Lots of good reasons for timber floors, as you’ve set out Lloyd. In NZ and Aus it is a standard way of construction to have a suspended timber floor on timber (or concrete or steel) piles. It works well for earthquakes and it’s easy enough to design for high wind uplift. Concrete slabs have been far more popular in recent decades but some are starting to go back to timber floors to reduce carbon impacts and to deal with sloping ground.
I was just about to post exactly this comment. I'm 76, have experience being a wheel chair user after an accident and see friends and neighbors grappling with being trapped in houses that are reached by a couple of steps. We solved my problem with a very long modular aluminum ramp, as appoach that was adopted by several of my neighbors. Perhaps instead of a lift consideration needs to be given to either including a ramp in the design or planning for one.
This is all great Lloyd and similar to my own thinking about having quite small stilts for new buildings to allow flooding to run underneath unimpeded. But my challenge is how to marry those stilts with wheelchair accessibility? A sloping site is handy for this but not always available. And the higher you go the longer the ramp would have to be to allow a reasonable slope. I don't have the solution but it's a clear trade-off we need to wrestle with.
Good idea! If you did it so the counterweight could be easily adjusted to the occupant it could be raised/lowered with a handcrank too as the weight differential would be so small. And designed to be fitted with an electric motor where that is a must have. Plus a small battery back up so in the event of fire/power disruption it still works.
I came here to make the same comment. The final tipping point for our build to go on a slab rather than piles was the wheelchair gradient ramp ending up wrapping around fully two sides of the building. And it would have triggered the need for railings/balustrades at the front of the house. Relying on power in a rural area to get someone safely in and out of the building would make me nervous. I don't want to defend the concrete slab and steel that our modestly sized house sits on but there are multiple problems to solve.
You know more about such things than me & things like snowdrifts, raccoons, & wind uplift can be mitigated, & I do echo the accessibility issues raised. I just wonder what this really achieves, one needs a foundation, & the relatively cheep cost of the additional living space a basement provides may offset the benefits of building poll barns on stilts. Reminds me of when I started out in Alberta in the 1980's and a solution to the then cost of new home construction was pressure treated wooden basements. IDK how well these things aged, but the widespread Southern Alberta floods of 2013 destroyed quite a few of these homes. As one who only uses AC for one bedroom, & given the early hot & humid weather in Southern Ontario this year, I really appreciate my cool finished basement. That, and you can't fall off the ground!
My house is on post and pier foundation, and I find the floor very cold in the winter (even with insulation) and two to three feet off the ground makes a good home for all kind of varments. Then there is the wasted heating and cooling from the ducts, which while insulated is still open to the winds which siphon the energy from the ducts and makes them less efficient.
I don't know about regular foundations, but, I imagine they may have the same problem I have in my home, but without all the leaks (and yes, I have siding around the foundation, and plastic on the ground, and though they help, they are no real solution).
So, I imagine that elevated homes may be a thing, but if it were me, I would still have walls on the outside, and use that space as either a basement, a screened in patio, or even a garage. The walls will help prevent critters (including yellow jackets) from entering the living space, the cold north winds from siphoning the energy, and easy access to whatever needs to be taken care of beneath the floor.
Houses on stilts sound like a great idea but I wonder how I’d manage without my cool basement which allows me to live without AC, and expand my square footage without expanding the land my house takes up.
Also struck by the opinion that single family homes should not be built when you are writing from your “cabin”, which word suggests not just single family but a second home. Perhaps I have jumped to conclusions there.
you are correct about the cabin it is not something I can justify now but I bought it half a life ago and have avoided a lot of air conditioning by being here...
I love this vision, Lloyd. Also makes me wonder if anyone has estimated how many Radon driven cancers have been a function of home basements. Writing this after moving two years ago to a 1970s log cabin in Maine with a finished basement for which we added a radon ventilation system.
