Ordinary Homes of the United States

Time period: 2010s Location: Denver, especially the neighborhood east of Sloan Lake. Cleveland and other cities with Form Based zoning also have them. Also known as: Sideways-facing town homes or fraux homes (combining the words faux and rowhome) Since the 1990s, Denver has been one of the fastest growing cities in the United States, going from a population of 467,000 to 715,000 over the last 30 years. Many Californians (and others) were attracted by Colorado's lower housing costs, clean air, and access to hiking and other outdoors activities. The tech industry also expanded, bringing lots of high paying jobs. With that came a demand for housing, especially large homes desired by the upper middle class. In 2010, Denver updated its zoning code to a Form Based Code (FBC) to encourage more "missing middle" housing - a range of density between detached houses and large apartment buildings. They were the one of the big cities in the US to use an FBC. The intent was to get rowh...

Location: Philadelphia, Seattle Time period: 1600s-1800s and 21st century   While the 5-story version is new, tower houses are one of the oldest types of homes in the United States.  The early version of it exists in Philadelphia, where they are known as trinities, so named because there are three floors, each with one room. The first floor would be the living room and kitchen, and the upper floors would be bedrooms.  Trinities are also known as "Father, Son & Holy Ghost houses".  When the US declared independence, Philadelphia was the largest city, and its metropolitan area population remained similar in size to New York until NYC overtook it following the completion of the Erie Canal in 1821. Tiny houses went hand in hand with tiny streets. Among the most famous example is Elfreth's Alley in Philadelphia, the oldest continuously inhabited residential street in the USA.When William Penn founded the city of Philadelphia in 1682, he laid out the street grid wit...

  Time period:2000s to 2015, limited height afterwards Location: Washington DC Adding floors (and homes) on top of a rowhouse  Key features - Narrow lot - Reuses lower floors of an existing rowhouse The rowhouse, a multistory house on its own lot but sharing a wall with its neighbors, is a common type of home in the Mid-Atlantic region. In Philadelphia and Baltimore, rowhouses make up half of all homes. In Washington DC, 1 in 4 homes is a rowhouse.  Elsewhere in the United States, rowhouses make up less than 10%. The classic rowhouse is only one room wide, and has the living room and kitchen on the 1st floor, and two bedrooms on the 2nd floor. Like other US cities, DC started getting tall buildings in the late 1800s. However, unlike other cities, the US Congress has the power to pass local laws in DC, and in 1899 Congress passed a citywide height limit that banned skyscrapers. In the mid and late 20th century, as number of government workers increased, this height limit ...