{"id":1205,"date":"2016-11-04T12:40:24","date_gmt":"2016-11-04T04:40:24","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/thesis.arch.hku.hk\/2016\/?p=1205"},"modified":"2016-11-25T01:14:56","modified_gmt":"2016-11-24T17:14:56","slug":"homeless-reintegration","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/thesis.arch.hku.hk\/2016\/homeless-reintegration\/","title":{"rendered":"Homeless Reintegration"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u201cI feel it is the duty of us as human to be compassionate to others in need and not treat them as vermin.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

Homeless has always been a social issue affecting all groups of people as well as the city image over the world. In recent years, homeless people in Hong Kong has been rising rapidly from 2004 to 2015. It raised from 400 homeless people in 2004 to more than 1400 people in 2013, which is around three times more than that in 2004, then raised to 1600 people in 2015. On the other hand, the average age of the homeless people has been decreasing continuously throughout the past few years. This issue will become even more severe in the future due to the harsh ways the Hong Kong Government used to tackle the homeless problem, such as expelling the homeless out of the streets by using the \u2018Hostile Architecture\u2019 instead of giving help. The Hong Kong Government also has great concern for financial issues, making them reluctant to help the homeless. Another very obvious reason of the rising amount of homeless people is that the housing price has been unreasonably high. People can no longer afford either buying or renting an apartment, while the supply of public housing is not enough for all citizens in need. That\u2019s why \u2018McRefugees\u2019 nowadays (those people who sleep in McDonalds every night) has become a common scene in Hong Kong.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The most common solution taken by different cities on tackling the problem is to house the homeless first since they think that it is the most effective way. Unfortunately, those street sleeper\u2019s shelters in Hong Kong are always combined with public toilet or refuse collection point which create a very poor condition that make the homeless people think sleeping at the street is even much better. Some other solutions are the temporary shelter, mobile housing and the \u2018Hostile Architecture\u2019 (such as the large rock in open space, metal studs installed at flat surface, pavilion without cover, etc.) that the Hong Kong Government used to force them out of straying in the open street. In fact, this kind of hostile architecture also not welcoming for the general public, not only the homelessness.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Until today, we still cannot solve the problem of homelessness. Or to say that, architecture cannot always solve the problem especially social problems. Therefore, this thesis aims to explore how architecture can actively work as a media to raise the problem of homelessness to the general public and at the same time to improve the current condition to meet the needs of homeless people.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The idea of the thesis is to explore how architecture can improve the current living condition of homelessness and response to the \u2018Hostile Architecture\u2019. Allowing the homeless people to become visible to the public is important since more than a decade the \u201cdefensive techniques\u201d has been creeping into our urban life. These techniques allow people to put homeless \u2018out of sight\u2019 and \u2018out of mind\u2019 which also harmful to the city. It is impossible to hide them forever. The possible way should be to change the public perception of homeless and reintegrate them back to the city. Therefore, the design will seek for a way to change the living condition of homeless and at the same time allow the architecture to interact with the public in the city so as to raise the public awareness.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The research will include<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. Current condition of homeless<\/li>\n
  2. Living condition of homeless<\/li>\n
  3. Hostile architecture<\/li>\n
  4. Spatial quality of interactive area (open space)<\/li>\n
  5. Living quality<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

     <\/p>\n

    \"hostile-architecture\"<\/a><\/p>\n

    Fig.1 Metal studs installed at flat surface<\/p>\n

    \"58f71f18464339-57237e4024b23\"<\/a><\/p>\n

    Fig.2\u00a0 The Six Disabled Veteran Housing_Brooks + Scarpa<\/p>\n

    \"homeless-housing-main\"<\/a><\/p>\n

    Fig.3 Some ideas for Homelessness<\/p>\n

    \"su120sfr86j7n9yc\"<\/a><\/p>\n

    Fig.4 The Social Condenser_A City in Transit<\/p>\n

     <\/p>\n

     <\/p>\n

    Reading and Reference:<\/strong><\/p>\n

    Sheltering Those in Need: Architects Confront Homelessness_ Christopher Herring<\/p>\n

    Designing for the Homeless: Architecture That Works_ Sam Davis<\/p>\n

    Homeless Research of HK 2014_City University of Hong Kong<\/p>\n

    http:\/\/archinect.com\/features\/article\/149944930\/how-4-us-cities-are-applying-architectural-solutions-to-homelessness<\/a><\/p>\n

    http:\/\/weburbanist.com\/2012\/03\/19\/housing-for-the-homeless-14-smart-sensitive-solutions\/<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    \u201cI feel it is the duty of us as human to be compassionate to others in need and not treat them as vermin.\u201d Homeless has always been a social issue affecting all groups of people as well as the city<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":148,"featured_media":1210,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[28],"tags":[120,511,512,330,513],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/thesis.arch.hku.hk\/2016\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1205"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/thesis.arch.hku.hk\/2016\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/thesis.arch.hku.hk\/2016\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thesis.arch.hku.hk\/2016\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/148"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thesis.arch.hku.hk\/2016\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1205"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/thesis.arch.hku.hk\/2016\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1205\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2677,"href":"http:\/\/thesis.arch.hku.hk\/2016\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1205\/revisions\/2677"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thesis.arch.hku.hk\/2016\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1210"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/thesis.arch.hku.hk\/2016\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1205"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thesis.arch.hku.hk\/2016\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1205"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thesis.arch.hku.hk\/2016\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1205"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}