In recent weeks, a debate has flared up in Germany about detached houses. The first thing that caught the eye was that some people equate the term single-family home with owner-occupied home. This is not true, of course, as any type of dwelling can become a home. Conversely, it is also possible to live in a single-family home for rent. The first point is to ask people to recognise that there is a spectrum between mega apartment blocks and suburban bungalows.

Here are a few observations:

1. in principle, the pursuit of home ownership should be encouraged. In a country where every second pension is less than 900 euros, home ownership is perhaps the best way to provide for old age. In general, flats, maisonettes, terraced houses, semi-detached houses, semi-detached houses and detached houses are all possible options. And if it is to be a detached house, there is also a second-hand market. So it does not necessarily have to be a new build. As far as the home ownership rate is concerned, Germany is at the bottom of the league in Europe.

2 We already have 16 million single-family homes in this country. If, as planned, four people lived in each of these, there would already be room for 64 million people. This is obviously not the case, because the houses are not where the jobs are, the children move out, marriages break up or partners are widowed. It is a sad figure, but it is part of the truth: one third of all over 65-year-olds in Germany live alone, among women it is even half. Anyone who wants to live in a single-family home as a retirement provision may end up living there alone and with high running costs. Or the retirement home may have to be sold, putting you in competition with others who are also willing to sell.

3. 140,000 single-family homes are built in Germany every year. Assuming that each of them stands on 500 square metres of land, that is 70 million square metres or 70 square kilometres per year. This does not include the development of roads, cul-de-sacs and roundabouts. If we add 60 square metres per detached house for development, we end up with 78 square kilometres. That's the area of Lake Chiemsee - Germany's third largest lake after all. After seven years, we will surpass the area of Lake Constance with 536 square kilometres. All this in a country that has had a constant population of around 80 million since 1990. As a republic, we have to ask ourselves whether we can afford to give up the area of Lake Chiemsee once a year for detached houses. Single-family homes are certainly not a problem in urban centres or villages. But when small towns that have been separated by outlying areas for centuries grow together, it becomes confusing: the settlement structure becomes difficult to read, formerly important town centres become secondary, citizens no longer feel connected to any municipality. The small town becomes the dormitory of a superordinate "metropolitan region".

4 Of course, new housing estates are not built on water - they are built on former meadows and fields. People of my generation should at least imagine what arduous labour it was for our ancestors to create a meadow: When the Romans came to Germania, the land was covered in dark forests. The forest is a marvellous thing, but when it comes to feeding dairy cattle, it is unsuitable. So if you wanted a forage meadow, you had to cut down forests by hand: usable trunks were taken to the sawmill, the rest was cleared. Then the remaining rootstocks had to be ripped out of the ground. Then the potholes had to be filled in. Then the stones lying around had to be picked up and the weeds plucked. All with muscle power, without an aggregate and without gloves. From then on, the meadow had to be kept down every year, otherwise the forest would reclaim the area. It is unclear how many men and women worked themselves into a hump just to bequeath a "mown meadow" to their children. We should think carefully about what we do with this land. I'm sure that if we had to cut down the forest today to create new housing estates, it would be a highly emotional process.

5 After the war, our landscape planning became Americanised: Land consolidation, commercial areas along all highways, motorisation of cities and settlements, etc. This did not take into account the fact that Germany is already seven times more densely populated than the USA. So we cannot use land as a resource like the Americans do. We cannot continue to urbanise and say: "Here is Yellowstone National Park, where the grizzlies live." As the largest federal state in terms of area, Bavaria has two national parks: the Bavarian Forest and Berchtesgaden. Further national parks are difficult to create because there is a village every five kilometres in Bavaria: bad cards for lynx and bison. We don't have the natural landscapes of American or African countries. We only have our cultural landscape of meadows, fields and vineyards, which we have inherited. Part of the idea of being conservative is to protect these landscapes.

What contribution can architecture make? After 60 years of urban sprawl, its most important task will be to revitalise urban development. Urban development that leads to pleasant and people-friendly densities. Sparsely populated areas may promise more privacy, but they also lead to a reduction in services. This starts with catering and ends with medical care.

I think working with bans is problematic, because we have a right to personal happiness in our republic. For many, this includes the aforementioned home, which does not necessarily have to be a detached house. But if both terms are used as synonymous, we have a problem with architectural enlightenment.

—

Sources:

to 1. https://www.zdf.de/nachrichten/heute/jede-zweite-rente-unter-900-euro-100.html

https://de.statista.com/statistik/daten/studie/155734/umfrage/wohneigentumsquoten-in-europa/

2. "Baukultur Report City and Country 2016/17" by the Federal Foundation of Baukultur; p. 38.

Baukultur Report 2016/17 (PDF) - Federal Foundation of Baukultur |www.bundesstiftung-baukultur.de ' media ' downloads

https://www.destatis.de/DE/Presse/Pressemitteilungen/Zahl-der-Woche/2018/PD18_49_p002.html

and https://www.destatis.de/DE/Presse/Pressemitteilungen/2020/03/PD20_N014_122.html

to 3. https://www1.wdr.de/radio/wdr5/sendungen/tagesgespraech/zweiter-februar-108.html

—

First published on Facebook on 21.02.2021