NEOBIOME

OT_144: Earthsong Eco-Neighbourhood — Dwelling Floor Plans (four-plex, southern-block & terrace unit types, 10.8.00)

Properties4
typesource
source_typeother
year2000
topicsbuilding_habitat, cohousing_intentional_community, case_study, nz_specific

10 min read

OT_144: Earthsong Eco-Neighbourhood — Dwelling Floor Plans (four-plex, southern-block & terrace unit types, 10.8.00)

Source

https://www.earthsong.org.nz/resources/documents — original source (opens in a new tab; the file is not redistributed)

Earthsong Eco-Neighbourhood — Dwelling Floor Plans (four-plex, southern-block & terrace unit types)

The as-designed dwelling-type mix of a NZ cohousing community — the residential counterpart to the common-house plan, grounding the earthsong_ranui case

A three-PDF set of as-designed 1:100 floor plans (all dated 10.8.00) for the dwellings of Earthsong Eco-Neighbourhood, Ranui, West Auckland: (1) ground-level four-plex + southern-block single/2-br units, (2) upper-level four-plex + southern-block units, (3) terrace houses. Together they enumerate and lay out all 32 units (1–32) across four dwelling types — a real NZ cohousing dwelling-type mix (studio → 4-bedroom), including single-storey wheelchair-accessible ground units stacked with two-storey loft units in the four-plex form, and A/B/C/D-composed terrace rows. All three are IMAGE-ONLY PDFs (pdftotext yields nothing; read here visually). ⚠ The plans are drawn to scale 1:100 but carry NO printed dimensions, room areas, or total floor areas — they establish the dwelling-type mix and room programs, not per-dwelling m². context: both (D04 dwelling typology / thesis cohousing housing form) → full ingest with key_claims, feeding the earthsong_ranui case.

Summary

This source is the set of as-designed dwelling floor plans for Earthsong Eco-Neighbourhood — three drawings (ground-level unit plans, upper-level unit plans, terrace house plan), each titled “Earthsong Eco-Neighbourhood” and dated 10.8.00 (10 August 2000, at the start of the community’s build). The drawings document the four dwelling types that make up the 32-dwelling community: (a) a standard four-plex building of two single-storey ground-level two-bedroom units (units 1, 4, 21, 24), explicitly “ground floor only and wheelchair accessible”, stacked with two upper-level two-bedroom-plus-loft units (units 2, 3, 22, 23); (b) a southern block of smaller units — one-bedroom/studio (units 27, 30, with an optional extra bedroom) and two-bedroom four-plex variants — at ground (units 27, 30, 31) and upper level (studios 28, 29 and two-bedroom unit 32); and (c) terrace houses (units 5–20, 25–26) whose A/B/C/D room-part system yields two-, three- or four-bedroom homes with optional second WC, optional pergola, and gable-or-flat dormer variants. The elevations label the four-plex common side as south and private side as north; terrace-unit orientation is mixed per the notes. Read visually (image-only PDFs); every label and note traces to the raw → data_quality: high (authoritative primary drawing, but a scanned raster read visually, with no numeric floor areas to corroborate). context: both — it feeds the earthsong_ranui case’s dwelling record and supports the thesis account of cohousing housing form.

