Urban Housing in New Zealand: Designing for Flexibility in Medium Density Housing

摘要

New Zealand, and the city of Auckland in particular, are experiencing a wave of medium density housing. This is encouraged by regional planning strategies to increase urban densities in traditionally low density areas, in response to recent and predicted rates of population growth. The response to the demand for this housing form, it is argued, is influenced in particular by the existing small scale construction industry in New Zealand, and by the impact on designers of the 1992 Resource Management Act. Paradoxically, in cities where social traditions are based on a low density suburban environment, characterised by high levels of car ownership and poor local amenity provision, there also exists a relatively high level of opportunity for 'customising' architecture. The paper argues that the latter is the least recognised, and perhaps the most significant omission from the design brief for a typical higher density development. After exploring the continuing relevance of housing research and experience of developing mass housing in the Netherlands, the paper focuses on three Auckland housing developments to illustrate the typically configurative and formalist approach to architecture influencing these developments.