Nonconforming Housing: Housing the Working Class

As cities struggle to provide enough adequate housing for their residents, there is a need to develop new ideas and typologies that address the housing crisis directly. Growth in the Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex [1] continues to provide challenges in addressing housing shortages [2], particularly for cost-burdened communities and those in danger of gentrification, displacement, or chronic homelessness [3]. This project focused on developing contextual infill housing typologies by analyzing the housing stock and context of a neighborhood in Fort Worth, TX. The central question driving the project was: How to design infill housing to increase density in existing single-family urban areas with an aging housing stock, a history of community marginalization, and inadequate zoning that deems many properties as nonconforming or unbuildable?