An innovative project designed to provide housing for people at risk of homelessness will soon be implemented in 9 locations in Melbourne’s inner west-providing 57 mobile homes.
The Victorian Minister of Planning approved the social housing project on Ballarat Road. The supporter is Launch Housing, a community organization based in Victoria that provides housing and homeless support services.
The addition of 57 homes for Melburnians is of great value in itself, especially considering the rapid increase in Melbourne’s population. However, the potential to expand the concept makes the project so exciting.
Related personnel recently started to study the project and interviewed the main stakeholders. The several elements contained in the project both represent the innovation and scalability of Australia’s urgent need for social security housing.
Elements of innovative solutions-starting from engineering
Innovation rarely leads to completely unprecedented ideas, products or services. It often reassembles existing elements in novel ways to create new solutions. In the Ballarat Road case, all elements of the project already exist. The interaction between participating partners, design and construction techniques, and land lease arrangements make it so interesting.
Schored Architects designed the house as a six-star green rating. Units designed for singles or couples will be built in the factory before being shipped to the site. The temporary transport unit is not new. In Amsterdam, the Keetwonnen project was developed in 2005 to provide students with 1,000 affordable, transportable units.
However, prefabrication and modular design is still in its infancy in Australia. It accounts for approximately 3-5% of all new buildings and houses. The size of the industry limits innovation, competition and diversity. It also poses challenges in managing projects. As a participant, I explained to him. The world of prefabs and modular design is in its infancy… to the point of prefabs-when buying a prefab house, there are no standards for documentation. Therefore, you are using an existing construction contractor’s contract, not a specific contract…
It has “How to transport? How to store? Does it meet the Australian building code standards?” It opens up many unanswered questions in the prefabrication workshop.
Partnership and land lease
The project is the product of collaboration between community organizations, government transportation agencies (VicRoads) and charitable donors. This connection stems from a series of occasional meetings and events, bringing together different resources and skills. As social housing shifts to a multi-provider system, such partnerships are becoming more common. Instead of focusing on government-sponsored public housing, it is better to rely more on partnerships between the government, philanthropy, the non-profit sector, and private companies. This requires the housing provider’s business knowledge and network knowledge-the ability to become a “pivot point”. As one participant of Launch Housing explained:
Once people lock in and participate in an idea, they bring their own ideas. You don’t need to know what to ask for… Then, it’s about becoming an agent with a certain position or authority. This is the key to these offers and allowing things to happen. We are that. The project is also important because it attracts a lot of charitable support. The Harris family donated 4 million Australian dollars and continue to provide advice and support for the project. For them, the ability to expand the scale of the project is an important factor in supporting the project.
This project is an interesting case study because it leased out VicRoads land. This is financially feasible because the land is leased at a “pepper price”, which is a symbolic cost to meet legal requirements. VicRoads is willing to do this because these units are transportable. This means that when the land finally needs to be expanded, it can be moved to a new location.
As one of the largest landowners in the state, VicRoads owns thousands of real estate and vacant lots, which have been acquired for future road widening.
Scalable solution
If the key elements are effectively integrated, the project is scalable: houses built, financing mechanisms, planning permissions and land. There is the ability to enhance existing factories or build new factories to build prefabricated houses. Evidence of demand and the success of this pilot project can help achieve this goal. Housing projects designed to be affordable for low-income individuals or families are not financially feasible without substantial subsidies. To expand the scale of this solution will require government funding, another charitable donation or a mixed commercial and non-profit organization.
This project went through a heavy planning process. Maribyrnong City Councillors unanimously support the plan. However, many members of the local community opposed the project, and the Minister of Planning eventually “requested” for an evaluation. As the state government strategy “Victoria House” emphasizes, the continued implementation of such projects can be supported through better community involvement or rapid utilization of underutilized government land and social housing planning processes.
Various government departments, religious organizations, charitable organizations and individuals manage a large amount of land resources. Land is left vacant due to anticipation of future demand, often for decades. Temporary housing may be a temporary solution to emergency housing needs and can be demolished when the land is needed for other purposes. This approach goes a long way in removing barriers to use and may challenge our perception of vacant land in Australia.
