Sustainable City Services: Housing

Sustainable City Services: Cycle of Housing Stock and Age of Residents

When looking at city services, do the needs fluctuate from decade to decade or half century to half century? For example, robust school enrollment followed by declining enrollment and then a rise in enrollment again. With the approaching "grey tsunami," the need for senior services will greatly increase. However, in roughly 40 years when the Boomer generation is mostly gone the need for the senior services will be reduced.

Littleton, located near Denver, has done a good job in making the city an enjoyable place to live. Many residents want to stay in the city as they age. However, a number of residents have expressed a desire to downsize their larger houses as they become empty nesters. The problem is limited housing options within city limits, much less within the family neighborhoods that they have grown to love. Thus, to downsize, they would have to move to a new neighborhood or out of the city. The challenges that Littleton faces is becoming more widespread among cities. 

This lack of housing appealing to older adults appears to be a major reason for school enrollment fluctuation. The cycle of young families moving into newly constructed neighborhoods is reflected in school enrollment increasing. As the families age, the kids graduate and move out of the house, but the parents cannot downsize, which keeps the family house under occupied for 10, 20, 30 plus years. Can schools weather the long cycles of housing turnover to young families?

As a case example, the graph below shows the fluctuation of Littleton Public Schools enrollment.¹ In the last few years, Littleton did close 2 schools due to falling enrollment.

The second graph shows the cycle in average household size, assuming a built-out community where people do not want to move out as they age. Analogous graphs would be needed for non-land locked communities still expanding in housing stock and population.

In this graph, the yellow bars represent time periods in which the city needs to provide more services and infrastructure for families with kids, such as schools and kid oriented events. The grey bars represent time periods in which the city needs to provide additional services for older residents such as shuttle service to grocery stores.

Some research indicates that in locations not having enough families in the neighborhood has some undesired consequences such as bus routes reduced when too high a percentage of passengers qualify for reduced senior rates and grocery stores relocate. Fluctuation in needed services is expensive for cities. A more constant average household size makes providing services easier. The following are housing considerations to help provide an environment for a more stable average household size.

Potential Solutions for Existing Neighborhoods:

Modifying existing neighborhoods is one of the harder challenges for improving the city's housing stock. The following ideas are small scale and should allow existing neighborhoods to evolve over time. For all of these options, there can be too much of a good thing. The recommendation is to limit the density of each housing type.

1. Group housing typically looks like a single-family residence from the outside and located within single-family neighborhoods. Inside, each resident has a private bedroom and possibly a private bathroom. The rest of the house is common space shared by all residents. A certified nurse or care giver may reside on site or visit regularly. Not all zoning codes allow group housing, but allowing group housing will provide more options for older adults.

2. Accessory dwelling units (ADU) allows a 2^nd unit to be built on a lot with an existing house. The ADU may house a recent college graduate looking for a job or an elderly parent. ADUs can also be rented to non-family members. Again, not all zoning allows ADUs. However, including ADUs in the housing mix can increase options for families as well as provide additional rental options.

3. ADUs can be taken to the next level by allowing the ADU to be sold independent of the main house. This can provide additional flexibility for the homeowner. To encourage more accessible housing, zoning could allow the minimum lot size to be ½ the current size provided that a "universal design" house built on each ½ lot. This would allow a homeowner in an existing single-family neighborhood to scrap the house, replace with 2 universal design houses, and potentially live in one of the houses while selling the other house to pay off the construction loan.

For New/Infill Projects:

For new or lager infill projects, cities could require variety in the housing sizes to help achieve a more constant average household size over time. These new projects present opportunities to make a significant impact on the future direction of the city.

1. For a mixed generational neighborhood, every 3^rd or 4^th unit should be a different size. For example, if the development is primarily a family neighborhood with 3+ bedroom houses, the "other" houses would be smaller such as patio homes for older adults. The housing mix should attract singles, couples, families with children, and empty nesters.

2. For multi-family units, require a mix of 1, 2, and 3+ bedrooms to accommodate all family sizes. All too often, multi-family is not family-friendly. This needs to change to allow for more affordable family size housing options. Accessibility is big for older adults, so ensuring an adequate mix of accessible units is also very important.   

Conclusion:

One of the goals is to support people living and aging in their city. Thus, aging in neighborhood is balanced by optimizing community resources in that larger houses are primarily occupied by larger households. When downsizing, hopefully the person or couple is literally only moving a few feet to a familiar house, thereby minimizing the stress associated with moving. A new young family now has the opportunity to move into the city and live in the larger house.

