Urban Design Discussion

To implement development practices that contribute to managing, mitigating and adapting to catastrophic and long-term climate changes, the practice and authority of land use law, including the use of eminent domain stands as the core issue.  The public trust in this vast body of law will begin to fail if it does not support or advance the solutions offered by advanced urban density.  The core reason for the lack of trust in government are these failures of leadership.

As public policies introduce steps to reduce greenhouse (GHG) emissions in the land use arena, I expect an increase in challenges to the thousands of annual land use judgments.  Whether induced by human activity, natural causes, both or neither, the undeniable reality is an unrelenting increase the cost of energy.  This central point must not be lost, energy as a criterion of land use remains highly undeveloped.

The regulation of land use offers a substantial means toward exponential increases in energy conservation.  Patterns of urban growth that support large tracks of open space with extensively minimized density are almost impossible to achieve.  Land areas most likely affected by the rise of sea levels and increases in natural disasters are the most resistant to additional regulations affecting long term trends of enhanced value and the reasons are grounded in the structure of American governance.

There are just fifty states, but there are about 40,000 local governments in the United States excluding other forms such as school districts and “special districts”.[See 1 below] I would point to this level of participation in governance as positive.  Without doubt, this is one of the great successes of the Republic.  In this context, the dynamic “winners/losers” character of a democracy for as long as there fewer losers than winners.  When the sense of winning begins to fail either sporadically or endemically, the authority of law becomes synonymous with government failure.  Thus, the debate among the nation’s 40,000 governing entities moves away from core energy conservation and regional land use questions into the immediacy of day-to-day revenue concerns.

The need and demand for most of the energy generated comes from buildings and their location.  They serve every use imaginable and logically represent the major source of GHG emissions in their operation, and by extension they represent substantial portion of the transportation GHG emissions relative to the use,  the user’s location and choice of transit.  University of Virginia professor has pointed out, the growth of the population will more than double the built environment over the next 50 years.  His key point is that most of it can occur within existing urban boundaries given support for significant improvements in new transit systems. (See TOD discussion pp.   )

Sustainable Density[2]

The new International Green Construction Code, issued by the International Codes Council, contains techniques for extending this energy saving strategy to existing buildings. Reports and analysis by the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment , the  Rio Accords, the Istanbul Declaration on Human Settlements via UN Habitat and The Johannesburg World Summit on Sustainable Development all point to the ease of defining problems, outlining solutions and the enormous difficulty in establishing protocols for implementation.  The inability of the IPCC to include chapters on Human Settlements and Infrastructure in the Fifth Assessment Report clearly illustrates this tragedy.

One of the quickest ways to get into the heart of these issues is to read Climate Change and Sustainable Development Law in a Nutshell by John Nolon and Patty Salkin.  (Get Book)

[1] The political culture of planning: American land use planning in comparative perspective (Google eBook) by J. B. Cullingworth.    According to the U.S. Census Bureau, 87,453 local governments exist in the U.S., including 39,044 general purpose governments (3,043 counties; 19,372 municipalities; and 16,629 towns or townships); 13,726 school districts; and 34,683 special districts that provide specialized services either not offered or not performed by existing governments

[2] In 1983 Gro Harlem Brundtland of Norway led the UN Commission on Environment and Development when the concept of sustainable development as a means to economic growth was defined and broadly accepted as one “which meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs”.   It is widely used because it is not a rule, but a challenge to develop them.

New York City’s newest set of proposed zoning changes will re-write rules to remove impediments to the construction and retrofitting of buildings in every land use.  The objective: reduce urban energy consumption and greenhouse gas (GHG) production.  The bottom line is the $15 billion/year spent to heat and power buildings that represent 80 percent of the city’s carbon emissions.  Reduction in consumption improves well being.

Can zoning regulations reduce the urban carbon footprint and lower energy costs? Assuring buildings have a good air-barrier and insulation on the exterior will yield energy performance.  Why is encouraging a good air/insulation barrier, (four to eight inches) a zoning issue?

