Developing Around Transit: Challenges for Cities and Suburbs

by Robert T. Dunphy

Current interest in public transit investments is enormous. The challenge is to create the supporting development that will make the investments work.

The Federal Transit Administration recently approved funding for projects in Phoenix, Arizona, and Charlotte, North Carolina. The two join the ranks of light rail cities, which in recent years have added Houston, Texas; Las Vegas, Nevada; and Minneapolis, Minnesota—regions in which transit had captured only 3 to 5 percent of commuters in 2000.

In spreading from traditional markets such as New York, Chicago, and San Francisco to nontraditional markets in the South, Midwest, and West, transit faces a twofold challenge. The first challenge is for advocates to convince the larger community that transit will work—that it will serve middle-class people who are accustomed to driving. The second and more difficult challenge is making the case that compact, urban development around transit will work to generate the ridership necessary to support the new project.

This kind of smart growth linked to transit is also necessary in established markets that have grown up around transit. Ironically, residents in some traditional transit cities such as Boston and Cleveland do not believe that they have any transit-oriented development, which is perceived as more of a West Coast, new urbanist phenomenon—that is, allied with smart growth and walkable communities that are large suburban planned developments.

Aspects of a Conundrum

The conundrum is that much of the interest in new transit investments is occurring in places where transit is a novelty, yet many established transit markets are struggling to maintain services. A national survey, conducted under the Transportation Research Board’s Transit Cooperative Research Program, identified approximately 100 transit-oriented developments in the United States.1 This is a paltry number, which suggests either that not much is occurring or that the size of this market is severely underrepresented in the survey results, considering the vast amount of attention devoted to the topic of transit-oriented development in the planning and transit literature.

A new book by the Urban Land Institute, Developing Around Transit: Strategies and Solutions That Work, avoids the term transit-oriented development but highlights examples that meet the goals, whether or not the developers or the cities acknowledge it.

Another aspect of the conundrum is that from a transit perspective, urban projects yield the greatest leverage in expanding transit ridership and supporting transit services. New housing and offices in neighborhoods with good transit service create additional transit riders, often without the need for adding transit service. Neighborhoods accessible to transit also give options to new residents who would like to avoid driving.

Reshaping Development

Building in established urban areas is friendly to transit, but unfriendly to development. Projects take longer and are more expensive to build. The market is often unproven—the risks are high, and profits are uncertain. In contrast, conventional suburban projects are development-friendly, but transit-unfriendly. Most growth is expected in the suburbs; therefore the challenge is to reshape conventional development to create the kind of vibrant places that offer transit choices.

The market opportunities for urban infill development are excellent in many older areas, with young professionals and empty nesters seeking a more urban lifestyle, and with employers seeking neighborhoods that offer more employee amenities. In the report, Emerging Trends in Real Estate: 2005, the Urban Land Institute and PricewaterhouseCoopers ranked the areas near transit highest for development and investment, reflecting the appeal of infill development, as well as the public’s frustration with traffic congestion.

Development, however, does not occur just because of transit. Block 37 in downtown Chicago, for example, has been vacant since 1990, when the city cleared the land for mixed-use development. The location is excellent, but the vagaries of the marketplace have foiled the city’s plans to create a mixed-use development in one phase—the office market lacked sufficient depth when retail business was strong, and vice versa. When the city relaxed the requirement for single-phase development, a new developer with a retail orientation gave the project new momentum. The experience demonstrates that in urban infill development, a strong location cannot make up for soft market conditions or unrealistic expectations.

The first mixed-use transit project in Texas, Mockingbird Station is located adjacent to a Dallas Area Rapid Transit light rail station. The developer understood the appeal of in-town living near transit, although the city would not assist with pedestrian improvements and would not relax parking standards because of the light rail. In contrast, Dallas suburbs such as Richardson and Plano have created more urban development around their transit stations.

Markets and Policies

Reinforcing a strong market with consistent public policies can turn individual projects into successful transit districts. One of the best examples in the United States is the Rosslyn–Ballston corridor in Arlington, Virginia. The vision that developed three decades ago with the support of public officials and civic leaders has turned a once-declining strip into a vibrant mix of office, high-density residential, retail, dining, and entertainment. The development is a massive fiscal success, giving Arlington County the region’s lowest tax rate.