Key claims

- claim: "Standard four-plex — ground-level units (units 1, 4, 21, 24): a single-storey two-bedroom unit with Living, Dining, Kitchen, two bedrooms, a Bathroom/WC, a Verandah and an Entrance porch. Note (verbatim): 'This unit is groundfloor only and is wheelchair accessible including bathrooms.' A second note: 'Furniture / fridges shown indicate position only.' Elevations are labelled 'Common side (south)' and 'Private side (north)'. Drawn to scale 1:100; no dimensions or floor area are printed."
  source_location: "Ground floor unit plans, p.1 ('Four-plex — ground level units')"
- claim: "Standard four-plex — upper-level units (units 2, 3, 22, 23): a two-storey unit entered 'via stair', with a main level of Living, Dining, Kitchen, two bedrooms (Bedroom 1, Bedroom 2), a Bathroom/WC and a 'Deck with pergola', plus a 'Loft over' the main level shown as a separate drawing. Elevations labelled 'Private side (north)' and 'Common side (south)'. Scale 1:100; no dimensions/areas printed."
  source_location: "Upper level unit plans, p.1 ('Four-plex — upper level unit')"
- claim: "Southern block, ground level — smaller/variant units: a 'TWO BEDROOM FOUR-PLEX VARIANT (unit 31)' (Bedroom 1, Bedroom 2, Living, Dining, Kitchen, Bathrm/WC, Veranda, private yard) and 'ONE BEDROOM / STUDIO (units 27 & 30)' (Living, Dining, Kitchen, a Bedroom, Bathrm/WC, veranda entrance, private yard). Notes (verbatim): 'The two bedroom unit has a different stair arrangement and kitchen from the other four-plex units. Entrance is from the north.'; 'Bedroom A in the one bedroom / studio units is optional'; 'These units are wheelchair accessible.'"
  source_location: "Ground floor unit plans, p.2 ('Southern block: single and 2 br units — ground level units'; 'This plan: units 27; 30-31')"
- claim: "Southern block, upper level — variant units: a 'TWO BEDROOM FOUR-PLEX VARIANT (unit 32)' (Bedroom 1, Bedroom 2, Living, Dining, Kitchen, Bathrm/WC, deck/pergola over) and 'STUDIOS (units 28, 29)' (Living, Dining, Kitchen, Bathrm/WC, deck/pergola over, 'loft over'). Notes (verbatim): 'Entrance to studio units is by shared stair and landing at B'; 'Entrance to the 2 br unit is by its own stair to landing at C'; 'Unit 32 has the same loft as the four plex units'; 'Access to lofts is via steep stair / ladder.'"
  source_location: "Upper level unit plans, p.2 ('Southern block: single and 2 br units — upper level units'; 'This plan: units 28-29; 32')"
- claim: "Terrace houses (units 5–20, 25–26): a two-storey unit (Ground level + Upper level) built from room-parts A, B, C and D. Notes (verbatim): '2 bedroom terrace units comprise either main part A or C'; '3 bedroom units comprise either main part A plus additional room B, or main part C plus additional room D'; '4 bedroom units comprise main part C plus additional rooms B & D'. Options shown: 'Optional 2nd WC', 'Optional pergola', 'Optional loft over stair', with 'Common side, gable dormer version' and 'Private side, flat dormer version' elevations."
  source_location: "Terrace house plan, p.1 ('Terrace House Plans'; 'This plan: units 5-20; 25-26')"
- claim: "Orientation and passive-design notes (terrace plan, verbatim): 'Some units have their private yards to the north, and others have entries and common sides to the north. Some units have gable dormers and others flat dormers (see unit schedule).'; 'All kitchens face the common side.'; 'Any pergolas (where opted) face north.' (For the four-plex units the elevations are labelled common side = south, private side = north.)"
  source_location: "Terrace house plan, p.1 (Notes); Ground/Upper four-plex elevation labels"
- claim: "Scope and enumeration: the three drawings collectively enumerate all 32 dwellings — units 1; 4; 21; 24 (four-plex ground) + 2; 3; 22; 23 (four-plex upper) + 27; 30 (1-br/studio) + 31 (2-br) + 28; 29 (studio upper) + 32 (2-br upper) + 5-20 and 25-26 (terrace) = 32 units — matching the 32-dwelling count recorded for the community. Every drawing is dated 10.8.00 and drawn to scale 1:100; NONE of the three carries printed room dimensions, room areas or a total floor area."
  source_location: "Ground floor unit plans p.1–2; Upper level unit plans p.1–2; Terrace house plan p.1 ('This plan: units …' captions, title blocks, scale notes)"

Relevance

context: both — this source contributes to the Neobiome Intelligence D04 dwelling/habitat picture (via the earthsong_ranui case, its only feeds: target) and to the thesis account of cohousing housing form.

