text:
Public housing

Public housing is a form of housing tenure in which the property is usually owned by a government authority, either central or local. Although the common goal of public housing is to provide affordable housing, the details, terminology, definitions of poverty, and other criteria for allocation vary within different contexts. Within the OECD, social housing represents an average of 7% of national housing stock (2020), ranging from ~34% in the Netherlands to less than 1% in Colombia.

In the United States, public housing developments are classified either as housing projects that are owned by a city's housing authority or federally subsidized public housing operated through HUD.

Social housing is any rental housing that may be owned and managed by the state, by non-profit organizations, or by a combination of the two, usually with the aim of providing affordable housing. Social housing is generally rationed by a government through some form of means-testing or through administrative measures of housing needs. One can regard social housing as a potential remedy for housing inequality.

Affordable housing goals can also be achieved through subsidies. Subsidized housing is owned and operated by private owners who receive subsidies in exchange for providing affordable housing. Owners may be individual landlords or for-profit or nonprofit corporations.

History

Social housing had existed sporadically prior to modern developments. The oldest still in use is the 16th-century Fuggerei in Augsburg, Bavaria.

The origins of modern municipal housing lie in the dramatic urban population increase caused by the Industrial Revolution of the 19th century. In the large cities of the period, many social commentators, such as Octavia Hill and Charles Booth reported on the squalor, sickness and immorality that arose. Henry Mayhew, visiting Bethnal Green, wrote in The Morning Chronicle: "... roads were unmade, often mere alleys, houses small and without foundations, subdivided and often around unpaved courts. An almost total lack of drainage and sewerage was made worse by the ponds formed by the excavation of brickearth. Pigs and cows in back yards, noxious trades like boiling tripe, melting tallow, or preparing cat's meat, and slaughter houses, dustheaps, and 'lakes of putrefying night soil' added to the filth."

Some philanthropists began to provide housing in tenement blocks, and some factory owners built entire villages for their workers, such as Saltaire in 1853 and Port Sunlight in 1888. It was in 1885, after the report from a Royal Commission in England, that the state first took an interest. This led to the Housing of the Working Classes Act of 1885, which empowered Local Government Boards to shut down unhealthy properties and encouraged them to improve the housing in their areas.

The City of London Corporation built tenements in the Farringdon Road in 1865. The world's first large-scale housing project was built in London to replace one of the capital's most notorious slums – the Old Nichol. Nearly 6,000 individuals were crammed into the packed streets, where one child in four died before his or her first birthday. Arthur Morrison wrote the influential A Child of the Jago, an account of the life of a child in the slum, which sparked a public outcry. Construction of the Boundary Estate was begun in 1890 by the Metropolitan Board of Works and completed by the then-recently formed London County Council in 1900.

The success of this project spurred many local councils to embark on similar construction schemes in the early 20th century. The Arts and Crafts movement and Ebenezer Howard's garden city ideas led to the leafy London County Council cottage estates such as firstly Totterdown Fields and later Wormholt and Old Oak. The First World War indirectly provided a new impetus, when the poor physical health and condition of many urban recruits to the British Army was noted with alarm. In 1916, 41% of conscripts were unfit to serve. This led to a campaign known as Homes fit for heroes and in 1919 the Government first compelled councils to provide housing, helping them to do so through the provision of subsidies, under the Housing Act 1919. Public housing projects were tried out in some European countries and the United States in the 1930s, but only became widespread globally after the Second World War.

South Africa
South African apartheid featured high poverty rates in Black South Africans due to racial segregation and discrimination, so the post-apartheid government has sought to build social housing for poor black households, in urban areas with economic opportunity. The Reconstruction and Development and Breaking New Ground programs have provided over 3.5 million houses from 1995 to 2020, but they did not fully meet demand, and were built away from inner urban areas, exacerbating racial divides. The housing shortage was estimated to be 3.7 million units in 2021. The Department of Human Settlements, which facilitates national housing development, has sought to transition from a housing-focused development model to a holistic view, including services.

Brazil

Minha Casa Minha Vida ("My House, My Life"), the Brazilian federal government's social housing program, was launched in March 2009 with a budget of R$36 billion (US$18 billion) to build one million homes. The second stage of the program, included within the government Growth Acceleration Program (PAC, Programa de Aceleração do Crescimento) was announced in March 2010. This stage foresaw the construction of a further two million homes.

All funds for Minha Casa Minha Vida properties were provided by the Brazilian public bank, Caixa Econômica Federal. The bank financed development and provided mortgages for qualifying families.

, 4.5 million homes were built and distributed to the population. The project has been criticized for its placement and quality of the houses. Houses are built far from the city centre to reduce housing costs which consequently reduces access to the labor market; a study of randomly selected houses of the MCMV project in Rio de Janeiro showed a reduced likelihood of being formally employed in job-seekers but income was not affected in those who were already employed.

Canada

In Canada, public housing is usually a block of purpose-built subsidized housing operated by a government agency, often simply referred to as community housing, with easier-to-manage townhouses. Many cities in Canada still maintain large high-rise clustered developments in working-class neighborhoods, a system that has fallen into disfavour in both the United States and the United Kingdom. However, many public housing corporations still offer a variety of buildings and communities ranging from individual houses to townhouse communities and mid-rise and high-rise apartments in both working-class and middle-class neighborhoods that house a significant number of low-income Canadians.

Following the decentralisation of public housing to local municipalities, Social Housing Services Corporation (SHSC) was created in the Province of Ontario in 2002 to provide group services for social housing providers (public housing, non-profit housing and co-operative housing). It is a non-profit corporation which provides Ontario housing providers and service managers with bulk purchasing, insurance, investment and information services that add significant value to their operations.

Recently, there has been a move toward the integration of public housing with market housing and other uses. Revitalization plans for properties such as in the notorious Downtown Eastside of Vancouver, Regent Park, in Toronto, and Rochester Heights in Ottawa, aim to provide better accommodations for low-income residents, and connect them to the greater community. The aim of the reconstruction plans are often to better integrate it into the traditional grid of streets, improve leisure and cultural amenities. However, the residents of these communities often have had little effective input in the plans and have had mixed reactions to the construction.

In 2014, Vancouver, long considered one of the least affordable cities in the world, changed the definition of social housing to mean rental housing in which a minimum of 30 percent of dwelling units are occupied by households that cannot pay market rents, due to lack of income.

Mexico
At the end of the Second World War, enriched by US investments and an oil boom, Mexico had its first demographic boom, in which the primary destination for rural immigrants was Mexico City. Mario Pani Darqui, a famous architect at time, was charged to build its first large-scale public housing project. Built for the Dirección de Pensiones Civiles y Retiro (the National Pensions office, today ISSSTE), the Centro Urbano (or Multifamiliar) Presidente Alemán (1947–50) in the Colonia del Valle and the Centro Urbano (or Multifamiliar) Benito Juárez (1951–52) in the Colonia Roma, introduced formal ideas from Le Corbusier's Ville Radieuse into the urban fabric.

His later project, the Conjunto Urbano Tlatelolco Nonoalco built in 1960–65, was meant to develop one of the poorest parts of the city, Santiago Tlatelolco, which was becoming a slum. Unfortunately, after a while, instead of giving the residences to the previous residents of Tlatelolco, corruption took place and most of the dwellings were handed to state employees.

During the earthquake of 1985, both the Benito Juárez and Nonoalco-Tlaltelolco complexes suffered major damage, with some buildings collapsing. Today most of the Multifamiliar Benito Juárez has been demolished.

Mexico has had experience with housing projects since Porfirio Díaz's regime (1877–1880, 1884–1911). One of those still remains and is the Barrio of Loreto in San Ángel, Álvaro Obregón in Mexico City, that was a project for a paper factory workers.

Another notable public housing project is the Conjunto Habitacional Independencia, located near Tizapán neighborhood, on most of the land that once was the Matsumoto Hacienda. The project was developed during Adolfo López Mateos presidential period, started in 1959 and completed in 1960. The development included an integral design considering landscaping, and premises that could provide basic services to the residents: a clinic, a sports complex, theater, movie theater, a supermarket, a kindergarten, three elementary schools, among others. It functioned as public housing until 1982, when the houses and apartments were sold to the residents.

Puerto Rico
Neighbourhoods in Puerto Rico are often divided into three types: barrio, urbanización (urbanisation) and residencial público (public housing). An urbanización is a type of housing where land is developed into lots, often by a private developer, and where single-family homes are built.

More recently, non-single-family units, such as condominiums and townhouses are being built which also fall into this category. (In Puerto Rico, a condominium is a housing unit located in a high-rise building. It is popularly called an apartamento (English: 'apartment'), whether or not its resident owns the unit or lives in it as a renter.)

Public housing, on the other hand, are housing units built with government funding, primarily through programs of the US Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) and the US Department of Agriculture (USDA). These have traditionally been multi-family dwellings in housing complexes called a Barriada or a Caserío (and more recently a Residencial Publico), where all exterior grounds are shared areas.

Increasingly, however, public housing developments are being built that consist of other than the traditional multi-family dwellings with all exterior grounds consisting of shared outside area, for example, public housing may consist of single family garden apartments units. Finally, a home that is located in neither an urbanizacion nor of a public housing development is said to be located in (and to be a part of) a barrio.

