The reports have quite a few numbers, but the recommendations at the end of the reports are in plain English. Happy reading.

The report sets out the case for a new cutting-edge low-carbon, community controlled housing development in Cambridge.Cambridge needs 734 new social homes per year, in addition to other affordable housing. Including some co-operative [...]]]> Somewhat belatedly, here is the ASH Co-op Development Report “The case for new co-operative housing in Cambridge” (pdf, 1.5MB). From the executive summary:

The report sets out the case for a new cutting-edge low-carbon, community controlled housing development in Cambridge.Cambridge needs 734 new social homes per year, in addition to other affordable housing. Including some co-operative housing in this figure would help meet many local, regional and national housing objectives. Developing co-operative housing offers the following benefits (Chapter 1):

•     Zero-carbon, sustainable building
•     Active citizens in sustainable, mixed developments
•     Training and capacity building
•     Tenant participation and control
•     Lifetime homes in a supportive environment
•     Cost effectiveness

The experience of the Argyle Street Housing (ASH) Co-operative in Cambridge bears witness to the advantages of co-operative housing. ASH is a Registered Social Landlord which has been successfully providing co-op housing in Cambridge for over 25 years, and is ideally placed to help build more. A new co-op would be able to share effort and expertise with ASH, complementing the advantages of a compact community with the efficiency of a wider pool of shared resources.

ASH Co-op has good relations with other, larger RSLs. In particular we have an understanding with BCHS, part of the Accord group, who we expect would act as our development agents. Accord is an approved development partner of the Housing Corporation with an exceptional track record of sustainable development of affordable housing, including co-operatives, delivered on time and to budget. We also have support from a larger local RSL, Cambridge Housing Society. ASH Co-op is seeking support for a new development in Cambridge, including (Chapter 3):

•     showcase sustainable building
•     community involvement in the design of the scheme
•     a new self-governing co-operative on a single site
•     communal areas and workspace
•     a mixture of family housing, smaller flats and shared housing
•     accommodation available to those in most need

Such a scheme would of course have to include plenty of rented accommodation, and we are open to the possibility of a mixture of other tenures. We are confident that the planned new development will demonstrate that co-operative housing is one of the best ways of providing sustainable housing where people want, and can afford, to live.

They did a lot of environmental improvements including boreholes for a ground source heat pump, solar thermal, natural ventilation and rain [...]]]> On the evening of February the 11th a few of us went to a talk at AC Architects organised by Cambridge Carbon Footprint. They were talking about the refurbishment of the building they work in.

They did a lot of environmental improvements including boreholes for a ground source heat pump, solar thermal, natural ventilation and rain water recycling. First Anne Cooper talked about the plan and intention, and then her husband talked about the practicalities of doing it and how well the different aspects worked.

They used rainwater for flushing toilets and the like, but they found the filter needed cleaning weekly and it doesn’t actually rain all that much in Cambridge. Still they sometimes get a negative water bill as there is a “surface water drainage allowance” for not letting your rain water go into the sewers.

The equipment needed to dig the boreholes was very difficult to get into the back garden. And the pipes from the boreholes to the house aren’t insulated so they need to dig up the connecting pipes again.

The solar thermal and the natural ventilation both work very well though.

Development

The development group is continuing to explore the possibility of buying the bit of land next to the Argyle St garden off Network Rail. Late in 2009, a housing needs survey of ASH residents was conducted and found that almost all respondents expressed a need for more family housing and flats for single people [...]]]>

Development

The development group is continuing to explore the possibility of buying the bit of land next to the Argyle St garden off Network Rail. Late in 2009, a housing needs survey of ASH residents was conducted and found that almost all respondents expressed a need for more family housing and flats for single people and couples.  ASH has had the piece of land independently valued which means our development partners, Accord, can now begin a process of negotiating a possible price for the land with Network Rail. Some possible designs of housing have been drawn up by architects and there will soon be meetings to explore the different possibilities if this project gets the go ahead. Watch this Space!!!

Bryony (1 Swanns)

Maintenance roles up for grabs!

Maintenance is a big job and at the moment Jaime (22 Arg) is doing most of it himself.  In the past people have taken on specific limited roles to take some of the work off the hands of the Maintenance Co-ordinator.  These are ideal jobs if you want to be involved but don’t fancy co-ordinating a whole area of co-op work and would rather have a specific task that doesn’t take up loads of time.  The jobs up for grabs include Paint person, futon person (responsible for distributing paint/futons respectively) and room inspector (checks out vacant rooms to see what needs doing maintenance-wise to make them lovely for new members).
Any Volunteers?  Please speak to Jaime/the office if you’re up for it.

Education:

Ali Power and Fara Afifi are working together to formulate a training and education program for Ash Coop. They will be contacting members in due course – Watch this Space!

New Website:

We have a new website – go look at http://www.ash.coop/ to see how it looks. And what would be great is for people to help build up content on the site. So if you want to write up something for news, upload some photos, add details to the pages or anything like please get in touch with Hamish at 8 Argyle St – hamish@ash.coop

Email Lists:

We use email lists for sending out agendas and minutes, raising and discussing issues in the co-op and letting each other know what is going on. If you are not on the list and want to join, just email hamish@ash.coop. Note that agendas and minutes will still be circulated on paper as the primary means of communicating with members. The email list is just a supplement to paper copies – it has never been intended to replace paper.

Do you want yourname@ash.coop ?

It’s easy to set up yourname@ash.coop to forward to the email account you normally use. So, for example, if you have sillyname@gmail.com and need to apply for a job, you can tell the employer to email yourname@ash.coop and you will receive the email in your usual account. Contact hamish@ash.coop if you want to do this.

This could be the answer! – http://www.thesharehood.org/about

In a nutshell, it’s a tool for building community by encouraging people to share stuff with each other. It’s different (and in my opinion much better in lots of [...]]]> There’s been a few conversations recently about ways we can more easily communicate about stuff we’d like to give away/share/have.

This could be the answer! – http://www.thesharehood.org/about

In a nutshell, it’s a tool for building community by encouraging people to share stuff with each other. It’s different (and in my opinion much better in lots of ways) from LETS schemes and freecycle. For a start, it’s deliberately very local – it’s set up so that you see the profiles of people who live within a 5 minute walk of your house. It’s not about setting up a local currency (although you can use it for that too if you want) for trading in a fairly traditional way and it’s not just about the one-off interaction with strangers that characterise most freecyle experiences.

It’s about meeting your neighbours, organising community events and building connections with people (partly on the basis of sharing possessions, skills and resources) in the real world. This would work well on a Co-op level and, even better, is a way of expanding our connections with the local community beyond that.

It’s really easy to create an account for yourself. A few people have joined in Romsey so far, so you’ll be able to see their profiles and the few things that people are already offering. You can offer as much or as little as you feel comfortable with. Obviously, the more people join, the more useful a resource it becomes and the more likely we are to find stuff we want and people who are interested in what we have to offer. So far, people are offering various things including a giving away a guitar, offering to lend books, to make cakes, to teach people to make bread, the loan of a video camera…and there’s only about 6 people signed up at the moment. Imagine if it were a couple of hundred!

There’s a plan to drop a note to all the houses in our neighbourhood, encouraging people to join. If you’d like to help write that and/or deliver it, email Rich or just sign up now and check it out.