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Netherlands floats new housing idea
August 21, 2007
Many towns plan to accommodate floating homes in face of climate fears
(AMSTERDAM) The Dutch answer to fears over climate change and lack of space is a modern three-storey luxury villa with a roof terrace, large living room, three bedrooms and, crucially … a water-proof hull.
Dozens of Dutch municipalities are planning new districts with room for floating homes and, as more and more socalled water lots become available, the market is experiencing a boom.
`There is this idea that it's reassuring that these houses will stay afloat even if the Netherlands is flooded,' Yvonne de Korte of the Amsterdam architecture centre Arcam told AFP.
In the Netherlands, a densely populated country where one third of the land is below sea level, the threat of rising sea levels is a constant one.
`We are no longer only worrying about global warming, we are now actively looking for solutions for the consequences of climate change,' climatologist Rik Leemans of the Wageningen University said.
`There has been a real change in the Dutch mentality … Before we were hiding behind our dykes. Now we are finding ways to create space for rising water levels and looking upon it as a chance to develop new ideas,' he added.
The Dutch government is not only keeping up the maintenance on its impressive system of dykes and flood dams, but has also launched plans to divert rivers and create designated delta areas that can be flooded in case of a sudden rise in water levels.
The luxury floating villa by ABC Arkenbouw on show in Amsterdam together with the exhibition `Living on Water' is a prototype aimed at people who buy so-called water lots in IJburg.
IJburg is a new housing development built on an artificial island in the east of Amsterdam and is expected to house 45,000 people between now and 2020.
The water lots in the new neighbourhood are on sale for between 110,000 and 140,000 euros (S$228,000 and S $290,000) and allow people to moor a floating house on a special landing.
`It is a great new market, we are building 40 floating homes this year and plan 60 next year,' said Marian Spenkeler of ABC Arkenbouw.
The company is specialised in building houseboats, the classic barge type that you see in the canals of Amsterdam, and is now turning more and more to constructing boathouses that look like floating villas.
`It attracts all kinds of buyers from young families with kids to pensioners,' Mr Sprenkeler said.
The floating villas cost around 250,000 euros. Taken with the price of the lot, this is a little lower than the prices for comparable family homes on IJburg.
The boathouse is built with the latest technology with all modern conveniences and floats on a concrete pontoon that doubles as a partly submerged basement with bedrooms.
For most of the 20th-century houseboat dwellers were, according to architecture expert De Korte, considered `a fringe group, poor people who did not have enough money to buy a real house on firm ground'.
In the 1970s houseboats become a popular choice for hippies as the ultimate sign of rejecting the bourgeois lifestyle.
In the last 10 years, that has changed as living on water has become increasingly fashionable and a number of housing projects started including water houses in their development plans.
To give an idea of the different forms of living on water Arcam has organised an exhibit in Amsterdam with models and real houseboats, including one over 80 years old.
Source: Business Times 14 Aug 07
2,000 new cyclone shelters to be built this year in Bangladesh
Tuesday, 01.08.2008, 03:03am (GMT+6)
Source: http://www.banglade shjournal. com/article/ Bangladesh/ 157/
DHAKA, Bangladesh, Jan 7 (BSS): Secretary of the Bangladesh Ministry of Food and Disaster Management Dr Mohammad Ayub Miah today said 2,000 new cyclone shelters will be built in the coastal areas of the country's 15 districts as part of the government's disaster preparedness.
A sub-committee for setting up the cyclone centres has been formed which will submit a report within this month on how the cyclone centers could be make sustainable, he said this while inaugurating a workshop on 'Cyclone Sidr 2007: Early Recovery' at BIAM auditorium here this morning.
United Nations development Programme (UNDP) and the Disaster Management Bureau (DMB) jointly organised the workshop in cooperation with Comprehensive Disaster Management Programme
(CDMP).
With director general of DMB KH Masud Siddiqui in the chair, the function was addressed, among others by UNDP country director Manoj Basnyat, chief of programme division of the Ministry of Planning Dr Idris Ali Dewan, director of DMB Mohammad Abu Sadeque, high officials of different ministries and development partners.
Dr Mohammad Ayub Miah said Bangladesh is a disaster-prone country and the recent cyclone Sidr had caused massive damage to lives and properties particularly in agriculture sector.
The government, he said, is taking a comprehensive and 12- month loss recovery programme aimed at reducing the loss of cyclone survivors in the southwestern coastlines of the country.
KH Masud Siddiqui underscored the need for carrying out more research on disaster preparation with a view to strengthening the country's disaster preparedness.
Manoj Basnyat appreciated the government's ongoing coordinated efforts aiming at reducing the sufferings of the Sidr- hit people.
"We are ready to provide necessary assistance to Bangladesh for early recovery of the economic loss suffered the country due to the cyclone Sidr," he added.
@ The Bangladesh Journal
Deep condolence for the Sadr victims. May Almighty give the family members of victims enough strength to recover from this great loss soon. Let us extend our hand to them the way we can.
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