Peterborough
Housing Cooperative
Situated in
inner-city Ōtautahi
(Christchurch), Peterborough Co-op is six households in a row with
joined-up back yards. The houses are standard 1930's bungalows. Three
households are family homes, and three are flats, giving ten adults and
seven children.
Peterborough Co-op is a project
of the Ōtākaro Land Trust.
Making a Co-operative
The
first act in making Peterborough Co-op was ripping down all the fences
in-between the
houses. The
houses were renovated so their entrance, living room and kitchens open
onto their backyard. Each backyard is a semi-private space, generally
separated from their neighbours by shrubbery. The backyards butt onto a
large common back yard and common sheds.
The design allows each
household's
privacy while encouraging a sense of community. Neighbours are not
allowed to walk through their neighbours yards, but the kids can,
although parents chasing their young kids are also Ok (obviously a
consensus decision).
Common Facilities 
The co-operative
has a common lounge, bike shed, ping-pong room, laundry, tool shed,
vaccuum cleaner, give-away collection, garages, picnic tables, bee
hives,
basketball hoop, compost bins, trailer, lawn-mower and tree-hut.
Residents can
share other resident's trampoline and kayaks.
None of the houses have their
own laundry, and residents use the co-ops three washers. They may also
use the co-op dryer but have to pay for that (to discourage naughty
power wasters). The laundry, clotheslines and garages
are great
informal meeting places.
Whanaungatanga
The
co-operative gives a sense of extended family-like ties. Each household
is in charge of itself, but is also part of something bigger. Formally
this consists of a weekly pot-luck dinner
in the common lounge or outside in summer. Residents also have a
monthly working-bee
for house and yard upkeep.
Informal chats are probably more
significant (especially being able to borrow a cup of sugar). Someone
is usually around if you want a chat.
The
children play together, and are much like cousins. Having many adults
around means its easy
to arrange child-minding. Several times, parents have gone
away for the
weekend together, while the rest of the residents rostered themselves
to look after the kids who remained at home.
It's much like how
neighbourhood's
used to be.
Resident
Management & Participatory Process
The
residents run the co-op themselves, and attend a monthly
meetings where decisions are made by consensus. They manage the
everyday operation, such as deciding on new
residents and making maintenance or improvement recommendations.
Ōtākaro
Land Trust owns the properties, and has open membership so that
everyone at Peterborough Co-op can be a member of the trust, and
participate in trust meetings, if they want.
Residents rent
the houses from the trust. Rent was initially set by an independent
land agent valuing the properties. Then $15 per bedroom was taken off
the rent in approximate exchange for the residents monthly maintenance
working bee. Now rent rises each year in accordance the CPI (rate of
inflation).
How
Established 
Peterborough Housing
Co-operative started in 1981. Ōtākaro
Land Trust had set up Piko
Wholefoods
Co-operative two years before. The trust also ran inner-city
neighbourhood dinners, organic garden and a recycling scheme.
The aim
was for a local self-sufficient economy. Most of the initial residents
either worked in the Piko, or were self employed using the
housing co-ops garages as workshops.
Rod Donald bought the four
houses at an auction with no money, and spent the weekend getting
people to take out small debenture loans to raise enough funds. The
co-operative then sought a bank mortgage and repaid the debentures.
Waiting
List
People
wishing to live at Peterborough Street are welcome to leave their name
and contact details with us. We will get in touch when a house becomes
available. Be warned that it may be some time, as we have a very low
turnover.
Email: Sam at peterboroughstreetcoop@gmail.com (put 'House' in subject line)
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