Co-Creating the Future-Decker

Over 100 years ago, a new housing typology emerged in Boston during a time of great change and population growth spurred by Boston’s second wave of immigration. Between 1880 and 1920, Boston’s population more than doubled, and immigrants made up nearly 40 percent of the population in 1910 (Boston College Department of History). Triple-deckers emerged from the 1880's through the 1930's throughout Boston. The triple-decker’s  efficient construction and design leant itself to rapid reproduction, comfortably housing and providing wealth-building opportunities to the masses.

Fast forward to 2023. Population projections from the Planning Department’s demographics team tell us that the city’s population is expected to exceed 740,000 people by 2030, and Boston is going to need to build more housing to accommodate this growth. Recognizing the potential for development on land owned by the City, in 2022 Mayor Michelle Wu completed a City-wide land audit. The land audit identified over 1,000 parcels owned by the Mayor’s Office of Housing and the Planning Department. The majority of these vacant or underutilized parcels are an appropriate size for small infill housing developments, but are too small for large multifamily or mixed use development (75% of vacant or underutilized parcels are 5,000 square feet or less.) Despite the availability of these sites, and the demand for smaller-scale, low-rise housing affordable to middle-income housing for those who don’t qualify for subsidized housing but are unable to afford market-rate prices (referred to as the “missing middle”), high construction and land costs challenge the financial feasibility of this scale of development.

This reality fueled our exploration of the following question:

What’s Boston’s next iteration of the triple-decker, an affordable, replicable, and adaptable housing typology that fits contextually with a range of site, zoning, and neighborhood conditions?

Phase 1: Request for Ideas

In May of 2021, the BSA and Housing iLab released a Request for Ideas (RFI), inviting residents, advocates, designers, and all who are interested to share ideas for multifamily housing in Boston’s neighborhoods. The RFI included 13 small sites across four different neighborhoods (Roxbury, Dorchester, Mattapan, Hyde Park). Read the responses.

Phase 2: Design Competition

Equipped with the insights provided in the RFI, we identified two city-owned, infill sites (379 Geneva Avenue in Dorchester and 569 River Street in Mattapan) and asked development teams to submit proposals that experimented with advanced design and construction methods to create ownership housing models that could be constructed efficiently and reflect the benefits of Boston’s beloved triple-decker. This design competition was advertised in the form of a Request for Proposals (RFP). Read about the submissions.

The six proposals received in response to the RFP illustrate the range of possibilities for infill site development across the city of Boston. Innovations such as the use of prefabricated panels, modular construction, and the holistic consideration of sustainable methods of building, highlighted a shared commitment to addressing the city’s housing needs in creative ways. Still, a number of challenges arose as part of this process, particularly in regards to one of the key goals of the RFP: financial feasibility for housing affordable to middle-income residents. All RFP proposals necessitated significant additional public funding to close the gap between the cost of development and an affordable price point for a middle-income household in Boston. 

The results of this competition demonstrate the challenges of achieving a price point affordable to middle income households at this scale of development, even with the use of advanced construction methods, given current financial conditions. No subsidy (beyond land) was included as part of the Future-Decker RFP, and this subsidy proved to be insufficient to achieve financial feasibility. As such, the city made the difficult decision to reject all proposals. Recognizing an interest from teams to learn about each other’s proposals, the Housing Innovation Lab, and Boston Society for Architecture hosted a fruitful conversation with the teams where respondents could share and speak openly about their proposals and the challenges of developing missing middle housing.

1. Scale Matters. A number of teams expressed that a scattered site approach, where more sites could be included in a single RFP, could lead to greater efficiency. However, challenges may arise given that components may have to change to suit individual sites and therefore pose a risk in the potential cost savings associated with standardization.
2. Replicability increases affordability. Teams also mentioned that the best way forward for Boston to address the missing middle, specifically with infill, is to embrace modular construction with a standardized design that is meant to be replicable but customizable.
3. Innovative financing is key. Affordability, as one of the key themes outlined in both the Future-Decker RFI and RFP, is a space where greater innovation is needed. Teams expressed interest in finding ways to secure funders with a revised approval earlier in the process to help mitigate potential risks later on.
4. Modular construction may be cost effective under certain conditions. Under the right circumstances, offsite construction has the potential to minimize the gap between what it costs to build and what a middle-income household can afford (but replicability and scale matter). While not all proposals considered the use of prefabricated or modular construction, those that did highlighted how quickly a project can be assembled in comparison to on-site construction. Additionally, the lack of local facilities affects the possibility of cost reduction in such projects.

While the Future-Decker initiative has concluded, the commitment to develop new cost-effective housing models carries on! The Future-Decker initiative provided us with fresh ideas on how to continue to improve housing opportunities for middle-income residents, as well as finding ways of introducing new approaches and methods to building housing in Boston. We are committed to continuing to build on the longstanding partnerships with residents, architects, and developers to achieve our common housing goals.  

Finally, we would like to thank our sponsors, The Boston Foundation and The Kuehn Charitable Foundation for their support.