In Puerto Rico, a barrio also has a second and very different meaning official meaning: the geographical area into which a municipios is divided for official administrative purposes. In this sense, urbanizaciones as well as public housing developments (as well as one or several barrios in the popular sense) may be located in one of these 901 official geographic areas.

United States
In the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, government involvement in housing for the poor was chiefly in the introduction of building standards. Atlanta, Georgia's Techwood Homes, dedicated in 1935, was the nation's first public housing project. Most housing communities were developed from the 1930s onward and initial public housing was largely slum clearance, with the requirement insisted upon by private builders that for every unit of public housing constructed, a unit of private housing would be demolished.

This also eased concerns of the establishment by eliminating or altering neighborhoods commonly considered a source of disease, and reflected progressive-era sanitation initiatives. Moreover, public housing, along with the Federal Highway Program, demolished the older, substandard housing of communities of color across the United States.

However, the advent of makeshift tent communities during the Great Depression caused concern in the Administration. The Federal public housing program was created by the 1937 Act, in which operations were "sustained primarily by tenant rents." As a result, public housing in its earliest decades was usually much more working-class and middle-class and white than it was by the 1970s. Many Americans associate large, multi-story towers with public housing, but early projects were actually low-rise, though Le Corbusier superblocks caught on before World War II.

A unique US public housing initiative was the development of subsidized middle-class housing during the late New Deal (1940–42) under the auspices of the Mutual Ownership Defense Housing Division of the Federal Works Agency under the direction of Colonel Lawrence Westbrook. These eight projects were purchased by the residents after the Second World War and as of 2009 seven of the projects continue to operate as mutual housing corporations owned by their residents. These projects are among the very few definitive success stories in the history of the US public housing effort.

Public housing was only built with the blessing of the local government, and projects were almost never built on suburban greenfields, but through regeneration of older neighborhoods. The destruction of tenements and eviction of their low-income residents consistently created problems in nearby neighborhoods with "soft" real estate markets.

Initiatives in housing policy were implemented in ways that perpetuated stigma against African Americans. Initially, public housing was intended to be built widespread, and as such be mixed-income, but lobbyists who did not want to see public housing decrease their housing values blocked such housing from going up . These early NIMBY movements limited where public housing was concentrated: predominantly in low-income neighborhoods. With the introduction of suburbs and expansion of choices for the white working class, the demographics of public housing changed from more class and racially integrated to predominantly impoverished, single-parent, welfare, and people of color . This led to stigmatization of public housing, through pushing the narrative that people living in public housing were "Welfare Queens", or otherwise living in a state of abject poverty and terrible conditions . These demographic changes also decreased support for housing, leading to the government cutting funding for the program . Because of funding cuts and mismanagement by public housing authorities, public housing started to reflect modern associated characteristics of "soul-crushing" buildings or "humanitarian disasters"—to which the 1993 HOPE VI project's response was demolition .

The federal Housing and Urban Development (HUD) department's 1993 HOPE VI program addressed concerns of distressed properties and blighted superblocks with revitalization and funding projects for the renewal of public housing to decrease its density and allow for tenants with mixed income levels. The project paired together the demolition of public housing stock and private development, leading to the displacement of many residents. One of the biggest components of this was the repealing of the "one-for-one" replacement rule, which said that for every unit of housing destroyed a new one must be built . HOPE VI's reasoning for repealing this policy was that it was hindering the construction of new, mixed-income units: since the public housing buildings were so massive, those behind HOPE VI believed that trying to match the 'one-for-one' rule would make building new housing extremely difficult . The long-term effect of this was that more housing was demolished than built, and many people were displaced without being guaranteed a spot in the new housing that would get built. This led to the widespread displacement and reshuffling of public house residents: namely, low-income, Black, single-parent families . Narratives that public housing projects were full of crime, drugs, and poverty were used to further justify demolition and destruction of public housing. Such associations between crime, surveillance and policing, and the projects increased in 1996.

Projects continue to have a reputation for violence, drug use, and prostitution, especially in New Orleans, Washington, D.C. Chicago and Detroit, leading to the passage of a 1996 federal "one strike you're out" law, enabling the eviction of tenants convicted of crimes, especially drug-related, or merely as a result of being tried for some crimes. Specifically, the Clinton era established, through HUD, the Public Housing Drug Elimination Program, which led to the cracking down of public housing, leading to more policing and surveillance for low-income people of color .

Turn to Subsidized Housing
In the 60s and 70s, the popularization of neoliberalism caused a turn away from public sector solutions towards private or public-private solutions. This, in conjunction with the narrative of public housing being obsolete, led to both the turn away from public housing and towards subsidized housing solutions.

Houses, apartments or other residential units are usually subsidized on a rent-geared-to-income (RGI) basis. Some communities have now embraced a mixed income, with both assisted and market rents, when allocating homes as they become available.

A significant change in the program took place in 1969, with the passage of the Brooke Amendment. Rents now became set at 25% of a tenant's income with the result that the program began serving the "poorest tenants."

Other attempts to solve these problems include the 1974 Section 8 Housing Program, which encourages the private sector to construct affordable homes, and subsidized public housing. This assistance can be "project-based", subsidizing properties, or "tenant-based", which provides tenants with a voucher, accepted by some landlords. This policy option represented a turn away from the public-sector policy of public housing, instead turning towards the private market to address housing needs. The program, in conjunction with HOPE VI, was intended to create income-integrated communities, by giving residents the choice of where to move . However, the housing voucher program has historically had long wait times and limited choice on where one can actually move . Additionally, it was found that many people of color did not want to move away from their families, communities, and systems of support, as well as experiencing stigma and difficulties with landlords, safety, or expenses . This leads to the program doing little to actually create a more racially-integrated city demographics, mostly reproducing inequality while simultaneously not having enough valid housing units for the long list of applicants .

China
The public-owned housing system was established when the Chinese Communist Party started a planned economy in the 1950s as part of its Great Leap Forward. The system was funded by the central government's budget and were administered and distributed by state-owned enterprises. The occupants of the public housing were usually the employees of the enterprises and their family, who were subject to pay rent at a very low price. The size and the type of room the households received were dependent on their job title or administrative level. The central government found it difficult to upkeep the public housing due to the low rent it received; the distribution policy that was intended to be "equalitarianism" was actually corrupt.

The Chinese government commercialized the housing market after the economic reform started in 1978 by Deng Xiaoping. The public houses that were constructed before that the economic reforms were categorized as "Old Public Houses" (老公房). "Old Public Houses" were, in principle, not supposed to be privately sold, but the household could sell it after purchasing the ownership of the building (not the property), and such transactions were subject to be review by local housing authorities and the State-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission. However, an informal filing system and unclear policies resulted in problems of corruption and family dispute.

The concept of the low-cost rental housing can be traced to a 1998 policy statement, but did not truly take off until 2006 due to limited funding and administrative problems. The provision of more affordable housing is one of the key components of China's Twelfth Five-year Plan, which targets the construction of 36 million homes by 2015. That program's costs will be split between the private and public sector and are estimated at five trillion yuan by China International Capital Corporation.

Hong Kong

In Hong Kong, public housing is one of the major housing policies of the government. Nearly half of Hong Kong's 7.5 million population lives in public housing. The two main public housing providers are the Housing Authority and the Housing Society.

The most common types of public housing in Hong Kong are public rental housing (PRH) and subsidised sale flats produced under the Home Ownership Scheme (HOS). In 2016, approximately 31 per cent of Hong Kong households lived in PRH flats while 15 per cent resided in subsidised sale flats (of all types).

The origin of large-scale public housing in Hong Kong can be traced to the resettlement programme launched by the Hong Kong government in the 1950s in response to the increasing prevalence of squatter settlements, which emerged as a result of a great influx of refugees following the Communist revolution in China. The squatter villages were considered unsafe as they were susceptible to disastrous fires, including a 1953 blaze in Shek Kip Mei that rendered over 50,000 people homeless overnight.

Large-scale resettlement estates were built throughout the 1950s and 1960s. In 1973, the government of Sir Murray MacLehose launched the Ten-Year Housing Programme, which aimed to provide the entire population with "satisfactory housing" within a decade. The government also launched the Home Ownership Scheme (HOS) in 1976 to enable lower-income households to purchase flats.

Many public housing estates were built as part of new town development programmes. During the 1980s, most of the earliest resettlement estates (from the 1950s and early 1960s) were also rebuilt to modern standards. Public housing remains a key concern of the Hong Kong Government, which plans to construct some 330,000 units between 2022 and 2032.

 India

86.6% of Indian Population lives in own houses. There are various public housing projects by both state and central governments in small scale.

Kerala has started an initiative of public housing called Life which is a part of their welfare mission, Nava Kerala Mission which aims to be one of the biggest public housing initiatives undertaken on a state level in India is schemed to build houses for an estimated 4.32 lakh (432,000) families in Kerala who do not own any land or houses. The handover of 3,23,894 houses were completed till date under the mission.

