2. AIA Houston is a Registered Provider with The American Institute of
Architects Continuing Education Systems (AIA/CES). Credit(s)
earned on completion of this program will be reported to AIA/CES for
AIA members. Certificates of Completion for both AIA members and
non-AIA members are available upon request.
This program is registered with AIA/CES for continuing professional
education. As such, it does not include content that may be deemed
or construed to be an approval or endorsement by the AIA of any
material of construction or any method or manner of
handling, using, distributing, or dealing in any material or product.
Questions related to specific materials, methods, and services will be
addressed at the conclusion of this presentation.
3. Course Description
In October 2010, the AIA/CES system was updated with the new CES
Discovery system, in that time we have transferred more than one
million records. This new update has made it necessary to remind
us of the AIA/CES policies and procedures, to introduce the “new”
provider ethics, and to reintroduce the AIA/CES audits/quality
assurance program. This presentation covers those areas giving
providers the opportunity to give feedback and input.
SAMPLE SLIDE
4. Learning Objectives
At the end of this program, participants will be able to:
1. Distinguish the three major urban design strategies in suburban
redevelopment and their appropriateness to different locations and market
conditions
2. Instruct communities and clients on the impact of changing suburban
demographics on development patterns and markets
3. Differentiate the environmental health and public health advantages of
walkable, mixed-use, and compact places versus automobile-dependent
spaces
4. Cite a variety of precedents for retrofitting different suburban property types
into more sustainable places
5. This concludes The American Institute of Architects
Continuing Education Systems Course
Ellen Dunham-Jones
Georgia Institute of Technology
edj@gatech.edu
6. 1100 malls: 150+ dead, 300 sick 60,000+ strip malls, 11% vacancy rate
350,000+ big box stores, 300 mil vacant sf
Retail square footage/capita in
shopping centers:
U.S.A. 23sf (up from 15 in 1986)
Canada 13sf
Australia 11sf
Sweden 3sf (largest in Europe)
Discretionary shopping as % of GLA:
1971: 25.7% , up to 31.9% in 2010
Source: Co-Star, Michael Nimira, ICSC
7. On average, urban dwellers in
the U.S. have 1/3 the carbon
footprint of suburban dwellers.
Interpolation from various studies
imperative :
climate change
8. The shift from the industrial to the
post-industrail economy has shifted
the public health focus from
infectious disease to chronic
disease. Suburban development
patterns have been linked with
sedentary lifestyles, dramatic
increases in obesity and
consequent higher risk factors for
cardiovascular disease and
diabetes.
Centers for Disease Control, Healthy Communities
Initiative
imperative :
health: obesity
9. imperative :
poverty
Since 2005, more Americans in
poverty have been living in suburbs
than in cities – and their numbers are
growing at a faster rate. The Brookings
Institution.
Between 2000 and 2008, large
suburbs saw the fastest growing low-
income populations across
community types. The Brookings
Institution.
El Paso and McAllen metros lead the
nation w/ 35-36% suburban poverty
ScrapteTV.
com
Center for American Progress
10. imperative :
affordability
Average U.S. household spending
on transportation is 19% of income.
-9-12% in “walkable urbanism”
-25% in “drivable suburbanism”
-30% for those in the lower
income 1/2 of U.S. households
Center for Neighborhood Technology(
2005)
11. ABOGO and the Housing + Transportation Affordability Index
Center for Neighborhood Technologies, http://htaindex.cnt.org
A household at 500 McKinney St spends approx $663/month on transportation ($3.39/gallon)
The Houston regional average is $1166/month
12. Housing + Transportation Affordability Index
Center for Neighborhood Technologies, http://htaindex.cnt.org
13% of Houston Metro households live in areas with walkable blocks
80% of Houston households contribute more than 6.5 tonnes of GHG emissions/year, 55% are at
o r a b o v e t h e 8 . 6 t o n n e s / y e a r ( t h e h i g h e s t n u m b e r c a l c u l a t e d )
13. market driver headlines :
demographic
shifts
suburbia simply isn’t “family-focused”
anymore. 2/3 of suburban hh’s don’t have
kids, 85% of new hh’s won’t through 2025
. Millennials are looking for nightlife and
value wifi and connectedness more than
cars.
the new centers
as metros have expanded, first ring
suburbs and commercial corridors now
have central locations, often meriting
densification and urbanization of their
“underperforming asphalt”.
