The Shape of the Future
makes many points about affordable and accessible housing. Two of them are:
1. To support a prosperous, stable and sustainable society the housing delivery process must change because now it is delivering the wrong size house in the wrong location for those who need better housing the least. Trickle down helps those at the top of the food chain, not those who need housing.
2. A major reason for locational and size dysfunction is that municipal and county controls, programs and incentives related to housing focus on the unit scale. The unit is only one of the five scales of organic components that make up Balanced (Alpha) Communities.
In a Sunday WaPo story (“In Land of Giants, Smallest Houses Bigger Than Ever: Home Buyers Redefine Concept of Starter Home,” Alec MacGillis Page 1A) focuses on the first point but misses the second.
Most of the “experts” quoted are not “wrong,” they just do not yet understand the context – that same context we discuss in this week’s column with respect to governance burnout.
Those quoted in the story who came closest to understanding were New Urbanists.
Unfortunately, many New Urbanist think of development in terms of their own cute and precious “projects.” These projects are often Beta Cluster and sometimes Beta Neighborhood scale. That is one step better but only 2 / 5s of the way home.
We need strategies for Alpha Communities that are made up of Alpha Villages. Alpha Villages are in turn made up of Alpha Neighborhoods and Alpha Neighborhoods of Alpha Clusters composed of Alpha Dooryards.
Great homes of any size are Units in Alpha Dooryards, Alpha Clusters, Alpha Neighborhoods and Alpha Villages that make up Balanced (Alpha) Communities. Anything else is uncivilized.
EMR