1. Kennet And Thames CoHousing

2. It all starts with people…
Vision Statement
We aim to create a cohousing development in Berkshire which will give 20 to 40 households of various sizes and age ranges their own self-contained homes, a percentage of which will be housing for rent or part-buy. Our common indoor areas will include kitchen, dining area and lounge for shared meals and socializing. There will also be provision for office and workshop space, potentially small business units for rent, and some common outdoor space.
The development will be managed by the residents using consensus decision making where possible. Whether new-build, renovation or a mix of the two, the architecture and design will facilitate social and environmental sustainability. The location will have good transport connections, and we will foster good relations with, and aim to provide some benefits to, the surrounding community.
KATCH members
It all starts with people…

3. Key Aspects of Cohousing
Private homes and shared facilities
Village-sized development
Intentional neighbourhood design
Neighbourhood managed by residents
Initial impetus:
“Social network to provide more support for the nuclear family”
So:
Courtyards
pedestrian streets
patios
But also…
No lack of privacy
Practical advantages
Store
Dinners
Cars
Childcare
Laundry
Lawn mower
Sailing boat!

4. An Example Cohousing Site
2.5 acres
33 dwellings
common house
business units
An Example Cohousing Site

5. Shared House and Facilities
Standard
Kitchen
Dining room
Living room
Large flexible space
Laundry
Desirable
Workshop
Office space
Store room / shop
Children/Teenagers room
Meeting Hall
Guest rooms
People!!

6. Springhill “The street” & common house Pedestrian Street.
Facilitates neighbourly interaction. “Life between the buildings”. Safe and inviting space. The invisible threads that cohere a society happen (or don’t happen) here. Residents can informally discuss things as they mutually care for the environment. Children can grow up with a wider safety zone, as in past times, with a richer experience for them and a safety valve for their parents!
“The street” & common house

7. Trudeslund, Denmark Initial impetus:
“Social network to provide more support for the nuclear family”
Layout
Courtyards & pedestrian streets
Common house centrally placed
Patios & clustered houses
Woodland
Cars on edge
Social life
No lack of privacy!
Store & Laundry
Dinners & Childcare
Sailing boat!
Lawn mower
33 families
(built 1981)

9. Why Cohousing? Feeling safe and connected Good neighbourly support
Attractive shared space
Onsite shared activities - planned and unplanned!
Isolation and minimal collaboration:
A lot of people don’t have anyone to cooperate with in their daily lives
And don’t know their neighbours
Fear:
What concerns people most about where they live? Crime and antisocial behaviour
Shared space:
People are disgruntled about dirty streets, neglected open spaces, lack of good lighting, and no good facilities for young people

10. Benefits of Cohousing
Cohousing comprehensively addresses the key environmental issues that face us today. As a social unit which is more self-reliant but also more consciously connected to others, it is a lifestyle of less consumption and less expenditure. As an Intentional Neighbourhood, there is more warmth in interpersonal connections, and better neighbourhood cohesion than the norm, through resident management and a thriving network of community activity.
Sustainable living is part of the cohousing ethos. As such, where practical steps to reduce footprint are possible, there will be a collective effort to engage in such things. For instance, the energy provision, the layout of the site, and building materials used will be chosen for high eco standards.
Resource sharing. Cookers, cars, washing machines, lawn-mowers etc. With some sharing, less of these are needed, and less used, significantly reducing the overall carbon footprint of the neighbourhood.
A cohousing neighbourhood also provides a focal point for activity, both social and work, so that people don’t need to travel so much to meet their needs.
Cohousing developments may choose to meet certain environmental targets, such as a Low-Impact Sustainable Settlement, or “LISS”.
Quote: “Its so much easier to be green here. Our dry goods shop means we can do bulk buying, we’re proud of our biomass district heating, and thank God for our car sharing now that the price of petrol is rocketing up week by week. But best of all, lots of our social life involves walking down to the common house – we don’t have to travel miles for an evening out.”

11. 1. Social Sustainability
Site design facilitates community spirit
Optional meals in common house 3 or 4 times a week
Residents empowered through self-management
Informal support between residents
Quality of Life
Safe environment for all
Socially, cohousing is a response to the real problems of the 21st century; of isolation and loss of community. It provides a rich hub of community life through social, recreational, cultural and economic activity.
For people living in a cohousing neighbourhood, aspirations become more social and less material/consumerist. Although people still have material capital in home ownership, a sense of the worth of SOCIAL CAPITAL is cultivated.
Site design facilitates community spirit. For instance, cars kept to the periphery, well placed buildings, good common resources and carefully planned common areas, all lead to an attractive shared physical space which attracts people to be part of the community. See Cohousing site designs
As an adult is one in 30 to 70 people, each has a much greater say in what happens in the neighbourhood than they would in part of a town, so they feel engaged in what happens, and in the design. As the people all know each other, they tend to think about the benefits to everyone else in the community as well as themselves, and take pleasure in enabling social initiatives. The consensus decision making also encourages people to be more aware of how other people are affected by decisions. There is a creative process to try to find solutions to communal issues that will work for everybody.
By knowing each other, and each other’s life situations, lots of informal support springs up between people, which significantly improves the quality of life for lonely or infirm people, while reducing their dependence on formal, council funded support. For instance, residents might help with an elderly person’s shopping or simple maintenance tasks, a single mother’s child care, or a neighbour’s dog walking. And through simply being an environment where neighbours stop and chat, people’s general happiness is benefitted.
With a good mix of people and the benefits of the communal facilities, there are many different ways that people can engage in activities and social life together, much of it without leaving the site.
A cohousing community is a safe neighbourhood – Neighbourhood Watch times ten. Far from a gated community, visitors are welcome (and would probably be invited to something rather than challenged!), but anybody or anything threatening would be known about very soon. Crime and the fear of crime are much reduced. Children who live in cohousing tend to be more confident and engaged than their peers.
When some event comes up, either in the cohousing or outside, the strength of numbers that the community can muster can often provide the critical mass for the event to be a success. Whether it is providing an audience for a performance, supporting the local fete, or getting a youth summer scheme going, when a cohousing neighbourhood gets behind a project, it will most probably take wing.