14. • 43 regionally-significant walkable
urban places
• 75% price premium for office rents
71% price premium for multi-family
residential rents/sales
• Retail lags –only 13% in walk-ups in
2009 cycle, despite $6.71/sf
premium for each tier ranking
• 77% have or are considering rail
transit
• Walk UPS = 11% of metro area, but
33% of metro real estate income
strategy:
DC Walk UPS
2012 Findings
GWU: Chris Leinberger, Mariela Alfonso
15. • 22 Regionally-significant walkable
urban places
• 7 regionally-significant emerging
walkable urban places
• 16% price premium for office rents
• 120% price premium for multi-family
residential rents/sales
• 116% price premium for retail rents
strategy:
ATL Walk UPS
2013 preliminary findings
GWU: Chris Leinberger, Mason Austin
ARC: Jared Lombard, Dan Reuter
GT: Ellen Dunham-Jones
16. relocalization of people, place,
and landscape
diversification of incomes and
activities
tactical urbanism, crowdsourcing,
and collaborative consumption
cheap space for community-
serving uses
“third places”
strategy :
Re-inhabitation
18. Congress for the New
Urbanism: Next Gen
short-term projects for
long-term gains
pavement to plaza depave
parklet yarnbombing
Walk posters guerrilla grafting
19. From Wal-Mart to Public Library
McAllen Public Library, McAllen TX; Boultinghouse Simpson Gates Architects, Meyer
Scherer Rockcastle Architects
Lara Swimmer
20. Meds & Eds: From dying mall to revived mall and university medical center
One Hundred Oaks, Nashville, TN: ATR & Assoc., Gresham Smith and Partners Architects
Source unverified
21. From Mies van der Rohe gas station to Sr and Youth Center
“Le Station”, Nun‟s Island, Quebec, Arrondisement of Verdun, Eric Gauthier -FABG
Architects, 2011
Geothermal heating allowed removal of the HVAC system to cleanly expose the roof and
ceiling systems
22. Updating the “L” strip mall as a “third place” with portals to the neighborhood
Lake Grove Shopping Center, Lake Oswego, OR: Eric Shoemaker Beam Development
From “back” to a new front to the neighborhood
23. From strip to job and
town center
Willingboro Town Center
Willingboro, NJ
Croxton Collaborative
Architects
1960
1. Boscov‟s Furniture
2. Sears
3. Woolworths
4. Power plant
2009
1. Mail-service pharmacy
2. Office building
3. Public library w/ retail
4. Community College
5. Town Commons
6. Townhouses
7. Planted swales
Courtesty Croxton Collaborative Architects
MTC Aerial Photography
24. New Leaf Center Affordable Equity Partners Habitat for Humanity townhomes
Social services, incu- Lease to Purchase NSP-funded
bator kitchen, restau- Low-income tax credits
rant, classrooms, mtg 32 cottages
space, with apts abv.
5 funding sources: NPS3,
CBDG, SPLOST, FHLB- AFB,
Newton Federal Bank
From zombie subdivision to mixed-income neighborhood: City as Master Developer
Walkers Bend, Covington, GA: Covington Redevelopment Authority
25. urbanize – organize buildings to
create connected outdoor rooms
and walkable street networks
densify and diversify: reward the
pedestrian eye
green the infrastructure
strategy:
Redevelopment
26. from 69 houses to TOD with 2,250 d.u., 300k sf office, 190k sf retail (2006)
MetroWest, Vienna, VA: Pulte Homes, Lessard Arch Group, EDAW.
27. From grocery anchored strip mall to village center
The A&P Lofts, Old Cloverdale, Montgomery AL
City Loft Corporation, McAlpine Tankersley Architecture, The Colonial Company
28. 1985 2005 2025
Source: Dunham-Jones, Williamson 2009
from strip center to “attachable urbanism”
Mashpee Commons, Cape Cod, MA
1988-present
Cornish Assoc. Ltd / Duany Plater-Zyberk & Co / Imai, Keller Moore
29. from strip center to “attachable urbanism”
Mashpee Commons, Cape Cod, MA
1988-present
Cornish Assoc. Ltd / Duany Plater-Zyberk & Co / Imai, Keller Moore
“skinny” liner
stores screen
parking lots and
provide incubator
retail space for
local shops
-highest grossing
$/s.f. on the site
30. From strip mall to Main Street with high-end shop, live, stay and now, office
Santana Row, San Jose, CA: Federal Realty Trust, Street Works, SB Archts, BAR Archts
In 10 years its grown from 35 to 100 merchants, 622 res‟l units (w/ 20% premium) and has contributed more than
$40 mil in property tax and $24mil in sales tax in 2011.