Successful development around transit is a challenge for cities and suburbs. The transit project must be attuned to the needs of the real estate development market, and developers in turn must appreciate the special opportunities of transit.

The Next Best Thing: Micro-retail

by Callison

The way we shop now

Shopping patterns and preferences have segregated into dozens of what demographers call "clusters," described in Michael Weiss's book The Clustered World, as "consumption communities defined by demographics, intellect, taste and outlook."

Each of these clusters (Weiss names 62) has their own initiations, ceremonies and cultural effects - think of the annual rally of Harley Davidson owners in Sturgis, South Dakota, the appetite for adventure-sports that young technology professionals share, or the environmental sensitivity of gen-y'ers - which influence the types of products and experiences each group seeks.

While this market segmentation is not new, it has been manifested mainly through product differentiation and advertising. Now, however, it is starting to direct the style and substance of our shopping destinations.

The so-called lifestyle center is clearly one type of segmentation - though given its upscale offerings, a more apt name might be the "Elite Suburban" center. Another is the rising number of co-tenancy clauses in lease agreements, where one tenant requires the presence of specific, complementary tenants.

Micro-retailing

These moves signal the start of a larger trend toward what Callison calls "micro-retail." Unlike the "all things for all people" regional shopping mall, micro-centers are targeted, thoughtfully packaged destinations that appeal to a given slice of the increasingly stratified American lifestyle pie.

Like a micro-beer, which is developed as a niche product aimed at specific tastes, these new developments feature carefully chosen ingredients, attention to detail and craftsmanship, custom packaging, and a characteristic, often sociable experience that surrounds its consumption.

Savvy developers will apply similar principles to create 21st century retail destinations, using targeted leasing, packaging and experiences to connect with a particular cluster or clusters.

The Payoff
Like all business today, retail development is far more complex than it used to be. Is it worth it? With its potential for both social and economic rewards, we think so. But don't take our word for it. Next time you decide to kick back and pop a cold one, just ask yourself: Local specialty brew, or Bud? Cheers.

Leasing
If the mantra used to be location, location, location, today it's tenants, tenants, tenants - with the right mix.

1. Replace the rolodex with research
The days of "rolodex" leasing for large retail centers are numbered. More important than who you know is what you know - about the offerings that will best satisfy your shoppers.

2. Bundle tenants
Tenant bundling can be either horizon-tal or vertical. Horizontal bundling serves a range of needs (apparel, hard goods, specialty, food and beverage) for a defined customer profile. Vertical bundling builds a tenant package around a specific concept, like recrea-tion, wellness, or culinary interests. Resist the temptation of cross-market deals, which dilute performance.

3. Think beyond 3-5-9
People will drive 25 miles, even more, to a place created just for them. Get the tenants you need by selling the idea, not the location.

4. Look local
Including local tenants may require extra legwork, but the effort pays off in a stronger identity and customer loyalty. Shoot for 20% local or regional offerings; consider community organizations or business services as well as stores and restaurants.

5. 30% to 40% food and beverage
Cafes, bars and restaurants are increasingly popular among consumers for three big reasons: less time, more money, enough stuff. Last year, Americans spent 46% of their food budget outside the home, a number that is expected to increase to 53% by 2010. (National Restaurant Association.)

Packaging
Customized packaging will leverage the value of a well-bundled tenant mix. Establish an appropriate "look and feel," while addressing fundamentals such as convenient access and smart layout.

6. Borrow from other models
Look to hospitality, wellness, cultural, entertainment or other models as a way to focus and differentiate your position. Remember, it's not just about shopping. Good experiences and relevant services rank right up there with more stuff.

7. Ditch the theme
Consumers up to their eyeballs in "reality" TV and synthetic environments ala Las Vegas and Disneyland increasingly value what is tangible, sensual and emotional. The superficial nature of themed environments now strike us as unnecessary, if not silly. Instead, create places and offerings that activate the senses - live music, fresh air, wood you can knock on, looking across the table and having a real conversation.

8. Identify yourself
Loyalty increases when people identify with a place. Foster a sense of ownership and pride by shaping a relevant design character. Be sensitive to time, people and place.
Experience
People crave rich experiences. It's a well-documented desire that testifies to a broader search for meaning that transcends material goods.

