Intro
In many jurisdictions, it is against code to build a
residence smaller than a certain square footage, often in the neighborhood of
500 sq feet. I think the original
purpose of these regs was to prevent slum lords from cramming people into
cramped tenement units.
But in this era of the cool, hip, microapartment, these regs
appear outdated. They prevent some great
innovation and often the residents want these small units so that they can live
in expensive parts of cities or to reduce their carbon footprints. They are also a great living laboratory to
try out all kinds of innovations in environmental design and in user
experience.
In a logical world, we would update the regulations to accommodate
the new approach to small residences.
Reword them so that they prevent the unwanted tenements but allow
microapartments. But of course, our
political system is way too broken for anything logical. So instead, we
creatively use loopholes.
For example, I heard of one person who built a 100 square
foot house in her friend’s backyard (nice friend!!). To get around the reg, she put the house on
wheels. She has no intention of ever
moving it. But now, it is officially
considered by the law as a trailer rather than a house. There are no minimum size regs for trailers. So it is kosher.
My Take
My question today is how far we can take this. What if you are designing a full sized
downtown apartment building and you want to have some microapartments in
it. You put some wheels on the bottom of
the lowest basement, fixed in concrete so that it doesn’t degrade the
structural integrity of the building. What do you think? It’s no worse than everything else going on
in politics.
I suspect that it depends on the regulators. If they are bureaucratic nincompoops, they
would have a problem with this just because you tried to get around a reg that
is “their turf.” If they are smarter,
they would just ignore it. But the
problem with ignoring it is the longer term consequence that you build up a
culture of ignoring rules. As much as we
sometimes make fun of the “slippery slope” buzzword, it is a reality in this
case (for example, see here). It is better to change the reg. But until then, I would rather have them
ignore the rule and allow the innovation.
Your Turn
OK, so what do you think?
Do you like my idea about sinking wheels in concrete? Do you have a
better solution?
