Horizon NEB: Vertical Space for Housing & Green Space

Designing and physically demonstrating (TRL 6-8) at least one solution that puts the un-used or under-used vertical space above a building or street to work — a rooftop extension, a rooftop garden or urban farm, a multi-use structure spanning a street, or another approach the topic doesn’t fix in advance — to add new housing, new green space, or both to a neighbourhood, without using more land. The solution has to be built beautifully and sustainably, with circular-economy principles designed in, its full life-cycle environmental, social and economic impact assessed, its effect on land-use demand assessed, and the regulatory, technical and societal barriers to building it identified and addressed. The project also has to run a participatory, transdisciplinary process that puts the local community inside the co-creation of the solution, involve social sciences and humanities expertise as a real part of the team, and — where relevant — bring in cultural and creative industries.