9. Make room for meaning
What types of everyday experiences will be meaningful to your customer? A moment of peace? An energizing crowd? Family fun? Should they be intimate or grand? Offbeat or mainstream? Urbane or down-home?

Set the stage for relevant "third place" experiences to unfold, and hit home with customers no matter where they live.

Harry Allen retail design for UNION

From David Report

The second store by New York designer Harry Allen for prestigious streetwear retailer, UNION, is one part archeological dig and two parts humble masterpiece. Located two doors down from the site of the original UNION store on Spring Street in Manhattan, the new space incorporates some of the elements we developed for its counterpart in LA yet remains true to New York. Harry Allen started by stripping away layers of interior finishes to reveal some original details. He found a window and door that had been covered over, a variety of plaster and brick finished, and the rafters were beautiful. “The demo process in New York is so interesting that we decided to preserve it,” says Harry Allen. The reclaimed details were “ghosted” out by decorative painter Frank Rynan and used as the backdrop for merchandise. The wooden area up front echoes the original store design - it is friendly and familiar. And the back lit, black metal shoe wall at the back of the store becomes a dramatic draw for the eye. The new UNION store is literally a “union” of brand, store environment, and location.

UNION is one of the most respected brands in the streetwear business. Harry Allen is really fond of the whole phenomenon and he has previously designed five stores for the UNION sister brand, Supreme.

Award Winning Park: "Wade Oval"

Cleveland’s Wade Oval is just seven acres, but it is uniquely-situated amid many of the most important cultural institutions in the city, including the Cleveland Museum of Natural History, Cleveland Botanical Garden, and Cleveland Art Museum. Located in the University Circle neighborhood that is home to Case Western Reserve University, the Oval is at the center of a neighborhood that draws tens of thousands of students, patients and visitors daily.
At the request of University Circle, Inc., a local nonprofit planning and development organization, PPS worked with citizens in University Circle, institutional stakeholders and internationally renowned architects and designers hired to expand several of these institutions, to help the Oval’s adjacent uses benefit from their unique location on the Oval, and transform the Oval itself – and the boulevard around it – to become more welcoming to both visitors and the local community, and enlivened by events and activities programmed by the rich array of partners around it.

PPS recommended a plan to connect the institutions to one another and to the park, partly through small changes to building facades and outdoor areas that reveal more information about what's going on inside these buildings. Using PPS’s conceptual plan, University Circle, Inc initiated a $1.4 million renovation of the Oval, which was completed in October of 2003, revealing such improvements as new walkways, pathway lighting, benches, lampposts, drinking fountains, and a performance stage that blends in with the surrounding landscape. The Cleveland Plain Dealer’s architecture critic, Steve Litt, wrote of the revitalized Oval “The transformation though modest in cost is astonishing. UCI has turned the park into a postcard-perfect amenity worthy of any city in the world.”

"Relational Neighborhoods"

Excerpt from Frank A. Mills, Urban Psychologist

A "relational neighborhood" is a "group of people with which an individual interacts frequently, to whom an individual feels connected, or to whom the individual would go to for help." Relational "neighbors" may include family members, schoolmates, friends, co-workers, and church members, as well as neighbors.

Although "relational neighborhood," by definition, can define "neighborhoods" other than geographical neighborhoods it would serve us well to understand the characteristics of a relational neighborhood as they apply to the geographical neighborhood.

Andrew Crook in his essay on the Relational City ("The Relational City: A New Framework for Tackling Unemployment," Relationship Institute, Cambridge, England, 1997) suggests that there are three characteristics, and five "micro-building blocks" for the Relational City. Applying these to the context of a geographical neighborhood, we find that a relational neighborhood is a neighborhood where residents share a commitment to the neighborhood, to each other, and to joint participation in improving their neighborhood.

To delineate, Crook's three characteristics are ...

• A commitment to place: A relational neighborhood is one to which residents are committed to, and feel pride in belonging to.


• A commitment to people: A relational neighborhood in one characterized by mutual respect and concern among residents.


• A commitment to participation: A relational neighborhood is one which residents know their joint power for change and use it.