1:http://www.boarddocs.com/co/lpsco/Board.nsf/files/8YXKEM518456/$file/LPS%20Demographic%20Study%20Presentation.pdf

Sustainability Toolkit for Family Friendly Cities

Our slides for "Sustainability Toolkit for Family Friendly Cities" presented at the Downtown Colorado Inc conference September 13, 2012 are located at:

www.humanlifeproject.com\SustainablityToolkitFamilyFriendlyCities.pdf (11M)

Outline of presentation:

• Human Sustainability Introduction
• Motivation for Multi-Generational Planning
• 12 Guiding Principles for Family Friendly Cities
• Mapping of City Family, Business, and Resource Centers
• Case Example for Littleton, CO
• Case Example of Mapping for Denver Metro with Light Rail to Connect Family and Business Centers
• Sustainability Toolkit:
• Social
• Multi-Generational Public Spaces
• Housing
• Multi-Generational Housing
• Affordable Eco-Friendly Living
• Mobility
• Multi-Modal Streets
• Personal Transportation Hubs
• Education
• Purposeful Education
• Universal Resources
• More Land for Living and Food
• Water Scarcity Leads to Abundance

Each Toolkit item includes a description with design considerations, benefits for various stakeholders, and case studies.

Charging Up Your City

6 vehicle spaces converted to 12 LSV spaces with a new picnic area

Charging Up Your City

Do you want to charge up your city? The following are some thoughts for charging up your community's excitement level, charging up your electrical devices, and charging up your economy.

The Denver Post June 24, 2012 article, “Getting a charge out of new law,” described a new state law effective in August. This law will allow anyone to sell electricity. One potential application is for electrical charging stations spread throughout the city. The law is aimed at charging electric vehicles, but the charging stations could be used to charge any electrical device. Consider for example, a charging station at a park. The same station could be used to charge an electric vehicle as well as a laptop, cell phone, or tablet.

For the owner of the charging station, this could be an additional source of income, be it the government entity that owns the park or a business owner with some unused rooftop space for solar panels.

The electric vehicle owners will have convenient, reasonably priced electricity to reduce "range anxiety" concerns. Refill costs may be “$4 instead of $40 or more for a tank of gas.” With the reduced emissions from the electric vehicles, everyone will benefit from the cleaner air. This could be a win-win for all stakeholders.

As much potential as the reselling of the electricity holds, this is only the tip of the iceberg, so to speak. The big impact could come from combining the charging stations with low speed vehicles (LSVs).

Of the many types of vehicles permitted on the road today in Colorado, low speed vehicles could be an up and coming mode of transportation. LSVs include neighborhood electric vehicles and golf cars (golf carts with head lights and brake lights). LSVs are already permitted on roads with a speed limit of 35 mph or less and can cross roads with a higher speed limit at intersections.

For car drivers, the LSVs are significantly lower cost. For senior drivers, they are also safer to operate. Thus, LSVs can provide mobility options for later in life.

The real potential of LSVs is the fact that the vehicles are one forth the size of traditional gas powered motor vehicles. Thus, if there were enough users of LSVs, the city could restripe a few parking lots and get a 4 fold increase in parking. Or, some of the space could be reclaimed for non-parking uses. For example, consider the economic impact of this reclaimed land used for additional outdoor seating at a restaurant. Developers could use this extra space for a larger building footprint, which may translate to more sales tax revenue or property tax revenue.

 

There are a number of actions that planners can take:

1)    Promote the use of LSV noting the benefits such as lower cost, safer, lower emissions, smaller size, and more non-parking space for developers/landowners.

2)    Make sure that all zoning and ordinances allow for the charging stations and solar panel installation.

3)    Make sure that parking requirements are properly adjusted for LSVs.

4)    Create a connectivity map of the city noting key destinations such as stores, parks, schools, and residences and roads with speed limits <= 35 mph. If the key destinations are not connected, see if there is an easy way to add the missing connectivity such as changing a speed limit from 45 to 35 mph.

5)    Determine how to best reallocate the reclaimed land to benefit the city and its residents.

NOTE: This was also published in APA Colorado Q3 newsletter

Roofs as Economic Generators

Creating and improving the economic potential for communities is always beneficial, but especially with the current great recession. These two areas can be addressed by looking up. As an exercise, go to a tall building in the city, look at a Google maps view of the city, rent a hot air balloon ride, or in some way look down at your city. In most cases, there will be a number of big flat roofs. These roofs are a missed opportunity for economic growth of the community.

Some potential economic generators for rooftops include:

• PV Solar Panels
• Green Roof
• Edible Green Roof

The PV solar panels would, somewhat obviously, generate electricity that the building owner can use to reduce their electric bill. In the extreme case, there will be a surplus of electricity that the building owner can sell back to the local utility company and actually make money instead of just saving money.

The state of Colorado recently passed a law making it much easier for non-utility companies to resell electricity. For example, the building owner could set up electric vehicle charging stations on their property and make some income from reselling the electricity.

New Jersey and California are using public-private partnerships to get solar panels installed, for example, on school rooftops.

If enough rooftops install solar, and the region is getting close to exceeding current electric plant capability, these rooftop electric generators could prevent the region from having to invest in a new power plant, thus saving everyone an electric rate increase to pay for the new plant.

In addition to reducing urban heat islands, thereby making the city more people friendly, green roofs can significantly reduce the building's heating and cooling needs. One on-line estimator provides some estimates for the cost savings. Some example yearly cost savings:

• Arizona State Capital Building = $24,266
• The Pentagon = $1.1 million
• Walmart SuperCenter in Bentonville, Arkansas = $179,300

Hopefully, this saved money will work its way back to the city and the residents. The concept can also be used for city buildings and the saved money can be used elsewhere within the city budget.

