Tackling overcrowding through visualisation
Communities and Local Government (CLG) have commissioned a number of pilots to tackle overcrowding. See background information from CLG. Home Connections worked last year with the London Borough of Camden to develop an interactive visualisation tool to help tenants with overcrowding issues.
The LB Camden overcrowding pilot is seeking to make better use and organisation of space in existing homes and to introduce minor adaptations to relieve pressure points - such as queues for the bathroom or insufficient room for kids to play or study.
Home Connections developed for LB Camden a 3D model of a typical overcrowded flat. A team of highly skilled multimedia artists from Home Connections created a 3D model to highlight how usage of space could be improved for example by:
• introducing bunk beds
• small property adaptations such converting cupboards into washbasins or toilets
• partitioning rooms to create multi-use areas
• larger works to create extra rooms
See a short flash exert of the overcrowding visualisation at our Building Visions website (the home of our visualisation service).
These visual tools are used by tenants and can stimulate them into taking action themselves or they can be used to present the help that is available from the council or its partners.
A package of information can be presented via the web or as information packs and a helpful DVD could be created to present these ideas as a movie to tenants as they wait in housing reception queues.
- We will keep you in the loop on future developments but would love to begin a deeper conversation with other authorities tackling overcrowding.
- The Home Connections team would be happy to discuss your ideas to tackle overcrowding and, where possible, turn your ideas into practical tools.
For further information contact jansen.vandok@homeconnections.org.uk or phone 07940 536 749
Lambeth up for choice and secure 3 stars
London Borough of Lambeth selected Home Connections last year to implement their choice based lettings scheme. See their plans for CBL at the Lambeth corporate site. The scheme is set to go live in April 2008. Lambeth is the most improved London council and one of only two councils nationally to have jumped from a one star to three star ‘good’ rating in just one year, according to an announcement from the Audit Commission.
Inspectors found the council had ‘improved strongly’, following their annual Comprehensive Performance Assessment, which rates councils across England on a scale from one to four stars.
The three star scorecard - which is a first for Lambeth - shows the council has significantly improved in a number of areas, exceeding targets to cut crime, increasing visitor numbers to libraries by seven per cent and creating one of the highest performing housing benefits teams in the country.