The added bulk to get “energy efficiency” is counted under existing regulations.  This reduces the useable space within the building and ends up in a cost/income trade-off and it tends to build in a substandard “triple net” energy cost transfer from the developer to the lease holder or owner.      The new regulations will exempt the added bulk in relation to floor area limits (FAR) and open space regulations (OSR).

Will this reduce the TDC/ROI energy trade off?  (total development cost to return on investment ratio)

Solar panels, rooftop greenhouses will also be exempt from FAR, and height limits in some cases, as long as the greenhouse is on top of a building that does not house residences. The result of these changes will be slightly bulkier, somewhat taller buildings that are more energy efficient.

A number regarding the discount from $15 billion in today’s energy cost and the reduction of GHGs also requires an estimate.  The cost of confirming compliance is yet another public responsibility.  This requires a factor as well, that is sufficiently off set by penalties that are equal the obvious incentives.

The City Planning Commission process began December 19, 2011 with the submission of the new regulations to the five borough presidents and the city’s 59 community boards.  The goal is to formalize the new regulations by Spring 2012.

In thoughtful research reporting the requirement to “sum up” should become a responsibility of participation.  In “Skyscrapers and the World of Tomorrow”  posted to Planetizen on  September, 1 2011 by editors Jeff Jamawat, Kris Fortin, Tim Halbur and Victor Negrete,  the questions sought to define the place for very big buildings, but the article ends by suggesting, “…the problem lies in a lack of a clear, agreed-upon vision for the future. “

According to the article, the content of this vision requires data that confirms the efficacy of the following steps.

1. add full life cycle analysis (e.g. embodied energy) to LEED certification (McEeaney, Toberian)
2. advance “smart building” ergo smart urban technologies (Black, Leung, Appel)
3. remove barriers to high (even ultra) density in the right places (Glaeser)
4. prevent bottom-feeding architecture and beware the onset of “tower blight” (Kunstler)
5. remove political gridlock (everybody)

Top of the line sellers provide the data needed for the first two steps thanks to high-end buyers of the technology (see video below).  Much of the data from these systems is proprietary and slows the rate of change, but at least it is pay-it-forward change.  These investment institutions are strong and global.

The remaining three define the “lack of a clear vision” problem less optimistically.  All of our democratic institutions face demands for NASA-style investment goals amidst “fix-it-first” philosophies.  How do we dissolve the contradictions of these two different approaches?

In our recent national history, we attacked a similar problem from the top-down and the grass-roots-up with top end ideas such as the “great society” and things like “Headstart” in a local precinct.  Part of it included an investment in “demonstration cities”, later renamed “model cities” while another part vociferously disagreed with an America entering a permanent state of war.   All of this began a process that forever changed the vision of the urban world.   Today, envisioning the “city” and our “future” is inseparable but this begs the question.  The vision that will remove the barriers, release unlimited wealth for growth, and break the gridlock is one of the “city” and “wilderness” as separate and inviolate. That is what is missing, that is what we need.

Bank of America Tower at One Bryant Park from Cook+Fox Architects on Vimeo.

Planning and Design 

Is it like bringing two versions of time into the room?  Yes/No? 

The answer would be ”No”, unless implementation is involved, then it would be a simple matter of cash via step#1 plan and #2 design.  In my experience watch out for the times when #2 goes first.

Meanwhile, the Urban Design Committee is back up and running, it will set goals and discuss ideas on  1) community outreach, 2) sponsorships and 3)  engage in public policy reviews.  All good.

Picking new targets could not be more important. If you can contribute drop a note to: ktheis@hntb.com

The Mission:

• to educate communities and public officials on the nature and purpose of urban design in defining the physical form of the urban landscape through the creation of public places and spaces.
• lato inform the public on the relevance of zoning recommendations on the shape of the physical environment and the process by which they are affected.
• to respond to planning and policy initiatives while in the formative stage.

