Upcoming Site Design Workshop in East Vancouver, Earth Month Book Sale, & Other Important Updates
| |
|
East Vancouver, BC Upcoming Site Design Workshop
May 13–14, 2023 @ Vancouver Cohousing
| |
|
"The City of Vancouver, like a lot of places, suffers from a huge lack of cohousing — but they are trying to do something about it."
The first cohousing community (and the first one in Vancouver) that we designed there eleven years ago was so much more difficult than today. After that one, the city of Vancouver decided that it was exactly the kind of neighborhood that the city wanted to encourage as they continue to allow more single-family houses to be turned into multifamily lots.
|  | |
Too often, politicians have been convinced that single-family is the only true neighborhood. But after the first cohousing project, I went back up to Vancouver to meet with (2) City Council members and the Head of the Vancouver School District together.
Since then, the zoning codes for Vancouver have been changed and they are considerably more reasonable and logical than they were eleven years ago.
So, we are looking for a much smoother process and presumably more economical as well. But bravo to Vancouver for wanting to make cohousing easier and better (too many rules are arbitrary and don't relate to cohousing) and more economical.
|  | |
The new cohousing that we are currently planning in East Vancouver promises to be state-of-the-art urban cohousing.
The community is located in Norquay Village, a fast-growing hub with several new and approved zoning applications to accommodate the growing population and need for densification. From our initial feasibility study, East Vancouver cohousing can comfortably have 30 units on 0.36 acres (83 units/acre density) with extensive list of common amenities that will complement the commercial and recreational spaces that already exist in this great neighborhood.
See the context maps above and below to see the extensive list of restaurants, parks, libraries, childcare centers, and schools that are within walking distance from the site.
| |
|
We are extremely excited to get this project rolling and going.
If you are too, we would like to invite you to join us and register for the Site Design Workshop on May 13–14. This workshop is where you can take part in designing your own future community and neighborhood—not brick by brick—but decision by decision.
For more information about this workshop, please visit: https://www.eastvancohousing.ca/
or call Jen Mollins at (778) 269 4311
| |
Other Updates in Cohousing: Table of Contents
April 2023
|
-
Cohousing Communities 30% off for the month of April
- Ramona Cohousing Public Presentation Recap & Next Steps
- LeadingAge Presentation: Senior Cohousing May 2nd
- New Antioch Continuing Education Course — Designing Community-Enhanced Neighborhoods: The Architecture of Cohousing
| |
|
Cohousing Communities 30% off for Earth Month
Use code "EAR30" at checkout HERE.
| Offer valid through the end of April. Order HERE. | |
Ramona Cohousing
Public Presentation March 16th Recap & Next Steps
| |
|
Ramona's public presentation was a great success!
Jim Hagey, long time developer in the San Diego area, has set aside 8 acres for a new cohousing community in Ramona, California, a small town of 20,000 people, 30 minutes North-East of San Diego. We went there to check on the number one feasibility question for a new cohousing to be built in any town — that is, is there a large enough group of households ready to pursue that effort?
About 100 people came to the public presentation on March 16th. Local schoolteachers, local environmental activists, retired folks, and folks with young families. It was a very positive all around — except we did have one heckler.
Some people like their town to be just what they already have, despite changing demographics and the pressing need to address not only global warming, but also more sociable, walkable environments, not to mention the need for more affordable housing. The heckler felt that the only thing appropriate at this downtown spot was more large single-family houses. The first project to get a heckler was Nevada City, CA but we eventually were able to build a state-of-the-art cohousing there, so Ramona is in good company.
That Saturday, March 18th, 30 folks came to find out more and to start thinking about the next steps for Ramona Cohousing.
|  | |
|
The next step is to find enough folks to host a 2-Day Getting-It-Built Workshop there to address the group process; the county planning process; the design process; the costs; and the rest.
For more information, or to get involved, email Jim Hagey at jim@redleafvillage.com, Alan Ridley at weprosper2@hotmail.com, Joshua Alvord at josh.alvord@gmail.com, or Tim Jeffries at landhound1@gmail.com.
The 12 acres to the north of the cohousing site is also being developed and will include a new town square, a new commercial hub, and a cohousing community combined — similar to the mixed-use project called Hearthstone that we designed years ago in Denver, Colorado. See pages 117 to 126 in the book Creating Cohousing as an example of this kind of mixed-use scenario.
| |
To sign up for the upcoming Getting-It-Build Workshop or to get more info, check out their website at: https://elliott-pond.com/ or email jim@redleafvillage.com | |
LeadingAge Conference
May 1st - May 3rd, Monterey, CA
| | |
|
Senior Cohousing: A community Approach to Independent Living
LeadingAge presentation by Charles Durrett
Tuesday, May 2, 2023, 4:15PM-5:15 PM PDT
This presentation will outline how seniors can custom-build their own appropriate neighborhood to fit their needs and aspirations. This is housing organized by seniors, not for them, with an emphasis on independence and autonomy, while having continuous support from community. Senior cohousing is built on relationships: knowing, caring, and supporting your neighbors.
| |
Antioch Continuing Education Class 2023
Now open for registration
| |
Designing Community-Enhanced Neighborhoods:
The Architecture of Cohousing
Professional Development Certificate
Wednesdays June 7 - June 28, 2023, 9:30 – 11:30 am PT
With this class, Charles Durrett will impart his knowledge from designing over 55 cohousing communities in North America (and probably more than anyone in the world) to give every cohousing designer a leg up if you’re going to design a new cohousing community and want it to be a high-quality and high-functioning cohousing community.
This class will also be utilizing his latest book, Cohousing Communities: Designing for High-Functioning Neighborhoods, as the main text of the class. This book is chock-full of more than 100 case studies; over a thousand photographs, plans, and diagrams; and all of the lessons learned from the good ones—giving readers a perfect point of departure and setting them up for success when they create their own communities. While still leaving it up to the creativity of the designer and their ability to understand the subculture of the group.
Sign Up Here
| |
The Cohousing Company is looking for a qualified Architecture intern for a 6-month internship | |
Email us at charles.durrett@cohousingco.com with your resume and portfolio to apply today! | |
|
Books have played a major role from the beginning in terms of getting cohousing to this country and built in your town, starting with our first book Cohousing: A Contemporary Approach to Housing Ourselves (The European Story). Bookstores normally play a key role in culture change in general, and cohousing is no exception.
Many groups have contacted the publisher (New Society Press and John Wiley & Sons, Inc.) directly to get bulk discounts, and I find that successful projects get started when lots of folks do this fun homework. I usually need to give a dozen copies of Creating Cohousing: Building Sustainable Communities, Senior Cohousing: A Community Approach to Independent Living and Cohousing Communities: Designing for High-Functioning Neighborhoods away to planners, banks, neighbors, mayors, new residents, local architects, builders, and so on—to give them context. It saves the group thousands and thousands of hours, dollars, and delays, and most importantly makes for a better project.
Cohousing is more than a sound bite; it is cultural pivot, and it takes folks doing some fun research first. Seattle and the surrounding areas have about a dozen cohousing communities today largely because the bookstores in town have sold more than 1,000 copies of Creating Cohousing: Building Sustainable Communities and the San Francisco area has over 20 cohousing communities largely because the book has sold more than 2,000 copies there.
|
| | | |
