Document Type : ORIGINAL RESEARCH ARTICLE
Authors
1
ESBLab, Civil Engineering Faculty, Ho Chi Minh City University of Technology (HUTECH), Ho Chi Minh, Vietnam
2
Faculty of Architecture and Industrial Fine Arts, Yersin University of Da Lat, Da Lat City, Vietnam
3
Civil Engineering Faculty, Ho Chi Minh City University of Technology (HUTECH), Ho Chi Minh, Vietnam
Abstract
BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES: This article examines the phenomenon of caged balconies in Da Lat, Vietnam, to explain how informal spatial extensions mediate tensions between residents’ everyday survival needs and aesthetic governance in a heritage-linked tourist city. Rather than treating caged balconies as isolated architectural violations, the study conceptualizes them as socio-spatial responses to housing scarcity under tourism-oriented visual regulation. Building on debates on urban informality, everyday urbanism, spatial justice, and the politics of visibility, the research aims to: (i) identify the drivers behind caged-balcony construction; (ii) compare their morphologies and interfaces with shared space; (iii) analyze mechanisms of surveillance, regulation, and stigmatization; and (iv) advance an Urban Aesthetic Justice framework to interpret these practices as contested claims to spatial legitimacy.
METHODS: The study adopts a qualitative comparative case design focusing on two contrasting sites: Ngo Quyen Apartment (formal housing) and the To Ngoc Van canal-side settlement (informal housing). Data were triangulated through field observation and photographic documentation, 60 semi-structured interviews with residents, typological analysis of balcony extensions, and review of planning regulations and secondary documents. Materials were analyzed using thematic and content analysis across micro (household), meso (neighborhood), and macro (policy–market) scales.
FINDINGS: Clear contrasts emerge between the two sites. In the formal apartment compound, caged balconies are typically small, standardized, and used for auxiliary functions such as drying and storage. In the canal-side settlement, extensions are larger, built from salvaged materials, and essential for cooking, sleeping, or livelihood activities. These differences reflect interacting micro-level household pressures, meso-level infrastructural and management conditions, and macro-level shortages of affordable housing under image-conscious planning. Field evidence further reveals uneven enforcement and differentiated stigma, in which visually “orderly” extensions are tolerated while precarious yet life-sustaining structures are marginalized within the tourism-oriented urban landscape.
CONCLUSION: The study advances an Urban Aesthetic Justice framework, emphasizing that spatial legitimacy in tourist cities is shaped not only by legality and safety but also by aesthetic regimes and politics of visibility. Caged balconies thus emerge as material indicators of how tourism-driven governance produces uneven tolerance of informality and reinforces socio-spatial inequality. Policy implications include expanding affordable housing supply, strengthening participatory planning, adopting flexible, area-specific regulations that legalize small, safe extensions while removing hazardous ones, and upgrading infrastructure in canal-side neighborhoods. Although limited to two case sites and primarily qualitative evidence, the framework offers a transferable lens for analyzing informal spatial practices in other heritage- and tourism-oriented cities.
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