Cohousing-L Mailing List: Re: Elevator Buildings

[Lautner, Patricia (Patricia.Lautner]

Aside from the question of cost effectiveness, our community had a strong 
desire to be able to 'age in place'.  100% of our units are ADA "adaptable" 
which means that they all are visit-able by wheelchair but not necessarily 
accessible without renovation. This was way above code but we wouldn't have 
considered not having an elevator - and we're not a senior community (yet ha 
ha.)  It was (and is) expensive but considered a 'must-have'. 

Patti
JPCohousing - Boston 

-----Original Message-----
From: Sharon Villines [mailto:sharon [at] sharonvillines.com] 
Sent: Thursday, May 10, 2012 8:43 AM
To: Cohousing-L
Subject: [C-L]_ Elevator Buildings



On 9 May 2012, at 2:38 PM, Thomas Lofft wrote:

> Related Query: Has any community developed an elevator building Senior 
> Cohousing community yet?

Tom's query reminded me of a question relevant to developing communities: At 
what point does having an elevator become cost effective in terms of the height 
of the building?

We have an elevator that serves the basement and three floors above. It was 
expensive to install and is expensive to maintain but we would not have been 
approved without it because of requirements for accessible housing. As Tom 
notes, it also affects sales by limiting the number of buyers who want to climb 
three flights of stairs to get home. And then another flight inside to get to 
their top floor.

If the building is too high, you need two elevators because many people can't 
walk the stairs at all or that many and the elevator can easily be out of 
service for 24 hours or even days. I once lived in a seven story building where 
it was out for 3 months. Some people were literally stranded in their 
apartments and others moved out for the duration. One man had to have his wife 
removed by EMS because she was recovering from a stroke and needed medical care.

Tom worked with me on a community in Florida where he raised the question of 
building a high-rise building instead of covering a large property with 
duplexes, particularly because the property was planted with a wide variety of 
special fruit trees, including bananas. 

Sharon
----
Sharon Villines
Takoma Village Cohousing, Washington DC
http://www.takomavillage.org




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