Dwelling in apartments reflects general trends in housing towards over-consumption as a result of reduced sharing, the plethora of high tech devices, long-distance travel and unnecessary purchases by those on above average incomes.
‘It’s mine’ and the technological turn
The spread of gas lamps, electricity and, later, central heating altered ways that residents occupied home spaces. Once members of households had congregated around the service of a candle or gas lamp, fire, stove or radio but, during the twentieth century, as apartments came to typify modern life, members of households became more atomised in separate rooms and alienated in private activities.2 This set the stage for personal mobile digital technologies, whose owners communicate most in ‘Internetworks’ that leap from kin and place-based relationships to interest-based and peer communities. Added to planned obsolescence pressuring residents to purchase new versions of even quite functional equipment, low levels of sharing for re-use, waste generation, and indi-viduation within households results in overconsumption of floor space and services such as heating and cooling.
In contrast, added to greater affordability and operating efficiencies, studies have found that a small dwelling occupied by at least two full-time residents can encourage environmentally friendly practices through sharing their living, socialising and relaxation spaces, storage and equipment. For instance, while research into all kinds of dwellings being built in London in the mid-2000s indicated that the average occupant of a one-bedroom flat had 15sq m of ‘habitable’ area compared with 10sq m for members of other kinds of dwellings, apartments with more household members clearly had comparatively more shared space, goods, services, skills and knowledge.3 Certainly even two-member households, compared with single households, occupying a similar space halves the per capita environmental cost of an apartment built of concrete and steel and high in ‘embodied’ energy and, similarly, significantly reduces operating costs for energy, maintenance and replacements.
During the twentieth century, technological advances diminished hard household labour, focusing such work overwhelmingly on women.4 Cleanliness, including tidiness, became a core value as rela-tionships between germs, dirt, mould and health became apparent.
Even as equipment and appliances supplanted the paid servant and were promoted as saving time as well as effort, housework still tended to fill a housewife’s day; perversely, washing machines and dishwashers actually had residents washing themselves, their houses and everything in them more as the century wore on. Studies suggest that by the start of the Second World War ‘middle-class housewives equipped with the latest in labour-saving technologies actually spent more time on housework than their mothers had at the turn of the century’.5
These kinds of studies only confirmed pre-existing suspicions and active resistance to mechanising homely duties on the basis of cost, and questions around whether ‘mod-cons’ really saved time, were well designed for everyday use and were of sufficient quality. Awareness of environmental limits in the last few decades has heightened such cynicism of technology.
Holistic analyses of urban lifestyles: culture, consciousness and income Critiques of research and rating tools that concentrate on making buildings more sustainable suggest that household members’ practices and their consumption of clothing and food, and waste generation, must be included in sustainability assessments (as discussed in Chapter 3).
Holistic consumption analyses take a broad approach to householders’
consumption. Excessive carbon-emitting travel in large powerful cars or air flights must be accounted for alongside the environmental costs of dwellings. Life outside home uses resources and energy so, if we are to better evaluate, understand and improve householders’ practices, the focus must be lifestyles rather than simply housing or household practices.
Significant demographic studies have explored the sources and cultures of residential sustainability practices. One found that household practices of Australian migrants from non-Anglo-Saxon backgrounds were more sustainable than the daily lifestyles of either those born in Australia or migrants from the United Kingdom (UK) and North West Europe. The former, compared with the latter, shared more and consumed less, lived in smaller spaces, were characterised by a higher proportion of apartment dwellers, and used and owned fewer cars. The same study revealed that women, lower income earners and seniors were more likely to engage in sustainable practices than men, affluent households and young people.6
Most interestingly, a high consciousness of and concern about the significance of environmental challenges and climate change did not necessarily translate into more sustainable practices:
In the survey of 1,465 Illawarra households, 426 reported having a rainwater tank. These households were more likely to have solar power, compost, use grey water, and regularly grow their own fruit and vegetables. Contrary to this engagement in pro-environmental behaviours, this group was also more likely to own four-wheel drives, clothes dryers, dishwashers, computers, separate freezers, air conditioning and heaters. The results showed no statistical difference in the way household water was used. Tank households were not more likely than others to undertake water saving practices.7
Choices decide how urban services and buildings are used in everyday practices. Apartment dwellers might have no option but to use mains water and pubic sewerage systems – rather than collect, store and use water on site and have water- and energy-efficient grey-water systems – but they can follow sustainable household practices, such as flushing the toilet only as necessary. Apartment dwellers might be able to use more public transport and walk and cycle more, but flying in planes proves
seriously negative for energy budgets and is commonplace amongst urban dwellers.
