the coming year, the Centre plans to conduct a comprehensive analysis and post-occupancy evaluation of all eight case studies, in close consultation with the developers and government agencies responsible for the housing developments. It will consist of questionnaires completed by the residents to determine the performance of the timber housing as described by a matrix of indicators, including: operational energy and water consumption, affordability, environmental sustainability, and social sustainability factors such as desirability, adaptability and social acceptability. Results will subsequently be published in papers and a book publication. The process will shift the focus from simple questions of technical efficiency to the behaviours and attitudes of the occupants of the selected CLT buildings, transforming their household consumption and current housing management practices into quantifiable evidence. We will compare the POE results with the aims of the case studies to inform subsequent CLT housing developments. We will also consider perceptions of the social status of residents in CLT housing projects by others in the neighbourhood and include provision for suggestions from the residents for improvements in this regard.
The aim of this research is to develop a comprehensive model of Australian CLT housing construction that offers effective guidance for the future delivery of affordable and sustainable housing by considering the needs and expectations of future consumers, the perspective of housing providers, and the structural challenges presented by the requirement to improve affordability and sustainability. The next step is the POE which, in addition to in-depth analysis of the selected cases, will include a mapping exercise comparing the concept with the experiential reality. The resulting comprehensive indicator matrix will enable us to develop a rigorous model on which Australian CLT initiatives can be based. For instance, answers need to be explored to the following questions:
What are the barriers to sustainable housing transition?
What are the motives and roles of the architects, real estate agents and engineers involved?
How strong was the public engagement with these CLT projects?
Finally, understanding the barriers to change and policy levers for accelerating innovation, this research will explore the liveability/acceptability of CLT buildings for infill development in Australian conditions and climate, taking the knowledge developed in Project ‘CLT 1’ and assessing the expectations and experiences of occupants through occupancy satisfaction surveys (post-occupancy evaluation research has not yet been conducted).
8. Conclusion and Further Discussion
The most urgent areas of action for planners and engineers that have emerged are probably in the fields of:
Water and waste in the built environment;
Electric vehicle mobility and green infrastructure;
Eco-city planning and green space linked to a public health agenda;
Low carbon construction systems;
Inner-city housing models attracting people to move back to the centre.
Better housing design can significantly improve health outcomes. The integration of affordability and sustainability in housing is of crucial importance for the future development and re-development of Australian urban areas. The author found that the barriers and obstacles are not so much technical as human. This is why we have to raise low-carbon construction systems to the top of our research agenda and focus attention on transforming industry to enable long-term change. In Australia, solid wood panel construction has to be moved beyond being a niche innovation that is only carried out by a small network of pioneers.
This paper has focused on cross-laminated timber as the most promising of a range of engineered timber technologies. There is now a sense of momentum behind CLT that will hopefully flow through to other engineered timber building systems and composite possibilities. Many of the new engineered timber buildings are hybrid constructions. The e3 Building in Berlin uses a combi