HOUSING EXPERIMENT

Evening Post, Volume CXXV, Issue 70, 24 March 1938, Page 8

HOUSING EXPERIMENT

Housing needs in New Zealand in the past have been met in the vast majority1 of instances by the singleunit dwelling, built separately on its own land. Recently, however, the acute housing shortage, has led to the erection of more, or less multiple-unit blocks of fiats, examples of which are now to be seen in many parts of Wellington. So far the Government in its housing scheme has confined itself to the single-unit, or, at the most, the double-unit dwelling, but a new departure was disclosed in "The Post" yesterday by the reproduction of a? scale model and a full description of a large block of modern flats it is proposed to erect under the scheme on a site in Berhampore. The area of the site is given as two acres and the number of individual flats as 48, of four different types ranging from two to five rooms. In external appearance the design is most attractive and from the' description it would seem that every effort is made to get the maximum of sunshine, air space, and internal comfort.

. There is undoubtedly in New Zealand a prejudice against' the multiple dwelling, the terrace, the tenement, or flat, as compared with the ideal, of the cottage. This is possibly derived from an inherited objection to the cramped conditions of rows of houses and tenements in Britain, which until recently were far . from satisfactory. Modern designs, adopted on a large scale in Europe and America, show a great advance and seem to have got over most of the abjections, while retaining the advantages of compactness, convenience, and communal services in a,spacious environment. Where land is limited, as in Wellington, an extension of the single-unit system is handicapped. There is, moreover, • the problem of transport to and from work. From this point of view the experiment in multipleunit bloc"ks is well worth a trial, provided always that the capital cost permits of an economic rental which tenants can pay.