31. From dead mall to upscale live-work-play – during a down market
CityCentre, Houston, TX: Midway Cos.; Gensler; Kirksey Architects, James Burnett
32. From strip mall to PPP-funded town center
Sugar Land Town Square, Sugarland, TX: Planned Community Developers Ltd.,
33. transit triggers infill of an office park
University Town Center, Hyattsville, MD
Prince George‟s Metro Center, Inc.
Parker Rodriguez
RTKL Associates
WDG Architecture
39. From a park-n-ride + mall to a civic centre w/ geothermal district heatingSurr
Surrey Central City, Surrey, BC; Simon Frasier University, Bing Thom Architects, Inc
source: Dunham-Jones, Williamson, 2009
Library Classrooms above shopping mall
Phase 1: college classrooms built above mall, + new high rise
40. From dead mall to green downtown
Belmar, Lakewood,CO
Continuum Partners
Elkus Manfredi Architects, Civitas Inc.
Van Meter Williams Pollack Architects
Before
41. before - Villa Italia mall
•140 subtenant leases
•PPP with City of Lakewood, Lakewood Reinvestment Authority, Continuum Partners
•Infrastructure delivered by Developer, paid back out of sales tax collected on site
45. •2002-8 fiscal and economic impact on Lakewood of $207.2 million ($49.5 million in
2008 alone), including a fiscal impact of $10.6 million
•9 acres of public space and parks including a 2.1 acre park, 1.1 acre plaza
•8 bus lines come through the new downtown
•2/3 complete in „09: 1.1 mil sf retail, .9mil sf office, 1300 residential units
46. 8 of 13 regional malls in the Denver
Metro area have been retrofitted or
announced plans to be.
Retrofitting does NOT imply the
wholesale redevelopment of
existing neighborhoods.
Rather it provides existing
neighborhoods with urban nodes
on targeted underperforming sites-
raising the question, how to
connect the dots?
Source: Dunham-Jones, Williamson, 2009
48. Recapturing traffic islands for redevelopment while making walkable intersections
Fort Totten MetroRail stop, Washington DC Planning Department, WAMATA
Source: Washington DC Planning Dept website
49. Intersection retrofit and public placemaking as catalyst
Normal Illinois Roundabout, Normal Illinois: Doug Farr Associates, Hoerr Schauer Landscape
50. Photoz; G. Komar
From 5-lane arterial to 2-lane Main Street with multi-use parking Ramblas & solar
Lancaster, CA: CT/KDF Community Development Partners, Moule & Polyzoides
Since revitalization started in 2009: $106mil in New Markets Tax Credits for redevelopment for local
entrepreneurs; 50 new businesses; 10% increase in downtown property values; 50% cut in traffic collisions
51. from commercial strip to multi-way boulevard and new downtown
Palm Canyon Drive, Cathedral City, CA; Freedman, Tung & Bottomley source: Dunham-Jones, Williamson, 2009
52. Retrofitting the strip corridor with transit-served nodes
Columbia Pike, Arlington County, VA, Ferrell Madden Associates, Dover Kohl & Partners
53. From edge city sprawl to 430-acre BRT-extended TOD centered on boulevard
White Flint, MD: White Flint Partnership, Montgomery County, Glatting Jackson, var designers
-new high-rise downtown over 20 years, $6-7 bil tax revenue, 10k residents – 25% affordable
54. Connecting the Dots: Retrofitting the airport, mall, chemical plant and corridor
Airport Boulevard, Austin TX: City of Austin, Gateway Planning Group
55. retrofitting land use, transportation and energy on a commercial corridor
Cambie Corridor, Vancouver, BC, Vancouver City Planning Department
56. reconstruct local ecology, daylight
culverted streams, and clean run-
off
add parks to increase adjacent
property values
food and energy production
carbon sequestration
strategy:
Regreening
57. from shopping center to wetland w/ new lakefront property investment
Phalen Village, Phalen MN,U.Minnesota CALA (Dowdell, Fraker, Nassauer) and City of St. Paul
Before After
58. from mall parking lot to TOD with water treatment bioswale as park amenity
Northgate Urban Center, North Seattle, WA: LEED-ND pilot program
Thornton Place, Mithun Architects for Stellar Holdings & Lorig Associates
•Added 530 units of housing at net 96 units/acre (another 1800 coming?)
•Increased open space within the Northgate Urban Center by 50%
•Provided pedestrian links that shortened walking distances by 50% from several adjacent neighborhoods
Source: Dunham-Jones, Williamson 2011
2000
condos to
replace
200 apts?
