesos a year earlier. Moving isn't an option because nobody would want to buy her apartment, she said.