Dos and Don’ts of modular housing
Housing Solutions Platform Debates
Online, 10 December 2024Save the date
Modular, offsite or prefabricated housing are different terms under the label of modern methods of construction (MMC). Using offsite manufacturing for housing construction is not new and it has been pointed out that the massive housing and labor shortage following WW2 had led to innovative engineering techniques, using for instance precast concrete, that allowed the fast delivery of millions of homes in Europe.
However, the climate crisis and the European policy response to it, focused on reducing and transitioning from polluting industries, have also entailed the promotion of new construction materials and methods to leave behind the times of massive cement prefabs, with their damaging effects on the environment. These are to be replaced with more sustainable materials and production processes while also delivering fast enough to respond to urgent housing needs. One EU initiative that aims to catalyze sustainable and inclusive growth in line with the European Green Deal is the New European Bauhaus, whose potential and challenges have already been discussed in recent debates of the Housing Solutions Platform.
Across the EU, the use of MMC for housing construction has been evolving at different speeds, with state of the art technology and widespread use of modular housing in some countries, like in Sweden, and emerging policies that promote industrialized public housing production, like in Barcelona and Ireland. However, the representation of modular for the poorest people still is that of repurposed shipping containers to which they are pushed usually following evictions. Thus, the discussion around modular housing is also a discussion about who gets to benefit from the technological progress that can improve our lives and how this can be made to serve the ones in most need in a way that is adequate and dignified, so without compromising minimum housing quality standards.
With this debate we aim to explore the dos and don’ts of modular housing and what would be the prerequisites that would prevent its use as a distinctly inadequate and stigmatizing form of housing.
Speakers
Barcelona’s experience with modular temporary accommodation
- Lourdes Herruz and Irene Subils, Barcelona City Council
The Flex-housing policy in the Netherlands:
- Anne Sanders, AEDES
- Oana Druta, Eindhoven University of Technology
Lessons from the MODULO Project in Brussels
- Aline Strens, Diogenes
Critical perspectives on modular housing
- Jonathan Lee, European Roma Rights Centre
- Discussion and Q&A
Register here.