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| Tiny House on the move... (Photo by Guillaume Dutilh) |
Henry David Thoreau’s Walden
Pond seemed
as much about simplicity as it was about nature.
That being the case, today’s version might very
well be Oakland, California’s “Containertopia.” The homeless community that has sprung up right next door to it, members of which are “lugging around coffinlike sleeping boxes on wheels,” might also qualify.
Sarah Maslin Nir of The
New York Times reports that Containertopia was started by a young couple, one of whom had “graduated from the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School and works in technology.”
Containertopia is presently “a village of 160-square-foot shipping containers… which can be modified with things like insulation, glass doors, electrical outlets, solar panels and a self-contained shower and toilet.” The cost
for the privilege of dwelling within one of these?
A mere $600 per month.
If the monthly price-tag seems excessive, consider this: the cost of
living in neighboring San Francisco now rivals that of living in Manhattan. Cofounder Luke Iseman states:
If we can do it [Containertopia] in one of the highest-cost places in the world, people can do this anywhere.”
It is time for building codes and zoning laws to become more “user-friendly.”
If housing costs weren’t so daunting, many more citizens could afford their very own “home sweet home.”
Resources
http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/live-in-boxes-in-oakland-redefine-housing-squeeze/ar-AAfpVLv?li=AAa0dzB
Copyright October 14, 2015 by Linda Van Slyke All Rights Reserved
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