Extending the heating and cooling benefits of green roofs to edible green roofs would have the additional benefit of increasing local jobs as well as local food. Some interesting examples of large rooftop gardens are coming from New York.

 

Rooftop farms are in the midst of a boom here in New York City…

Driving that boom – at least in part – is New York City’s Zone Green. Proposed amendments to Gotham’s zoning code that continue an inexorable march through the approval process, Zone Green would permit solar panels, green roofs, storm water systems, skylights and other green features on New York City buildings, despite existing restrictions within the 1961 code. Specifically with respect to rooftop farms, Zone Green would allow a waiver of floor area and height limits for greenhouses on top of non-residential buildings.

A second rooftop garden example comes from Brooklyn. This one is a hydroponics greenhouse on top of a warehouse rooftop that is harvesting 365 days a year.

… hydroponics allow the urban farm to produce about 10,000 heads of lettuce a week – roughly 100 tons a year.  The controlled environment agriculture uses 10 times less water and 20 times less land than traditional harvesting methods.

“We’re producing crops and delivering it within 24 hours, definitely making it the freshest product on the market – the shelf life is passed on to the consumer,” said Nelkin. “By being the freshest, it’s also the most flavorful and nutritious.”

Another agricultural example comes from Denver. The Brown Palace hotel in downtown Denver has added 4 bee hives and 65,000 bees to their roof and "can produce upwards of 150 pounds of harvestable honey every summer". "Marcel Pitton, managing director of The Brown Palace, said the honey is like 'liquid gold' for the hotel. The honey is used in the restaurant kitchen and as the basis for a lavender honey soap and a local beer, made with the Wynkoop Brewing Company." The article states that the beekeeping program started "three years ago, after the city passed an ordinance in 2008 allowing hobbyists to own hives." Thus, emphasizing the importance of planners working with the city to make the conditions appropriate for roofs to become economic generators.

Rooftop gardening can be practical with the only change to the roof being the addition of light weight planters. In 2011, "450 urban agriculture planters were installed on the roof of the Palais des congrès, allowing three partner restaurants (Crudessence, the Palais’ catering service, and Intercontinental hotel) to learn more about the basics of market gardening in cities and offer a wide variety of produce on their menu for those who want to eat locally and in season." (Source article)

As one example, Biotop has an edible roof integrated system for growing food. It is lightweight and can be installed on an existing roof without structural modifications. The Montreal Convention Center installed this system over the summer during the Ecocity World Summit 2011. The food grown went to local restaurants.

Here are 7 brainstorm ideas for how cities can help to turn the city's unused rooftops into economic generators:

1)     Comprehensive Plan and Sustainability Plan
2)     One Page Briefs
3)     Free Advertising
4)     Zoning and Ordinances
5)     Open Space Reduction for Green Roofs with Additional Credit for Growing Food on Roof
6)     Make it Easy
7)     (Last Resort) Unused Rooftop Tax

First, make sure that the city's Comprehensive and Sustainability Plans include using the rooftops in creative ways, so as to encourage economic benefit to the building owner as well as the city and its residents.

Second, create one page briefs. These would be short educational brochures to inform the building owners of the potential cost savings or income potential from different roof uses. Logistic, cost, and other "barriers to entry" should also be noted to help the building owner decide if one of the options is not appropriate for their building.

Third, do some free advertising for building owners that implement a rooftop economic generator. For example, highlight the business on the city web site or in the local newspaper. Use the company as a case example highlighting what it took the company to implement the economic generator. This could be framed as this month's "Rooftop Economic Generator Winner". Over time, revisit the company and have another article, or award, highlighting the economic benefits that the company has generated from the rooftop effort.

Forth, make sure that all zoning and ordinances allow these economic generators on the roof. For example, see New YorkCity’s Zone Green above. Also, for the edible rooftops, allowing food stands to be set up around the city would help the food growers to sell the produce to residents. Wheat Ridge, CO claims to have one of the most liberal food stand policies in the U.S., allowing food stands almost anywhere: "This ordinance updated the city's regulations so that community garden (under the category "urban gardens"), farmer's markets, and produce stands are now allowed in any zone district."

Fifth, which is a subset of Zoning and Ordinances, is to allow green roofs to count towards open space requirements. This will give developers more ground space for development, increasing their profit. This should also increase city tax revenue (sales tax for increased business size, increased property tax from larger building/more housing units).

Sixth, make it easy. For the most part, the building owner is most likely not concerned about trying to run a second business. A big box chain store will not want to change their focus. A small mom and pop business may already be stretched on available time and brain power. To overcome this, the city can do some of the leg work for the building owners. For example, consolidate all needed forms and steps into a pre-packaged form. Consider the case of an edible green roof, the city can have on hand a leasing contract that the building owner can use with the farmer that wants to lease the roof space. The building owner can then use these forms verbatim, or modify them as desired. As a case study, look at Santa Cruz. They have 7 pre-approved ADU packages that, if selected by the home owner, allows for shortening the building approval process.