Top ten options for review..

1. impact of ten years of zoning change on urban design…
2. waterfronts outside of manhattan  — the failure of “restrictive declarations”
3. review of school playground project –  paint
4. revisiting Long Island City — too big to fail?
5. revisiting Brooklyn’s west coast — and then there is “billburg” vs.  ?
6. massive increase in density is good, right? something is missing and it is on the streets.
7. are the urban designers at the MTA incompitent?  an inside story
8. getting past HPV lane finger painting and getting to dedicated rights of way – segway into cycles?
9. Jane Jacobs was right — but what if she could have planned or designed something
10. name the best urban place contest…. then prove it… get cash and prizes!

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This history of the human settlement is a story of continuous growth and increasing urban densities that reduce per capita resource consumption among the successfully urbanizing countries and decreasing net densities among those who do not have an urban agenda.  The summary omits Africa in this context. It is a glaring omission of the summary, but it is covered well elsewhere.

That said, the 140 should read:

The new Lincoln Institute report Making Room for a Planet of Cities should have, “With informal crap everywhere else” as the tag line.  (Read Decline of Density Chap.2) 

The rapidly urbanizing world needs a better quantitive analysis, so four data sets are offered to help:

1. A global sample of 120 cities with 100,000 people via satellite;
2. Population density data for 20 U. S. cities, 1910–2000, based on census tracts;
3. Built-up sample of 30 cities, 1800–2000, from 120 cities using historic city maps;
4. Urban land cover universe (3,646 citie of 100,000 or more in 2000, based on satellite.

Findings:

Densities in developing countries are double Europe and Japan.  Densities in Europe and Japan are double those of the United States, Canada, and Australia.  The growth rate of urban land cover was twice that of the urban population 1990 and 2000.  The urban population of the developing countries is expected to double between 2000 and 2030 and the the nation’s of the world are largely ignorant of the impacts, or cannot act on the implications of this knowledge.

The data. images, metrics, and methodology from Making Room for a Planet of Cities is available in an accompanying subcenter, the Atlas of Urban Expansion, in the Databases section of Resources & Tools at the Lincoln Institute Web site.Подаръциikoni

Creating density and wealth in New York City is its raison d’être, but if this is untested or questioned it can lead to callous insensitivity.  A city that looses the layers of its cultural history denies itself the means to tell the stories that made it great.  The place noted below triggers one of our city’s most important narratives.  To loose it to thoughtless design and development decisions is to loose our capacity to celebrate and support the courage of human conviction.  This one must not suffer this fate, to do so would acknowledge its true wealth will be lost.

The following will document the solution to this particular problem.  It should be thought of as an example of how the city must resolve the demand for continuous growth without loosing its capacity to be “self-renewing”.

Please keep me up to date on the 339 W 29^th Street issue by bringing to my immediate attention its proposed resolution or status.  I am keenly interested in retaining the physical integrity of this place for it importance in American history.  Steps taken in this direction would be greatly appreciated.  I also believe some agency coordination is in order in this new era of “silo” prevention.

Rex Curry: The Urban Design Discussion

The message above has been address according to the following titles and agencies: 

AT LPC:
Executive Director Kate Daily at LPC:  kdaly@lpc.nyc.gov;
Commissioner Robert Tierney at LPC: rtierney@lpc.nyc.gov and comments@lpc.nyc.gov

 AT DOB:
Leah Donaldson
Manhattan Liaison: Intergovernmental & Community Affairs
ldonaldson@buildings.nyc.gov 

History of the house at: http://saveabolitionisthome339w29stnyc.blogspot.com/

Go to the earliest posts at the site for this info.  On Facebook there are some photos of the building at:

http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=737066428#!/group.php?gid=11580831517&v=photos&so=60 

Locations Presented

The details on a “Reach by Reach” basis are well worth some “urban design” quires and perusals.  To this end, I suggest the following stipulation to your examination.

