With a new wave of micro-apartments coming to the city, experts are warning that the super-small dwellings could make their cramped occupants crazy.
Higher rates of stress, substance abuse and domestic violence have been linked to tight living quarters, and allowing an influx of apartments under 370 square feet could create a new population of stressed-out city dwellers with cabin fever, experts warn.
“Sure, these micro-apartments may be fantastic for young professionals in their 20s,” Dak Kopec, director of “design for human health” at Boston Architectural College, told The Atlantic Cities site. “But they definitely can be unhealthy for older people, say, in their 30s and 40s, who face different stress factors that can make tight living conditions a problem.”
And don’t expect the tiny quarters to come with tiny rents.
At the city-owned Midtown site where Mayor Bloomberg is backing the development of the Big Apple’s first all-micro-unit building, rents are expected to run between $940 and $1,800. The building, at 335 E. 27th St., is set to open in 2015.
Experts say that will be just the beginning as demand for these compartments in the space-strapped city rises, and the dollar amount charged for each square foot goes through the roof — leading to even more stress.
Cities such as Seattle and Vancouver are already seeing a backlash against micro-apartments, with locals complaining that “apodment” tenants are overrunning their already crowded neighborhoods.
“Nobody is claiming that micro-apartments will be a silver bullet,” Eric Bunge, a principal at the Brooklyn-based firm nARCHITECTS, told The Atlantic Cities.
But Bunge, whose firm designed the planned East 27th Street building, insists the pads there won’t be claustrophobia-inducing cells. Tenants will have spacious on-site amenities including a lobby with a public garden, he said.
Some experts note that having a place of one’s own — however miniscule — can be a psychological boost for any urbanite.
“Organizing and living in a tiny house can clearly be a challenge, and many people really enjoy solving puzzles,” one expert on design environments, Sally Augustin, wrote in Psychology Today.
“Tiny places need to be well designed or they quickly become chaotic.”
How small is too small? Berkeley, Calif.-based developer Patrick Kennedy joked to The New York Times that he can bottom out at 160 square feet “without causing psychological problems.”