Madison Reporter

At 81, Christine Cannon, a retired teacher, is considering selling her home to move into a senior condo. However, the condo she envisions does not yet exist. She and her husband Ted, 86, previously downsized from their two-story house in Middleton to a one-story home nearby. Their current residence has a larger yard which Ted enjoys maintaining as an avid gardener.

Cannon anticipates that Ted may not always be able to manage the yard work and is uninterested in traditional assisted living or nursing facilities where many of her friends have moved. "So many people just sit around and kind of waste away," said Cannon. She prefers staying active by swimming three mornings a week, volunteering at the Middleton-Cross Plains Performing Arts Center, and going on nature walks with her husband.

Instead of conventional options, Cannon is interested in a new project on Madison’s west side. Nurse Karin Krause and family educator Paula Reif are working on creating an "intentional intergenerational neighborhood" behind a 19th-century farmhouse. They claim it would be the first such model in Wisconsin.