For Crook, the five elements, or "micro-level building blocks," necessary to create a Relational City, or for our purposes, a relational neighborhood out of which beneficial characteristics like mutual trust and co-operation can develop are:

• Face-to-face contact (Directness)
  Residents physically meet with each other and mutually interact. In the process, they begin to understand and appreciate other perspectives expressed by neighbors. Simply put, relationships cannot exist if people do not come together.


• Common purpose (Commonality)
  Residents share a joint vision, or at least some elements. If residents do not share a common purpose there will be no opportunity to profitably work together. Common purpose requires residents to be convinced that there are common projects on which they can co-operate to their mutual advantage.


• Contact over time (Continuity)
  Relationships take time to develop. People are highly unlikely to form strong commitment to a neighborhood if they see their stay likely to be short.


• Contact in different contexts (Multiplexity)
  Multiplexity is the idea that a relationship between two (or more) people is strengthened if it takes place in more than one context. In my neighborhood, for example, most of my neighbors attend the same church and we all walk to the same stores.


• Mutual respect (Parity)
  Neighborhood residents are able to interact on roughly the same level with equal power. Neighbors meet on equal footing and contribute equally. When a particular neighbor chooses at times to remain aloof from the neighborhood a relational neighborhood will accept the neighbor back into the process as if he had never left.

Keys to a smart transit-oriented project

Urban cluster projects have a delicate chemistry. With so many variables, players, financial formulas, and expectations involved, it's easy to end up on the wrong side of the track before the first shovel of dirt is even turned.

“From a city's point of view, these transit nodes will become a gateway to the city, and everybody has high expectations of what that gateway should look like,” says designer Chek Tang, principal of Oakland, Calif.-based McLarand Vasquez Emsiek & Partners, which specializes in transportation-oriented developments (TODs). Hence, laying the early groundwork for the TOD is every bit as important as its execution, says Tang.

“City governments have an entrenched lack of familiarity in TOD projects,” adds Austin City Councilman Brewster McCracken, the city's point person for two planned transit villages along its future light-rail line. “So, it's absolutely critical to be transparent from the very beginning and to have shared information and shared goals.”

That's a message that Marilee Utter, a Denver-based national transit consultant for Citiventure Associates, routinely carries to cities, architects and developers. Over the years, Utter has compiled a list of five crucial steps cities should take with developers in the early-planning process of a transit-oriented project:

Map out the objective: Cities should aggressively determine the project's initial vision, instead of the developer, urges Utter. “Who better to know the city's culture than the people who hold office there?” Conversely, communities should cede decisions on design elements such as pedestrian-flow patterns to the architects and developers.

Optimize land usage: Cities should commit to studying and understanding a TOD's requirement for higher-density development and less-than-standard parking ratios. Cities should assist developers with land assembly from the beginning of the project, Utter stresses.

Listen to your neighbors: Nearby residents are the most likely to resist plans for a transit village. Their concerns should be prioritized in TOD master plans, tenant mix and traffic flow.

Use quality materials: Construction materials should be top-of-the-line and help make a statement about the project's staying power, Utter says. Additionally, cities should insist on exemplary street designs, but not demand that every enclave or street have retail.

Understand your customer: Project architects and developers should strongly link the development's access points to its design and theme to further create continuity. “Always think about the consumer,” emphasizes Utter.

Excape The Bland...Designing Micro Centers

excerpt from Retail Trends

Main Street USA

For horizontal mixed-use projects, architects say the most frequent failing is creating a development that feels bland to the customer. Mixed-use projects are expected to recreate the town square setting found in downtowns of the past, but many architects don't look closely enough at what made those settings work, according to John R. Clifford, principal of GreenbergFarrow, a national firm offering architecture, engineering and development services.

“They are trying to recreate the Main Street of Disneyland, this artificial idea of what a Main Street looks like,” says Jack Illes, managing partner of Urban Labs, a Del Mar, Calif.-based urban design and architecture firm specializing in mixed-use retail and residential projects. “You can show up anywhere in the country and you'll find the same kind of place, with the same tenants and after a while, it's going to feel as tired as the mall because it's not unique.”