Indonesia
Indonesia has undertaken One Million Houses program for low-income people. The program has been implementing since 2015 to achieve an ambitious target of building 10 million houses. The proportion of the housing is 70 percent for low-income people and 30 percent for non-low-income people. This program is a joint movement between the Central Government, regional governments, real estate developers and the community. The program is targeted to reach one million housing units annually. In 2015, about 700,000 homes were built, increasing to approximately 800,000 in 2016 and around 904,000 by the end of 2017.

Iran
Iranian Minister of Road and Urban Development promised to deliver 4 millions apartment unit and flats and failed its aim. Registration scheme is closed for only males aged 23–45 without prior land ownership history.
 * Maskan mehr
 * Maskan meli

Japan
Danchi (団地) is the Japanese word for a large cluster of apartment buildings or houses of a particular style and design, typically built as public housing by government authorities.

The Japan Housing Corporation (JHC), now known as the Urban Renaissance Agency (UR), was founded in 1955. During the 1950s, 1960s, and 1970s, the JHC built many danchi in suburban areas to offset the increasing housing demand during the post-World War II economic boom. It introduced the Japanese salaryman to a life around the nuclear family in contrast with the multi-generation homes before the war.

The rent payment for a danchi is much cheaper than that of an apartment or a mortgage, but for a public danchi the prospective tenant must usually participate in a lottery to be assigned an open apartment. Residents in UR danchi do not have to pay key money or contract renewal fees, making the residences cheaper than comparable housing even if the monthly rents are equivalent.

Singapore

In Singapore, the public housing program, particularly the planning and development of new public housing and the allocation of rental units and resale of existing ownership units, is managed by the Housing and Development Board. Day-to-day management of public housing communities has been delegated to Town Councils headed by the local members of parliament.

In 2018, 78.7% of Singaporeans live in public residential developments, ranging from studio units to executive condominiums provided by the HDB, a major factor in Singapore having one of the highest home-ownership rates – over 90% of the resident population – in the world.

Vietnam
From the 1960s to the 1980s, Vietnam built Khu tập thể (KTT), socialist-modeled apartment blocks on the periphery of cities for civil servants, state-owned companies' workers, and military personnel. Market reforms in the late 1980s resulted in the partial privatization of the KTT, which were sold to low- and low-middle income populations. The KTT have since become dilapidated, due to a lack of municipal funding for repairs and maintenance, and been the target of demolition, displacement, and redevelopment for high-income populations.

In the 2010s, Vietnam has experienced a surge in property prices, with the affordable housing stock shrinking by 7% of the entire housing stock from 2014 to 2016, and apartment prices rising by 90% between 2017 and 2020. Developers are not interested in social housing projects since they are not profitable, even amidst rising demand from workers, so the Ministry of Construction requires funding to build 294,600 social housing units in the 2021 – 2025 period.

European Union
According to a 2018 discussion paper of the European Commission, in 2015, 11.3% of the EU-population lived in households that spent 40% or more of their disposable income on housing. In January 2019, the former European Commission President, Romano Prodi, declared that "public investment in social infrastructure during the Eurocrisis reached a 20-year low. Current investment in social infrastructure in the EU is estimated at 170 billion euros per year. The minimum infrastructure investment gap in these sectors is estimated at 100 to 150 billion euros, representing a total gap of at least 1.5 trillion euros between 2018 and 2030."

Housing projects in Europe can be found in urban areas, as well as in suburban areas.

The EU was moving to support more affordable, energy-efficient and accessible housing with the financial contribution of the CEB and of the EIB through its European Fund for Strategic Investments. Public funding was planned to be directed primarily on affordable housing and secondly in the education and lifelong learning, health and long-term care sectors.

In Europe, there is a significant shortage of investment in social housing and a pressing need to renovate existing units. Annual investment in housing is predicted at €57 billion for new building and energy-efficiency modifications. The projections do not include the refugee situation caused by the war in Ukraine.

Austria

Public housing was an important issue right from the foundation of the Republic of German-Austria in 1918. The population was faced with a great deal of uncertainty particularly as regards food and fuel. This led to a significant number of less affluent people to move to the periphery of towns, often building makeshift homes to be closer to where they could grow food. They were called Siedler ('settlers'). As the political situation became stabilised with foundation of the First Austrian Republic in September 1919, the Siedler movement started creating formal organizations like the Austrian Association for Settlements and Small Gardens. The electoral victory of the Social Democratic Party of Austria in the elections for the Viennese Gemeinderat (city parliament) gave rise to Red Vienna. Part of their programme was the provision of decent homes for the Viennese working class who made up the core of their supporters. Hence the German word Gemeindebau (plural: Gemeindebauten) for "municipality building". In Austria, it refers to residential buildings erected by a municipality, usually to provide public housing. These have been an important part of the architecture and culture of Vienna since the 1920s.

Belgium
Social housing is a responsibility of the regions in Belgium. The regions do not directly own the houses, semi-private social housing corporations do. The government regulates and mostly finances this corporations. Below a certain income limit, people are eligible for social housing. Because there is a major shortage of social housing in Belgium, other priority conditions are often imposed, such as having children to care for. Social housing accounts for approximately 6.5% of the Belgian housing market. This is much lower than neighbouring countries such as the Netherlands and France. As of 2018 Flanders, Wallonia and Brussels are responsible for 280,687 social houses, 212,794 people are on the waiting list. For the people on the waiting list there are other possibilities such as subsidies and sociale rental agencies in Flanders.

Denmark
In Denmark, public housing is called alment boligbyggeri and is owned and administered by approximately 700 self-governing, democratic and non-profit organizations by and for the tenants themselves. Many of the public housing organizations in Denmark are rooted in the early history of the labor unions and currently forms about 20% of the total housing stock with about 7,500 departments countrywide. A membership of a housing organization is usually required to obtain a rental and they are granted with regard to length of membership.

Although the buildings are owned and administered by self-governing and economically independent organizations, the State of Denmark is strongly regulating public housing in the country. By law, the municipalities have access to 25% of the rentals, usually reserving them for the poor, the unemployed, the disabled or mentally ill or any other group dependent on social benefits from the municipality. Over the years, these regulations have created many 'vulnerable residential areas' within the country. Danish public housing has never had any income restrictions, but in recent years new state regulations has made it mandatory for several of them to favor fully employed renters and disfavor unemployed or part-time employed people. This is a relatively new effort by the state to counter the ghettoisation, which is now an officially recognized problem countrywide.

As in Sweden, state and municipal policies carried out throughout the first decade of the 21st century, has led to an increased privatization of public housing. In many areas, residents have been offered to buy their own flats, thereby effectively changing the status of the property. The privatization of public housing was initiated as part of an ideological program by the right wing governments of the early 21st century and was launched a few years after the closure of the former Ministry of Housing Affairs in 2001. The former ministry was re-opened as Ministry of Housing, Urban and Rural Affairs in October 2011, when a new coalition government led by social-democrats was formed.

Finland
The right to housing is guaranteed in the Finnish constitution, and public housing in Finland is largely funded through loans which are subsidized and guaranteed by the government. Roughly one third of Finland's housing stock has been built this way. Rents for public housing apartments in Finland are typically significantly lower than market-rate housing. Eligibility to live in public housing in Finland is based on a need-based evaluation, and those with very low incomes and those who are experiencing homelessness are given priority. The earliest public housing project in Finland was in Helsinki. In 1909, four wooden houses designed by the architect A. Nyberg were built on Kirstinkuja (formerly Kristiinankatu) for the city's workers. The residents were mainly working-class families with several children. The apartments had an average of five people per room, sometimes up to eight. The tiny apartments were equipped with running water, a pantry and an attic cupboard. Every apartment had its own toilet in the cellar. Electric lighting was installed in 1918.

The homes and lives of worker families in Helsinki from 1909 to 1985 are presented in a museum near the Linnanmäki amusement park.

In 2008, Helsinki launched its Housing First policy, with the goal of ending homelessness by prioritizing unconditional housing. With municipal, state, and NGO support, and coupled with health and medical services, the program reduced homelessness by 35% between 2008 and 2019.

France

After World War II, the population increased at a rate previously unknown, the rural exodus increased, while war damage had reduced the number of houses in many cities. Rental prices dramatically rose, and the government made a law in 1948 to block them, effectively ending the economic benefits of housing investment. Rents were gradually deregulated until debate in the 1980s led to the current rental law of 1989 theoretically balancing landlord and tenant relations. However, there was a major homelessness crisis in the winter of 1953–4 and the necessary laws were gradually mobilized producing high levels of construction almost continuously from the 1960s. Social landlords were a major source of expertise as well as construction actors with links to national and local bodies. The construction industry was at the time inadequate so political support was needed.

It is incorrect to refer to French social housing as public housing. The origins of French social housing lie in the private sector, with the first State aid provided to limited-profit companies by the loi Siegfried in 1793. The originally socialist idea was promoted by some French employers in the 2nd half of the 19th century. Public housing companies followed before World War I. There are still different social housing movements, public, private and some cooperative. Social landlord organizations all have similar regulation and similar access to government loans but there are significant differences.

