Sustainable Self-reliant Complex--Make It Home Submission

I made this project for the Make It Home Contest. Even though I am 14 I still hope I will be able to compete because being younger does not mean being dumber. In this complex there is Solar panels, batteries to store power and even a gym unit that uses the power from people working out to create electricity. There is no definitive parking space because that costs lots of money. The complex is as green as possible to help encourage people around it to go green (put more trees and plants in). The houses are made from recycled plastic around the streets with steel beams in between the walls. This makes it as lightweight and recyclable as possible. People can bring in specific types of rubbish from the streets to earn money and food. This will benefit everyone by making the ecosystem healthier the people healthier and the buildings cheaper.

-3D designing platform

You want to find a place that has a lot of housing issues. Alexandria Township is in South Africa and is one of the oldest townships and most crowded places in South Africa. Rubbish and litter lies everywhere. This is why I chose this place. People are very poor here so they cannot afford normal housing. As you can see there is not a lot of grass or trees. My design were not blend in because it is not supposed to. It is supposed to get people thinking how much better their lives would be if they put in more trees and grass and used the rubbish to build new houses.

Because I built this design on Tinkercad, it was not the most detailed designing app but it still does the job. Here are the steps to begin designing your sustainable complex.

1. Build a beginning platform.

2. Build a parking space. Make sure you don't damage the environment.

3. Either build a platform over the parking or start building your first story houses near the parking.

4. Put a few more stories on top of the base.

5. Add elements that support nature and recyclability.

6. Add solar panels or other things environmental friendly ways of making electricity.

Everything on my design was put to scale, 1=1m. I also went and checked the minimum living space for five people in South Africa and made it a few meters over that. I put quite a lot of solar panels on the roofs of the top houses so that I can know the electricity the units were using were sustainable and emissions-free. This is the link to my design: https://www.tinkercad.com/things/3LJl9V7NJe1-copy-of-make-it-home-starter-model

Always remember that if your places are in a different hemisphere from yours, you must always remember that solar panels must face where the sun is and make houses that are suitable for the conditions in that certain place. The unfortunate thing is that there is so much efforts put into places that already have a much better environment and housing then compared to other countries. Here is the difference between South Africa and America:

Average Yearly Income per Person (including unemployed, kids, elderly):

South Africa: R100,000 (~$5,300)

United States: R960,000 (~$51,000)

Average Monthly Income per Person:

South Africa: R8,300 (~$440)

United States: R80,000 (~$4,250)

Average Living Space per Person (including homeless as 0 m²):

South Africa: 25 m² (~270 ft²)

United States: 67 m² (~720 ft²)

As this shows there is a lot of work to be done on places like South Africa, which is one of the richest places in Africa!