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For a while, I've been proposing actionable, specific ways to create
Traditional City neighborhoods within the context of the present
Suburban Hell or 19th Century Hypertrophic City as it exists in the
United States today. These formats are intended to achieve all of
our Traditional City goals of creating pleasing environments to
live, work, shop and play, while also being highly profitable for
developers.
January
20, 2013: HTMAPODWTTC 11: The Diminishing Returns of Suburbia
November
11,
2012: HTMAPODWTTC 10: Let's Bulldoze a Big Box Shopping Center 2:
No, Seriously
July
1, 2012: How To Make a Pile of Dough With the Traditional City 9:
Townhouses With Parking
April 22, 2012: How to Make a Pile of Dough With the Traditional
City 8: Shared Parking
April
1, 2012: How To Make a Pile of Dough With the Traditional City 7:
Let's Bulldoze a Big Box Shopping Center
August
21, 2011: How To Make A Pile of Dough With the Traditional City 6:
Better Than a Thousand Words
July
31,
2011:
How
To
...
Make a Pile of Dough With the Traditional City 5: The New New
Suburbanism
target="_blank" July
17,
2011:
How
To
Make
A
Pile
of
Dough...
the Traditional City 4: More SFDR/SFAR Solutions
target="_blank" June
12,
2011:
How
to
Make
a
Pile
of
Do...
City 3: Single Family Detached in the Traditional City Style
May
15, 2011: How To Make A Pile of Dough With the Traditional City 2:
A Ski Resort Village
August
22, 2010: How to Make a Pile of Dough with the Traditional City
Two such formats are the Trailer Park and Mobile Home community.
These are actually rather distinct: a "trailer park" is generally a
place for towable travel trailers, for seasonal use or occasionally
for long-term use in places with a mild climate, as travel trailers
are barely if at all insulated. The "mobile home" is actually quite
distinct from a "trailer," and has a more formal name "manufactured
housing." These structures are mostly built in a factory somewhere,
with the finished or near-finished product then transported via
flatbed to what amounts to a permanent installation somewhere. In
practice, they do not differ much from a (smallish and rather
poorly-made) site-built house, often reaching sizes of 1500sf or
more.
Neither of these are ideal in their present format. For the most
part, a site-built structure of the same or similar size would be
better for long-term residence. However, given that we have to
mostly work within the existing Suburban Hell framework as it exists
in the U.S., we might as well use these tested-and-proven formats.
For one thing, they already fit within most municipalities' zoning
codes and general ways of doing business. Larger developers of
site-built structures (single family homes, townhouses, apartment
buildings, office buildings etc.) are probably working with larger
budgets, and can perhaps influence municipal bureaucracies to allow
what amounts to a Traditional City arrangement. In other words, they
could get cooperation to build something that does not fit today's
cookie-cutter modalities. However, this might be difficult for
smaller-scale developers, so it would be easiest just to use some
kind of format that is already well accepted and doesn't ruffle too
many bureaucratic feathers.
Travel trailers are generally designed for towable travel use,
naturally, and generally do not make very good long-term structures.
Plus, they are plain ugly; the way a house looks is actually quite
important. A house should look like a house. This is one reason why
repurposing things like old school buses generally doesn't work very
well, even though it has a lot of utilitarian advantages. School
buses are generally quite well made, and large, and you might be
able to get an oldish one for under $5000. However, it looks like a
school bus, and anyone living in one, even if repainted and
redecorated, inevitably looks like some kind of refugee. Living in a
travel trailer is much the same. Although it can be a perfectly
functional (although typically not very durable) device, using it
for something besides its intended purpose (short term use in
summer) inevitably looks shabby.
One of the ingenious elements of the tiny houses built on trailers,
which have become surprisingly popular today, is that they follow
very closely the three-century-old traditions of American site-built
house architecture. Thus, although they are often very small even
for travel trailers, sometimes below 100sf of usable interior space,
they look like "homes" rather than some repurposed transportation
device. This is important.