We have long known that we see is what we think is there and that this can be correct or incorrect at anytime but always considered correct, and we know that not every observation we make is exact.  We know errors in perception and measurement exist.  These elements of the human condition are fundamental and accepted collectively in science and psychology.  The more important issue is our responsibility to seek or develop statements of fact that have such lasting clarity in describing the conditions of our time they will continue to make sense in a distant future despite these errors.  

I would like your opinion of the waterfront draft on this basis. (or how much jargon can plan one take?)

Armed with this knowledge please read the “Waterfront Plan” for recommendations and procedures most likely to reduce error when discussing measurements and second, suggest ways to find these errors during the implementation of plan components that provide for adjustments.

Design police….

Nevertheless, the New Yorker only needs to recall the 6^th Avenue commercial office bonus scheme to realize the limitations involved in the public’s regulatory interest in extending Central Park a bit to south with urban plazas.   One only needs to look at a ”restrictive declaration” used in Astoria, to recognize a public access failure when you see it.  Both represented a straightforward and honorable desire, but one that was interpreted very differently by the developer’s bottom line of that time.  Today we have a double bottom line approach.  Please bring this “do no harm” value to your review of the plans revision as follows: 

The New York Department of City Planning website asks you to get involved with Vision 2020: NYC Comprehensive Waterfront Plan.   It offers a set of links (below).  Each seeks thoughtful people to reflect on “new public realm” and to deduce the purpose of the update from its 1992 version under Wilber “Bill” Woods.

Seek out the following and provide your view using the resource links below and share facts and opinions with this blog or the other venues known to many of you as listed below: 

1.   Read the Draft Recommendations – NEW 
2.   Send us your comments online
3.   Read a recap of the workshops
4.   Subscribe to our email newsletter 

The “connection” of New York City’s 500+ miles of “blue-interface” to regulatory entities such as the NYC Building Code, the Clean Water Act, and the long list or labyrinth of permits demand site-t0-site complexities.  The call for waterproofing every new structure within a few hundred feet of the waterfront at 14 feet “ABOVE” mean high tide is a “code” example.  

Another is use of the word “elevated” in reference to the inevitable rise of sea levels.  It suggests the need for other measurements to sustain the basic value of public access that sits as the foundation of the public interest.    Perhaps it would be a good thing to see NYC function as well as Venice has in the centuries to come, or to plan as well as our friends in the Netherlands.  It would seem prudent in a ten-year plan to outline factors that are in NYC’s interest as far into the future as reasonable.

• Note: The word “elevated” in the DRAFT is found twice as follows: “Provide elevated views to waterfront” in Reach 2 — Lower Manhattan and “Explore creation of elevated viewing deck overlooking cruise terminals” in Reach 3 – Lower West Side.  What exactly is the measure for “elevated” and how might this carry over or affect the entire waterfront.

Unlike the folks in the Netherlands that have confidently stated the country to be “climate proof”, NYC-DCP selection is “climate resilience”.  It says:

While Vision 2020 is focused on the next ten years, the plan recognizes the need to plan for a much longer timeframe as well. The New York City Panel on Climate Change.  See 2010 Report (354 pgs) from the NY Academy of Sciences.  It has projected hat sea levels are expected to rise anywhere from 12 inches to 55 inches by 2080. In addition, severe storms and the floods associated with them are expected to occur more frequently.

As a coastal city, many New York neighborhoods experience flooding and storm surges. These risks are expected to increase as the affects of climate change are felt.  The Department of City Planning is working with other City agencies on assessing the risks associated with sea level rise in order to develop strategies for the city to increase its resilience. Strategies include regulatory and other measures to improve the flood resistance of new and existing buildings, as well as exploring soft infrastructure approaches to coastal protection.

Apologies

That is far more introduction than needed.  I implore you to read the DRAFT using your “urban design” lens as a planner or architect and offer your opinions.  Observations from other cities, states in the USA or throughout the precious orb of life we call earth. 

