Housing for All
A growing concern leads to a search for new ideas in the ways we live.
By Susan S. Szenasy
April 2004
Suddenly everyone is talking about affordable housing—the pent-up
need for it, the new forms it should take, and how to realize the
inventive schemes surfacing through competitions and exhibitions.
The National Building Museum’s show opened in mid-February with the
promising title
Affordable Housing: Designing an American Asset (through
August 8). In preparation for our position paper on housing, the civic
group I cochair,
Rebuild Downtown Our Town (R.Dot), held a symposium
last November on the crucial role housing will play in rebuilding Lower
Manhattan. In this effort we were encouraged by Mayor Michael Bloomberg
when he said that there’s no better way to memorialize those who
died at the World Trade Center than to build housing and schools to
support community life.
In early February I was among the jurors who evaluated 160 entries in
the “New Housing New York Design Ideas Competition,” sponsored
by New York’s City Council, the local American Institute of
Architects chapter, and the City University of New York. Our two days of
judging began with a sense of urgency. We gathered in council chambers
at city hall, where we got the distinct feeling that the city is finally
interested in affordable housing and may even do something about it.
Then we piled into a van to visit three prototypical sites in three New
York boroughs (Manhattan, Queens, and Brooklyn) where revitalization is
needed. Though sleet and wind kept us from walking around, we could see
the lay of the land, survey surrounding traffic and buildings, and get a
pretty good idea of what the competitors were thinking about when they
drew up their suggestions.
This was an ideas competition emphasizing innovative design,
sustainability, economic viability, and transferability to other sites.
What we found was a growing knowledge of green architecture and a good
understanding of LEED standards. We also saw a great deal of positive
social engineering, including housing for the young and the restless,
lots of communal spaces for people who aren’t interested in locking
themselves inside their apartments, and ways to incorporate culture and
retail and restaurants into neighborhoods where everyday life is
celebrated. Harder to find was universal access, even in buildings
proposed for a mix of ages and cultures.
As the jury went into deliberations, one member noted that we can no
longer talk about “low-cost housing” if that means shoddy
buildings that fall apart in 20 years. We now see this is a waste of our
resources and is not sustainable, just as we understand that a city
cannot survive and thrive without decent housing for all of its people. |
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Winners of New Housing New York include Choi Law, Clinton W. Brinster,
and Melody Yiu for their Manhattan infill house. |
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For Brooklyn, Beth Blostein and Bart Overly propose a building where
casual encounters can take place (above and below). |
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Courtesy American Institute of Architects, New York Chapter |
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