Adoption of Green Neighbourhood Development: A Case of Affordable Housing Projects

Abstract

The Kenyan government identified low-cost housing as one of four top priorities and aimed to add 500 000 affordable homes. The ability of affordable housing projects to continue, remain sustainable, and be effective is one of the most crucial hurdles. Expanding the boundaries of assessment to the neighbourhood scale in Kenya means that not only the single buildings but also spaces between them, services that are provided, humans and other organisms that are living there, and the synergies between this broad range of elements and activities have to be considered in the assessment process. This study examined in detail the provision of low-cost housing within the LEED-ND rating system as a platform for having a rating system that focuses on sustainable low-cost housing. The study adopted a survey research design and made use of both qualitative and quantitative modes of investigation to examine the green building practice in Kenya. The proposed park road Ngara project entailed the construction of six blocks four of them housing one two and three-bedroom units, one block housing a parking silo, and another housing a kindergarten and other auxiliary facilities. The study’s target population comprises park road low-cost housing units of the big four agenda by the government. Analysis was undertaken to generate a descriptive picture of the data gathered. The study concludes that the process used to produce an implementation tool can be just as crucial to the success of the tool itself as the tool itself is to the success of the process. The high cost of certification and the labour-intensive complexity of certifying development projects which frequently encompassed a large number of buildings and were finished over several years had two primary issues established, the first being that green neighbourhood assessment systems that are utilised frequently were called LEED-ND. Secondly, the green neighbourhood assessment was another popular technique that was utilised to assist in the decision-making process. The results of the study indicate that LEED-ND is currently the standard that the industry has adopted as a benchmark for environmentally responsible neighbourhood development everywhere in the world. The study recommends that LEED-ND incorporate a post-occupancy evaluation to determine the level of satisfaction felt by residents and transition from a prescriptive-based system to a performance-based one.