Cohousing-L Mailing List: 180 degrees different, in Denmark

[Michael Whitman (Michael.Whitman]

--- Jessie Handforth Kome wrote:
Solterra Cohousing has car access to every unit. They pretty much have a circle
road with all the homes inside it....
--- end of quote ---

The mental image that this conjured up reminds me to ask if anyone else has seen
the fascinating (and huge) book of aerial photographs "Earth From Above," by
Yann Arthus-Bertrand. It is a stunning book of aerial shots from all over the
globe, which focuses largely on the eye-poppingly gorgeous designs -- natural
and man-made -- that can be seen from the air.

On-topic, there is a photo of housing developments in a Danish town (its name
escapes me) that shows a design 180 degrees from what Jessie describes. Shown
from above must be a dozen pie-like settlements in close proximity to each
other, each of which contains about two dozen houses arranged in a circle, with
pie-shaped plots that must measure about 15 degrees of arc. Judging by the trees
in the settlements, these must have been built 20 or 25 years ago. 

What's curious to note is that the auto access for each group of 24 houses is in
the CENTER: the access road runs to a small paved circle in the middle of the
layout, so cars are in the middle and the houses are at the perimeter! 

I wonder whether Chuck Durrett and Kathryn McCamant ran across this settlement
in Denmark, its design being so markedly different from the "perimeterizing" of
autos that seems a standard feature of cohousing layouts, both in Denmark and
north American layouts.

   michael whitman