59. Thornton Creek Water Quality Channel: City of Seattle, SvR Design
•Reduced impervious surface by 78%
•Designed to remove an estimated 40-80% of suspended solids from 91% of the avg annual stormwater runoff
from the 680-acre drainage basin
•Created new habitat: native birds were observed within one month and native volunteer plants have gotten
established with the 85% native species that were planted. Source: Kaid Benfield, Natural Resources Defence Council
•Adds an estimated 30% increase in adjacent property values
60. From urban mall to park ringed with urban housing
Columbus City Center Park, Columbus OH
61. From convention center parking lots to public/private park
Discovery Green, Houston, TX: Brown and Kinder Foundations, Hargreaves Associates
63. Amateur photographers protesting for the right to public space on the Astroturf green
at Downtown Silver Spring, MD, July 4, 2007
64. HYBRID PLACES
“PUBLIC” spaces under PRIVATE management/ownership
URBAN streetscapes with SUBURBAN parking ratios
URBAN qualities at SUBURBAN costs
LOCAL placemaking with NATIONAL retail/design/funding
Populations that are MORE DIVERSE than typical suburbs,
but LESS DIVERSE than typical cities
INSTANT URBANISM
65. challenge:
New Tools
Planning grants: Federal and Metro
The ITE street design manual
Community/Business Improvement Districts
Real estate transaction fees
Anticipatory retrofitting and contingent zoning
Design competitions
Retrofittability analysis & performance
metrics
Street art
66. Partnering to
Remove Obstacles
to Urbanism by
Reforming
Standards and
Practices
Past Initiatives:
HOPE VI Mixed-
Income Communities
LEED-ND
CNU/ITE Manual on
Walkable Urban
Thoroughfares
Emerging Initiatives: Tactical Urbanism,
Urban Agricutlure, Code Reform, New
Urbanism in China
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Now, you can say we’re over-retailed -and I probably would – or you can say the retail’s simply in the wrong place. 59 US malls have been “demalled” – list only includes 8 or so “retrofits”
Why else SHOULD we focus on retrofitting suburbs? Yes- we should – and we have been focused on our downtowns. But, there are several reasons for ALSO focusing on the suburbs. First, from the perspective of climate change;. The average urban dweller has 1/3 the carbon footprint of a suburbanite – mostly because suburbanites drive so much more and lose more energy from the greater exterior surface area of their detached buildings. So, as this map shows on a per capita basis cities – like San Francisco and Oakland are already relatively “green” compared to suburbs.
Public health is another reason for retrofitting suburbia. Researchers at the CDC and elsewhere have linked suburban development patterns with sedentary lifestyles and consequent increases in diabetes, heart disease, and obesity (as shown in these rather frightening slides) 1 in 3 children born in the US today are expected to develop diabetes in their lifetime - a percentage that has increased at the same time that the percent of children walking to school has dramatically declined.
And then there’s the pocketbook question of just how affordable is suburbia in the face of rising gas prices? Suburban expansion to cheap land on the urbn periphery has helped generations of families live the American Dream – but increasingly the savings promised by “drive ‘til you qualify” affordability are wiped out by the high cost of transportation. For instance, in Atlanta, households making $20-50K (approximately half of the households) are paying 29% of income on housing and 32% on transportation – and that’s based on 2005 data, well before we saw $4.00/gallon.
Canadian Automobile Association estimated in 2008 that the annual net cost for a Canadian household to sustain 2 cars exceeds $20k. Canada’s amalgamated regional governments has often resulted in “harmonized” costs such that urban residents end up subsidizing the higher costs of garbage collection, fire stations, and the provision of utilities in suburbs.
New Orleans residents spend $803/month vs a regional average of $1190Baton Rouge residents spend $1073/month (vs $803 in New Orleans) and a regional avg of $1190
The brain trust assembled here will speak to the significant market shifts. I’ll simply mention the headlines.
Suburbia’s “newness” is often at odds with its traditional imagery
McAllen has 2nd largest suburban poverty rate in the nation (34%) only just behind El Paso. The country’s largest single-purpose library: size of 2.5 football fieldsInternational Interior Design Association’s award for 2012 best library$24milOld Main Library had walkscore of 84. This location is only 49. Will it’s presence lead to further improvements in walkability?