This is a costly mistake, because horizontal mixed-use projects, where buildings are spread out over many small buildings, bring some added expenses to the mix. Four-sided construction tends to cost 10 percent to 15 percent more than the three-sided approach commonly used with single-use retail properties, says Jack O'Brien, president of Dallas, Texas-based architecture firm O'Brien & Associates.

To break monotony, allowing retailers to pursue their own design visions can help make the place unique, according to Illes. He brings up the example of General Growth Properties' Otay Ranch Town Center, a recently opened lifestyle property in Chula Vista, Calif.
General Growth let each retailer design its own storefront, resulting in details as varied as limestone pillars and striped awnings to stonework and a sunset yellow color scheme for the local Barnes & Noble.

The quality of the materials, however, has to be consistent throughout the development, says Stan Laegreid, principal of Seattle, Wash-based Callison Architecture. A community for the mid-market consumer should not have elements of luxury to avoid confusing customers.

A common mistake architects have made with some of the first horizontal mixed-use projects has been to bury the retail deep inside the project's residential components. The retail and residential should play off each other, but retail also needs to pull from a wider trade area, says Greg Lyon, partner with KTGY Group, Inc., an Irvine, Calif.-based planning and architecture firm. “They need traffic that extends beyond that community,” he says.

When adding entertainment to the mix, designers also need to think about the hours of operation for theaters and restaurants. “A live theater isn't necessarily used 365 days a year and even if it is, it's typically only from 8 p.m. to 10 p.m.,” says Illes. “What happens the rest of the day? You've got a bunch of doors leading to an empty, dark place and that can kill traffic.” And location is important as well. Otherwise, residents may have to deal with noise every night.

To make the projects interesting to explore, architects and planners should vary the width and length of streets within the development, the style and height of various buildings, the size of public area spaces and the distribution of architectural features such as fountains and clock towers.

“Real cities were built over time by different architects and different landlords,” says Clifford. “They have modern structures on the side of Neoclassical ones, with Victorian architecture nearby.”

Spacing is also an important consideration, says Alex Espinoza, design principal in the retail/commercial studio of Dorsky Hodgson Parrish Yue, a Cleveland, Ohio-based architecture firm. When buildings are too close together, people feel uneasy, but putting them too far apart disorients visitors, Espinoza says.

The configuration and placement of parking lots is one of the greatest challenges in mixed-use development. Most experts say that parking in horizontal projects should be segregated by use, with separate lots set aside for residents, retail customers and office workers. These lots have to be connected to their respective uses by convenient pedestrian links and should be within close walking distance for the center's customers, says Michael Alston, of Development Design Group, a Baltimore, Md.-based planning, architecture and design firm. In vertical projects, which tend to use structured parking, segregation is even more critical — the condominium owners don't want to come home a week before Christmas and find that their spaces have been taken by shoppers, says Lyon. He recommends creating separate entrances for residents and office workers from the retail portion of the project.

Vertically challenged

In vertical mixed-use projects national retail tenants with good credit are vital for securing financing, but they have set store prototypes and prefer wide, open spaces with great ceiling height. That is difficult to achieve when there are all kinds of mechanical and plumbing systems coming down from the apartments above, says Simon Sykes, vice president with Development Design Group. One solution is to position these systems horizontally, along the ceiling, instead of vertically, when they come to the first floor. O'Brien recommends creating a 2- to 4-foot tall interstitial space between the retail level and the apartments above for sewer pipes as a way to avoid multiple penetrations of the podium slab above retail.

In vertical mixed-use, structured parking can account for up to 15 percent of the entire project cost, while not producing any revenue, says Laegreid.

Another issue to tackle is how the retailers can load and unload merchandise without disturbing residents. A loading dock can be installed in the back of the building or on the ground floor or basement level, with an elevator delivering the goods to the retailer's main floor. This requires a delicate balancing act — elevators and servicing areas often translate into inefficient space and lost revenue, resulting in up to 15 percent of additional expense, says Laegreid.

Getting the message out

The architect also has to make sure that the retail component is the most eye-catching of all in a mixed-use property, says Jeff Green, owner of Jeff Green Partners, a Mill Valley, Calif.-based retail consulting firm. In such a dense environment, visitors' eyes tend to wander and if the storefronts don't jump out at them, the retailers are likely to suffer. O'Brien recommends using different construction materials to set retail apartfrom residential and office.

