Housing Commission Duplex

At the close of Second World War Australia experienced a major housing shortage. In Queensland the shortage reached its peak in 1947 with over 4218 families living in temporary accommodation including housing camps comprised of disused army barracks, calico and canvas tents, and even bark huts. The role of the newly established Queensland Housing Commission (est. 1945) was to provide affordable housing or rental homes for those Queenslanders without. 

Post-war shortages in the supply of timber and roofing iron encouraged the use of alternative building materials. Bricks, fibro cement, terra-cotta and concrete were used. Initially brick was used before less traditional materials. It was not long however before bricks became scarce as increased demand outstripped even the increased output made possible by mechanisation and industry expansion.

While acceding to Commonwealth Government recommendations in many regards, the Queensland Housing Commission also developed a measure of independence in the matter of the styles of housing it provided. The Housing Minister (Mr Bruce) was reluctant to follow the New South Wales example of erecting blocks of flats, commenting early in 1946 that Queenslanders preferred individual houses on blocks of land where they could engage in gardening. Thus, while adopting the common standards laid down by the Commonwealth in relation to maximum floor standards, Queensland authorities resisted the pressure for uniformity and ‘uttermost economy’. 

In 1948 the Brisbane City Council approved the construction of a two unit dwelling at 58 Montcrief Road, Cannon Hill. The applicant, the Queensland Housing Commission, had purchased the land in 1947. The material to be used for the construction of the duplex was recorded as brick. The floors were recorded as hardwood. The area in which the duplex was constructed saw a large number of housing commission dwellings built. Situated close to the industries in the area that could provide adequate employment as well as beside the railway station, the majority of QHC dwellings constructed in this part of Cannon Hill in the late 1940s and early 1950s were single units with individual yards. 

58 Montcrief Road was built as a two unit dwelling, an unusual design for the QHC in this period. In the same year two other brick duplexes were constructed in the vicinity. The three duplex buildings that exist in Gatling and Montcrief Roads follow the same layout and all were constructed of masonry. It is probable that the duplexes were intended to be rented by single or childless couples who were employed in the nearby industries, not for families. Evidence of the unusualness of these duplexes can be found in the QHC’s publications on house designs. The booklet from the late 1940s includes only single unit dwellings in both timber and brick construction. The absence of the duplex is significant as it suggests that it did not follow the standard QHC housing designs. In a time of governmental restrictions on new building sizes the duplex provides evidence of the QHC’s attempts to construct multi-unit dwellings. It also demonstrates the QHC’s wish to avoid construction of high rise intensive housing solutions that were being constructed in Melbourne and Sydney in the same period.

1. Historic Titles, Department of Environment and Resource Management

2. Metropolitan Water and Sewerage Survey Map

3. Apperley, Richard and Robert Irving and Peter Reynolds, A Pictorial Guild to Identifying Australian Architecture, Angus and Robertson Publishers, Sydney, 1989

4. University of Queensland, ‘Queensland Places: Cannon Hill”

5. Cannon Hill School of Arts: 75th Anniversary 1923-1998, Cannon Hill Community Association, 1998

6. Brisbane City Council Building Cards

7. Hollander, Robyn, Housing Under Labour: The Queensland Housing Commission, 1945-57, Phd Thesis, Griffith University, 1996.

8. Queensland Government, Department of Housing, Building Communities: Celebrating the Achievements of the Queensland Housing Commission 1945-2003

9. Queensland Housing Commission, Home Designs 1945-, Brisbane: Government Printer, 1945