PRESENTATION
Relegalizing small apartments and shared housing
0:56:57
·
3 min
Garodnick presents the proposal to relegalize small apartments and shared housing as part of the City of Yes for Housing Opportunity initiative. He explains the historical context and the potential benefits of this change.
- New York City banned shared housing in the 1950s and buildings full of studio apartments in the 1960s
- The proposal would remove the 'dwelling unit factor' in central locations and reduce it elsewhere, allowing for buildings with smaller apartments
- Small apartments are presented as beneficial for young adults, older households downsizing, and individuals who prefer to live alone
- The proposal aims to create a path for shared housing in multifamily districts and allow non-residential buildings to convert to shared housing
- Garodnick argues that allowing more small and shared apartments will also open up larger family-size apartments currently occupied by roommates
Daniel Garodnick
0:56:57
We also want to relegalize buildings with small apartments and shared housing New York City banned, shared housing in the 19 fifties, and buildings full of studio apartments in 19 sixties.
0:57:10
This has contributed to our homelessness crisis in the decades since it's forced people who would prefer to live alone into living with roommates.
0:57:18
Next slide.
0:57:21
I will note that the the way that it was functionally banned in zoning was through something called the dwelling unit factor.
0:57:30
Which is a mathematical equation, which tells you the maximum number of homes that a building can have, and is determined by this complex equation that you may or may not be able to see from where you're sitting, But on this slide, we remove the dwelling unit factor in central locations and reduce it elsewhere allowing for buildings with small apartments.
0:57:51
We have a lot of protections in place for health and safety of New Yorkers, the building code, the fire code.
0:58:00
Zoning does not need to define how many smaller units you might want to include in a building will note that the requirement or, you know, the opportunity to create smaller units frequently alleviates the burden on family sized units because we have so many singles, doubles, triples, quadruples living in family sized units, people who might rather live alone.
0:58:24
Next slide.
0:58:27
Here's the the illustration of this, small apartments help a lot of people.
0:58:32
Young adults starting out, older householder households that are downsizing, and everyone within the sound of my voice, who lives with roommates, but would prefer to live alone.
0:58:43
We believe and feel rather certain that allowing more small and shared apartments will also open up those larger family size apartments that otherwise would be occupied by roommates.
0:58:54
This is an important point because some people assume that by creating an opportunity for smaller units, you actually are doing harm to the larger size units.
0:59:02
In reality, the opposite is true.
0:59:04
We are alleviating the burden on the family sized unit units by enabling smaller units to exist.
0:59:11
Next slide.
0:59:13
And, of course, we need more of all of it.
0:59:15
We need more of all of it, which is the animating point behind this entire proposal.
0:59:19
We also want to create a path for shared housing.
0:59:22
Shared housing offers homes with private bedrooms and shared kitchen kitchens, bathrooms, or other facilities.
0:59:30
This has historically provided a crucial source of housing for many New Yorkers, but current zoning makes it very, very difficult to build.
0:59:39
We would help clear a path here for the return of shared housing by allowing shared housing in multifamily districts and allow nonresidential buildings to convert to shared housing.
0:59:52
Other changes to local law also would be needed to be able to fully effectuate this, but we are doing what we believe we should be doing in zoning.
1:00:00
Next slide.
1:00:03
We also wanna create new zoning districts to spur housing in high demand areas.
1:00:09
You all know that the cap on residential f a r was created in the 19 sixties to restrict how much housing could be built in high density areas.
