47 can see, street vending was a regular practice, but it was not a dominant activity that subordinated the neighbourhood to its own logics. The central patio was used for many functions; among them drying cloth, playing, working, do some domestic work. Festivities also take place here such as posadas (celebrations before Christmas), sonideros (local typical dancing), quinceañeras celebrations, birthdays, etc. Red points indicate multiple activities carried out in space by the same family, we can see this spatial relations were dense. The vecindad was the central unit of local economy and social cohesion. Streets had a secondary role as extensions of the vecindad. The vecindad in the 2011’s: exchange value of space In 1986, neighbours living in the vecindad Aztecas n° 63 decided to participate in the City Renovation Programme. The 14 families became owners of in the apartments reconstructed in the renovation unit. Apartments were organised in three floors buildings around the central patio in the same plot; but conceived as individual, modern units. Two shops opening to the street were constructed and original tenants became owners. They rent these shops to market vendors’. Aztecas street market became specialised in cloth and jewellery, local shops were transformed in specialised boutiques. The central patio had lost its social practices, now it is mainly used to store chariots and racks used in the street market. An inhabitant told me during field trip: We stopped organising dancing and celebrations in patios because street vendors’ have no time; when they go back to home after the market close they count all the money they’ve earned during the day (LO in PhD thesis notes ucl-dpu, 2011). Street vending has changed the community organisation of time and space. In the diagram (2) we can see that 10 out of 15 apartments are still used as dwelling. Most of them are families working in the street market. One is used also as a working place, preparing food to distribute to street vendors. Four out of 15 apartments (31%) are used as rented storage places. Only one is still used as a pirated cd’s workshop. This show to what extent dwellings, streets and social practices are subordinated to the street market. We can see in the diagram that the local economic unit is the street, which is the major organising principle of the neighbourhood. Social activities and spaces have almost disappeared. Middle class original inhabitants tend to move out, while others settle down and try to extend their properties (stalls in streets and apartments). This shows that community will exploit space as an economic asset if they can, because their priority is to develop family businesses. Conclusions In the Tepito neighbourhood the “right to the city” has been materialised as: (1) access to private land property (dwellings) (2) the use of streets, as private property in practice, to develop individual businesses (market stalls) Empowerment of local community facilitated the community exploitation of space as an economic resource to develop market activities. Expansion of the street market transformed deeply social relations and organisation of space. Exchange value has subordinated social space to its own needs. The case study shows that local communities may be willing to adapt themselves to the expansion of capitalism, if they can obtain direct economic benefits from doing so. The right to the city as a code that empower communities should establish limits to exploitation, to prevent the community to transform use value of space into exchange value. Thus, becoming a factor of self-destruction of the community and exploitation of space. Spatial practices in 2011´s (renovation unit located in Aztecas Street nº 63)
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