Tumbleweed Tiny House Company "Elm" design, 117 square feet. Looks
like a "house," right?
One layout for the interior of the Elm design.
Elm floorplan. It is only 6'8" wide.
Keystone Springdale 225RBGL -- the smallest model in the Springdale
model lineup. 225 square feet. Other models go up to 293sf. It's
nearly twice the size of the "Elm"!
Springdale model trailer, interior view.
Springdale floorplan.
And yet, despite the fact that the Springdale model is nearly twice
the size of the "Elm," and rather well appointed on the inside, it
nevertheless looks like a vehicle rather than a house. We would
consider the "Elm" much more "respectable." This is even represented
in the terms we use, a "tiny house" which happens to be on wheels,
compared to a "trailer" which happens to be inhabited long-term.
Why build a house like the "Elm" on wheels?
The main reason is that putting the structure on wheels allows it to
be considered a vehicle for regulatory purposes, exempting it from
all the regulations pertaining to site-built structures. There are a
few other advantages, notably portability, and the fact that any
structure needs some kind of foundation anyway. However, putting the
structure on wheels also introduces many acute limitations. Weight
limits are severe, as the finished structure must be suitable for
off-the-rack flatbed trailers and towable by a typical vehicle. One
reason that trailer-built tiny houses like the Elm are so small,
compared to travel trailers, is that they use much heavier wood
framing. You can't build very much before you exceed the weight
capacities of trailers and towing vehicles. The travel trailers are
much larger, because they use much lighter sheet-metal construction.
They both weigh the same, about 6000 lbs.
In addition, the structure must be very narrow, typically about 7'6"
on the outside and 6'6" on the inside, as any trailer must fit a
typical vehicle traffic lane. Pop-outs and so forth, common on
travel trailers, are difficult with wood-framed construction. Also,
you cannot make an effective second story beyond the "sleeping loft"
as shown, as this would make it too tall for towing, in addition to
creating rather odd dimensions.
Once you make it very narrow, then you also cannot make it very
long, before you violate traditional proportions of site-built homes
and end up with something that looks ... a lot more like a wooden
travel trailer, or wooden shipping container.
There's a reason that site-built homes are generally not long and
narrow (except when they are, in the case of "shotgun houses" or
Japanese "eel houses"). A very long and narrow structure, besides
being somewhat impractical for daily use, also is much more
consumptive of construction materials in relation to the enclosed
space. For example, if you have a 7x15 structure (like the Elm), and
double the floor space by doubling the length, then you must extend
two walls by 15' each. However, if you double the floor space by
doubling the width, then you would extend two walls by 7' each. In
addition, the very long and narrow structure might have requirements
for things like hallways that a more squarish design might not, thus
consuming more space. On a related point, the ratio of surface area
to enclosed space is very high, which means that it would tend to
lose heat more rapidly in cold climates.
Lastly, an 80-150 square foot home really is very small,
impractically small, even for a single person and certainly for a
family of three or more. That is not to say that it is impossible,
or even that such minimalism doesn't have its own attractions and
advantages. But, people seem to settle on a little larger size,
perhaps in the 300-600 square foot range, if they aren't constrained
by extremely high land costs or the difficulties of building on a
trailer flatbed. I find that around 150 square feet per person seems
to be a good benchmark even for minimalist living. That's why the
Keystone trailer company doesn't even make the Springdale in a size
below 225 square feet.
In short, building a 100sf house on wheels is a very stupid way to
build houses. However, it is a very good way of building a small
house within the context of Suburban Hell as it exists today, where
municipal governments basically won't let you do such a thing unless
you can drop out of the existing regulations for site-built
structures, which basically force you to make the typical Suburban
Hell house of 1500+ square feet on a lot of at least an eighth-acre
(about 5000sf), with a 19th Century Hypertrophic street of 65+ feet
wide, all of which implies a selling cost of $150,000 at a minimum,
for shoddy construction.
