OSU COMMUNITY RECONSIDERED
SOCIAL A hub of social and cultural condensers to spur community cohesion .
EDUCATION An exchange of information and knowledge necessary to support local and regional economic and cultural production.
HOUSING The essential anchor, providing community, security ,health and well being and cultural cohesion.
ECOLOGY A ecological balance struck between living, cultural and economic production, and their supportive infrastructure - energy, water, waste and natural resources.
ECONOMY A hub of economic activity and Innovation fueled by proximities to talent, creativity, technology and financial resources.
HEALTH A communal platform aimed at supporting and improving the broad range of social and spatial determinants of health and their related outcomes.
Community is often created by shared values. However, for those values to take root and grow, a basic infrastructure must exist. We contend that basic infrastructure is housing. Ghanaian history and progress exhibit a cultural and social cohesion that overcomes many of the social, economic and infrastructural urban challenges facing Accra. Supply and access to reconsidered and repurposed resources is what will advance new models of development. Thinking holistically and toward community driven circular economies, new and existing Accra communities using community reconsidered principles can foster local hubs of renewed activity and economic and cultural production.
The spatial organization of these new communities borrows heavily from locally derived Compound House. The compound house’s informal court or compound organization, loosely organized by independent and connected structures, contributes greatly to the function of the communities within. This concept is grounded in an understanding of close interpersonal and intergenerational relations that extends this history and the working knowledge of shared purpose and space. The organizational models of the new scalable communal hubs offer a similar and yet tangible approach to shared multi use space. It does so by allowing locally conceived groups of programs to complement the living aspects of the hub ensuring defined community needs have priority placement within the development.
Local infrastructure and ecologies, such as water, power, environment and waste management are introduced on site to advance concepts of community led circular economies, self-determination and management. The concept extends Impact Hub Accra’s and other entrepreneurial and innovation sectors abilities to provide intermediary services to the hubs while generating new markets of economic opportunity. The newly generated economic activity would provide tax revenue to enhance further infrastructure and environmental improvements already underway.