All the houses you show are single detached country dwellings. In our NZ suburbs we typically have 7m height limits and recession planes to deal with. Slab on grade allows 2 story and gable roof. Urban situations are different.
The idea of stone pillars or screwpiles sounds attractive – but how does a designer cope with strong winds or hurricanes lifting buildings not on the ground? How does a designer cope with needing to get to stable ground below frost-line, which may be 2.0m / >5 ft in the north? How does a designer protect pipes and wires in such conditions? Just asking ... I'm a geographer and community planner, not a building designer. Gravel pads are used extensively in the north, to protect heat from buildings melting permafrost.
In 2005, there was a massive flood on the east coast of Guyana. I'm truly grateful that our old family home was built high above ground... we're below sea level...we would've been flooded out. We were safe and dry "upstairs".
I'm curious to see how houses built on posts would fare in hurricane territory though.
We call them posts in Guyana. When the land floods, houses on posts aren't affect. Also, being below sea level, at least some breeze can enter the home.
I've seen houses on posts in one town in Australia...a town prone to flooding.
Yes indeed let the critters move on through. My crawl space is a nest for all sorts of beasts if they are not heavily discouraged. I've always loved the look of stilts and perhaps It was the lurking dread of my future of crawlspace yoga plumbing, duct work and electrical work.
“There are so many good reasons for houses to be built on stilts:”
My favorite thing is in floor heating. With timer assist, nothing like putting your feet on warm floor when you like 54-60° F in you’re living space ….
The constituents of industrial hemp and the biological mechanisms of the endless fungi kingdom could literally safe complex lifeforms on this planet. If we love them the opportunity to do so…http://justbiofiber.ca/
Passive, situationally smart, mostly labor capital investments on our existing structural architecture is pathetic. Thank you so much for doing it right!!!
I would have to contend, tidal power, the only thing close in the underutilized known technology category.
Again, words cannot express how much I appreciate you. Sincerely
Lots of good reasons for timber floors, as you’ve set out Lloyd. In NZ and Aus it is a standard way of construction to have a suspended timber floor on timber (or concrete or steel) piles. It works well for earthquakes and it’s easy enough to design for high wind uplift. Concrete slabs have been far more popular in recent decades but some are starting to go back to timber floors to reduce carbon impacts and to deal with sloping ground.
I was just about to post exactly this comment. I'm 76, have experience being a wheel chair user after an accident and see friends and neighbors grappling with being trapped in houses that are reached by a couple of steps. We solved my problem with a very long modular aluminum ramp, as appoach that was adopted by several of my neighbors. Perhaps instead of a lift consideration needs to be given to either including a ramp in the design or planning for one.
This is all great Lloyd and similar to my own thinking about having quite small stilts for new buildings to allow flooding to run underneath unimpeded. But my challenge is how to marry those stilts with wheelchair accessibility? A sloping site is handy for this but not always available. And the higher you go the longer the ramp would have to be to allow a reasonable slope. I don't have the solution but it's a clear trade-off we need to wrestle with.
I was thinking the same thing. What the world needs is a cheap prefab standardized lift.
Good idea! If you did it so the counterweight could be easily adjusted to the occupant it could be raised/lowered with a handcrank too as the weight differential would be so small. And designed to be fitted with an electric motor where that is a must have. Plus a small battery back up so in the event of fire/power disruption it still works.
I came here to make the same comment. The final tipping point for our build to go on a slab rather than piles was the wheelchair gradient ramp ending up wrapping around fully two sides of the building. And it would have triggered the need for railings/balustrades at the front of the house. Relying on power in a rural area to get someone safely in and out of the building would make me nervous. I don't want to defend the concrete slab and steel that our modestly sized house sits on but there are multiple problems to solve.
