A settlement of 150 people needs about 30-40 housing units, grouped into courtyard clusters of 4-8 houses with at least 5 m of clear space between buildings, a private yard of 30-50 m² per unit, and a path from every unit to the communal core. The 5 m gap assumes non-combustible walls and must be doubled for timber or thatch, so the wall material decides how much land the zone needs.
Part of Settlement Layout for 150 People
The residential zone is where families sleep and cook, laid out so that mutual aid is close, fire cannot jump between homes, and waste and water stay apart.
Cluster Housing Balances Neighbourliness Against Fire And Privacy
The layout guide offers three arrangements. A cluster puts 4-8 houses around a shared courtyard, which gives semi-private shared space and natural mutual aid. A linear row along a path is cheap to service with water and paths but less communal. An organic scatter uses each micro-site best but is hardest to service. The guide recommends the cluster.
The number of units follows from household size. 150 people in 30-40 units is 150 ÷ 40 = 3.75 to 150 ÷ 30 = 5 people per unit, which matches the family units in Multi-Family Housing Design.
What You Need
- A count of households — from the census, not the headcount alone
- The wall material for each unit — it sets the fire spacing
- The communal core already placed — clusters are arranged around it
- A drainage plan — yards and paths shed water to ditches (Drainage Ditches)
Method: Count, Cluster, Space, Connect
Step 1: Count units. Divide the households into units; plan 30-40 for 150 people.
Step 2: Choose cluster size. The guide gives two figures that do not quite agree: 4-8 houses around a courtyard in one place, and four clusters of 8-10 houses in its recommendation. Both are workable. Four clusters of 8-10 give 32-40 units, while 4-8 per courtyard gives between 30 ÷ 8 ≈ 4 and 40 ÷ 4 = 10 courtyards. Pick the one your terrain allows.
Step 3: Set the spacing. Keep at least 5 m of clear ground between buildings of non-combustible or fire-resistant wall, and double it for timber or thatch walls, as the fire guide requires (Fire Prevention in Settlements). Do not fill the gap with woodpiles.
Step 4: Give each unit its yard. At 30-50 m² per unit, 30-40 units need 30 × 30 = 900 m² to 40 × 50 = 2,000 m² of yard in total, 0.09-0.2 ha.
Step 5: Connect. Each unit gets a secondary path of 1-1.5 m to a primary path (Path Network Design).
Common Mistakes
- Treating 5 m as universal — it holds only for non-combustible walls.
- Putting a toilet or soakaway upslope of a well — site sanitation relative to the water source first (Source Protection).
- One chimney serving several homes — smoke and carbon monoxide pass between dwellings; see Shared Kitchen and Dining.
Safety
A burning home is a threat to every neighbour
Radiant heat and sparks from one burning house can ignite the next. Keep spacing, roofs of metal, tile or sod rather than thatch, and a water barrel of at least 200 L at each cluster, as the layout guide specifies. Cooking in a sleeping space produces carbon monoxide; vent every stove to the outside.
What’s Next
- Learn next: Fire Breaks and Building Spacing — where the spacing figures come from
- Combine with: Courtyard Cluster — the building form behind the cluster