Housing Diversity
Features and benefits of housing diversity:
Authors: Alex Kleeman, Dr Lucy Gunn, Professor Billie Giles-Corti.
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Each additional kilometre walked per day in mixed use environments was associated with a 4.8% reduction in the likelihood of obesity. An increase in land use mix is associated with a 12.2% reduction in the likelihood of obesity
The term housing diversity refers to the range of housing types in a development or neighbourhood. A diverse neighbourhood has various different dwelling types and sizes – usually achieved by offering a wider range of lot sizes and promoting a variety of building forms. By providing greater housing choice, developments can meet the housing needs of increasingly diverse residents and household types (such as young families, professionals, retirees, people with disabilities) across the life course.
Conversely, a wider choice of housing and lifestyles attracts a more diverse range of people to a location. Smaller lots and the mixing of compatible uses within and around town centres and near public transport creates the higher densities needed to support destinations and services that residents can easily reach by walking or cycling.
Residential density, at its simplest, is a measure of the number of residents or dwellings in a given area. But there is no universally agreed definition of residential density, and different professions have applied and defined the concept in various ways.
Two major points of difference and confusion are the base land-area calculation (the denominator) and the inclusion and exclusion of different types of land. [1] In the literature on physical activity, residential density has typically been defined as the number of people living in a given area (population per hectare) or the number of housing units in an area (residences per hectare).
Increased density, when carefully planned, can produce numerous benefits to the environment and health of the community
Many types of dwelling can combine to achieve housing diversity:
Streets with dwellings designed to have increased opportunities for passive surveillance, are 60% less likely to have incidence of graffiti, litter, vandalism and broken windows
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