The venues for discussion are:

APA Metro NY Urban Design Committee
http://www.linkedin.com/groups?home=&gid=41374&trk=anet_ug_hm

There are 40 members in this section and the activity level is low.  LinkedIn is known for its a job networking services, but its “group” function makes this system available to members to share articles, post questions and define issues affecting New York City and the Region.  Anyone can view group content, request an invitation to join, become managers or set up a subgroup on an issue.

Urban Design Network
http://www.linkedin.com/groups?home=&gid=95125&trk=anet_ug_hm

There are about 3,000 members in this group with 9  managers and 12 moderators involved in sharing data on issues in the broad context of Urban Design as it is experienced from Dabronx to Dubai

Urban Design Committee Via Google 
http://groups.google.com/group/urban-design-committee

There are 64 members with a low activity rating.  The objective is to use this area to sift through issues that may occur with the revision of the 1992 NYC Waterfront Plan (or other issues)  and it connects to various WebEx, Google Docs, WindowsLive locations, and so on.  Members are encouraged to develop individual “draft development” areas.

Vision 2020’s citywide policies was completed and offered as FINAL in March 2011.  It will seek to accomplish the following eight goals:

• Expand public access to the waterfront and waterways on public and private property for all New Yorkers and visitors alike.
• Enliven the waterfront with a range of attractive uses integrated with adjacent upland communities.
• Support economic development activity on the working waterfront.
• Improve water quality through measures that benefit natural habitats, support public recreation, and enhance waterfront and upland communities.
• Restore degraded natural waterfront areas, and protect wetlands and shorefront habitats.
• Enhance the public experience of the waterways that surround New York – our Blue Network.
• Improve governmental regulation, coordination, and oversight of the waterfront and waterways.
• Identify and pursue strategies to increase the city’s resilience to climate change and sea level rise.

We shall see.  Download a copy at www.nyc.gov/waterfront. Comment if you like….

NIMBY

The history of keeping things “out of your back yard” begins with demonstrable adverse health problems caused by pollution, but it does not end there.  It has advanced to the critique of poorly chosen uses of land, how the use affects others over time and the kind of society the uses produce.  What happens in this section of a growing Downtown Brooklyn is now one of those questions.  What quality of society will we produce here? 

For now, look at it as the collision of two interests, one is private and predictive toward profitable returns and the other is public and prescriptive toward resolving the errors committed in the pursuit of the first interest whether the errors were predicable or not.  This leeds to expressions of due diligence that prove efforts are made to anticipate damages that are conducted through project approval and evaluation procedures that are capable of constant improvement.  In this way, living in the world may not be risk free, but the path to it is both predictable and prescribed.   To sum up, the community is now like the building in this photo. 

This photo’s traction for use in articles on the rise of NIMBYism in general has its roots in China.  I have been unable to source it to a physical location other than the links below- it appears to be Shanghai, but I cannot be certain.   Photo sources: 

Not in My Backyard: China’s Rising Middle Class Growing Environmental Contention. 
http://www.chinaenvironmentallaw.com/2008/03/01/nimby-with-chinese-characteristics/
http://chinaenvironment.files.wordpress.com
http://www.chinaenvironmentallaw.com/
http://www.placefutures.com/

All rights reserved by luuluu

Criticism of the US Pavilion in the Shanghai Expo of 2010 is reasoned.  The American program is presented in “mall” glass/steel architecture, but it gets worse.  Not much elso to say about the US mall, but since it did get privately funded, American participation in the Expo’s theme  ”Better City, Better Life” includes policies aimed at blending five urban ideas worth of brief review.

