Articles

Gas prices are on everyone’s mind these days. Supply shocks from global conflict have pushed fuel costs to levels that are forcing people to rethink how they get around, and prompting planners to revisit a long-standing question: when does a neighbourhood become dense enough to give people a real choice to rely on cars less? Source: Dawn McDonald on Unsplash The answer, it turns out, has a measurable threshold. Once residential density crosses a critical point, car dependency

When thinking about intensification in older neighbourhoods, a question that might come to mind is: “What about infrastructure capacity? Can the pipes, stormwater, and water supply systems support it?” It’s true. Most older neighbourhoods weren’t built with today’s housing needs in mind. Add a few more homes, and suddenly the pipes work harder, the showers run longer, and the stormwater has fewer places to soak in. But that’s no reason to treat infill like a threat. With the

For over a century, catalogues like Aladdin's mail-order kits and the postwar Victory Homes delivered fast, affordable and replicable homes that built entire neighbourhoods. Today's Federal Housing Catalogue revives this dream with no-cost “pre-approved” or “near permit-ready” designs to spur low-rise infill redevelopment. The appeal of catalogue housing lies in repetition. Once a design is approved, it can be built again and again, reducing costs, shortening timelines, and m