The government launched a series of major construction plans, including the creation of new towns (villes nouvelles) and new suburbs with HLM (Habitation à Loyer Modéré, "low-rent housing"). The state had the funds and the legal means to acquire the land and could provide some advantages to the companies that then built its huge housing complexes of hundreds of apartments. Quality was also effectively regulated, resulting in decent or even top quality housing for the standard of the 1950s and 1960s. The construction of HLMs were subject to much political debate. Much smaller developments are now the norm. This housing is now generally referred to as l'habitat social, a slightly wider sphere than just housing.

France still retains this system, a recent law making it an obligation for every town to have at least 20% HLM. Nowadays HLM represents roughly half of the rental market (46% in 2006). Social housing is not all for disadvantaged people who are just one of the target groups. Part of the funding can be provided by employer-employee groups to provide housing for local employees. The 20% target can include intermediate housing for better off groups, although its object is to produce social mix. Gentrification and the very basis of social housing allocation are divisive issues as well as the extent of local control of housing. This housing has always been a multi-actor activity and recent local government reorganization continues to change the political landscape.

While they succeeded in giving lower-income families a place to live in the drive to provide popular housing, this system also led to the creation of suburban ghettos, with a problem of disrepair. There has been a long-term problem of gradual impoverishment of social tenants There, deprived strata of the population, mostly of immigrant origin and suffering massive under-employment, might in the past have been left to simmer away from the more affluent urban centres, sometimes becoming rife with social tensions and violence. This affects a minority of social housing but has a high profile and still produces serious tension.

Tackling this problem at its roots is all but simple, and social mix policies can break up populations seen as difficult by redevelopment. This has not had the hoped for results. It has also been sought to resolve the problem of access to the system by disadvantaged people by a new system where certain groups can apply to court to be housed if refused, the "right to housing". This tends to intensify the controversy over social housing allocation, who should be housed. The French tradition of 'universal' social housing allocation – housing for everyone is called into question by EU competition law restricting subsidy except for the disadvantaged. In any event, the system is certainly effective in producing construction, although not with the excesses seen in the recent credit crunch elsewhere.

Germany
Between 1925 and 1930 Germany was the site of innovative and extensive municipal public housing projects, mostly in Berlin, Hamburg, Cologne and Frankfurt. These housing estates (Siedlungen), were made necessary by the dreadful living conditions of pre-war urban tenements. The right to healthy housing was written into the 1919 Weimar Constitution, but few homes were built until the economy stabilised in 1925.

The new German housing estates were low-rise, no more than five stories, and in suburban settings. Residents were provided access to light, air, and sun. The size, shape, orientation and architectural style of Germany's public housing were informed by the recent experience of the Viennese, the Dutch, the anti-urban Garden City Movement in Britain, the new industrialized mass-production and pre-fabrication building techniques, the novel use of steel and glass, and by the progressive-liberal policies of the Social Democrats.

In 1930 in the industrial city of Dessau, the Laubenganghäuser ('Houses with Balcony Access') were designed by Bauhaus director Hannes Meyer for a housing cooperative that wanted apartments it could let for no more than a quarter of the occupant's income. Working on a tight budget inspired money and space saving innovations, such as using balcony walkways for access to the apartments rather than having internal corridors and clever use of the internal space in the 47 m2 apartments.

Architects Martin Wagner, Bruno Taut and others built the Berlin Modernism Housing Estates, now a World Heritage Site, consisting of thousands of homes built in and around Berlin, including the Horseshoe Estate (named for its shape), and Uncle Tom's Cabin estate (named after a local restaurant). In Frankfurt the architect Ernst May lead the New Frankfurt public housing project, in which over 12,000 apartments were built 1925–1930. May ran his own sizable research facility to investigate, for instance, air-flow in various floorplan configurations, construction techniques, etc. The Austrian architect Margarete Schütte-Lihotzky applied the principles of Taylorism to the kitchen workspace and developed the Frankfurt kitchen while working for Ernst May.

Beyond technical research May also published two magazines and embarked on a significant public-relations project, with films and classes and public exhibitions, to make Neues Bauen acceptable to the public. In the late 1920s the principles of equal access to Licht, Luft und Sonne ('light, air and sun') and the social effects of a state-guaranteed Existenzminimum ("minimum subsistence level") became a matter of lively popular debate all over Germany. One indirect result of this publicity was the American housing movement: a young Catherine Bauer attended one of May's conferences in 1930, and wrote her influential book Modern Housing (1934) based on research done in Frankfurt and with Dutch architect JJP Oud.

Increasing pressure from the rising Nazis brought this era to an end in 1933. A majority of the German public housing experts had social democrat or communist sympathies and were forced out of the country.

In East Germany, the communist administration built monolithic Plattenbau apartment blocks and estates. Most new residential buildings from the 1960s onward were built in this style, as it was a quick and relatively cheap way to solve the country's severe housing shortage, which had been caused by wartime bombing raids and the large influx of German refugees from further east.

Hungary

Panelház (short form: panel) is the name of a type of block of flats (panel buildings) in Hungary. It was the main housing type built in the Socialist era. From 1959 to 1990 788,000 panel flats were built in Hungary. About 2 million people, about one fifth of the country's total population, live in these flats. The Hungarian government and local municipalities began a renovation program during the 2000s. In the program they have insulated these buildings, replaced the old doors and windows with multi-layer thermo glass, renewed the heating system and colored the buildings in a more pleasant way.

Ireland
In Ireland, public housing and halting sites (sites used by semi-nomadic Traveller communities) have been built by local authorities and are known as Local Authority Accommodation. Dublin Corporation and the former Dublin County Council provided the lion's share of Irish local authority housing, with County Longford having the largest ratio of local authority to private housing in the state.

Large-scale social housing was erected in the 1930s and 1960s, with both cases following slum clearance. Critics argue that the National Building Agency focused too much on housing delivery, and failed to deliver retail and other services.

The government has promoted tenant purchase on favourable terms, and many former social housing areas are now completely or almost completely privately owned. Housing associations, or independent, nonprofit charities, now play a significant role in rental social housing provision. As the Irish state's ability to borrow is diminished government policy favours an increased role for private financing of housing associations instead of capital grants for local authorities. Ireland currently faces a severe shortage of social and council housing, and is experiencing a housing and homelessness crisis.

Netherlands
In the Netherlands, the rent for the cheaper rental homes is kept low through governmental oversight and regulation. These types of homes are known as sociale huurwoningen.

In practice this is accomplished by non-profit private housing foundations or associations (toegelaten instellingen). Due to frequent mergers the number of these organizations dropped to around 430 by 2009. They manage 2.4 million dwellings. The majority of the low-rent apartments in the Netherlands are owned by such organisations. Since the policy changed in 1995 the social housing organizations have become financially independent, focusing on their role as social entrepreneurs. In most Dutch municipalities there came to exist a certain minimum capacity of social housing throughout the last decades. In many cities such as Amsterdam, The Hague, Rotterdam and Utrecht the percentage of social housing approaches or even passes 50 percent. The public (financial) supervision is done by the central fund for housing (Centraal Fonds Volkshuisvesting).

The Dutch housing policy is based on a concept of universal access to affordable housing for all and the prevention of segregation. As of 2020, the Dutch government is attempting to build 10,000 housing units for the homeless, by 2022. There is a Homeownership Guarantee Fund to support the National Mortgage Guarantee, which provides access to finance and purchase owner-occupied housing.

Romania

The skyline of many Romanian cities became dominated by standardized apartment blocks under the former communist government's policy of tower bloc construction. Beginning in 1974, systematization consisted largely of the demolition and reconstruction of existing villages, towns, and cities, in whole or in part, with the stated goal of turning Romania into a "multilaterally developed socialist society". In 2012, 2.7 million flats date from the communist period, accounting for 37% of total housing in Romania and for about 70% in cities and towns. Subsequent to post-communist privatization, the homeownership rate in this form of housing reached of 99.9%. The new Home Owner Associations (HOAs) were challenged internally by the cumulative effect of defaulting contributions, lack of affordability and the established practice of casual resident service in HOAs, which often triggered mismanagement. On the other hand, HOAs were challenged from outside by non-effective mechanisms to address their internal problems, such as non-existent fast court procedures against defaulting, poor financial assistance to socially disadvantaged households and a private sector unprepared to take on condominium management.

Spain

Spaniards' reluctance to home rental, and government spending cuts in the 1980s, reduced rented public housing in Spain to a minimum. Rented public houses were relatively common in the Franco era (1939–75). With the advent of democracy and the 1978 Constitution, the right to housing became guaranteed, and the management of social housing depended mostly on the autonomous regions. This resulted in a wide variety of laws, which make the issue highly dependent on the region.

In spite of this, a scheme for viviendas de protección oficial (VPO) has been widely used, consisting of local councils allowing for building contractors and developers to build in public sites or with public loans on condition that a certain percentage of apartments remain subsidized and under control of the local authorities. This is known as VPO de promoción privada ('privately developed'), as opposed to the VPO de promoción pública ('publicly developed'), in which the whole property is owned and managed by a government authority. Publicly developed housing is made almost exclusively for owner-occupation, not rent, and made up 11% of the housing stock in 2010.

