Tenure preference and housing strategy: An exploration of Pakistani experiences

There is an increasing literature on the exclusion of and difficulties faced by minority ethnic communities in a range of areas, of which housing is one of the most important. But there is relatively little good, recent, qualitative material available, which explores the process of decision‐making—including decisions regarding housing—within minority ethnic families. A missing element, therefore, is the study of action by householders and consequently, the realisation (or otherwise) of preferences and the cumulative results of actions in facilitating or restricting choice. The present paper reports on a small‐scale research study of Pakistani housing preferences in Glasgow, whose aim was to develop a life history interviewing technique, using a semi‐structured schedule, focusing on housing preferences, housing moves and experiences. Pakistani households are shown to experience continuing difficulties in funding and organising household moves. There are areas of Glasgow where families feel unsafe and there is a continuing problem of racial harassment. Neither the local authority nor housing associations are generally able to offer appropriate housing. The life history interviewing technique used allows an exploration of how households reached decisions on their housing and on how they indulged in ‘trade‐offs’ between different houses, areas or tenures. Thus our understanding of the role of agency in the development of patterns of housing and individual housing careers is developed.     

Chaotic,fluid and unstable: an exploration of the complex housing trajectories of homeless people in Flanders,Belgium

This article analyses the housing and homeless pathways of (ex)homeless persons in the coastal city of Ostend. After a short review of the literature on the causes and meaning of the vulnerability of homeless persons, we describe how our case study with (former) homeless persons in Ostend was organised. We deal with some methodological issues and the analytic results, revealing a very complex housing trajectory. We focus on these dynamic and complex housing pathways and look at the role of relationships and relationship breakdown, work and unemployment, eviction after rent arrears and moving as an escape strategy. We also deal with the searching process for housing and the role of social networks. We end with some conclusions and interest points for policy.     

Redevelopment of public housing estates: The Australian experience

This paper provides an overview of some key aspects of the different contemporary approaches being utilised across the Australian States to redevelop public housing estates. Questions are raised about the effects of the projects on existing and future tenants, both in terms of the strategies used to address particular concentrations of disadvantage on the estates and the success in maintaining the current and future supply of public housing stock. In addition, the study points to the need for further evaluation of the approaches used in redevelopment, as currently little is known about the success or otherwise of the projects.     

Leaving home in the Netherlands: Timing and first housing

Successive birth cohorts have left the parentalhome at an accelerating pace in the earlypost-war decades in the Netherlands. A secondtrend, starting later but lasting longer, isthat people increasingly leave the parentalhome to live alone. Both trends have hadimplications for the housing market as theycontributed to the continuation of the housingshortage and generated a shift in the type ofaccommodation in which young adults start theirhousing career: an independent rented dwelling,shared accommodation, or home-ownership. Inthis contribution we set out to unravel boththe causes of the changing pattern ofhome-leaving between successive cohorts and therelation with the housing market entry insuccessive periods.The main hypothesis is that educationalexpansion was a major cause of the shift in themix of motives between cohorts, accounted forthe accelerating pace of home-leaving, and alsoaffected the type of housing market entry. Theempirical results support this hypothesis butalso show that the educational expansion doesnot provide a full explanation for eitherphenomenon. Union formation in particular isinvariably also determined by the employmentstatus of the male partner. Leaving home tolive alone, on the other hand, is lesssensitive to the individual income but isclearly stimulated by ample parental resources.In housing choice, the opportunity structureprovides an extra explanation. The wider accessto independent rental accommodation, forinstance, reduces the pent-up demand for sharedaccommodation that results from the educationalexpansion.     

过渡安置房建设实践探讨

探讨了过渡安置房建设中出现的问题及根源,从应急预案、城市规划体系、震害统计、扳房区管理及现状利用等方面总结出过渡安置房建设的可行对策及灾区重建的有效途径,以保证居民的生产生活尽快走向正轨。     

The housing crisis,squatters and the State: the glebe estate experience

This article analyzes policies towards public housing in the Glebe area of Sydney. Particular attention is paid to the conflict between squatters and the state, culminating in the use of the police in enforcing evictions. The specific issue of squatting is interpreted in the broader context of

(a) the general housing crisis and

(b) the theory of urban social movements.     

The credit crunch and subsidized low-income housing: the UK and US experience compared

This paper examines how the mortgage crisis and subsequent recession have affected subsidized rental housing in the United Kingdom and the United States. These two nations approach the housing needs of low-income households in very different ways and to very different degrees. In the UK, non-profit housing associations are pivotal to the production and management of affordable rental housing; in the US, the affordable housing system revolves mostly around a single program, the Low-Income Housing Tax Credit. Yet the crisis destabilized key parts of both countries’ subsidy systems and raised important questions about their sustainability in the future. The UK responded sooner and arguably more effectively than the US to the crisis. However, over the longer term, the prospects for affordable housing development are likely to be more difficult in the UK than in the US.     

Spatial aspects of housing abandonment in the 1990s: The cleveland experience

Housing abandonment continues to ravage US cities, despite a recent waning of scholarly interest in this topic. Our paper revisits this topic by examining recent patterns of housing abandonment in a prototypical rust belt city, Cleveland. We assess the evolving pattern of abandoned units between 1980 and 1990 and its ecological (housing and population) correlates. The results suggest that housing abandonment in Cleveland has spread in a contagious fashion beyond a dilapidated core. A diversity of neighbourhood types—owner occupied moderate income, Asian occupied, low ‐income black, and newly arrived high unemployment —have recently been plagued by this phenomenon. We call for more study on this important topic and offer preliminary policy recommendations.     

