I feel that I'm going to get fiercely downvoted for expressing this but I always felt that a realistic and cost-constrained solution for homelessness would look a lot more similar to a prison than to a lavish suburb.<p>There are several problems to solve and prisons do it to the best of their capabilities, being also constrained by the population housed inside:<p>- Cost of operation must be minimized. Comfort and space is a luxury for people who can afford it. When the state needs to provide it for a large number of inmates, small rooms with little privacy is all that's possible. There's a vast difference between a Swedish prison and one in Antananarivo and eventually it all reduces to available budget. It's not like Madagascar wouldn't like to have Swedish prison conditions, they just can't afford it. In fact by reductio ad absurdum if they would DO have Swedish prison conditions they'd probably have a problem keeping people out, not in :)<p>- Food would follow the same typology. Expect prison / hospital / army level food rather than Michelin 3 stars restaurant quality.<p>- Unlike a "normal" neighborhood, expect a much higher percent of troublesome population. Mental illness, disability, substance abuse, violent behavior that is. So the problem is not just housing these people, is providing protection not just from the natural elements but from their own kind. Communities like this simply cannot function as regular suburbs, they probably need to be policed and controlled if not like a prison at least like a psychiatric institution.<p>Before jumping at my throat like rabied dogs for daring to propose such a revolting solution rather than build lavish villas to each homeless person on "money taken from the rich", in fact let's build TWO MANSIONS for each person! (I'm being sarcastic if you haven't noticed)... think a bit that it's better than sleeping on the streets, particularly winter streets. And people would be free to leave and live as they wish ... if they can afford something better nothing's stopping them. For some unfortunately, this might be their entire existence so needs to be made as endurable as possible but they need to be realizable realistically and not just dreams of utopias just so we can go to sleep without actually doing anything.