What is York Central Co-Owned (YoCo)?
York Central Co-Owned (YoCo) is a project which will create a community-led development of affordable homes and workplaces as a small part of the redevelopment of the York Central site being carried out by Homes England, its partners and master developer. It will provide a different type of neighbourhood with shared space, resources and facilities, demonstrating how creative and comfortable such a communal approach can be.
YoCo is being developed by a small group of people from the locality and across York. It grew out of the public engagement carried out in 2018 and the wish of local people to have an active role in addressing issues of housing affordability, local wealth creation and responding to York’s massive problem with inequality. Everyone is putting their time in for free, including the professionals helping to steer the project. The group have had discussions with all the major partners in the York Central development and aim to negotiate purchase of land as part of one of the upcoming phases.
How did this all start?
The My York Central community engagement process resulted in a public vision for the massive site. This made a priority of homes for living rather than investment, created in mixed-use, walkable neighbourhoods with public space for people to share for creative use, rather than for cars. People recognised the problems caused by York’s inequality, but also the opportunities that inequality provided for people to invest in neighbourhoods which enabled better life for everyone.
YoCo was formed in 2019 and developed a community plan for York Central, which asked key questions:- if you want children playing in safe streets and birdsong in the trees, how do you get it? YoCo’s chosen approach is to create a walkable neighbourhood with co-owned homes and local businesses, working with the master developer using a process known as Collective Custom Build where people work together to shape and ultimately run their own immediate locality.
How will it be funded?
YoCo aims to create a mixed neighbourhood with a balance of homes and workplaces for people who bring equity, and also for people who need them to be as affordable as possible. By working with Homes England and experienced social landlords who can bring grant funding to the scheme, we will ensure the remaining costs can be covered by affordable borrowing, paid back through rent income.
Who can be part of it?
YoCo is seeking people who wish to be part of this new community and are happy to help shape and its design and governance – join YoCo to find out more.
What’s happening now?
As with most innovative projects, it’s been a long and interesting path, with most of the steps along the way reported via our Blog page.