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A change in stats

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I modified the stats on the Association website today to reflect a modified long-term plan for the towns. While the initial number of sites per town will only be 10% (108) of a town’s capacity, the new stats reflect a town’s population at maximum density. The numbers are based on the new site POD plans posted earlier in the Advisor Discussion forum and include 10% for greenspace and town administration areas. The stats also reflect a larger town staff to resident ratio of 1 to 75. With the proposed 10 hrs per month of volunteer time by residents and 32 hrs per month for ARTO Program participants, this is expected to cover the anticipated town needs at this point.

The greenspace allowance is planned to include some centralized administration space which will include the BioGas processing plant. I am attending a seminar and tour with Mike Janiec which is being hosted by CCIBioEnergy. We are talking with them about providing waste/compost processing solutions town-wide, to produce our own renewable natural gas (RNG). At this point, the plan is to use RNG to supply the town’s tiny homes NG needs and to act as back electricity production to supplement solar production. Each POD will have its own solar energy production and storage facility (see the POD designs) and the RNG will supplement this if the solar storage is depleted. Presently we have planned 8 solar panels per tiny home and are expecting that will allow us to store enough power to get us through dark times. 

I have also been discussing the solar panel design with Mike to maximize solar collection and storage for the Canadian locations and will post more news as talks progress. Look for more details coming in the forum.

 

Proposed BioGas Processing

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I reached out to the board of the Canadian BioGas Association yesterday requesting that they direct me to any members that could assist in the development of a biogas processing/waste management plan for our Tiny Towns.

The current trend in tiny home designs supports independence through off-grid living. This home model has a higher initial acquisition cost and requires specialized knowledge to operate and maintain. This makes an off-grid home less than an ideal design to fit our housing model, one that is more affordable and where anyone can live in. We instead are developing the concept of off-grid towns. The idea is that the town itself will be self-sufficient, generating its own hydro, natural gas, processing its own waste, producing some of its own food. We are working to design a town plan which will be as green as possible, so we are following all leads and ideas to determine which are best suited to incorporate into each town.

The BioGas initiative is to convert human waste and organics generated by the town into Renewable Natural Gas (RNG) that can then be used to operate natural gas appliances and generate power for the town to supplement the solar program.

Here is the request that was sent to their board:

Canadian BioGas Association Board Member,

I am reaching out to you in the hope that you can direct me to a member or members of your association that can assist us in developing a biosgas processing/waste management plan for the tiny home towns that we are in the process of planning.

Our mandate is to create a network of “Tiny Towns” where tiny homeowners may legally park and reside. Our towns are planned to be self-sufficient and our interest is in processing human waste and organics into RNG. This together with a solar energy program, we are planning to use to operate our towns off-grid.

More information about our association is available on our website:

https://www.tinytownassociation.com

I would ask you to forward my contact details to any members of your association that you feel could assist us. If you have any questions, do not hesitate to contact me directly.

Thank you in advance for your assistance,
Ed Peterson
Founder/Director

NFP Certification

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Just a quick note to keep everyone in the loop. On October 2nd, we received our official certification from Corporations Canada that as of September 29, 2017 we are a Federally incorporated Canadian Not-For-Profit. This certification will allow us to move forward on many of the projects we have on the go, as well as many new projects that are in the planning stages.

As always, if you are available to help out further, please send me a PM. If you know anyone that is interested in making Tiny Homes a viable housing option, introduce them to the website, encourage them to sign the petition and join the association.

Thanks to all.

Tiny Town Association direction refined

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The direction of the Tiny Town Association has been refined and the information on the website has been updated to reflect this clarified purpose. We have begun working with a few municipalities to develop Tiny Towns to provide affordable housing in the form of tiny homes. We are also exploring the possibility of producing a base tiny house on wheels for the program. Together this will allow us to begin construction of the first Tiny Town with some affordable tiny homes with occupants in them. Additional spaces will be made available for tiny homeowners that want to book into the vacant sites.

This business model of combining affordable housing and transitional housing, while originally a concept is connecting with existing provincial programs to accelerate the development of the towns. As more towns are added from our target list of host cities, tiny homeowners will have more choices of cites to live “tiny” close to. Stay tuned for announcements of each tiny townsite as they are confirmed.

Most of the menu items have been changed on the site as well as many new items have been added. These include some YouTube items where we are beginning to post videos about tiny home design in addition to community videos. 

The association is working together with some manufacturers to mass produce our custom affordable tiny homes. Stay tuned for more details.

Website updates

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I just wanted to update everyone on some new website news.

