I recently asked a friend how he was doing and got a blunt “I’m really unhappy about where Hawaii’s heading. I can never afford a house.” And a teacher with a lovely home atop a ridge: “I had to chase my dog into the forest and found a whole tent city up there. I get it, though — it’s nicer in the forest than sleeping on a sidewalk.” No matter your housing situation, Hawaii’s affordability crisis filters into your life.
As a designer, I think there must be a design solution to our housing problem. Not just structures, but the design of the whole housing system. It’s been helpful to lay out all the pieces to better spot opportunities.
Land: Ever since the 1848 Mahele, Hawaii’s land has been concentrated largely in a few privileged hands. Our costliest resource raises development costs. To make progress, we need to agree that using some public land to help people in need is common sense. Sharing and aloha are critical to caring for all residents.
Permits: Building codes and zoning protect lives and the fabric of our communities. But what’s helped us grow safely and appropriately can also limit creativity. They create hurdles to improving the status quo. Our leaders need to make the system work for us — not the other way around — and apply a common-sense approach to new ideas.
Construction: Hawaii has some of the highest construction costs in the country for several reasons (imported materials, fuel costs, high labor costs). Why doesn’t Hawaii have the nation’s costliest iPhones and cars? They’re produced centrally and efficiently, and the consumer reaps the benefits. We have to get serious and creative about cutting construction and material costs and work toward a new way of building, especially for less expensive housing.
Community approval: Any project needs community support. We have to agree to make modest sacrifices and take modest risks to create new ways to house everyone. Do we want to be an island of NIMBYs, walled off from the neighbors like everywhere else?
Here’s the sort of creativity needed. When I was 18 and without dependable housing, I lived a while in a squatted building in Manhattan. This let me watch firsthand as a city creatively solved part of its housing crisis by selling 11 buildings to their tenants for $1 each. The buildings had been squatted when the Lower East Side was a crumbling shell of the hip neighborhood it is today; young families moved in and fixed up the buildings. Tenant leaders had negotiated a deal: In return for the $1 price tag, the tenants would convert the buildings to co-ops, renovate and bring them into compliance with building codes, and guarantee affordability when units were sold. It was government at its best, an example of the kind of creativity Hawaii needs.
So what can we do?
Consider other ways of living. We should consider tiny homes or living arrangements with shared kitchens and bathrooms. While not for everyone, make these options available for those willing to try an approach that in many ways recalls a more traditional island way of life.
Change the way we build. Alternative construction methods like modular prefabrication make sense. To house 300 residents of the Pu’uhonua O Wai’anae camp would cost $3,000,000 ($10,000 per unit) if we are willing to build small 100 square foot prefab units with shared kitchens.
Find creative leaders willing to take risks. The status quo is not working. The millennial generation responds to risk-takers. We’re ready for leaders willing to make tough decisions that look to the future.
Realize we’re all in this together. This issue touches everyone. We can become YIMBYs and demand that our leaders do business differently in this time of emergency.
It starts with a community commitment to ensure everyone has a safe place to sleep.
Michael Hodge, a Honolulu architect and planner, is a millennial who has lived here since 2001.