12. Our group visit to Sussex – the biomass boiler
2. Environmental Sustainability
Reduced travel and car use
Reduced energy use
Reduced waste
Cohousing comprehensively addresses the key environmental issues that face us today. As a social unit which is more self-reliant but also more consciously connected to others, it is a lifestyle of less consumption and less expenditure. As an Intentional Neighbourhood, there is more warmth in interpersonal connections, and better neighbourhood cohesion than the norm, through resident management and a thriving network of community activity.
Sustainable living is part of the cohousing ethos. As such, where practical steps to reduce footprint are possible, there will be a collective effort to engage in such things. For instance, the energy provision, the layout of the site, and building materials used will be chosen for high eco standards.
Resource sharing. Cookers, cars, washing machines, lawn-mowers etc. With some sharing, less of these are needed, and less used, significantly reducing the overall carbon footprint of the neighbourhood.
A cohousing neighbourhood also provides a focal point for activity, both social and work, so that people don’t need to travel so much to meet their needs.
Cohousing developments may choose to meet certain environmental targets, such as a Low-Impact Sustainable Settlement, or “LISS”.
Quote: “Its so much easier to be green here. Our dry goods shop means we can do bulk buying, we’re proud of our biomass district heating, and thank God for our car sharing now that the price of petrol is rocketing up week by week. But best of all, lots of our social life involves walking down to the common house – we don’t have to travel miles for an evening out.”
Our group visit to Sussex – the biomass boiler

13. Environmentally friendly build
Self-build option for the adventurous

14. 3. Benefits to wider community
Good neighbours
Provision of local facilities and activities
Engagement in local life
A route to enabling local people to stay in area
Provision of affordable and sustainable housing
Good neighbours
Engaged in the locality. The strength of a network. Community awareness. Low impact – eg less car use
Local facilities and activities
Possible spaces for hire. Businesses. Activities for wider community; eg parents network, yoga group, singing group, reading group, etc.
Local life
The cohousing community can draw people together to provide people to support local events, eg charity events, fayres, chilren’s plays etc.
Affordable housing
Cohousing schemes often offer a percentage of affordable housing through a registered provider to be available for people in housing need.

15. 4. Affordable Low living costs Resource sharing Reduced travel
Affordable housing under a variety of tenures
As a result of the resource sharing, the reduced energy costs, and the onsite life, living costs in a cohousing neighbourhood are significantly less than normal
Because of all the shared facilities, the size of individual units can be smaller and cheaper to run than similar units outside the cohousing, without sacrificing comfort and convenience.
Affordable housing
There are a number of ways of providing affordable homes, and it is the ethos of cohousing to offer this where possible

16. Drawing together expertise
Information & Support
Networking
Events
Drawing together expertise

17. Cohousing in the UK Projects in the pipeline
Lancaster – build in progress
London Countryside Cohousing
Bridport
LILAC (Leeds – site now purchased)
Oxford Cohousing
KATCH
Up and running
Springhill, Stroud
The Community Project, Sussex
The Threshold Centre, Dorset
(Some projects are new-build, others refurbishments)

18. Springhill, Stroud
Springhill Cohousing in Stroud – one of the pedestrian streets

19. Lancaster Cohousing Autumn 2011
Build this December taking one year approx.
Autumn 2011
“We are now preparing the site for our Cohousing project with private homes, community facilities, workshop/offices and shared outdoor space”

20. Our team and network Partnership with Aster Housing Association
Links with UK Cohousing Network
Architect member, Jean Murphy
Sustainability consultant
Support from
West Berks Housing Officers
MP Richard Benyon

21. Our possible KATCHment areas…
Considerations: West Berkshire’s LDF Connectivity Our wishes

22. KATCH can provide a housing scheme with…
A sustainable model
An attractive and innovative neighbourhood
A low-impact settlement
Community cohesion

23. We are looking for a location where there is a wish for…
A housing model that aims to work in partnership with the local community
A development whose ethos is a known quantity
A development that is innovative, sustainable, and builds community

25. And finally, some scenarios…
Cohousing can be:
Stand-alone, or part of a larger housing scheme
New-build, or part use of existing buildings
Include a self-build option
Flexible and sensitive to surrounding area, as future residents part of design process
A good answer on an unusual site
More than one cohousing projects;
Urban v Rural locations

27. Thank you for listening
Any questions?

28. McCamant and Durrett