A new plan (Plan estatal español de vivienda y rehabilitación para el período 2009–2012) was put forward by the Rodríguez Zapatero government, aiming to make near a million homes available for public housing, relying both on new construction and refurbishment of unused houses. Major parts of Spanish cities have been expanded in the last 20 years with projects heavily dependent on public and collective housing projects, which has stressed its importance inside the main architecture schools, that have answered the challenge with the development of several specialized courses and formation plans, such as the Madrid UPM – ETH Zurich combined MCH Master in Collective Housing.

Sweden

Swedish public housing is called Allmännyttigt bostadsföretag, and consists mostly of flats owned by the local council. Unlike its counterparts in Great Britain, for instance, the Swedish Public Housing has never had any income restrictions. Instead, for large parts of the period between 1920 and 1990 (for instance, during the era of Million Programme), the public housing companies such as Svenska Bostäder were the major operators in housing projects as well as in projects aiming to acquire old and worn down buildings. Although not carrying out housebuilding nor acquisition projects in recent times, the policies lead to a ubiquitous presence of publicly owned buildings throughout the cities of Sweden, including attractive urban areas, with a rather wide range of income among the tenants.

Policies carried out in the Swedish cities throughout the first decade of the 21st century have led to the tenants of public housing having bought the publicly owned buildings in which they live, which in turn has led to a significant decrease of publicly owned buildings in attractive urban areas.

Slovakia and Czechia
Forms of housing projects may vary in Slovakia. In the former Czechoslovakia (now Czech Republic and Slovakia) during the communist era, a construction of large housing estates (sídlisko, sídliště) was an important part of building plans in the former Czechoslovakia. The government wanted to provide large quantities of fast and affordable housing and to slash costs by employing uniform designs over the whole country. They also sought to foster a "collectivist nature" in people. People living in these housing projects can either usually own their apartments or rent them, usually through a private landlord. There's usually a mix of social classes in these housing projects.

United Kingdom

In the United Kingdom public housing is often referred to by the British public as "council housing" and "council estates", based on the historical role of district and borough councils in running public housing. Mass council house building began in about 1920 in order to replace older and dilapidated properties. This followed the 1919 'Addison' Act and the provision of central state subsidies; some local authority or municipal housing was provided before 1914.

Housing was a major policy area under Wilson's Labour government, 1964 to 1970, with an accelerated pace of new building, as there was still a great deal of unfit housing needing replacement. Tower blocks, first built in the 1950s, featured prominently in this era. The proportion of council housing rose from 42% to 50% of the nation's housing total, while the number of council homes built increased steadily, from 119,000 in 1964 to 133,000 in 1965 and to 142,000 in 1966.

Allowing for demolitions, 1.3 million new homes were built between 1965 and 1970. To encourage home ownership, the government introduced the Option Mortgage Scheme (1968), which made low-income house buyers eligible for subsidies (equivalent to tax relief on mortgage interest payments). This scheme had the effect of reducing housing costs for buyers on low incomes.

Since the 1970s, non-profit housing associations have been operating an increasing share of social housing properties in the United Kingdom. From 1996 they have also been known as Registered Social Landlords (RSLs), and public housing has been referred to as "social housing" to encompass both councils and RSLs. Despite being non-profit based, RSLs generally charge higher rents than councils. However, the Westminster Government introduced a "rent re-structuring" policy for housing associations in England in 2002, which aimed to bring council and RSL rents into line in England by 2012. Local planning departments may require private-sector developers to offer "affordable housing" as a condition of planning permission (section 106 agreement). This accounts for another £700m of Government funding each year for tenants in part of the United Kingdom. As of 2012, Housing Associations are now also referred to as "Private Registered Providers of Social Housing" (PRPs).

Local authorities have been discouraged from building council housing since 1979 following the election of Conservative leader Margaret Thatcher as prime minister. The Parker Morris standard was abolished for those that were built, resulting in smaller room sizes and fewer facilities. The Right to Buy was introduced, resulting in the move of some of the best stock from public tenanted to private owner occupation.

Since the year 2000, "choice-based lettings" (CBL) have been introduced to help ensure social housing was occupied speedily as tenants moved. This can still favour the local over the non-local prospective tenant. In a number of local authority areas, due to the shortage of council housing, three out of four properties may be designated for priority cases (those living in poor overcrowded conditions, with medical or welfare needs, or needing family support) or homeless applicants in order to meet the councils' legal obligations to rehouse people in need. The percentage of properties set aside for vulnerable groups will vary dependent on the demand for council housing in the area. All local authorities have a Housing Strategy to ensure that council houses are let fairly and fulfil the council's legal obligations; deal with people in need; and contribute to sustainability of housing estates, neighbourhood regeneration, and social inclusion.

The 1997–2010 Labour Government wished to move council housing away from local authority management. At first, this was through Large Scale Voluntary Transfers (LSVT) of stock from councils to Housing Associations (HAs). Not all council property could be transferred, as in some local authorities, their housing stock was in poor condition and had a capital value less than the remaining debts from construction costs—in effect, the council stock was in negative equity. In some local authority areas, the tenants rejected the transfer option.

The Labour Government introduced a "third way": the Arms Length Management Organisation (ALMO), where the housing stock stays with the Local Authority but is managed by a not-for-profit organisation at arm's length from the Local Authority. It also introduced the Decent Homes programme, a capital fund to bring social housing up to a modern physical standard. To use this fund, the manager, whether ALMO or HA, had to achieve a 2 or 3 star rating from its inspection by the Audit Commission. This was intended to drive up management standards. Council landlords cannot access this funding, another incentive to transfer management of council housing to an ALMO or HA.

Governments since the early 1990s have also encouraged "mixed tenure" in regeneration areas and on "new-build" housing estates, offering a range of ownership and rental options, with a view to engineering social harmony through including "social housing" and "affordable housing" options. A recent research report has argued that the evidence base for tenure mixing remains thin. Social housing occupants may be stigmatised and forced to use a poor door that is separate and less convenient than the door the unsubsidised occupants use and social housing may be less desirably situated.

After the adoption of austerity policies in 2010 the traditional "safety net" model was maintained by the devolved administrations like the Scottish Parliament and the Welsh and Northern Ireland Assemblies. Most UK social housing tenants have the right to swap homes with another tenant even if their landlords are different. This is called a "mutual exchange". As of 2017, in England, local authorities can destinate homeless households in local tenancies, whereas in Scotland social housing remained the first chosen policy. According to the Museum of Homelessness, in 2020 the UK recorded at least 976 deaths among homeless people. In 2019 England and Wales estimated 778 deaths with an increase of 7.2% on the previous year.

Former Soviet Union
In the Soviet Union, most of the houses built after World War II were usually 3–5 stories high, with small apartments. In these boroughs, the goal was saving space and creating as many apartments as possible. Construction starting in the 1970s favored 9- and 16-story concrete panel municipal housing in major cities, 7–12 stories in smaller urban areas. These housing projects are still used in some countries, especially in countries in central and eastern Europe, and most of them are slowly being renovated.

Australia

Public housing in Australia is provided by departments of state governments, with funding provided by both the state and federal government. Policies vary by state but generally, eligibility is based on income, asset limits and residency requirements. The allocation of public housing is typically done through a priority system where the applicants in the greatest need are housed first.

There are over 300,000 public housing dwellings in Australia, consisting of low-density housing on master-planned estates located in suburban areas, and also inner-city high-rise apartments in Melbourne and Sydney.

In recent decades, rooming and relief housing for the homeless has been privatised, and in recent years this housing has been sold off to avoid maintenance costs and capitalise on sales in a booming property market. In Melbourne, public housing stocks have been in decline for some time, sparking the recent 2016 Bendigo Street housing dispute in which homeless people are being housed by the community campaign in homes left empty by the state government.

In 2016, a study by the Australian Housing and Urban Research Institute found an interesting effect of providing public housing to those living in poverty and who are at risk of losing their homes. When poor Western Australians were granted access to public housing, they began to rely on the region's healthcare system less and less, with immense savings for Western Australia. The reduction in the stress on hospitals, emergency rooms, and other forms of medical care projected to over $16 million saved for Western Australia per annum.

Recently, in a move to address the public housing crisis, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese announced an allocation of $2 billion to states and territories specifically for the development of social housing. This measure is part of the government's commitment to tackling housing affordability and homelessness across Australia. The Housing Minister has proposed a guaranteed annual expenditure of $500 million on public housing. This commitment, however, is contingent on garnering crossbench support to ensure the implementation of this policy.

New Zealand

Private companies (such as the New Zealand Company) which fostered early organised European settlement in New Zealand constructed immigration barracks to serve as temporary accommodation for their new arrivals.

The Workers' Dwellings Act of 1905 resulted in the New Zealand Government commissioning the building of 646 houses.

In 1937 the First Labour Government launched a major public-housing system—it became known as "state housing"—for citizens unable to afford private rents. Most state housing built between 1937 and the mid-1950s consisted of detached two-to-three-bedroom cottage-style houses; only 1.5% of state houses in 1949 formed part of apartment blocks, all of them in Auckland or in greater Wellington. After World War II ended in 1945, local authorities also started providing social housing, mainly for elderly people with low incomes.

title: Public housing


text:
User:Jasp

Well this is my page. Please check out my website. I'll put more stuff here one day...

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

title: User:Jasp


text:
Catacombs of Rome

The Catacombs of Rome (Catacombe di Roma) are ancient catacombs, underground burial places in and around Rome, of which there are at least forty, some rediscovered only in recent decades.