Seventh, create a new "unused rooftop" tax. This should only be used if all other means to encourage effective rooftop uses fails. The concept for this tax is that if a commercial building owner with a flat roof does not implement an approved economic generator use for a "sufficient" percentage of their roof, than the building owner has to pay a tax for this unused space. If the building owner does implement an approved use for enough of their roof, then there is no tax.

By looking up, cities can "create" additional space to plan for the future. With some creating thinking, the unused space rooftops in the city can become an economic generator.

Speaking at APA Colorado Conference

We have been accepted to speak at the APA CO conference in Snowmass Colorado (http://www.apacolorado.org/content/annual-conference). The talk is scheduled for the afternoon of Fri. Oct. 5, 2012. Title: "Babies & Boomers - Assessment Tools to Create Livable, Sustainable Communities for All Ages"

This is a joint presentation with the DRCOG representatives who will discuss the Boomer Bond project including the city staff based self-assessment and toolkit items to better prepare the city for the pending significant increase in senior population.

HLP will expend the discussion to include all ages. We will present our city ranking system, which is a data driven system using information from the internet. Our focus includes eco-friendly, sustainability, and designing for all ages.

Speaking at Downtown Colorado Inc. Annual Conference

Jenny has been accepted to present at the Downtown Colorado Inc. annual conference in Golden Colorado (http://www.downtowncoloradoinc.org/?page=conference). The talk is currently scheduled for Thur. Sept. 13 9:30 am. The talk title is "Sustainability Toolkit for Family-Friendly Cities". We are hoping to present a number of innovative ideas to help cities be more eco and family friendly by designing for the youngest to the oldest resident.

Personal Transportation Hubs: Supporting Alternative Transportation

Note: This blog post is being written from a U.S. perspective for U.S. cities. We do realize that much can be learned from other countries.

A growing number of reports indicate that some demographics, especially seniors and millennials, are interested in moving back to the city centers. Other reports promote the benefits of such "hot topics" as: increased densities, mixed-used, transit oriented developments, etc.

To support all of this, we should expand our transportation options. Granted, options such as Bus Rapid Transit programs similar to what was implemented in Curitiba and is being started in Chicago and high speed trains are good. Our proposal is to consider creating "Personal Transportation Hubs.”

A Personal Transportation Hub is a shared resource for a group of people. The resource being shared is various transportation vehicles. These could include cars, bikes, scooters, and "electric vehicles" (more on this later). This idea is inspired by some reports indicating that millennials are more interested in renting than owning. With this train of thought, more compact developments could gain space and cost savings by creating a Personal Transportation Hub of shared vehicles. The Personal Transportation Hub would be for members only. The members could reserve and check out any vehicle that is in the Personal Transportation Hub.

Consider, for example, a cohousing development with 40 to 100 units. Traditional design would indicate that 1-2 parting spots are needed per unit with some spaces for visitors. With a Personal Transportation Hub, car sharing could reduce the number of parking spaces per unit by eliminating the need for a second car, or in some cases, their primary car. Thus, there would be space savings, as well as cost savings to residents without the worry of car maintenance or insurance. If managed well, the Personal Transportation Hub could provide the members access to specialty vehicles such as a pickup truck for home chores or a convertible sports car for date nights. Hopefully, each member would indicate their destination to allow others to see this with the hope of encouraging car pooling. For example, consider when someone is going to the grocery store. A senior Personal Transportation Hub member who can no longer drive may be very appreciative of this car pooling opportunity.

Consider again a cohousing development with multiple generations. Considerable space is needed to allow everyone to store their personal adult bikes and especially the kid's bikes. At any one time, only a fraction of the bikes will be in use. Replacing the individual bikes with bike sharing stations will save garage/storage space for the housing development as a whole.

Borrowing from European experience, it would seem that as U.S. cities become more compact that scooters will become more and more acceptable to use. Scooters would then be a natural component within the available transportation options.

The "electric vehicle" inclusion would require changes to our transportation infrastructure as the "electric vehicle" we are referring to is a golf cart. Compared to a gasoline powered car or the new hybrid and fully electric cars, golf carts are inexpensive. The golf carts are also smaller, so it will be easier to find parking than a full size car. The idea is that the golf carts could be used for short trips by a person that is not physically able to use scooters. Consider a senior going to a doctor appointment or grocery store or a mother with kids going to a park or museum (safety improvements would probably be needed for the kids to be passengers in the golf cart).

Currently, U.S. roads do not allow golf carts. The thought is to change current regulations and designs so that the golf carts are allowed. For example, consider a Complete Street-like design. Another, option to consider for retrofitting existing city infrastructure is to convert a road that has one lane in each direction. These roads could easily be converted to have 1, one-way lane for cars with the second lane being dedicated to alternative low-speed vehicles such as the golf carts, low speed scooters, and bikes. Hopefully, these alternative vehicle lanes would be safe enough so that families could also use them for bike riding with young kids.

