Dr. Melissa Fernández profiles Islington Park Street community, an alternative housing model in London, as a possible model for the effective and low cost reuse of obsolete owned sheltered housing and care homes.
Some key findings include:
- Islington Park Street Community (IPS) is a long-established mixedneeds housing that provides a mutually supportive permanent home for people with mixed backgrounds, needs and abilities.
- IPS is financially and socially self-managed with a robust decisionmaking protocol and operates a shared resources model that offers community, health and environmental benefits. Though it originated in the 1970s, its approach is consistent with the current political agenda in terms of community self-determination, voluntary action and the integration of vulnerable and differently abled people.
- Islington Park Street Community provides a model that could help those facing mental of physical challenges to sustain healthy independent living via mutual support. Housing associations should be educated in this approach.
- Public and private financial support should be sought to support this innovative, alternative form of community and to allow affordable mixed needs communities and neighborhoods to continue to thrive in London’s city centre.
- IPS could be seen as a possible model for the effective and low cost reuse of obsolete owned sheltered housing and care homes.
The full report can be accessed here.