First, a kind of question, how can we manage the inevitable diversity of culture?   The second offers the obsurdity of continuous economic prosperity.  The third is the promise of technological and scientific innovations that are likely to save us all from the effect of “continuous prosperity”.   If that is not enough, two ideas with a “last minute tone” promote the importance of design through urban remodeling practices and a somewhat vague suggestion regarding the need to define the physical interactions of urban and rural governance with greater accuracy.  But wait, just when it seems to make sense at the last minute, it gets worse. 

The business or corporate sense of priority at these Expos is carried by a truely vapid narrative of ad copy headings such as,  “quality leads to better experiences”, “sustainability is mandatory”,  “enable healthy lifestyles”, and my favorite, “be frugal”.   There is nothing like a set of flavorless clichés to successfully obscure the actual challenges that lie ahead.  It is obvious that irony will not be dismissed and that getting to the truth remains very, very difficult.

In  2012, the Expo will be called “The Living Ocean and Coast” (Yeosu, Korea)  or why a nation’s policy of believing in self interest (fair, but differentiated) is in everyone’s self interest.  Was it not self-interests little sister “due dilegence” that turned the Gulf of Mexico into an oil storage tank for about two months, predicating the wild use of chemical dispersants (soap), and then celebrated the well’s final closure in early August 2010.  Obviously a different relationship between the private and public interest needs to be reviewed.  N’est pas?

In 2015 we will be treated to an expo-presentation entitled, “Feeding the Planet, Energy for Life” (Milan, Italy) that will no doubt be organized to apolgize to the twelve million people facing death through starvation in that year.

The New York State Supreme Court in Brooklyn on Monday March 1, 2009 rejected the final legal challenge by homeowners and businesses to the state’s use of eminent domain for the $4.9 billion, 22-acre Atlantic Yards project (see TimesTopics for more)  The news triggered a groundbreaking for March 11, 2009.

How much ground will be broken remains unknown to all, even the developer, Bruce Ratner is reportedly unsure.  One thing is sure, the general failure of effective criticism of the plan.  Perhaps this was in deference to the disruption of those whose lives and businesses are forever changed.  Perhaps not.   Time remains to go on the record regarding the failure of “super blocks and its architecture, or to examine the distracted inability of the MTA and the DOT to address serious public safety questions given the plan as it stands.

The other 22

New York State officials will force the last 22 families and companies to move out of the Atlantic Yards project footprint if they don’t leave voluntarily by April 3, 2010.  It began with several hundred families and businesses, but Errol Lewis summed it all up best as a reporter for the Daily News and a long time observer of New York’s uniquely imprudent politic.

“The seven-year slog leading up to today’s ribbon-cutting on the Atlantic Yards project demonstrates why New York must rethink and restructure the way it handles big land deals.

Nearly no one on either side of the debate over the planned 18,000-seat arena and 6,400 units of housing – not even the winning developer, Forest City Ratner – thinks the process was fair, balanced and rational.

There were too many lawsuits, too many unanswered questions and too many heated arguments. Worst of all, the years of bickering and delay have left behind bitterness and civic exhaustion just when we need energy, enthusiasm and public scrutiny to make Atlantic Yards a success.”

I would have readers with an interest in the urban development process in general and in this part of Brooklyn specifically, to notice Errol’s criticism in this way.  The enormously accurate criticisms of the Atlantic Yards plan from an architectural, urban planning and design point of view are ineffective.  Despite grievous errors of design, the less evident event is the obituary of architectural criticism.

As Lewis points out, the measure of success is tragically blurred and the lessons learned are painfully slow and easily forgotten.  Our society has the authority to engage in the destruction of one community as a constitutionally guaranteed process for building a new one.

Lewis is right.  We must question the current criterion that suggests we are actually making a place better or more life affirming or more environmentally sound, not just environmentally neutral.

We are currently limited to writing the postmortem.  Given the desire to correct mistakes before they are made,  what steps could be taken to give a community affected more controls over a design and development process that the law of our land as already deemed inevitable?  How can the rules of engagement for community development practices eliminate our tragic acceptance of collateral damage?

See Source to Lewis