August 24, 2022
Being able to work, play, have a coffee or a meal and do your shopping within walking distance of your home seems too good to be true? Not having to use your car on a daily basis seems like magical thinking? Are you thrilled to run into your neighbors on a busy street? All of this is possible thanks to a simple, but still poorly understood concept - urban densification.
This concept has been in the news for a few months now. Done right, it can be an effective response to the challenges of urban development. Commonly referred to as "15-minute neighbourhoods", this type of urban development is well worth our attention and deserves to be explained. It is the future of our great cities that lies between these words.
Economists, urban planners and environmentalists agree that this concept should be used as a model for the design of new neighbourhoods or the reconfiguration of existing areas. Allowing people to feel part of a community, to be able to live, work and play together is a modern way of living in a city.
Healthy densification will allow more housing projects to come to fruition. Moreover, the principles of densification go far beyond the simple construction of high-rise buildings. Densifying a city has several components:
- Allowing people to live in an urban environment while reducing their environmental footprint.
- Encouraging mixed use.
- Creating vibrant economic spaces where businesses and services can thrive.
- Protecting urban green spaces.
- Providing a human-scale living environment that contributes to a strong sense of community;
- Maximizing the use of municipal and provincial public services.
Let's take a look at one type of housing that we propose: the "Horizon" building, which has 82 units on 4 floors. It can house 82 people (minimum) on a 25,800 square foot lot. To house those same 82 people in townhouses requires 4 times more land than a 4-story building, or 103,000 square feet. And to build single-family homes would require 6 times as much land, or 145,000 square feet. Densification obviously reduces the environmental footprint.
Now imagine if, by misfortune, the single-family homes needed to house those same 82 people were built on the outskirts of the city, contributing to the undesirable phenomenon of urban sprawl that is already hitting our region hard. The mandatory use of cars, the social pressure to obtain new public services such as an elementary school, a daycare center or a hospital, as well as the inevitable deforestation are only a few of the negative effects of the sprawl phenomenon.
Let's remember that for every single-family home built in the suburbs, about 1 acre of land is sacrificed. That means that 1,000 homes require nearly 43,000,000 square feet of space, which is the equivalent of 490 soccer fields. How much land will we sacrifice, how many trees will we cut down and how many roads will we have to build before we realize that this type of development is harmful to our environment.
Moreover, it is rare that the housing shortage does not make the headlines. The CMHC says Ottawa is building homes at the highest rate seen in nearly 50 years, but experts say it may not make much of a dent in the massive demand.
All of this is in addition to the issue of housing accessibility. The more time passes, the more accessibility is reduced by rising construction costs, rising interest rates, shortages of labour and construction materials, administrative delays, etc. The result: less housing and more expensive housing.
We are currently experiencing the repercussions of our past choices and hesitations. Faced with this situation, which many people refer to as a "housing crisis", we must unite to adopt an innovative and sustainable approach that is forward-looking and respectful of our environment.
Let's take action and lay the foundations for a civic partnership between the municipal administration and builders who are ready to invest in this future that is knocking at our doors. The Brigil team is already ready to contribute to this partnership, with its resources and expertise, to build the living environments our citizens have a right to expect.
It is in this fruitful collaboration that our mission to "build with purpose" will take on its full meaning.
Gilles Desjardins
Founding President of Brigil