08: housing and single parents

Several of our friends and colleagues are currently going through divorces and other changes in their family household structure. Many of them were homeowners. However, Seattle - as many other cities in the US, has a pretty severe housing shortage. There are very limited options for housing that is affordable for single parents or those co-parenting... Let alone housing specifically designed for single parents. Over the last year, I have had numerous discussions like this – by and large parents with younger children – who, until their divorce, had been homeowners and housing secure. In the process of getting divorced, they found themselves on the other side of housing precarity. Some even being technically homeless.

Today, on the Livable Low-Carbon City podcast – we’ll be talking about some housing solutions for single parents that I think cities should be prioritizing, so that they have a good economic and social mix of residents.

Further reading...

Gender in Mainstreaming Urban Development, via the City of Berlin.

Apfelbaum, an innovative housing project centered on radical inclusivity and accessibility in Vienna. via IBA Wien.

Affordable Housing for Single Parents (German), via MeinBezirk.at.

Baugruppen, via Larch Lab.

Bring on the Clusterwohnungen, Mike Eliason's piece on cluster apartments, via the Urbanist.

Mehr Als Wohnen, Zuerich from cooperative to community. via Architektur Aktuell.

Mit den Augen der Anderen (Through the eyes of others), a (stunning) short film highlighting life in Mehr Als Wohnen.

These single-mom friends joked about buying a house together. On a whim, they did it, via the Washington Post.

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