The meaning of ‘home’ in contemporary english culture

This paper develops an earlier and more speculative article on the meaning of the home by drawing on material generated in a recent household survey in three English towns. It first considers the frequently repeated view that men experience home as haven while women experience it more negatively as a place of work and entrapment. No evidence is found to support this view, for although they divide domestic work unevenly between them, men and women seem to express very similar sentiments about their homes. Next the paper looks at the significance of age and shows that home becomes more important to people as they grow older. Thirdly, it considers the significance of tenure. Here it is found that home ownership does not ‘privatise’ people in terms of their life styles (as critics have often imagined), but it does create the basis for a stronger sense of ‘ontological security’ than is found among tenants. Finally, the paper shows very little difference in the cultural meaning of the home in different parts of the country. It is concluded that, although survey evidence like this is limited in its scope and validity, the findings do indicate that we should reconsider some of the myths which have often been taken for granted in the literature on home ownership.     

Multi-family housing management in post-socialist countries: the Albanian experience

Condominium maintenance is a critical issue in Albania. After the fall of communism, the ownership and maintenance responsibilities of hundreds of thousands of flats that were constructed and owned by the state was transferred to their occupants. In the capital, Tirana, there was also a huge wave of new condominium construction after 1990. A new law on the management and maintenance of condominium building was recently adopted and is in the early stages of implementation. This article discusses how residents of condominiums actually manage the maintenance of their buildings in Tirana. It reveals that condominium laws have had little impact and that the performance of maintenance tasks is based on informal and often ad-hoc agreements, in keeping with the cultural norms of the society and the actual financial situation of the residents.     

国内外住宅产业发展现状与发展方向

~~国内外住宅产业发展现状与发展方向@姜阵剑$山东建筑工程学院~~     

苏州古村落保护与开发的实践与思考

关于古村落的保护,曾有许多地方努力探索实践,也有许多专家学者积极建言献策,但古村落遭受人为或自然破坏的形势依然严峻。据有关统计,我国60多万个村庄中,经过开发的“洗礼”,大多已经失去了历史文化特征,剩下来的古村落只有5000-8000个,这些仅存的古村落也危在旦夕。在现代化和城市化的冲击下,古村镇消失很快,由于无序开发和保护不力,加上一些地方片面理解社会主义新农村建设,导致我围古村落的破坏有加剧趋势。一方面,是以建筑为主体的整体上的瓦解,     

日本钢结构住宅发展现状与经验借鉴

钢结构住宅具有抗震性能优良、轻质高强、工业化程度高和可循环利用等优势,是适宜我国发展需要,促进建造方式转变,推进供给侧结构性改革和新型城镇化发展的重要举措。但与发达国家相比,我国的钢结构住宅应用范围和发展方式还存在一定差距。日本钢结构住宅经过多年的发展,已形成较为完善的规范体系。本文通过探究日本现阶段钢结构住宅发展历史、应用情况与应用特点,以期为我国钢结构住宅发展方向提供参考和借鉴。     

房屋建筑施工管理与质量控制探讨

论述了房屋建筑施工管理中对人员的管理方法,并对相关施工制度的建立和执行进行了介绍,分析了施工过程中房屋的质量控制手段,以确保建筑工程的安全生产和顺利完工。     

传统院落住宅在小城镇住宅建设中的借鉴意义

本文通过对传统聚落的研究,指出低层高密度的庭院住宅主要具有以下优点:首先选材容易,结构简单,故造价较低,建造容易,而且院落空间组合有一定的灵活性,有利于居民参与更新。其次,在小城镇住宅建设的过程中,对传统住宅进行“类设计”的合院住宅可融入乡民的集体记忆,保持小城镇肌理,实现有机更新。第三,有利于创造丰富的过渡空间,实现从私密空间到半私密空间再到公共空间的过渡,形成了多层次的人际交往空间,从而获得高质量的具有领域感、人情味、私密性的生活场所。最后,有利于发挥较高的生态环境效益和结合农业生产发展庭院经济。同时文章阐述了其在小城镇住宅建设中的意义,得出低层高密度的庭院住宅可以成为小城镇居住土地使用的经典模式的结论。     

Statistics on housing and construction in the netherlands: The administrative housing survey

This column was prepared by Rob Hoffmann of the Department of Construction Statistics (CBS) Voorburg (telephone +31(70)-3374396). More detailed information is available in publications of the CBS and upon request. For more information about the Administrative Housing Survey, see Amse, A.K., Monthly Bulletin of Construction Statistics 1992, No. 5. Staatsuitgeverij, The Hague.     

Towards the comparative exploration of public housing segregation in England and the United States

This paper is an exploration of the treatment of racial minorities by public sector housing agencies in Britain and the United States over the last several decades, with the objective of describing empirical and policy differences and similarities. Public housing programmes in each country have been, at differing points in time, important cornerstone's of the welfare state but each has become a residualised sector of the housing delivery system. In the context of such residualisation, the key issue to consider is whether British council housing is likely to reproduce the patterns of racial segregation, impoverishment, and discrimination which are endemic in the American public housing system.

A variety of administrative agency reports and data, court cases, as well as case studies of race and public housing policies in the US and England have been used in this paper (Smith and Whalley, 1975; Commission for Racial Equality seriatim; Hirsch, 1983; Bauman, 1987; Department of the Environment; Smith, 1989). Unpublished tables for the English Housing Trailer for the 1988 Labour Force Survey were provided by the Department of the Environment.

Despite the presence of such information, there are a number of resource and data gathering concerns that affect the understanding of the interrelationships between race, class, and public housing policy on a comparative basis including: constrained research resources; unreliable data collection procedures; unavailability of time series data; and chronically limited research on civil rights/organisational effectiveness (Liebert, 1981). Despite these shortcomings, there are a significant number of both academic and applied studies in the area which suggest basic themes, issues and hypotheses for future examination.