A consideration with golf carts is inclement weather. One low cost option is a clear plastic "tarp" (specifically designed for golf carts) that goes over the golf cart. This can minimize the effects of rain, but is not overly "pretty" looking and does not help with more sever weather. Doing an internet search, the below hard shell golf cart was found. It this becomes popular, more options would likely become available.

For a properly designed city, essential services such as doctor offices, grocery stores, parks, museums will be in relatively close proximity to where the people live. Thus, the golf cart should be able to easily reach these locations with a single charge. Never-the-less, an associated idea is to put charging stations around town at key locations such as senior centers and parks. The idea is that the city or a private group would pay for the cost of the charging station. Each user would pay for the electricity that they use plus a "connection" fee to help pay for the operating costs. For example, $1 connection fee + 10 cents per kWHr (market rate where we live). Hopefully the local government would be reasonable about the cost. As a reminder about trying to make the transportation more sustainable, having a solar panels attached to the charging station would be a nice option. The charging stations would hopefully have connections for many types of devices from electric cars to golf carts to computers to hand held electronic devices. This should increase the station's use and shorten the payback period.

Mixed-Generational Housing: Seniors and Families with Kids in the City

Senior housing is usually separate from where families with kids live and yet, seniors and families share surprisingly many common housing and environment design needs¹. Living in the city has advantages such as jobs, transportation options, shopping, parks, entertainment, and services. Unfortunately, the seniors and families typically live outside the urban center and miss out on the urban advantages. The goal of mix-generational housing is two fold: design for the youngest to the oldest resident to live in close proximity to each other and the urban center.

Our first proposal is that there appears to be benefits by co-locating the seniors and families with children. Instead of duplicating services in multiple parts of town, services would be consolidated in one location. The APA briefing paper² reports that the AARP research has shown that seniors do want to live closer to younger people.

From a business case perspective, in addition to the cost savings by combining the similar services, demographic data is indicating that seniors and children will compose almost half of the population in the upcoming years.³ Thus, there should be a good financial case for co-locating the seniors and kids.

To gain additional synergies, such as restaurants that serve the business crowd during the day and the families in the evenings, our second proposal is to locate the mixed-generational housing within the downtown or in close proximity. This will reduce the commute time for the family income earners thereby freeing up more time to spend with the family, creating stronger families. This location choice ties into the growing movement of walkable, transit-oriented communities with the live-work-play mentality.

The resulting representation of the city now looks like:

It should be noted that designing for seniors and families in no way leaves out singles and couples with no children. These demographics will benefit from the design as well. ⁴

The Human Life Project® has a list of guiding principles for Mixed-Generational Housing:

• Design for youngest to oldest resident

• Families and senior adults live in close proximity, singles and couples also included

• Provide mixed-income options

• Encourage social interaction with common gathering spaces

• Family-friendly living sized for larger households with safe play areas

• Connection to nature/outdoor spaces

• Multiple transportation options

• Minimize waste and maximize recycling

• Attractive and user-friendly design

• ADA accessibility

• Long-term sustainability

• Green building

• Effective use of resources

• Growing food for residents

Some interesting observations:

The first observation came from a senior focus group. Their comments were that if you design the city for the seniors, you will accommodate everyone else as well. We believe there is significant truth in this perception, but that it is not completely accurate. For us, it seems as though senior-oriented design will result in maybe 80% of family needs being met. For example, seniors can probably be comfortable with a 1-2 bedroom unit. However, families with more than one child will need 3-4 bedrooms. With some foresight and additional planning, senior design can also include the families with children. This should accomplish about 95% of the total design. The last piece to add is the support for singles and couples, which should be a relatively small step to take once the seniors and families are adequately supported.

The second observation has come from trying to research family-friendly cities and more specifically family-friendly design standards. A prominent west coast city undertook a commendable effort to create family-friendly housing. However, a young couple could not find an adequate three bedroom family unit downtown. For example, they said that the size of the children's bedroom was not big enough for a bed and that to them, it seemed more like a home office. Thus, proper design standards are imperative to make sure that developers create housing that will truly meet the needs of the intended residents.

The Human Life Project® has created a vision for a "multi-mixed" housing design concept. Principally, mixed-generational housing offers both senior units and family units. The design concept is very flexible, and can include mixed-use with businesses and supporting services. Preferably, it would be mixed-income as well. Our designs do support efficient use of space and other principles that can lead to cost effective housing as well as adding of amenities for the higher end residents. Another goal is to also include multiple transportation options (mixed-transportation), encouraging walking, bicycling, and public transit.

We envision a number of benefits for this type of design. The first benefit is aging in neighborhood. The concept is that as the person's state in life changes, they can move a very short distance to a more appropriate house. A single young adult may start with a 1 bedroom unit. Once married, they can move to a 2 bedroom unit. As family size expands, the family moves to the larger 3 to 4 bedroom units. Finally, when the couple becomes empty nesters and no longer want to deal with stairs, they can move to one of the ADA assessable units. The concept is that all of these units could be within the same building structure. Consequently, as a person's state in life changes, they have the option to stay in the same neighborhood and retain friends, favorite restaurants, grocery store, bank, place of worship, etc.