Though most famous for Christian burials, either in separate catacombs or mixed together, Jews and also adherents of a variety of pagan Roman religions were buried in catacombs, beginning in the 2nd century AD, occasioned by the ancient Roman ban on burials within a city, and also as a response to overcrowding and shortage of land. The most extensive and perhaps the best known is the Christian Catacomb of Callixtus located near the Park of the Caffarella, but there are other sites, both Christian and not, scattered around the city, some of which are now engulfed by modern urban sprawl.

The Christian catacombs are extremely important for the history of Early Christian art, as they contain the great majority of examples from before about 400 AD, in fresco and sculpture, as well as gold glass medallions (these, like most bodies, have been removed). The Jewish catacombs are similarly important for the study of Jewish culture at this early period.

Etymology
The word catacombs comes from the Latin root word catatumbas meaning either “among the tombs” or, according to other translations from the original Late Latin, “next to the quarry”. The later translation stems from the first excavations done to create the catacombs system, which was conducted outside of Rome near the quarry.

Precursors
The Etruscan civilization dominated a territory including the area which now includes Rome from perhaps 900 to 100 BC. Like many other European peoples, it had buried its dead in excavated underground chambers, such as the Tomb of the Capitals, and less complex tumuli. In contrast, the original Roman custom had been cremation of the human body, after which the burnt remains were kept in a pot, urn, or ash-chest, often deposited in a columbarium or dovecote. Rome faced two problems in the 2nd century CE: overpopulation and a lack of land. The city was growing, and many of the buildings were four or five stories tall. Since burials were not allowed inside the city walls, and early Christians did not agree with the pagan practice of cremating their dead, communal underground cemeteries provided a practical alternative. From about the 2nd century AD, inhumation (burial of unburnt human remains) became customary, either in graves or, for those who could afford them, in sarcophagi, often elaborately carved. By the 4th century, burial had overtaken cremation as the usual practice, and the construction of tombs had grown greater and spread throughout the empire. Jews and Christians preferred burial due to the idea of preserving the dead body for the resurrection. Considerable tracts of the ancient roads leading out of Rome and other Roman cities, like the Via Appia to this day, had monumental tombs running alongside them. These would inevitably cost a fortune to construct, whereas clearly in digging out of the catacombs would be less expensive.

Despite widespread popular modern ideas, these tunnels were probably not used for regular worship at first, but simply for burial. However, extending pre-existing Roman customs, memorial services, and celebrations of the anniversaries of Christian martyrs took place there. There are sixty known subterranean burial chambers in Rome. They were built outside the walls along main Roman roads, like the Via Appia, the Via Ostiense, the Via Labicana, the Via Tiburtina, and the Via Nomentana. Names of the catacombs – like St Calixtus and St Sebastian, which is alongside Via Appia – refer to martyrs that may have been buried there. However, about 80% of the excavations used for Christian burials date to after the time of the persecutions.

Discoveries
Through research, it has been found that the population's diet consisted of freshwater fish. Sample D9-W-XVI-8, considered to be a two-year-old child, shows that children in Ancient Rome were breastfed and this child, in particular, had not yet been weaned off its mother. This results from the fact that the δ15N values had not begun to decline.

Fish had intertwined secular and religious aspects in Roman society. For one thing, it was a staple of the daily diet. It also had a variety of significance for Christians, for whom it was not only a common food, as for other Romans, but featured as a symbol in Christian iconography and was consumed at meals held to commemorate the dead.

Christian catacombs
Roman law forbade burial places within city limits and so all burial places, including the catacombs, were located outside the walls of the city. The first large-scale catacombs in the vicinity of Rome were dug from the 2nd century onwards. They were carved in "tufa" (tuff), a type of volcanic rock which is relatively soft to dig into but subsequently hardens.

Christian catacombs existed as a burial ground for early Christians accompanied by inscriptions and early wall art. Although catacombs were of Jewish origin in the first century, by the end of the sixth century there were over 60 Christian catacombs. These catacombs served as a connector for various Christian communities through the underlying concepts of socio-economic status shown within the art. Additionally, the art showed a story of how Christians in the first couple of centuries viewed the world and their idealistic view of how it should be.

According to L. Michael White, the catacombs of Rome have a place in the romantic historiography of how early Christianity developed. This is because it has often been said those catacombs were good hiding places, and that when Christians were persecuted by the Roman Empire, they would go there to hold their worship.

However, White believes Christians did not use the catacombs of Rome to secretly hold their worship during times of persecutions. He says that they did not do so, in the first place because Christians were not persecuted on a regular basis by the Roman Empire, and in the second place because the larger rooms or chambers within the catacombs were not used for regular worship, the Eucharist or assembly by Christians. White says that those catacombs' larger rooms, which had some benches along their walls and were appropriate to hold eucharistic assemblies, were in fact used by Christians to "hol[d] meals for the dead". He states such "funerary meals" were practised among most families of the city of Rome. Therefore, he explains, Christians, in their everyday life, regularly went down into the catacombs of Rome, not to hold assemblies or the Eucharist, but "to hold memorial meals with dead members of their families, just like their pagan neighbors". V. Rutgers considers that "[r]esearchers have long debunked the myth that Christians used the catacombs as hiding places in times of persecution", because when those persecutions took place, the exact locations of the catacombs of Rome were widely known. Frank K. Flinn considers that during the period of Christian persecutions and shortly after it, Christians held "memorial rites and Eucharist" near the graves of the more famous Christian martyrs. He adds that "[c]ontrary to novel and movie lore," the catacombs of Rome "were not used as hiding places for Christians." Author J. Osbourne says that "nothing could be further from the truth" than the idea that Christians inhabited the Catacombs during the period of persecution.

Christian art in the catacombs is split into three categories: iconographic, stylistic, and technical. From the first to the sixth century, the art in Roman Christian catacombs progressively went into phases as well: an early phase, an Old Testament phase, and a New Testament phase.

Excavators (fossors) built vast systems of galleries and passages on top of each other. They lie 7 - 19 m below the surface in an area of more than 2.4 km2. Narrow steps that descend as many as four stories join the levels. Passages are about 2.5 x. Burial niches (loculi) were carved into walls. They are 40 - 60 cm high and 120 - 150 cm long. Bodies were placed in chambers in stone sarcophagi in their clothes and bound in linen. Then the chamber was sealed with a slab bearing the name, age, and the day of death. The fresco decorations provide the main surviving evidence for Early Christian art, and initially show typically Roman styles used for decorating homes – with secular iconography adapted to a religious function. The catacomb of Saint Agnes is a small church. Some families were able to construct cubicula which would house various loculi and the architectural elements of the space would offer support for decoration. Another excellent place for artistic programs were the arcosolia.

History of original tunnelling
The complex system of tunnels that would later be known as the catacombs were first excavated by the Etruscan people that lived in the region predating the Romans. These tunnels were first excavated in the process of mining for various rock resources such as limestone and sandstone. These quarries became the basis for later excavation, first by the Romans for rock resources and then by the Christians and Jews for burial sites and mass graves.

Decline and rediscovery
In 380, Christianity became a state religion. At first, many still desired to be buried in chambers alongside the martyrs. However, the practice of catacomb burial declined slowly, and the dead were increasingly buried in church cemeteries. After the Edict of Milan in 313, many Roman Christians flocked to the catacombs in order to find relics from the martyrs, and would pillage through the remains. Due to this, vandalism became rampant in the catacombs. In the 6th century, catacombs were used only for martyrs' memorial services, though some paintings were added as late as the 7th century, for example, a Saint Stephen in the Catacomb of Commodilla. Apparently, Ostrogoths, Vandals and Lombards that sacked Rome also violated the catacombs, presumably looking for valuables. By the 10th century, catacombs were practically abandoned, and holy relics were transferred to above-ground basilicas. Osbourne disputes this characterization, suggesting that the catacombs fell into disrepair following the move out of Rome for the Avignon Papacy and it was only because of the lack of sufficient religious practice in Rome that led the catacombs to completely fall into disrepair.

In the intervening centuries they remained forgotten until they were accidentally rediscovered in 1578, after which Antonio Bosio spent decades exploring and researching them for his Roma Sotterranea (1632). Archeologist Giovanni Battista de Rossi (1822–1894) published the first extensive professional studies about catacombs. In 1956 and 1959 Italian authorities found more catacombs near Rome. The catacombs have become an important monument of the early Christian church.

Today
Responsibility for the Christian catacombs lies with the Holy See, which has set up active official organizations for this purpose: the Pontifical Commission of Sacred Archaeology (Pontificia Commissione di Archeologia Sacra) directs excavations and restoration works, while the study of the catacombs is directed in particular by the Pontifical Academy of Archaeology. The administration of some sites is entrusted on a day-to-day basis to local clergy or religious orders who have an activity on or adjacent to the site. The supervision of the Catacombs of St. Callixtus by the Salesian Fathers is well known. In the last years, with the growth of the internet, updated information is often available online, with an indication of a current street address, opening hours, fees, availability of guides in the different languages, size of groups permitted, and public transport. Like other historical sites in Italy, the catacombs are often not accessible at certain times of the day or on certain days of the week and may require online pre-booking. There are currently only 5 Catacombs open to the public; San Sebastiano, San Callisto, Priscilla, Domitilla, and Sant'Agnese.

