Adding a street with about 50 homes on the edge of every Dutch town and village would ease the country’s growing housing crisis, the Netherlands Environmental Assessment Agency has said.
Added to more than 2,100 communities, the move could add 95,000 more units and “make a modest contribution to the housing construction task”, the agency said, NL Times reports.
According to the ABF consultancy, the country has a shortfall of around 400,000 homes in 2024, up from 390,000 in 2023 – the third consecutive annual rise.
It calculates the housing shortage for the central government every year by counting the number of people who want to form a household, but can’t because no affordable housing is available.
That includes more than one family sharing a home or young adults who still live with their parents.
The Environmental Assessment Agency described its proposal as “modest” because almost a million homes need to be added to country’s total by 2030.
It added that other solutions to the housing shortage would be necessary, primarily the densification and expansion of urban areas.
Densification and expansion are more attractive options than building new settlements because the physical and social infrastructure is already in place, reducing the cost of the units.
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