Paris & Affordable Housing
The housing shortage and housing affordability is a very real problem in a lot of the world in 2022. According to this article from Bloomberg, one of the world’s most expensive cities, Paris, has come up with a model that has already transformed 25% of the housing affordable to low income residents. Paris has already set a goal of raising that 25% to 40% by 2035!
In addition to the affordability problem, Paris has had to figure out how to put more housing units with limited space in the already incredibly dense city. One method, is using obsolete buildings such as parking garages, old offices and old hotels.
Offices in Paris have a fairly unique set of circumstances as to why they’ve become defunct. Not only did the COVID-19 pandemic allow more people to work from home, Paris also has implemented traffic-restricting measures that has reduced the amount of daily cars that can come into the city. The City has an ordinance that requires new residential projects to contain some affordable units. Using an extension of this ordinance, the City can deny the construction of new office complexes if they don’t integrate some housing units as well.
The City of Paris has also started their own developments. The City has allocated approximately $501 million in their annual budget for development.