The topic of "aging in place" seems to be gaining momentum. We actually would like to dissuade this because of a couple of observations. Aging in place principles would require that the larger family units incorporate ADA accessibility features so that as the parents age, they can still function well. Instead, aging in neighborhood is encouraged. Our proposal is that the ADA features would only be in the senior accessible units, which the person would move to as physical condition changes. Thus, they could cash out some of the equity from larger family unit, move to the smaller assessable unit, and use this extra money to help fund their retirement. The larger family unit is then passed along to the next generation of families with young children. This is a more active approach to addressing generational housing needs rather than stationary.

Another observation in the progression of cities over time is how young families initially move close to schools and then remain in the same house many years after the children graduate. In our town, this has resulted in school neighborhoods with few children. However, housing options are limited for seniors to move within the city. Thus, families with the young children are often forced to live remote from the schools. We think that our proposed design will allow the continual influx of families with young children so that the school enrollment can be maintained.

Another anticipated benefit is for the formation of neighborhood social networks. We are hoping that the design will encourage a high degree of social interaction between the residents which will result in the neighbors helping one another. For example, the family may check in on a senior periodically. The senior could call upon the family once in a while for help with small tasks. The senior in turn can occasionally watch the kids when the parents need to go somewhere.

I would be interested in feedback (scottranville@humanlifeproject.com) on this topic.

What do you think of the two main proposals?

a. Locating seniors and families with children close to one another

b. Locating the seniors/families near the business center

What is the best way for implementing mixed-generational housing?

We are guessing that a combination of "push" and "pull" will likely be needed. Our observations so far is that the concepts are more accepted at the comprehensive plan level for a city rather than changing municipal codes. Thus, some "push" will be needed to encourage cities to change zoning and public policy to move in a direction of uniting the generations within the city by addressing specific housing needs for seniors and families with kids. However, cities do not seem to be in the position to mandate this type of design to developers. On the flip side, urban planners and architects working with developers are in a great position to do some "pulling" to start proposing and implementing multi-generation housing to show feasibility, desirability for residents, and profitability.

The following quotes are from the American Planning Association briefing paper, “Multigenerational Planning: Using smart growth and universal design to link the needs of children and the aging population,” http://www.planning.org/research/family/briefingpapers/multigenerational.htm.

¹ “Older citizens, families with young children, and the young adult population share many common needs, interests, and concerns … safe, walkable neighborhoods, a complete range of services nearby (child care, senior centers, parks, food stores, health care, etc.), an opportunity for civic engagement, affordable and mixed use housing, and adequate transportation options (Lynott et al. 2009).”

² “Unfortunately, most programs for the elderly have been built on the notion of age segregation — in services, housing, and even transportation. Yet recent research by AARP has shown that most aging Americans do not want to live in communities separate from younger people.”

³ “By 2040, the proportion of people over the age of 65 will top 20 percent, and people under the age of 18 will make up almost 23 percent of the population. As result, the oldest and youngest populations combined will make up almost half of all U.S. residents.”

⁴ “Communities built to address the needs of older persons and families are communities that can serve all residents well.”

Concept design for affordable housing. The picture is for a larger 4 bedroom unit, but smaller units are possible.

This housing style has a preliminary estimate of 50-60% reduction in construction costs compared to a comparably sized traditional stick frame design. Preliminary estimates also indicate a 30% reduction in expected heating costs.

Reshaping Cities 2+

The Reshaping Cities 2+ presentation at the Ecocity World Summit 2011 in Montreal confirmed the need and interest for cities to better design for families. Households with 2+ generations is essential for a city's human sustainability.

While many green cities experience a decline in the child population, Denver tops the list of green cities growing the child population. Two case studies show the potential of increasing family households living in Denver: Stapleton development and Benedict Park Place. The core guiding principle for Reshaping Cities 2+ is interdependency. Cities endure over time by designing for the youngest to the oldest resident, acknowledging the interdependency between families, businesses, and natural resources.

The conference was attended by 1,500 delegates from 280 cities and 70 countries.

View PowerPoint Slides for Reshaping Cities 2+
http://humanlifeproject.com/ReshapingCities2Plus.pdf

Ecocity World Summit 2011 Montreal

Reshaping Cities 2+

On August 24, I will be presenting at the Ecocity World Summit 2011 in Montreal, Canada.

Abstract:

Designing cities for 1 to 2 adults per household is easy. The real challenge is to attract and retain households of more than 2 people. Families raise the next generation of residents, ensuring ecocities endure over time. How can we reshape our cities to better support family households?

Key concepts include reversing sprawl by creating family centers closely tied to a city’s business center, dramatically reducing work commute and resource usage. Family centers are defined by places that encourage a high degree of social interaction such as schools and cultural venues. Daily living components are conveniently clustered together including healthy food access, recreation, and child care. Residential neighborhoods are located near the family center, providing a variety of green housing options with 2+ bedrooms across a spectrum of income levels. People walk and bicycle daily from their residence to the family center as well as the business center. Public transportation is also prominent, providing a viable substitute to the automobile. Design for the youngest to the oldest resident is integral to overall success.

