Cohousing-L Mailing List: Re: Necessity of passing the CH

[Elizabeth Stevenson (tamgoddess]

Thanks, James. I don't remember the issue of passing the common house on the
way home as one of importance. Rather, it's important to have reasons for
going into or near the common house on a daily basis in order to facilitate
social interaction. Laundry, mail, and meals are more important in that
respect.

Our situation is quite different from anyone's that I'm aware of, so I
hesitated to weigh in on this. We have it all, in terms of access to the
common house by cars, it being in the center of the site, and all the car
access put out of the way of pedestrians. We have an alley that runs right
through our site, giving car, fire and utility access.

The alley is blocked off by bollards that are removable in case of fire, and
for the garbage and recycling trucks to come in. Otherwise, cars cannot go
through the site. I mention this because it seems to me that building access
for vehicles doesn't need to be a reason that all those vehicles need to
have access all the time. Paved areas are great for basketball, bike riding
and other sports. It isn't always bad. Especially if you live in an area, as
in Sacramento, where the ground in the winter is just so much mud and the
kids can't play on it anyway.

-- 
Liz Stevenson
Southside Park Cohousing
Sacramento, California
lilbert [at] comcast.net
> From: James Kacki <jimkacki [at] mb.sympatico.ca>
> Reply-To: Developing cohousing - collaborative housing communities
> <cohousing-l [at] cohousing.org>
> Date: Sat, 07 Feb 2004 15:09:11 -0800
> To: Developing cohousing - collaborative housing communities
> <cohousing-l [at] cohousing.org>
> Subject: Re: [C-L]_ Necessity of passing the CH
> 
> 
> 
> Re/ Passing the common house to get to parking.  My understanding is
> that the main reason for having a parking lot a little separate from the
> housing units, is not to encourage trips past or through the common
> house, but rather to minimize the amount of site taken up by the car
> (roads, driveways, back alleys, etc.) and use that space instead for
> common green space, outdoor gathering spaces, walkways etc.  If you are
> in a wheelchair it would be best to get a unit that was close to the
> parking lot.  Some site designs consider that and design 'barrier -free'
> units adjacent to the parking lot.
> James
> 
> 
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