Despite all of these issues, the idea of the Tiny House in the 100sf
range has become a focus of a lot of people's imagination. Now the
question is: where do you put it?
I think most people would fantasize that it would be kept either in
a friends' backyard, in a suburban context, or perhaps on five acres
deep in the country. The first would require a rather good friend
indeed; the second would require some way of making a living in a
rural area. Both are a bit marginal at best. In any case, we are
talking about building Traditional City neighborhoods and
communities here, not just hiding a wooden travel trailer behind
some bushes somewhere.
Typical formats today for travel trailers include the "campground"
and also the "RV park," for more long-term residence. It is actually
quite common for people to keep a travel trailer at a campground
year-round, but use it only in the warmer months. In effect, it
becomes a sort of cheap vacation home or summer residence. The
trailer never moves. I've been to some campgrounds of this sort, and
they can in fact be quite pleasant and lively places, often with a
strong sense of community.
A typical trailer campground.
Note the relatively tight spacing and Really Narrow Street of
about 20-25 feet wide, with no sidewalks or central roadway.
This looks pretty nice. Note the Really Narrow Street, gravel,
about 18 feet wide. Nice use of trees here.
Dense spacing, informal "backyards."
Another Really Narrow Street here.
These spots typically have "hookups" for water, sewage and
electricity. For longer-term use, you could include Internet if
you wanted to.
The point is, things like these are already being done, in the
United States, so what if you did it with a "tiny house on wheels"
rather than a "travel trailer"? I think about 6% of the U.S.
population is living full-time in an "RV" or "travel trailer" today.
That's about 20 million people.
You could, within the context of an "RV campground," also use a
layout which is more typical of urban site-built homes rather than
campgrounds. Campgrounds are usually in rural areas, where land is
cheap and plentiful. However, for long-term use, you would want to
be nearer to cities, which means higher land costs and thus
significant benefits from higher density. Plus, as the density goes
up, it becomes much more like a traditional "village" than a
scattered campground.
For example, let's use some of the nicer elements of the pictures
above: a Really Narrow Street (often gravel), of about 16-20 feet
wide, and some nice trees and so forth. Put the Tiny Houses on plots
of about 20'x40' (800sf). At 800sf plots, 15% of surface area for
streets, and 15% of surface area for shared amenities like parks and
playgrounds, that would mean about 78 plots per acre.
The 20x40 foot plot would allow side parking of up to two cars,
stack-parked. Also, you would have about 20' to work with for front
setback and rear yard, where things like gardens and trees could
also be planted.
If you wanted to, you could use a separate parking lot, which then
allows closer spacing. With a three-foot separation between tiny
houses, they would be on 11-foot spacing, Also, the "street" can
become more like a pedestrian walkway, of a width of as little as 6
feet, since it wouldn't have to accommodate vehicle traffic.
(Actually, you would want a way to get the tiny house in and out,
since it is still on wheels, so more like 12 feet would probably be
better.)
This sort of thing does exist in the U.S. today. This particular
example is, frankly, pretty dismal. But, if you can imagine
something like this with wooden "tiny houses," each one unique,
rather than these identical sheet-metal travel trailers, and also
with some nice backyards, trees and other greenery, you can get an
idea of what I mean.
This sort of format, of compact single-family houses on Really
Narrow Streets, is actually quite common throughout Asia. It was the
normal pattern of development in Japan before 1960 or so.
Unfortunately, it has been quite hard to find a good picture of what
I mean, of the classic tile roofs and small wooden detached houses
(footprint typically 250-400sf). Here's about the best I've done:
This is a similar sort of neighborhood in China. Small detached
houses in a compact arrangement with Really Narrow Streets.
Another Chinese neighborhood. Trees and bushes here and there.
Small houses and shops in a Japanese village. Note the Really
Narrow Street.
Small houses on a Really Narrow Street, Japan.
Small houses on a Really Narrow Street, England.
Like this, but wooden. And on wheels.
Is that so horrible?
We will look at "mobile homes" (manufactured housing) later.
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