Sean Botham leads the development file for City Housing Hamilton. CHH is the first certified passive house consultant in Canada for community housing corporations. Sean spoke about the need in Hamilton for below market affordable housing for the vulnerable. Currently Hamilton has a massive wait list of over 5000 households. There are 7000 unit of community housing available currently serving 12,000 dwellers. The wait list is centralized He and his team combined with resources from private citizens are determined to rebuild, retrofit and build new using principles of cutting edge design. The passive house approach has been proven to yield high performance and cost effectiveness. In essence they have reset the CHH development strategy.
There are 9 projects underway in the city; 4 are new the other 5 are rebuilds. One example of the rebuild was 500 MacNab the oldest public housing high rise in the city. One hundred and forty seven units have been retrofitted to high performance standards following universal design principles. The building that has been modified to provide thermal comfort throughout, has a simplified mechanical system and is ready for occupancy. Federal and provincial funding was used for this rebuild. One of the challenges for the city is how to take existing spaces and upgrade them – and 500 MacNab is an excellent example of how to do this.
A new build has different challenges. Roxborough is an example of this. Formerly the site of a public school and several blocks of aging city housing it has become a jewel in the CHH portfolio. The funding came from a combination of public and private developers. The buildings were constructed in modules off site, allowing for shorter build times and costs efficiencies. The photos Sean shared were very impressive. The largest project is the rebuilding of the Jamesville site which aims to create a mid-rise community that is walkable and modelled on European design. The prefab panelized constructions will double the affordability of the site.
The pending projects include the former City Motor Motel in the east end. This building will be electrified and use heat pumps to limit energy use and effectively render the building a net zero project. There are two building planned for Bay/Cannon site, and a mid-rise 66 unit building planned for land adjacent to Macassa Lodge.
Health, recreation and housing should be integrated services in order to maximize the overall social health of the clients. The principles of affordability, integration, universal design and support are now the driving first principles of CHH. Very positive physics based values are driving the department.
Sean took some questions from our members. He referenced a study by AECON which confirmed the premium returned when high performance principles are used in new construction. https://publications.aecom.com/sustainable-legacies/article/debunking-the-myth-that-passivhaus-is-costly-to-achieve.
Sean took some questions from our members. He referenced a study by AECON which confirmed the premium returned when high performance principles are used in new construction. https://publications.aecom.com/sustainable-legacies/article/debunking-the-myth-that-passivhaus-is-costly-to-achieve.