No room at the inn, but world's cities are fighting back

Friday, 22 January 2021

Auckland Council is pushing back at the Government's plans to get thousands of prefab homes built here to tackle the housing crisis (first published in February 2020).

The good news is that Wellington has joined an exclusive club.

The bad news is that it’s one nobody wants to be part of.

Skyrocketing housing prices, lengthy queues for the few houses on the market, people increasingly pushed to the city fringes and beyond?

These are problems that afflict 90 per cent of 200 other cities around the world World Economic Forum has deemed unaffordable in a new survey.

* Wellington Report 2019: Getting too big for our boots?

* Multi-million cost blowout for major Wellington infrastructure project blamed on inaccurate 'guesstimate'

Academic Philippa Howden-Chapman says New Zealand can learn a lot from what other countries are doing on housing.

And United Nations research suggests the cost of living is only going to get worse in our urban centres, with close to one in seven people globally tipped to call cities home by 2050.

Many of these growing centres are fighting back, and academics say there are lessons to be learned in New Zealand.

Philippa Howden-Chapman, Wellington-based University of Otago professor and director of the New Zealand Centre for Sustainable Cities, highlights the work done in Singapore, Germany, and the Nordic countries.

John Tookey, the head of Auckland University of Technology’s Built Environment School of Engineering, points to Los Angeles and Denver in the United States, Copenhagen and Hamburg in Europe and, closer to home, Melbourne and Sydney across the Tasman.

Repurposing empty factories, schools and other buildings is being done in many of these cities, and could be expanded here, they say.

Professor John Tookey says repurposing factories and other buildings could be a boon for housing.

“In a place like Wellington this repurposing of defunct factories…could have a major effect on the current problem,” said Tookey.

This was being done successfully in Europe, said Howden-Chapman.

“Stockholm and Copenhagen have maintained the historic character of the cities, while using repurposed industrial sites for medium- and high-density housing with superb amenities,” she said.

Wellington was doing some of this, with its city council working with developers to convert offices into affordable rental apartments, but Howden-Chapman thought the city could go even further.

“There are also creative opportunities…to use ‘road reserves’ for infill housing.

“Rather than reserving space for cars, we need to follow European examples and have in-fill houses with street fronts, interspersed with small section parks and shared streets for pedestrians and cyclists.”

New Zealanders have become used to motels being used for emergency and transitional housing.

Los Angeles has gone further, passing a law to allow the conversion of motels into “permanent supportive housing”.

London’s might be quiet because of Covid-19 but its housing market remains red-hot.

The Bulgarian city of Dunipsta,, which is helping those struggling to buy a home.

Bristol, UK, where an old school will be converted into new housing.

Chengdu is looking to land beyond the city for more housing.

New prefabrication building materials have been approved for building multi-storey buildings faster and cheaper.

In places like Sydney, Melbourne and London, local authorities were increasingly working with the private sector to speed-up approval, build more properties faster, and use the proceeds to build even more social housing.

Good regulation could also support more secure housing, said Howden-Chapman.

“Singapore…had a huge government building programme and now an over 90 per cent home ownership rate, predominantly in apartments,” she said.

Germany and the Nordic countries had prioritised secure, quality housing and backed that up with “strong social contracts and housing regulations that encourage stable tenancies”.

Five cities fighting back

The World Economic Forum has highlighted work done in a number of cities to build more and affordable housing, faster and cheaper, for a growing population. Here’s a handful:

London: The city has established the Mayor’s Construction Academy to fast-track funding and training of skilled workers for the region’s under-resourced construction industry.

Dupnitsa: No house? No problem. The Bulgarian city is building 150 houses specifically for people who earn an income but not enough to buy a home.

Bristol: A former primary school will soon be home to 161 houses. Some will be sold at market price and others through shared ownership and rent-to-buy schemes.

Chengdu: The Chinese city is trying tradable land quotas, which allows developers to build houses on the fringes, in exchange for opening up more land for use beyond the city boundaries.

Chennai: The Indian Institute of Technology has devised a building system using low-cost, prefabricated panels made using gypsum waste from fertilizer plants, with minimal concrete and steel, and no bricks. The government has approved it for structures of up to 10 storeys high.