Neobiome Intelligence — the Earthsong dwelling-type mix (D04, via the case)

  • A real NZ cohousing dwelling-type mix. The plans resolve the community’s 32 homes into four types — a two-storey four-plex (single-storey accessible ground units + upper units with lofts), a southern block of studio/one-bedroom/two-bedroom units, and terrace rows (2–4 bedrooms via A/B/C/D parts). This is a documented worked example of how a ~32-household cohousing scheme distributes dwelling sizes and forms — the residential counterpart to the common-house program held in the sibling common-house-plans source. It grounds the earthsong_ranui case’s “Design features” record (previously carrying materials but not the unit-type breakdown, OT_093).
  • Accessibility and compact attached forms. The ground-level four-plex and southern-block units are explicitly “wheelchair accessible including bathrooms”, and the whole scheme is attached/stacked (four-plexes) or party-walled (terraces) — consistent with the community’s ~11 dwellings/ha density (LIT_018) and the compact-roof-catchment reading noted for Earthsong forms elsewhere in the model.
  • What it does NOT quantify (the honest limit). The drawings are scale 1:100 but carry no printed dimensions or floor areas, so they establish the type mix and room programs, not per-dwelling m². They do not feed any specific engine input on their own strength, and they do not touch RT_327 (community-building footprints — that is the common house, handled by the sibling common-house-plans draft, not these dwelling plans). Cross-references only: the national dwelling floor-area basis stays with BRANZ SR501 (OT_123 / RT_206) — these plans qualify Earthsong’s forms, they do not re-baseline the model.

Thesis — cohousing housing form

  • Diversity of dwelling sizes within one community. Studio through four-bedroom homes in one 32-household scheme is the physical expression of the mixed-household cohousing model (singles, couples, families) that the case’s governance and social-cohesion material describes (Interview V [INT_005] / Interview VI [INT_006]). The recurring common-side / private-side distinction (kitchens facing the shared “common” side, private yards and pergolas to the other) is the built grammar of the pedestrian-priority, common-house-centred layout the thesis discusses.

Research targets

Documents to retrieve

  • Candidate, not raised as a formal target (low priority): the Earthsong “unit schedule” referenced on the terrace plan (“see unit schedule”), and/or the architect’s dimensioned dwelling floor-area schedule, which would state per-dwelling gross floor areas (and the dormer / orientation assignments) that this 1:100 image set omits. A case-validation datapoint for the dwelling model; likely held by the project architect (cf. Interview VI [INT_006]) or in the WCC building-consent record. → D04

Research gaps

  • These plans introduce no new quantitative gap (they carry no numbers) and resolve none. The per-dwelling floor-area question remains open (covered nationally by RT_206/RT_304, not by this case source), and RT_327 (community-building footprints) is unaffected — it is advanced by the sibling common-house-plans source, not by these dwelling plans.

Notes

Authoritative primary architectural drawings for Earthsong Eco-Neighbourhood (three sheets, all dated 10.8.00), a multi-file GROUP source stored in the subfolder source-files/07_other/ot_144_earthsong-dwelling-plans/. All three PDFs are image-only (pdftotext returns nothing) and were read visually — the title blocks, room labels, unit-number captions and notes transcribed here all trace to the raw drawings. Not AI-prepared, so no retrieval-provenance block is required. data_quality: high (not verified): the drawings are a scanned raster read visually rather than machine-extractable text, and they contain no numeric figures (no dimensions/areas) to independently corroborate — so high matches the sibling Earthsong primaries (OT_093, OT_098) and the sibling common-house plans, rather than the verbatim-figure verified tier.

⚠ The load-bearing limit: these are 1:100 drawings with no printed dimensions or floor areas. They establish the dwelling-type mix and room programs, not m². Do not derive any floor-area number from them.

⚠ Scope coordination with the sibling common-house plans: that source is the community building (common house → D04 *_m2_per_hh, RT_327); this source is the dwellings, and these dwelling plans neither resolve nor advance RT_327. Kept scoped to the earthsong_ranui case; D04 is referenced inline (above) but not fed, because the plans do not ground a specific D04 engine lever the way the common-house plan grounds the community-buildings sizing default.

Cross-references: the earthsong_ranui case (this source’s feeds: target; dwelling-typology paragraph appended there); the sibling common-house-plans source (the community-building counterpart); OT_093 (the build’s materials spec for these same dwellings); OT_098 and LIT_018 (the 32-dwelling count these plans enumerate).

Connections

Links to

Sources (4): LIT_018 · OT_093 · OT_098 · OT_123

Cases (1): Earthsong Eco-Neighbourhood

Referenced by

Cases (1): Earthsong Eco-Neighbourhood

Graph View

Backlinks