The Denver metropolitan region is an excellent example to show the complexities and possibilities of the business center relationship to its family centers. Inspiring examples include the Stapleton development, America’s largest urban infill project, with approximately half of the residents representing family households with homes designed to conserve 40-70 percent of natural resources. Public transportation is rapidly expanding to connect all metropolitan cities to downtown Denver called FasTracks, one of the largest regional transit programs in North America. The recently launched Denver B-Cycle program combined with a pedestrian and bicycle master plan is a positive shift towards green transportation.

Reshaping cities for 2+ makes it possible for families to live and work in the city.

This session will provide ideas to better support families living and working in the city, reversing urban sprawl and saving resources. Green housing, transportation, and land use are integral to designing the ecocity for families.

Organic Farming Multiplying Crop Yields

Research is paying off in higher crop yields for organic farming. Catherine Badgley, Associate Professor for the University of Michigan, is demonstrating the potential to feed more people on less land. A local organic farmer in Ann Arbor, Michigan is able to produce 26 tons of fresh produce a year on only 3 acres of land. Research from around the world is showing that organic farming can produce as much as 4 times the amount of food as industrial Western farming practices.

University of Michigan Organic Farming
http://sustainability.umich.edu/content/out-blue-episode-212-organic-farming

Short Walk to Hampstead Community Farm

Can a community really support itself on locally grown food? The Hampstead community is not only growing some of its own food but using the fastest delivery method: walking. Fresh produce is grown at the Hampstead Farm just down the street from the Town Center.

The Hampstead neighborhood development in Montgomery, Alabama is designed by Duany Plater-Zyberk and Company to “meet daily needs within a 5 minute walk.” Daily living needs accessible by a short walk from home include a market, shops, library, recreation center, and even a farm. The one major missing component for families is a school.

View CNN Video on Hampstead

Hampstead Master Plan

Soft Path - Local Food

Food, Inc. Documentary Uncovers Food Industry Practices

After watching the documentary Food, Inc. (http://www.foodincmovie.com/), it inspired us to write this blog posting. Food, Inc. points out that only few companies control the majority of food supply in the U.S. Business practices employed by these companies elevate profits way above the health of their customers and employees. These companies seem to "own" the politicians who also favor the profits of a few CEOs over the health and well being of the citizens.

Food, Inc. makes an interesting point of how local organic farms could be part of the answer to combat the precarious situation in the U.S. food supply chain and the associated related health issues. The concept of locally grown organic food is a great example of a sustainable soft path effort that fits perfectly into the Human Life Project for building family-friendly communities. The local organic food (including fruits, vegetables, grains, meat, dairy, eggs) has a number of advantages such as being healthier, reduced emissions from transporting the food, and supporting the local economy. The previous posts on Agriburbia are another example of locally grown food.

Could a city really produce enough food to support itself? For the moment, consider supplying a city with vegetables for the entire year. Homeowners could plant a small vegetable garden. Apartment dwellers could place plants on their balconies. Those with larger buildings such as corporations and schools could convert their roof to a "green" roof for growing food. City open space could use the Agriburbia concept to convert unused open space including a portion of maintained lawns into a mini vegetable farm.

For this concept to work, it would require residents to change eating habits. Instead of eating "fresh" tomatoes shipped from another nation during the local off season, they would eat local canned tomatoes. From a practical perspective, who is going to plant and harvest the food and then package the extra produce? Community involvement would be essential to its success. Volunteering might be a path to receive free and affordable fresh food.

Does anyone have an example of a city implementing local food ? (last night we found a clip on ccn.com on a city outside of Montgomery Alabama that is doing this successfully - hopefully more on this soon)

Denver Post - Letter to the Editor

In today's paper (June 11, 2010), the Denver Post printed a letter that we wrote to the editor commenting on the feasibility of residential photovoltaic.

http://blogs.denverpost.com/eletters/2010/06/10/photovoltaics-are-within-reach-of-homeowners/?source=ARK_eletters

Here is what we sent to the Denver Post:

This is in response to Ellen Schroeder Mackey's "The low-hanging fruit of energy savings" article on June 7.

Mrs. Mackey's article is a nice reminder, but we think that her opening statement that photovoltaics are not within reach of the typical family is outdated. Until recently, we would have agreed as the initial costs were large with a payback period of 15 plus years. However, Colorado recently allowed residential solar leasing. We researched 4 companies in the last few weeks and as a result are beginning a solar lease program. All companies offer a 0 down option with monthly payments approximately equal to your current Xcel monthly payments. However, your monthly payment will stay the same over the next 20 years. With the current yearly Xcel rate increases, this can result in 20 year savings around $9000. We chose the pre-pay option which is more down, payback period of 6 years, but $0 monthly payments and an estimated 20 year savings around $17,000.

