“NYCHA is New York City’s primary provider of deeply affordable housing and the ongoing deterioration of its developments is putting that housing at grave risk,” said Carol Kellermann, president of the Citizen’s Budget Commission. “Without dramatic change, by 2027, 90 percent of NYCHA’s housing units will have declined to the point at which they are at risk of no longer being cost-effective to repair.”                       

NY Post, July 2, 2018

Development and design and public housing

From 2017-2018, CfDC developed a design concept for a NYCHA development based on Johnson Houses in East Harlem. The concept includes 24 fully rendered architectural images. While other design studies have been created based solely on market criteria, CfDC studied redevelopment asking how would families who have experienced generations of poverty find opportunity and be enjoined in the city? How would this shape the re-envisioning of public housing, bring it into the 21st century, and establish a financially, socially, culturally, and environmentally sustainable model?  

As a design study and not a design solution, we developed principles for redevelopment that would protect residents - their health and homes - and expand the development to become a cosmopolitan mixed-use, mixed-income environment and a vibrant commercial, residential, cultural and social neighborhood center. 

Our study established principles included below:

·       Build an environment where people with mixed incomes would participate in the re-conception of the development and create something new together. This means creating an understanding for working together and setting goals, where people are supported to be active builders of the community of which they are part.

·       Knit the development to the existing city fabric. Densify the development with residential and commercial space. Add a diverse program of commercial, cultural, and social uses and work/live space. Provide an architecture that makes these uses transparent, approachable and accessible.

-Revitalize streets with retail and commercial space at the ground floor along the property line;

-Start residences at the second floor and maintain commercial at the street; ground floor residences would be relocated to residences in new buildings on site;

-Build and maintain the street wall, strengthen pedestrian pathways and landscaped grounds;

-Activate roof tops for gardens, urban farms, and solar fields;

-Provide an elevated green park to the roofs of two-story commercial buildings built in the interior courtyards of the super block that serve and connect residential spaces:

·       Include a center for afterschool development tied to commercial workspaces. Children develop and learn by interacting with adults and finding out what kinds of professions and opportunities exist in the world and learning how to access them. 

·       Integrate different types of mixed-income housing with services such as a gym, healthcare practices, a library, and amenities so that socio/economic differences among people are thoughtfully considered and planned. 

CfDC Design Principles (based oN redevelopment)