The Olympic Village as a catalyst for Urban Transformation in the South of Buenos Aires

Abstract

Urban developments resulting from mega-events have generated divergent territorial outcomes, ranging from market-driven restructuring to more integrated forms of urban regeneration. In Buenos Aires, the 2018 Youth Olympic Games led to the development of the Olympic Village in Comuna 8, a historically disadvantaged and fragmented area of the city. This article examines how the Olympic Village was reinterpreted as a catalyst for a broader territorial vision of the city’s southern area. Using a qualitative, interpretative, and ex post case-study approach, it analyses planning documents and empirical materials produced during the formulation of strategic visions between 2022 and 2025. The paper defines a catalyst as an intervention that enables the development and scaling of planning frameworks and institutional arrangements, rather than one that directly produces spatial transformation. From this perspective, the Olympic Village functioned as a methodological and institutional pilot case. The findings indicate a partial and conditional success: while the experience contributed to reframing planning approaches, its spatial effects remain limited and dependent on ongoing implementation capacity and metropolitan coordination. The article shows that catalytic interventions in fragmented contexts operate primarily through institutional and methodological transformation rather than immediate territorial change.