You know more about such things than me & things like snowdrifts, raccoons, & wind uplift can be mitigated, & I do echo the accessibility issues raised. I just wonder what this really achieves, one needs a foundation, & the relatively cheep cost of the additional living space a basement provides may offset the benefits of building poll barns on stilts. Reminds me of when I started out in Alberta in the 1980's and a solution to the then cost of new home construction was pressure treated wooden basements. IDK how well these things aged, but the widespread Southern Alberta floods of 2013 destroyed quite a few of these homes. As one who only uses AC for one bedroom, & given the early hot & humid weather in Southern Ontario this year, I really appreciate my cool finished basement. That, and you can't fall off the ground!
My house is on post and pier foundation, and I find the floor very cold in the winter (even with insulation) and two to three feet off the ground makes a good home for all kind of varments. Then there is the wasted heating and cooling from the ducts, which while insulated is still open to the winds which siphon the energy from the ducts and makes them less efficient.
I don't know about regular foundations, but, I imagine they may have the same problem I have in my home, but without all the leaks (and yes, I have siding around the foundation, and plastic on the ground, and though they help, they are no real solution).
So, I imagine that elevated homes may be a thing, but if it were me, I would still have walls on the outside, and use that space as either a basement, a screened in patio, or even a garage. The walls will help prevent critters (including yellow jackets) from entering the living space, the cold north winds from siphoning the energy, and easy access to whatever needs to be taken care of beneath the floor.
Houses on stilts sound like a great idea but I wonder how I’d manage without my cool basement which allows me to live without AC, and expand my square footage without expanding the land my house takes up.
Also struck by the opinion that single family homes should not be built when you are writing from your “cabin”, which word suggests not just single family but a second home. Perhaps I have jumped to conclusions there.
you are correct about the cabin it is not something I can justify now but I bought it half a life ago and have avoided a lot of air conditioning by being here...
I love this vision, Lloyd. Also makes me wonder if anyone has estimated how many Radon driven cancers have been a function of home basements. Writing this after moving two years ago to a 1970s log cabin in Maine with a finished basement for which we added a radon ventilation system.
This might make sense for Canadian cold climates but the thermal mass and constant cool ground temperature work better for hot dry climates.
All the houses you show are single detached country dwellings. In our NZ suburbs we typically have 7m height limits and recession planes to deal with. Slab on grade allows 2 story and gable roof. Urban situations are different.
The idea of stone pillars or screwpiles sounds attractive – but how does a designer cope with strong winds or hurricanes lifting buildings not on the ground? How does a designer cope with needing to get to stable ground below frost-line, which may be 2.0m / >5 ft in the north? How does a designer protect pipes and wires in such conditions? Just asking ... I'm a geographer and community planner, not a building designer. Gravel pads are used extensively in the north, to protect heat from buildings melting permafrost.
In 2005, there was a massive flood on the east coast of Guyana. I'm truly grateful that our old family home was built high above ground... we're below sea level...we would've been flooded out. We were safe and dry "upstairs".
I'm curious to see how houses built on posts would fare in hurricane territory though.
We call them posts in Guyana. When the land floods, houses on posts aren't affect. Also, being below sea level, at least some breeze can enter the home.
I've seen houses on posts in one town in Australia...a town prone to flooding.
Yes indeed let the critters move on through. My crawl space is a nest for all sorts of beasts if they are not heavily discouraged. I've always loved the look of stilts and perhaps It was the lurking dread of my future of crawlspace yoga plumbing, duct work and electrical work.
“There are so many good reasons for houses to be built on stilts:”
My favorite thing is in floor heating. With timer assist, nothing like putting your feet on warm floor when you like 54-60° F in you’re living space ….
The constituents of industrial hemp and the biological mechanisms of the endless fungi kingdom could literally safe complex lifeforms on this planet. If we love them the opportunity to do so…http://justbiofiber.ca/
Passive, situationally smart, mostly labor capital investments on our existing structural architecture is pathetic. Thank you so much for doing it right!!!
I would have to contend, tidal power, the only thing close in the underutilized known technology category.
Again, words cannot express how much I appreciate you. Sincerely