  • The website is now secured and you will notice the Secure | https://www.tinytownassociation.com. This ensures that you will not get any notices about unsecured web site logins.
  • The Tiny Home Directory is beginning to grow, thanks and keep recommending those websites that you find to be of interest.
  • I have secured a really impressive prize to the member that has the most successful invites by the end of 2017! If you own, or plan/hope to own a Tiny Home and you are hoping to stay in a Tiny Town, the grand prize will be something that you will value a lot. More details to come, so keep inviting!
  • Disqus commenting is being added throughout the site, so look for your opportunity to share your thoughts.
  • If you have a question about the Tiny Town Association or something related to the website, post your question in the FAQ section. FAQs will help us grow a repository of answers that may help others with similar questions.

If you have some time that you can volunteer to help us with some of the admin/website/association promotions, update your member profile and let us know. If you aren’t a member, Join and indicate you would like to Volunteer.

Website links directory – delayed on new site

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We have launched our new Tiny Home Directory which we have dubbed “Our world of Tiny Homes”. We want to build a resource for owners and wannabes to help us navigate the growing Tiny Home industry. If you have a tiny home related website or offer products and services for tiny homes, or you find a really great website, YouTube channel, etc. that you want to share with the community, we encourage you to submit it under Recommend a website.

Being listed in the directory is free, as we want to build the most comprehensive directory possible. All we ask is a link reference to the association website on your site so that we can spread the word about our Tiny Town mission. As the industry comes together, we can make Tiny Homes a viable housing option, now and for the future.

Advisory Board Discussions are now Open

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I have now begun posting to the Advisory Board Discussions. This is where all plans and discussions about the direction of the Tiny Town Association will develop. All members of the Advisory Board are encouraged to follow and comment in any discussion that interests you, as this will form the basis for the Associations actions.

The first discussion started is regarding designing the model for Tiny Towns. I believe that building with a plan will create a better town, so I have posted my initial thoughts (well thoughts that have developed over the last year or so) and I look forward to the board’s comments. I have started with the town design as a discussion as I am beginning discussions with suppliers about town services.

Currently the Advisory Board is open to new members, so if you think you can contribute to the association’s plans, I encourage you to become a member of the board. Simply log into the site and update your profile to indicate you want to join the board or register and select Advisory Board member as a way you would like to Participate.

100,000 Supporters

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Our goal is to get 100,000 people to sign our petition to prove to the municipal, provincial, territorial and federal governments that Tiny Homes, and our Tiny Town initiative is something to be taken seriously. Once we have reached our target, we will present our Petition, along with our plan to make Tiny Towns a reality to all levels of government.

We are not looking to just advocate our plan, we want to enact our plan by acquiring the land, getting the correct Tiny Town zoning applied, developing the land based on the town model we are designing, then make the sites available to tiny homeowners. We are beginning discussions with some tiny home builders about construction of our social program homes, and plan to have some available in each Tiny Town when they open.

So help us get to 100,000 signatures. Tell everyone you know that has an interest in tiny homes about the association. Post us on your social feeds. When you are logged into the website, within your profile is an Invite tab. You can send invites to your friends from your profile and track who signs up. This will also track how many people that you recommend to us, sign the petition. Maybe we’ll award a prize to the member that gets the most  people to sign the petition. I am not promising anything here, because a prize is not the reason to tell people about the association. It is the strength in numbers that 100,000 signatures brings to the table. So help us grow!

 

Follow Tiny Home Communities in the News

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Note: we had stopped collecting news and YouTube videos, focusing on our own content

We have begun collecting the latest news stories that relate to Tiny Home communities from across the web. The news that we find relevant to communities we are posting an intro in our News category and linking to the original story. If you have an interest in Tiny Home communities, you will be able to follow the latest news, as it breaks through the association site.

We have also begun filtering through YouTube videos that are relevant to our THOWs community cause and are linking to them in our News category as well.

Our aim is to bring together everything that relates to THOWs communities on this website to assist the policy makers, homeowners, and partner corporations with a single portal to everything that is Tiny Town relevant. If you find information that you think is of value, send us a link to our Contact Us page, or join the association yourself!

Tiny Town Association website is active

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The Tiny Town Association website is now active. We have been working hard to formalize our Mission and create a direction towards achieving our goals. While we understand that as new information arises and we move through the plan as it exists today, modifications and improvements will be required to bring a version of our vision to reality.

If you have an interest in Tiny Houses (Homes) on Wheels, then I would extend to you an invitation to join our membership. Our goal is simply to make legal places for Tiny Homes to park. While our initial focus is in Canada (we live here), our hopes are that the association concept will extend to every country around the world, providing all people with the ability to live tiny, should they so choose.

There are no membership fees to join, just your support of the concept is enough. If you want to go further, then indicate how you would like to help out on the registration form and we will contact you to discuss what you can do to help us create a place for Tiny Homes in our world.