The NDP’s amendment to the federal budget in the spring of 2005 will result in a $1.6 billion investment in affordable housing con- struction (with a dedicated fund for Aborigi- nal housing) across Canada over the next two years. Even in the short term however, this significant injection of cash leaves us with no vision for the sustained development and investment in housing. We can state with some optimism that as one of the many high quality projects to be completed in Montreal as part of a recent municipal initiative to provide 5000 new units of social housing, the redevelopment of Benny Farm sets a precedent for what may result from the convergence of a cultural and political commitment to the social and envi- ronmental welfare of the city. g
mal system at Benny Farm will transfer heat expelled from buildings or collected from thermal solar panels in the summer to soil 100m below the surface to be stored for use in heating during winter. As a direct benefit to the co-op residents, the system will also provide substantial savings in energy costs which can be directed to other needs. Link- ing buildings on four properties to the same geothermal borefield reduces the capital investment costs for individual co-ops and promotes community decision making in a neighbourhood with an established tradition of communal living. The non-profit green energy utility will be self-run by members of the coops themselves, with long term energy savings being reinvested back into the com- munity infrastructure systems. From the urban scale of the neighbourhood through to development of minute details of envelope construction, L’OEUF’s (L’Office de
l’Eclectisme Urbain et Fonctionnel) projects at Benny Farm link interrelate concerns for social, urban and environmental welfare. The underlying values carried through the proj- ects take sustainable building and sustainable community development as inseparable and complementary collective imperatives. While the overall redevelopment at Benny Farm demonstrates developments in social, urban and environmental concepts in Canadi- an architecture since the Second World War, it also reveals a lost commitment to social welfare by governments over the same period. Mark and Danny’s admirable tenacity in pursuing their convictions through thirteen years of thwarted plans, ignored proposals and unpaid efforts (acting as lobbyists and organisers as often as architects), also has to be seen as another reminder of the unsustain- able mode of providing affordable housing in this country.
Florian Jungen worked on Benny Farm projects as an intern at L’OEUF. He is currently involved in design and construction at Habitat Design in Calgary.
on |site 14
architecture and land
9
Made with FlippingBook interactive PDF creator