Cohousing is a housing movement that is also called intentional community, or small neighborhoods, or ecovillages. The concept of cohousing originated in Denmark in the 1960s and was brought to the U.S. in the 1980s by Kathryn McCamant and Charles Durrett. Quoting from the website of The Cohousing Association of the United States:
Cohousing is a type of collaborative housing in which residents actively participate in the design and operation of their own neighborhoods. Cohousing residents are consciously committed to living as a community. The physical design encourages both social contact and individual space. Private homes contain all the features of conventional homes, but residents also have access to common facilities such as open space, courtyards, a playground and a common house.
The same website lists six defining characteristics of cohousing:
1. Participatory process. Future residents participate in the planning of the community.
2. Neighborhood design. The site plan is designed to encourage a sense of community.
3. Common facilities. The community includes a "common house" or "common room" designed for daily use (but not as a substitute for the community's private residences) and interaction by residents. The common house might include such areas as: recreation facilities, guest rooms, a children's playroom, and a kitchen and dining area for group gatherings.
4. Resident management. Residents develop and maintain the community's policies and procedures.
5. Non-hierarchical structure and decision-making. Decision making is by consensus.
6. No shared community economy. In other words, 'cohousing' does not equal 'commune.'
In the U.S. right now there are hundreds of cohousing communities either completed or in the development phase, typically structured as condominium associations, with the majority to be found on the two coasts. Well-known cohousing communities include Muir Commons in Davis, California, Doyle Street Cohousing in Emeryville, CA, Winslow Cohousing in Bainbridge Island,Washington, Nyland Cohousing in Lafayette, Colorado, and Sunward Cohousing in Ann Arbor, MI.
Elder cohousing is cohousing built specifically to provide continuing independence and accessibility for residents as they age. Common areas may include living quarters for shared home health aides. The Elder Cohousing Network links efforts to build elder cohousing. Numerous developments are under way. Three that have already opened include Glacier Circle in Davis, California, Silver Sage Village in Boulder, Colorado, and the ElderSpirit Community in Abingdon, Virginia.
The first characteristic of cohousing communities would seem to make them ephemeral. Once the planner generation passes on, the successors who will live in the community (even if they are the children of the original members) will not have participated in the planning. So, by the given definition, it is no longer a cohousing community. If I were to think of applying for admission to one of these communities, it would probably not be as a planner.
Re the 5th characteristic: does democratic planning really have equal participation in the planning process or governance? Won't there always be leader types and follower types, assertive types and acquiescent types?
I habve a subscription to the Christian Science Monitor. On Fridays, it has a classified ads section. Always listed are retirement or aging communities which are exclusively for Christian Science members. IK wonder if they would qualify as cohousing-inspired. The Christian Scientists I have known tend to be reasonable people who are accustomed to mutually considerate behavior. I rembere that you and Jim as teenagers attended some meetings and regarded them positively.
Posted by: DAd | December 14, 2007 at 07:59 AM