Typology
Roman catacombs are made up of underground passages (ambulacra), in the walls of which horizontal niches (loculi) were dug. These loculi, generally laid out in sequences (pilae) one above the other from floor or waist level, could each contain one or more bodies. When placed inside of loculi, bodies were usually covered in a shroud and often covered in lime, which helped to cover the smell of the decaying process. In order to make more money, fossores would often sell occupied loculi to other people. A loculus large enough to contain two bodies were referred to as a bisomus. Another type of burial, typical of Roman catacombs, was the arcosolium, consisting of a curved niche, enclosed under a carved horizontal marble slab. Cubicula (burial rooms containing loculi all for one family) and cryptae (chapels decorated with frescoes) are also commonly found in catacomb passages. When space began to run out, other graves were also dug in the floor of the corridors – these graves are called formae.

List of catacombs in Rome
The Roman catacombs, of which there are forty in the suburbs or former suburbs, were built along the consular roads out of Rome, such as the Via Appia, the Via Ostiensis, the Via Labicana, the Via Tiburtina, and the Via Nomentana. With the exception of the Via Ostiensis (Italian: Via Ostiense), these ancient Latin terms are also the current Italian names for these roads.

Catacombs of Marcellinus and Peter
These catacombs are situated on the ancient Via Labicana, today Via Casilina in Rome, Italy, near the church of Santi Marcellino e Pietro ad Duas Lauros. Their name refers to the Christian martyrs Marcellinus and Peter who, according to tradition, were buried here, near the body of St. Tiburtius.

Catacombs of Domitilla
Close to the Catacombs of San Callisto are the large and impressive Catacombs of Domitilla (named after Saint Domitilla), spread over 17 km of caves.

In the beginning of 2009, at the request of the Vatican, the Divine Word Missionaries, a Roman Catholic Society of priests and Brothers, assumed responsibility as an administrator of St. Domitilla Catacombs.

Catacombs of Commodilla
These catacombs, on the Via Ostiensis, contain one of the earliest images of a bearded Christ. They originally held the relics of Saints Felix and Adauctus. Excavations on the Commodilla were conducted by Franciscan archaeologist Bellarmino Bagatti (1933–34).

Catacombs of Generosa
Located on the Campana Road, these catacombs are said to have been the resting place, perhaps temporarily, of Simplicius, Faustinus and Beatrix, Christian Martyrs who died in Rome during the Diocletian persecution (302 or 303).

Catacombs of Praetextatus
These are found along the via Appia and were built at the end of the 2nd century. They consist of a vast underground burial area, at first in pagan then in Christian use, housing various tombs of Christian martyrs. In the oldest parts of the complex may be found the "cubiculum of the coronation", with a rare depiction for that period of Christ being crowned with thorns, and a 4th-century painting of Susanna and the old men in the allegorical guise of a lamb and wolves.

Catacombs of Priscilla
The Catacomb of Priscilla, situated at the Via Salaria across from the Villa Ada, probably derives its name from the name of the landowner on whose land they were built. They are looked after by the Benedictine nuns of Priscilla.

Catacombs of San Callisto
Sited along the Appian way, these catacombs were built after AD 150, with some private Christian hypogea and a funeral area directly dependent on the Catholic Church. It takes its name from the deacon Saint Callixtus, proposed by Pope Zephyrinus in the administration of the same cemetery – on his accession as pope, he enlarged the complex, that quite soon became the official one for the Roman Church. The arcades, where more than fifty martyrs and sixteen pontiffs were buried, form part of a complex graveyard that occupies fifteen hectares. The Catacombs of San Callisto are around 90 acres large, 12 miles long, contains 4 levels, and spans more than 20 meters underground. Because of the high volume of popes buried inside the catacombs, it is often called the "Little Vatican".

Catacombs of San Lorenzo
Built into the hill beside San Lorenzo fuori le Mura, these catacombs are said to have been the final resting place of St. Lawrence. The church was built by Pope Sixtus III and later remodeled into the present nave. Sixtus also redecorated the shrine in the catacomb and was buried there.

Catacombs of San Pancrazio
Established underneath the San Pacrazio basilica which was built by Pope Symmachus on the place where the body of the young martyr Saint Pancras, or Pancratius, had been buried. In the 17th century, it was given to the Discalced Carmelites, who completely remodeled it. The catacombs house fragments of sculpture and pagan and early Christian inscriptions.

Catacombs of San Sebastiano
One of the smallest Christian cemeteries, this has always been one of the most accessible catacombs and is thus one of the least preserved (of the four original floors, the first is almost completely gone). On the left-hand end of the right-hand wall of the nave of the primitive basilica, rebuilt in 1933 on ancient remains, arches to end the middle of the nave of the actual church, built in the 13th century, are visible, along with the outside of the apse of the Chapel of the Relics; whole and fragmentary collected sarcophagi (mostly of 4th-century date) were found in excavations. This is where the martyrs Sebastian and Eutychius were buried. Via a staircase down, one finds the arcades where varied cubicula (including the cubiculum of Giona's fine four stage cycle of paintings, dating to the end of the 4th century). One then arrives at the restored crypt of S. Sebastiano, with a table altar on the site of the ancient one (some remains of the original's base still survive) and a bust of Saint Sebastian attributed to Bernini. From here one reaches a platform, under which is a sandstone cavity ad catacumbas which once may have been named "ad catacumbas", thus giving this and all other tombs of this type their name. 3 mausolea of the second half of the 2nd century (but also in later use) open off the platform. The first one on the right, decorated on the outside with paintings of funereal banquets and the miracle of the calling out of Cerasa's demons, on the inside contains paintings (including a ceiling painting of a Gorgon's head) and inhumation burials and has a surviving inscription reading "Marcus Clodius Hermes", the name of its owner. The second, called by some "tomb of the Innocentiores" (a burial club which owned it), has a refined stucco ceiling, Latin inscriptions in Greek characters, and a graffito with the initials of the Greek words for "Jesus Christ, Son of God, Saviour". On the left is the mausoleum of Ascia, with an exterior wall painting of vine shoots rising from kantharoi up trompe-l'œil pillars.

A room called the "Triglia" rises from the platform, roughly in the middle of the basilica and cut into from above by the present basilica. This covered room was used for funereal banquets; the plastered walls have hundreds of graffiti by the devotees at these banquets, carved in the second half of the 3rd to the beginnings of the 4th century, with appeals to the apostle's Peter and Paul. From the "Trigilia" one passed into an ancient ambulatory, which turns around into an apse: here is a collection of epitaphs and a model of all the mausolei, of the "Triglia" and of the Constantinian basilica. From here one descends into the "Platonica", construction at the rear of the basilica that was long believed to have been the temporary resting place for Peter and Paul, but was in fact (as proved by excavation) a tomb for the martyr Quirinus, bishop of Sescia in Pannonia, whose remains were brought here in the 5th century. To the right of the "Platonica" is the chapel of Honorius III, adapted as the vestibule of the mausoleum, with interesting 13th-century paintings of Peter and Paul, the Crucifixion, saints, the Massacre of the Innocents, Madonna and Child, and other subjects. On the left is an apsidal mausoleum with an altar built against the apse: on the left wall, a surviving graffito reading "domus Petri" either hints at Peter having been buried here or testifies to the belief at the time the graffito was written that Peter was buried here.

Catacombs of San Valentino
These catacombs were dedicated to Saint Valentine. In the 13th century, the martyr's relics were transferred to Basilica of Saint Praxedes.

Catacombs of Sant'Agnese
Built for the conservation and veneration of the remains of Saint Agnes of Rome. Agnes' bones are now conserved in the church of Sant'Agnese fuori le mura in Rome, built over the catacomb. Her skull is preserved in a side chapel in the church of Sant'Agnese in Agone in Rome's Piazza Navona.

Catacombs of via Anapo
On the via Salaria, the Catacombs of via Anapo are datable to the end of the 3rd or the beginning of the 4th century and contain diverse frescoes of biblical subjects.

Jewish catacombs
There are six known Jewish catacombs in Rome, two of which are open to the public: Vigna Randanini and Villa Torlonia.

The Jewish catacombs were discovered in 1918, and archaeological excavations continued for twelve years. The structure has two entrances, one on via Syracuse and the other inside Villa Torlonia. The catacombs extend for more than 13000 m2, and date back to the period between the 2nd and 3rd centuries, and possibly remained in use until the 5th century. There are almost a century of epitaphs, but these do not show any examples of a particular belief, beyond some rare frescoes showing the classic Jewish religious symbols. Jewish Catacombs are distinguished from their Christian counterparts by various signs as well as the fact that Jewish people did not visit the dead in the Catacombs. Parts of the Old Testament and the symbol of a candlestick with seven-branches have been spotted on the walls of Jewish Catacombs.

Due to high levels of humidity and temperature, bone preservation has been negatively affected in the catacombs. Scientists are unable to identify the sex of the dead due to the lack of preservation in the bones.

The other catacombs are not open to the public because of the instability of their structure and the presence of radon.

