Earthquake victim squatter encampment in a traffic circle near San Salvador. Many people from small towns and isolated rural places have been protesting what they have experienced as the insufficiency and slowness of relief and recovery efforts by the central government. These people have moved to a high profile location in order to make their situation visible. San Salvador sprawls up the flanks of the eponymous volcano and fills narrow valleys between mountains. Ravines that drain these steep slopes are now urban waterways and open sewers.
Urban drainage is impeded by accumulations of solid waste and rubbish.
This situation is exacerbated by the presence of earthquake debris and constrictions caused by landslides or the collapse of culverts. Flooding can be the result. Low income, self built housing encroaches into many spaces of opportunity in San Salvador's urban fabric. The poorest urban residents actually live in the ravines and narrow urban flood plains. However, such re-housing needs are added to those of approximately 1.5 million people displaced by the earthquakes.