Biomarkers as Sustainability Indicators - City Case Study 1

Biomarkers is an ongoing discussion topic to identify key indicators in communities that lead to sustainability. The Mid-America Regional Council (MARC) group in the Kansas City area provides an excellent case study. MARC identifies seven green infrastructure indicators for local communities and regional areas.

MARC Seven Green Infrastructure Indicators:

1. Sustainable Land Use: Percent of land in the MARC region that is permeable.

2. Sustainable Economic Development: Annual regional greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions compared to 1990 baseline.

3. Social Capital Investment: Percent of 3rd graders reading at the 3rd grade level.

4. Financial Well-Being: Percent of population in households with jobs providing self-sufficient level of income.

5. Health: Percent of population that is obese.

6. Safety: Percent of people who feel safe compared to the actual crime rate (change compared to baseline year).

7. Equality of Opportunity: Geographic concentration of poverty.

MARC Indicator Framework Table:

MARC Example Program Indicators:

The full report is at: http://www.greeninfrastructure.net/sites/greeninfrastructure.net/files/MARC_GI_Indicators_Final_Report.pdf

What sustainability indicators are in your community? The Human Life Project® is interested in finding a partner to implement a mechanism to automatically collect and display biomarker information. One thought is that maybe a College Professor with a Ph D student that is looking for a thesis project. As with many efforts, securing some funding is an open topic.

We are also looking for partners to define more biomarkers.

Family Friendly Communities

Let us know what your thoughts are on the question: What characteristics define a family friendly community ?

The American Planning Association conducted a survey on family friendly communities and their results are at: APA Survey Results

Some interesting quotes from the APA presentation:

"Families are the most likely population group to reinvest in their community through time, money, and other forms of civic engagement."

"Families are important to growth, sustainability, and diversity. They build vibrant communities."

From the National League of Cities: “Strong cities are built on a foundation of strong families and empowered neighborhoods that support every child.”

From Jaime Lerner, former three-time mayor of Curitiba, Brazil: “When you start to love the children, you have to love all of the children because if the city can't love those children too, then those children will grow to hate the city. And if they hate the city, they will destroy the city.”

One of the goals of the Human Life Project® is to write down a list of features for the "ideal" family friendly sustainable community. Hopefully we will get to this in the near future, but for the moment, these features will have to be inferred from the other postings.

Sustainable Activities

In previous posts, sustainable patterns encompass environmentally-friendly practices, socially related practices such as strengthening relationships, and an overall effort to establish healthy living patterns.

What activities do you as an individual or family engage in to be more sustainable?

As we started to compose our list, it was very short but grew in length rapidly. We would encourage you to add one sustainable activity to your lifestyle periodically. For business people, add one sustainable activity each quarter. For families tied to school schedules, add one sustainable activity during the first half of the school year before Christmas, one activity from Christmas to the end of the school year, and finally one activity during the summer break.

Here is our brainstorm list:

Environmentally-friendly practices:

- Replace plastic grocery bags with reusable bags

If you pay attention to adds, you can get bags for free or $1. Our grocery store gives 5 cents credit per reusable bag that is used. Shopping every week, payback on reusable bags can be as soon as 5 months.

- Plant a garden in our yard

We are hoping to reduce our grocery bill and provide healthier food for the family. Preparing the garden did cost some money, but hopefully within a year or two we will have a net saving.

- 100% of our electricity from solar panels on our roof (hopefully near future)

Leasing solar panels is actually more cost effective. As mentioned in a previous post, this can be with 0 or some upfront cost, but the 20 year savings are substantial

- Composting

Reduced our household related landfill contributions in half

- Switched to CFL light bulbs

- Cloth diapers in place of "landfill" diapers (no service, we wash our own diapers)

Our estimated savings per month is $50-60. We do still use disposable diapers when out of the house.

- Converting front yard from grass to xeriscape (still in progress)

- Installed dual flush toilet in main bathroom

Uses 50% less water at .8 gallons instead of the standard 1.6 gallons for most flushes

- Bike for local chores (kids in bike trailer)

- Paid extra fee to electric company to support wind generated electricity

- Traditional Recycling: paper, plastic, metal, glass

- Recycling usable items instead of throwing into trash, take the extra effort to find a friend or family member that can use the item.

For example, an old computer not being used at our house worked well for another family with a young son.

Social Related:

- Mentor engaged couples to help them establish good patterns and improve the changes for a life long marriage

- Eat dinner together as a family almost every night

- Maintain Sunday as a special family day allocated to time together as a family. (avoid making Sunday a chore day)

- Developing and maintaining a network of friends and family

Healthy Patterns/Improve Quality of Life Related:

- Created automation tools for work tasks and established work related process improvements resulting in lower stress and less overtime. This leads to more time with family and improved family life.

- On a personal level, work no or only very little overtime

- Use vacation days

- Avoid food with "bad" ingredients such as artificial coloring, high fructose corn syrup, and artificially preservatives.

- Nursing our baby to help keep her healthier

- Regular exercise

- Not spending more than earn