Gallery of paintings from the catacombs of Rome
In the Catacombs of Rome, there are many different pieces of artwork. Most artworks are religious in nature, some depicting important Christian rites such as baptism, or scenes and stories such as the tale of "The Three Hebrews and the Fiery Furnace," or biblical figures such as Adam and Eve.

title: Catacombs of Rome


text:
Bangai-O

Bangai-O is a multidirectional shooter developed by Treasure and released in 1999 on the Nintendo 64 in Japan. It was ported to the Dreamcast worldwide shortly after with some gameplay changes and updated graphics and audio. The game places the player in control of a weaponized mech that can hover across large stages and fire at enemies all around them. The player must reach the end of each stage and defeat the boss, while avoiding hazards scattered across the map such as enemy mechs and gun turrets.

The initial ideas for Bangai-O came from Treasure programmer Mitsuru Yaida who wanted to challenge himself by programming an extreme number of bullets on the screen at once. Journalists agree that Yaida was most likely inspired by the 1984 Japanese computer game Hover Attack. The team developed the game with a focus on creating enjoyable gameplay, and opted for simple graphical effects to preserve the game's speed. Bangai-O was released on the Nintendo 64 and was limited to a run of 10,000 copies because of publisher Entertainment Software Publishing's belief it had niche appeal. The team replaced most of the graphics and audio, changed some gameplay elements, and re-released it on the Dreamcast three months later, a version later released internationally.

Bangai-O received positive reviews from game journalists. Many critics compared it to shoot 'em ups and action games of the past, praising its retro gameplay and aesthetics. They also commended the level design for keeping the game interesting throughout. Some reviews, especially those for the Dreamcast version, were more critical of the graphics and believed the game's value was primarily in its nostalgic gameplay. The game received two sequels: Bangai-O Spirits (2008) for the Nintendo DS and Bangai-O HD: Missile Fury (2011) for the Xbox 360.

Gameplay

Bangai-O is a 2D side-scrolling multidirectional shooter. The player controls a weaponized mech that is piloted by the two main characters, Riki and his sister Mami. The story follows Riki and Mami in their efforts to stop criminals from smuggling fruit contraband to finance their evil deeds. The player can fly freely around each of the game's 44 stages, and must find and destroy the boss in each stage to advance. The mech can shoot in eight directions, and the type of ammo is dependent on which character is piloting. The two pilots can be interchanged instantaneously, Riki fires homing missiles and Mami shoots reflecting projectiles which bounce off walls. The stages are populated with destroyable buildings and obstacles, as well as some walls that are opened by switches. There are also hazards such as gun turrets and enemy mechs which fire projectiles at the player. The player has a health meter but no brief invulnerability period after being hit, so can die instantly if hit with a barrage of fire. Destroyed enemies and objects yield fruit which replenishes a meter that is used to power the "scatter bomb" attack. This attack can be charged to release up to 100 shots scattered in all directions at once. Hitting all 100 shots on enemies will open a small portal to a shop where the player can get upgrades such as improved shot damage.

The Dreamcast version of Bangai-O, released after the initial Nintendo 64 version, features significant differences in gameplay which results in a more streamlined experience. In the Dreamcast version, the bullets are stronger, and destroying objects and enemies refills the bomb attack meter instead of fruit which now only add to the player's score. The bomb attack also can no longer be charged to a specific number of missiles, but is dependent on the player's proximity to enemy projectiles. In the Dreamcast version, up to 400 missiles can be shot at once in comparison to 100 on the Nintendo 64. Also, the shop is removed. Instead, the game includes power-ups that can be found among environment wreckage. There are also other minor differences such as scoring differences and more structure and enemy types.

Development
The idea for Bangai-O came from Treasure employee Mitsuru Yaida (commonly known by the pseudonym "Yaiman"). He remembered playing an older shooting game that amazed him with the sheer number of bullets that could be rendered on the screen at once. Even though Yaiman and other staff behind the game have not identified the game, industry analysts agree that the game is almost certainly Hover Attack (1984) for Japanese computers. Yaiman began thinking about the programming challenges involved in detecting when the bullets collide with other objects, and started work on a prototype. He later received permission from company president Masato Maegawa to pull in other staff and work towards producing a full game. Yaiman served as the main programmer and "General Manager". About ten people worked on Bangai-O.

Treasure developed the game with a focus on creating addictive and fast gameplay, with less focus on graphics. They opted for large and fast 2D graphical effects and anime artwork to preserve their style. One of the artists on the team, Koichi Kimura, had just finished working on Guardian Heroes (1996), another 2D game. With more powerful development hardware available, he wanted to challenge himself the possibilities and limits of 2D graphics. The story is based on typical Japanese yakuza revenge plays.

Release
Treasure announced Bangai-O for the Nintendo 64 in June 1999. It was released on September 3 the same year. Because of the game's niche appeal, the publisher Entertainment Software Publishing (ESP) only shipped 10,000 units.

The Dreamcast version was first released in Japan on December 9, 1999. This version had improved graphics and audio over the Nintendo 64 original. Many of the sprites were reworked, background animations were added, and the game now featured CD-quality music. By February 2000, publishers were researching the possibility of localizing the Dreamcast version for Western audiences. At the Electronic Entertainment Expo (E3) in May that year, IGN reported that a company had begun localizing the game, and had given it English menus and renamed it Bangai-O from its obscure Japanese title, Bakuretsu Muteki Bangaioh. In December, industry newcomer Conspiracy Entertainment announced they were localizing Bangai-O along with another Dreamcast game, Record of Lodoss War (2000). The Dreamcast version was planned for release on February 27, 2001, but was eventually released on March 21.

Reception
Bangai-O received positive reviews for its initial Nintendo 64 release. Critics enjoyed the manic and unique gameplay that they believed was characteristic of Treasure's video games. Most compared it to older shoot 'em ups and action games. Eric Mylonas of GameFan called it a mix between the free-floating gameplay of Sub-Terrania (1994) and the rotating shooting action of Omega Boost (1999). He appreciated it as one of the few shooters on the Nintendo 64, and compared its aesthetic missile shooting style to Macross. Peter Bartholow (GameSpot) wrote that the game was "in typical Treasure fashion...an addictive and original hodgepodge of genres and game mechanics that defy easy explanation". Journalists commended the variety in the game's design that kept it feeling fresh throughout. Anoop Gantayat (IGN) wrote that the level design made good use of each character's shooting mode. Bartholow and Martin Kitts (N64 Magazine) both praised the level design for forcing the player to change their tactics level to level. Bartholow called the building elements for the levels "versatile", and went on to say some levels were puzzles, others had racing aspects, and others were "insane blastfests". Gantayat argued that Bangai-O is "a game that you either love, or just don't understand yet".

Bangai-O was praised for its retro gameplay and aesthetics. Kitts and Mylonas wrote that it looked and played like a Super NES game and pointed out how some effects were reminiscent of the 16-bit system's Mode 7 rotation effects. Mylonas explained further that it looked like a Super NES game with less slowdown, a higher resolution, and more color. Rick Mears (GameFan) wrote that it felt like Robotron (1982) with its unique control style, and called it an "old school 2D treat". Although the game was not in 3D like most other games at the time, critics felt the 2D graphics were satisfactory enough. Gantayat pointed out the scatter bomb attack that fills the screen with bullets "a momentous occasion...one of the main parts of the Bangai-O experience". Mears praised the game for not slowing down when rendering scenes like this.

Reviews for the Dreamcast version carried the same sentiments as the Nintendo 64 version in regards to the frantic and unique gameplay. Gantayat (IGN) and Matt van Stone (GameFan) preferred this new version because of the updated graphics, new CD-quality soundtrack, and more streamlined gameplay. With this release, journalists were more critical of the graphics and audio, commenting more heavily on the game's appeal primarily as a nostalgic shooter. The staff at Computer and Video Games wrote that it was a fun in a nostalgic way, but will not hold a player's attention for very long. A critic of PlanetDreamcast wrote that the graphics were bland and lacked polish, and the focus was on the gameplay. They argued that Bangai-O is a game designed for "hardcore" gamers and commented: "Are games coming out today missing something from the glory days of twitch gameplay...Or am I just too jaded by the 3-D graphics, complex mission objectives, and controls of most modern games[?]" In a brief but critical review, Dreamcast Magazine UK argued that it was a nearly direct port of the Nintendo 64 version, and called it "unimaginative". Human Tornado of GamePro said, "This well-designed 2D shooter will satisfy fans of old-school arcade ation games, but Bangai-O doesn't break any new ground. Still, it's a very challenging game that action gamers can groove to."

Despite never having been reviewed, the Dreamcast version was nominated at The Electric Playground's 2001 Blister Awards for "Best Console Shooter Game", but lost to Halo: Combat Evolved.

Sequels
Bangai-O received two sequels. The first, Bangai-O Spirits, was released for the Nintendo DS in 2008, and the second, Bangai-O HD: Missile Fury, was released exclusively on the Xbox 360 via Xbox Live Arcade in 2011. The games feature most of the same core gameplay ideas as the first game, but evolve on them with more weapons and gameplay elements. Both games included level editors, and the latter features multiplayer modes.

title: Bangai-O