The population in cities is constantly increasing, and
thus
housing crisis is a most common problem big cities are facing today.
This
is a major concern for governments as it not only increase the cost of living, but
also
affects the quality of life for its residents. I do agree that only governments can solve
this
problem by taking various measures,
such
as restricting landed houses to save the space, encouraging vertical residential buildings and gradually expanding the
city
.
In the olden days, people lived in landed independent houses as there were lots of spaces in the
city
.
However
,
this
is not possible in the modern cities as the
city
population is increasing rapidly, and resulting in a space shortage situation for accommodating housing for all. One of the action governments can take is to discourage building new landed houses and encourage people to live in apartment flats.
For instance
, the Singapore government has built thousands of high-floor residential flats through a housing development board to accommodate its ever-growing residents in an affordable way. It
also
stopped permitting for building new landed houses to deal with the space crunch.
Some governments are
also
looking at options for expanding the
city
to create more residential properties.
For example
, Bangalore, one of the fast growing cities in India is continuously expanding by incorporating more residential properties and other infrastructure at the outskirts of the
city
, which gradually becomes part of the growing
city
.
However
,
this
option is viable only when there are enough spaces surrounding the
city
. For cities like Hong-Kong and Singapore, which are islands, the only option is to grow vertically within the
city
. Solving the housing shortage is an issue that requires proper planning and big investment and residence of a big
city
have very little to do and the government seems like the appropriate authority to solve
this
problem.
In conclusion, the cities are growing rapidly and so the residents of the
city
also
grow.
Thus
, it is the responsibility of governments to take appropriate measures to create a better living place at an affordable price for its
city
residents.