Leed certified. (illustrative of the commoditization of medical care.) Healthcare in 2nd and 3rd flor of mall, plus an office bldg. Approx 40 mall retrofits so far: this exemplifies the trend of reinhab with “meds and eds”. Tony Ruggeri bought troubled mall for $49 mil in 2006, spent $99mil in redevel, expects to sell it fully leased in 2012 for $100 mil. Other malls have become office bldgs, datacenters, and…
Adapting a conventional L-shaped grocery-anchored strip mall into a “third place”. OK City has some dead malls being reinhabited. Crossroads Mall bought last week to be reinhabited as a hispaniccommunity center.
-reinhabitation at the multi-parcel scale-adding jobs, education, a library – and residences to the rear – while greening the parking lots with a town commons and swales
Subdiv approved in 2003 for 249 modest homes on 50 acres. By ‘07, 72 SFH and 8 TH built, 50 occupied. Bankrupt in 08, 8 banks, inc FDIC left w $5mil debt. Summer 08, 1 bank auctioned 22 unoccupied homes for $57k ea (50% value.) All but 2 bought by investors as rentals. 09 City approved redevel plan annexing prop and estab CRA to imp redeve plan, and loaned CRA $1mil to purchars vacant lots and compl it as MU, MI, Earth Craft comm’y. Shortened deep lots, created parks, added MU at T-entry to nhd. 3 partners: CHA to occupy and dev srhsgw social svcs and business incubator. PACES fdn = partner for hsg for disabled. Affordable Equity Partners for 32 lease-purchase cottages.by 2011, CRA bought 42 SFH lots, 17 TH lots, 3 MF pads from 5 banks and facilitated AEP’s purchase of 19 lots. CRA wrote, city approved overlay ord to op as HOA and req rental prop owners maintenance. W/ this in place, CRA comfortable that rest of lots can simply be market-based.
While re-inhabitation tends to help with social sustainability, to get environmental benefits, one tends to need to redevelop and urbanize these properties into mixed-use, walkable, transit-served neighborhoods.
2002: 15.6 acres: 1200 residents, resil rents command a 20% premium- mostly weekend homes, 20 restaurants,Now, it’s 10 years old and expanding with more office and apts: 42 acres.
Part of the 9000-acre First Colony development 19-miles out of Houston. Site was first envisioned as town center in 1996. First phase opened w Marriott in 2003.
Low income community, hit hard by recession, w most retail out on the strip. Solar Lancaster has constructed a 1.45 MW project that now powers 5 city facilities.
Series of fortunate events: airport closed, redev’d as mixed-use NU Mueller (green and lower right); Voters approved 1 cent tax for MetroRail, City rezoned a chemical plant (in blue) for TOD, upper right photo is the view from the train of the transit plaza at Crestview Station; Dying Highland Mall (red) has been purchased by Austin Community College – planning to reinhabit the mall and build a full campus on the mall’s pkg lots – as shown in the middle image. AND the city just approved pilot test of a FBC for this 3.5 mile stretch and the planning dept is now working on much smaller grain infill and strategies to preserve affordable housing.
But densification won’t work everywhere. Sometimes, regreening is the better answer.
Perhaps most important is the opportunity to restore the local ecology - as in this example outside Minneapolis. When the shopping center died, the city restored the site’s original wetlands, creating lakefront property that succeeded in attracting the first new private investment in forty years to the low-income neighborhood.
So while redevelopment of the dead urban mall worked in the strong market of Rockville, regreening has worked well in the slow market of Columbus, OH. Driver here is replacing drag on economic development, with a catalyst.Mall demolished in 2009. Park opened in 2010. First new housing to open in 2013.
Attendance goal of 500,000 in first year was met in first 6 months. 400+ free public and private events. Land acquired in 2004.$54mil in priv donations. Opened in 2008. Leed Gold in 2009. 2010: 1.7 mil visitors. 40,000 ice skaters. -1 new hig-rise resl tower, new office devel, and hotel udner construction.
Referendum next week, City plans to use parks bond $ to purchase 2 apt complexes w 785 residents (inc 560 school children), to build sports complex.
Next step for all of you, is to consider joining CNU in removing the obstacles to urbanism. (I know a LOT of architects are suspicious of the MOVEMENT of NU – and I understand the reasons! But, less people understand the WORK of the ORGANIZATION. Great track record of initiatives at the national level – just got F/F to lift the cap on comm’l in m-u res’lbldgs from 20 to 35%. Sprawl Retrofit’s dev’g toolkits for municipalities. You have a great local chapter here too. I look forward to coming back and learning how Denver’s advanced the NEXT generation of suburban retrofits.
