Community Land Trust

First Community Land Trust site fully occupied

It Takes a City Community Land Trust (the CLT) has completed its first modular homes scheme.

Joy’s Corner, Cambridge welcomed its first resident at the end of 2024 and by March 2025, the three other occupants had moved in.

The CLT was initially set up by It Takes a City (ITAC), and the charities, whilst legally and financially independent, share a mission to support vulnerable people on their long journey from streets to home. They also share a Founder and Chair, Chris Jenkin BEM, who is delighted to see this innovative scheme come to fruition:

“We are proud to have led such an amazing team of partners in delivering this innovative project, which makes great use of a very small site in the city.

Our thanks go to all of them, along with our donors and investors, who have made it possible for us to give four people a place to call home.

We are delighted that the residents have been given such a warm welcome by the local community and would particularly like to thank the Queen Edith Community Forum for their support.”

Joy’s Corner is the first of what the CLT hopes, will be many similar schemes, as part of the larger efforts to end homelessness and rough sleeping in the Greater Cambridge area.

If you would like to find out more and support our efforts then do, please contact the CLT team.

The sites and homes

The modular homes, known as ‘pods’ were built off-site by local organisation, New Meaning Foundation. The pods are small, fully equipped and self-contained. They are designed to be easy to run, hi-tech and environmentally friendly, with a minimum 60-year lifetime. They are also designed to be relocatable.

Initially, the CLT focused on the use of temporary land, not yet in use for housing, to develop small schemes using off-site built relocatable modular homes. Joy’s Corner is located on a site owned by Cambridge City Council. We are grateful to the following for their valuable contributions, often provided on a pro-bono basis Allia, Archangel Architects, Bidwells, Breheny Civil Engineering, Carter Jonas, CB3 Consulting Ltd, HCR Hewitsons, Ligna Consultancy, MKA Ecology, Munro Building Services, Stantec and Welch Group.

The aim is for future sites to be located on permanent land, either owned / long-term leased, or hybrid schemes alongside traditional social housing in partnership with a developer.

You can take a quick tour of one of the homes here.

Survive and Thrive

A key aim of this project was to ensure that residents receive the flexible support they need. This support is provided by It Takes a City and their very experienced Survive & Thrive team.