Project Description
From the AIA:
After years in the development pipeline, this bright new building now replaces a crime-ridden site with safe and stable homes. This is the only building dedicated to formerly homeless families in its neighborhood, which has the second highest homelessness rate in the City. Its opening moved many families off waiting lists for overtaxed shelters and has reduced pressure on emergency services.
The new secure building brings 73 homes, positive energy, and "eyes on the street" to the neighborhood. Formerly homeless families and transition-aged youth are provided stable new homes with "welcome kits" of furnishings and supplies. A comprehensive range of support services, including child-specific programs are offered in the building’s convenient on-site offices. The 115 kids living in the building receive healthy snacks, homework help, after-school care, and chaperoned field trips.
In the central courtyard, 8,500-square-foot urban garden with fruit trees, vines, and planting beds allows residents to grow their own food and get their hands dirty. Varied-height planters accommodate people’s differing relationships to the gardening beds – for adults, teens, children, and those with mobility differences – as well as providing places to rest or socialize in the garden court. A local gardening non-profit oversees this "edible landscape," with residents providing the daily garden care.
By providing increased safety and increased housing capacity and density as well as on-site social and vocational services for residents, the development supports residents and fosters the cultural and economic diversity of the neighborhood.