Housing estate

Such estates are usually designed to minimise through-traffic flows and provide recreational space in the form of parks and greens.

Private housing estates usually feature a cluster of high-rise buildings, often with its own shopping centre or market in the case of larger developments.

Mei Foo Sun Chuen, built by Mobil, is the earliest (1965) and largest (99 blocks) example of its kind.

Uniform high-rise developments may form 'wall effect (Chinese: 屏風效應)', adversely affecting air circulation, causing some controversy.

Given the security situation and power shortages in South Asia, 'gated communities' with self-generated energy and modern amenities (24-hour armed security, schools, hospitals, a fire department, retail shopping, restaurants and entertainment centres ) such as Bahria Town and DHA have been developed in all major Pakistani cities.

[7] Bahria has been featured by international magazines and news agencies such as GlobalPost, Newsweek, Los Angeles Times and Emirates 24/7, referred to as the prosperous face of Pakistan.

During the Communist era of Czechoslovakia, construction of large housing estates (Czech: sídliště, Slovak: sídlisko) was an important part of building plans in the country, as the government wanted to provide large quantities of fast and affordable housing for all people,[12] as well as to slash costs by employing uniform designs over the whole country.

Large housing estates of concrete panel buildings (paneláks) now dominate the streets of Prague, Bratislava and other towns.

The largest such housing estate in Central Europe can be found in Petržalka (population about 130,000), a part of the Slovak capital of Bratislava.

The problems incurred[clarification needed] by the early attempts at high density tower-block housing turned people away from this style of living.