A study of residents of inner and outer areas of Detroit showed that higher-income households tended to have bigger and more powerful cars that consumed more fuel than lighter small cars, and that those on higher incomes tended to live in low-density suburbs, travelling much more frequently than households in compact inner areas of the city. In short, higher income households tended to contribute more carbon – and other pollutant – emissions than lower-income households.8
small
Regardless of the impacts of income and lifestyle, a seemingly simple, immediate and easy way to limit consumption is to live in a smaller space, which automatically reduces space for ‘stuff’. However, reducing consumption involves more than space. Taking clothing as an example, it’s true that a small apartment will mean limiting purchases. Still, it is best if clothes are made of natural materials, grown sustainably not too far away, and can be laundered at low temperatures. Second-hand clothing is ideal. Using air and the sun to dry clothes is preferable to a drying machine. Where councils or apartment associations ban clotheslines, inviting unsustainable practices, clothes horses can be still be used discreetly.9
Unfortunately, in terms of apartments, ‘small’ still tends to be associated with poor quality and poor environmental sustainability. A City of Melbourne review of apartments constructed between 2006 and 2012 – more than half with just one bedroom and rental stock – found that all those in residential towers 16–41 storeys high ranked either ‘poor’
or merely ‘average’ in terms of adequate private and community space, storage and utilities, ventilation, light and layout, whereas 60 per cent of low-rise (buildings of five or fewer storeys) rated as ‘good’. The review showed that car spaces had greater priority than residents’ pedestrian and diverse life cycle needs! This was mainly due to council regulations and market drivers.10
The City of Melbourne review found that apartments were generally constructed with high embodied energy materials, such as concrete and glass, failed to observe good passive solar design principles to appropri-ately capture sunlight and adequappropri-ately protect against the sun’s heat, and neglected to install appliances for collecting solar energy and water for
residents to use.11 Given that Melbourne has won awards as the world’s most liveable city, such trends gave city planners reason to pause.
If faults in such buildings are due to ‘poor design’, studies in both Australia and the UK show that ‘good design’ does not refer to any widely agreed upon criteria or values, let alone an established language for broad public discourse.12 Meanwhile, surveys and interviews with apartment residents in the Melbourne study confirmed the need for more attention to accessing daylight, space design, natural ventilation, noise minimisation, and improvements to energy and resource efficiency performance.13
Digging into the detail of the growth in the average size of new dwellings in Australia, the City of Melbourne review referred to research indicating that, between 2008 and 2010, one-bedroom apartments had diminished in floor size by more than 15 per cent to an average of 44sq mand, similarly, two-bedroom apartments by 13 per cent to 67sq m. This size is below comparable recommended minimum sizes in cities such as London and Sydney. Furthermore, the City of Melbourne found that investors had bought 85 per cent of the apartments studied;
in short most apartment dwellers had next-to-no say not only in how their dwellings were built but also in how they might make sustainability improvements.14
A UK study has shown a similar trend in London and, moreover, how averages conceal great discrepancies: despite the average internal size of a one-bedroom flat being 47sq m, a London bed-sit (studio) of 22sq m and one-bedroom apartment of 38sq m represented almost one-quarter of apartments in their respective buildings, which researchers estimated could ‘form a very significant portion of overall output’, especially given that prices per square metre were more cost effective for smaller than for larger abodes.15 In global cities, commercial fare is highly conditioned by investors’ rental prospects rather than residents’ needs. Although I argue for small-footprint living in a small space, it is a fact that tiny, poorly designed apartments put residents off and tend to prove socially unsus-tainable; cramped residents in dingy apartments often rent extra space for storage and to work and determinedly aspire to ‘bigger and better’ in their next abode.
Before discussing well-designed small apartments, we pause to look at some key rooms that comprise floor plans and how styles in interior design assist and hinder in developing environmentally sustainable practices within apartments.