Municipal Housing Study

BOP assisted a municipality in exploring the potential to create affordable housing on City-owned land. This study was prepared so as to illuminate possible housing outcomes on six City-owned sites distributed broadly throughout the municipality. For each site, ‘low’ and ‘high’ concepts were explored. ‘Low’ concepts included redevelopment at heights up to six storeys to enable lower cost of construction (wood-frame) and greater likelihood of supportability/policy compliance in the short term. ‘High’ concepts included redevelopment at greater heights and densities.

The purpose of considering both ‘low’ and ‘high’ concepts was to create reasonable brackets or ‘book-ends’ in order to inform each site’s potential. A full-day, 30-person design workshop with City staff was instrumental in defining the opportunities and constraints of each site. Moreover, the workshop emphasized the integration of community supporting uses and public realm design to complement the delivery of housing.