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Downsizing the McMansion: Study gauges a sustainable size for future homes:
What might homes of the future look like if countries were really committed to meeting global calls for sustainability, such as the recommendations advanced by the Paris Agreement and the U.N.'s 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development?
Much wider adoption of smart design features and renewable energy for low- to zero-carbon homes is one place to start -- the U.N. estimates households consume 29% of global energy and consequently contribute to 21% of resultant CO2 emissions, which will only rise as global population increases.
However, a new scholarly paper authored at New Jersey Institute of Technology (NJIT) assesses another big factor in the needed transformation of our living spaces toward sustainability -- the size of our homes.
The paper published in the journal Housing, Theory & Society makes the case for transitioning away from the large, single-family homes that typify suburban sprawl, offering new conceptions for what constitutes a more sustainable and sufficient average home size in high-income countries going forward.
The article surveys more than 75 years of housing history and provides estimates for the optimal spatial dimensions that would align with an "environmentally tenable and globally equitable amount of per-person living area" today. It also spotlights five emerging cases of housing innovation around the world that could serve as models for effectively adopting more space-efficient homes of the future.
"There is no question that if we are serious about embracing our expressed commitments to sustainability, we will in the future need to live more densely and wisely," said Maurie Cohen, the paper's author and professor at NJIT's Department of Humanities. "This will require a complete reversal in our understanding of what it means to enjoy a 'good life' and we will need to start with the centerpiece of the 'American Dream,' namely the location and scale of our homes.
"The notion of 'bigger is better' will need to be supplanted by the question of 'how much is enough?' Fortunately, we are beginning to see examples of this process unfolding in some countries around the world, including the United States."
Maurie J. Cohen. New Conceptions of Sufficient Home Size in High-Income Countries: Are We Approaching a Sustainable Consumption Transition? Housing, Theory and Society, 2020; 1 DOI: 10.1080/14036096.2020.1722218
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 10 2020, @04:55PM (2 children)
If you want to live in an overcrowded city with "excellent" public transportation, you are welcome to move to NYC. You could of course probably not afford the "good" parts, so you'd have to live in the not-so-good part. But hey, with no space for personal cars and being surrounded by people too poor to afford one, transportation options will be tailor made to fit your expressed preference.
The truth is, for pervasive public transportation, you need to design entire cities around it and tax people heavily to pay for it: public transportation is very expensive. (It only seems like a deal when you think somebody else is paying for it.) Given that, does public transportation serve a society or does a society serve public transportation? Given a choice (and we are all given a choice in that we move to a region we choose), people in America have overwhelmingly shown that they prioritize other things over public transportation. ALMOST EVERY TIME. For those who want it, you are free to move to the city. The public transportation people are always saying how much better the city is already, right? Oh that's right, they aren't content with letting people live where/as they wish; their suburb must be turned into a city. Any other possibility is just WRONG.
(Score: 2) by driverless on Tuesday March 10 2020, @08:55PM
That's the US model for public transportation. It works well in other countries. And then you get flow-on effects where, if a place has fast, efficient, cheap public transport, everyone uses it and there are fewer cars clogging up the streets.
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Wednesday March 11 2020, @12:22AM
Even so, you can live quite well without a car. There are foldable bikes that pop into a bag. Ride to the subway/bus/whatever, sit down, on the other side ride to work and throw the thing under your desk. Mostly, though, in NYC you can get where you need to go faster and cheaper on a bike, without public transportation at all.
Washington DC delenda est.