As we look back on 2019 and look forward to 2020, it’s good to remind ourselves of what MUCH have achieved in the last 12 months.

We signed a partnership agreement with Great Places, our Housing Association development partners.

Paddock Johnson Partnership have been selected as our architects and we had an initial design workshop with them to explore and expand on our Design Criteria.

Florence Collier of humblebee.eco came to talk to us about building to the Passivhaus standard.

We’re updating our Mem&Arts, now with help from solicitors who specialise in community led housing.

A Consensus Decision Making workshop provided a refresher and spurred us on to work harder on making our decision making processes both more effective and more efficient.

We’ve met with councillors, and council officers, attended GMCA Co-operative and Community Controlled Housing Project meetings and GM Housing Futures events.

Several prospective members have met with us for coffee, some have joined us for a shared meal and some have attended one or more MUCH monthly meetings.

We’ve visited OWCH in London, the first CoHousing scheme for the over 50s completed in the UK. We’ve visited other CoHousing schemes both home and abroad. We’re talking to another South Manchester CoHousing group.

And we’ve looked at more sites. Some are too small or too big. Some are too expensive. Some turned out not to be available for development. Finding the owner is sometimes difficult.  Some are unsuitable for development for other reasons.

So although we still don’t have a site, we have been busy talking to lots of people, and learning, and continuing to lay down the virtual foundations of our CoHousing!

Wishing all our readers a Happy New Year,

Sian (member of MUCH)