At the other end of the scale, technologically driven ‘‘solutions’’ to upgrading, which were really
developed and taken to scale in Brazil, are now beginning to extend to other countries in Latin
and Central America (Imperato & Ruster, in press), and are being widely adopted by both
national governments and the World Bank. These solutions are based on remote sensing, aerial
photography and geographical information system (GIS), and seek to use this technology to
create a new type of settlement masterplan appropriate to informal settlements. Their ability to
define the complexspatial patterns of shacks as found in informal settlements and to demarcate
shacks and boundaries supports an upgrading approach based upon land regularisation.