Background

I have been on and off about my “OrthoTown” project but finally found some motivation to update some of these essays I wrote back on my secondary blog on Urbit. I have taken down my Urbit blog and am transferring things over to here.

Essay

The density in the average single family detached home is about 3000 persons/sq km. In Montreal medium density housing is anywhere from 3x to 6x this number so 9000 persons/sq km to 18,000 persons/sq km. For reference Manhattan has a population density of 29,000~ persons/sq km, Brooklyn has one of 15,000 persons/sq km, and Singapore has one of 8,250~ persons/sq km. It seems like 9,000 is definitely on the higher end that most people would be comfortable with.

Assuming there is 40-60 acres of land available; averaged to 50 this is 0.2 sq km. At single family housing density this would yield about 600, at medium density it would be about 1800 and the higher density number about 3600 persons, or on average 2100 persons. At the higher end these sorts of densities avoid having larger front yards, and less space or NO space between buildings… Front yards tend to be empty space and less functional… Often just ends up being a place to mow. This can be changed if the front yard ends up being a shared space. So with just 50 acres of land you could feasibly have a functional town/city with ~3000 people with no high rises and no buildings higher than say 4 stores. The highest building could easy be a church to fit the traditional model of Christian city planning.

Assuming there is 5-15 acres of land available, averaged to 10 acres this is .04 sq km. Lower density number is $9k times 0.04 and higher density number is $18k times 0.04, yielding 360 persons and 720 persons respectively. This is a good “starter” size I believe for monasteries near cities that have sufficient populations that can move there. Using the lower estimate of 360 people, and assuming there are households that average 5 people that comprise 50% of the population, and 20% with just two people, and the rest as singles then this would be 36 large family households, 36 two-person households, and 120 singles. A mix of detached single family homes, attached/semi-detached family homes/townhouses, row houses and or condo complexes. Emphasis on MEDIUM density and mixed-use to make moving financially feasible. Keep infrastructure and constructions costs down by building denser. Density does not have to be high-rises that destroy human sized scale of buildings.

Assuming that 10 acres of land would cost something like $50,000. Or at most $100,000 dollars. Then to construct roughly…

36 homes for each large family, 36 homes that would fit the 36 two-person households, and another 40 homes to house the 120 singles. This would be about $300,000/home*(32+32+40)= $300,000/home *102 homes=$30,600,000.