Considering what kind of tenants go well with a mixed-use building is also an important decision. Restaurants, for example, are a risk for vertical mixed-use projects because in addition to the smell and noise that might bother residents, they can draw rats and mice that could eventually scurry up and infest residential units.

“That's new information to many people in the suburban hinterland; it isn't necessarily self-evident,” says Illes. To prevent a disaster, developers need to make sure that the market in which their mixed-use property is going to be located can support each use on its own. They have to educate themselves on what makes mixed-use work and adequately explain their vision to the architect, says Illes.

“If you hire different architecture firms for each use, you've got one team trying to solve all of their problems and another team concentrating on what they need,” says Brian Church, of Urban Labs.

“We've tried that in some cases, but it's really difficult,” Church says.

Return of the Occidental Tourist

excerpts from Seattlest

Yesterday Seattlest broke out of the office at noon, grabbed a Tats'trami and headed to Occidental Square. There's nothing like passing a short hour with a book and a gut bomb in a square... Actually, had a book along, but it was only cover for our real mission which was to watch all the little people go about their little lives and they happily obliged by showing up and staring back at us. What? Just eating a sandwich and reading over here. Nosy freak.

Earlier this week Seattlest got an email from the Project for Public Spaces who'd recently found a post of ours from last fall about the newly renovated Occidental Square, a renovation they had a hand in. They wondered if we had any updates to our first reactions. A bunch of trees were removed during the park's renovation--seventeen of them, exactly--which, in light of the P-I's article on Monday about the declining fortunes of the tree in Seattle, is pretty tragic.

Generally we're not in favor of the removal of urban trees, but it did help the square. Yesterday the sun came out just as we were arriving and it was leafy and bright at the same time. We had our book and the Tats'trami and when the couple at the table next to us started speaking Polish we thought for just a second that we might be back in the greatest square on the face of the Earth. But no.

It's not really the square's fault, though. You can mess with the leafy to sunny ratio for ever, but you're not going to change the fact that the businesses that surround the square are designed to be used once a month. If there were a few boutiques that opened directly into Occidental Square and maybe another cafe or four there would be a reason for people to meander around on a lunch hour. As things stand, it still seems like a really nice square that most people haul ass through en route to catching the first pitch. We're going head back for some more lunches, though, and maybe we'll grab a few coworkers on the way next time. It should be the best spot in or near Downtown for people watching and we're going to start doing our part by showing up.

Can new architecture create successful places?

by Kathy Madden

People often ask me if a building has to be old or look historic to create a sense of place. I always answer with a definite "No!" While it may be easier to find older buildings where public activity flourishes, their success is not due to age or a particular architectural style. The main factor is actually how the base of the building is treated. A building with a well-designed (and well-managed!) ground floor can be a great place regardless of the style in which it is constructed. Let's look at two places which I think illustrate this point quite effectively: Country Club Plaza in Kansas City, and Rockefeller Center in New York.

Country Club Plaza, which debuted in the 1920s, is one of the nation's oldest shopping centers. Built in a style that mimics the architecture of Seville, Spain, it succeeds as a pedestrian district even though it was developed to accommodate cars. A few years ago PPS interviewed the managers of the complex, and we found that they attributed their success to four things. One, they offered a mix of attractions that appeal to a broad array of people – for example, by varying the price ranges of retail and restaurants. Second, they located necessities (e.g. bank branches, or doctors' and dentists' offices) in places that would lead people to pass by retail stores en route. Third, everything in the development allowed people to interact with it in some way. Children could touch sculptures; people could sit by pools and fountains; window displays were designed to maximize intrigue; outdoor cafes hosted jazz performers and other entertainment. And last, but certainly not least, blank walls were not allowed anywhere. Where management identified sterile areas around the exterior of the complex, they added plantings or artwork to liven the space up for passersby. What's remarkable is that, even though the Plaza is widely known for its historicist aesthetic, the people who run it cite very different reasons for its enduring popularity.

Rockefeller Center, though it was constructed just a short time after Country Club Plaza, couldn't look more different--but it is an even better public space. Its soaring forms are modernist icons, and the closer you get, the more these buildings come alive. Art deco sculptures grace the entrances. Ground floor windows protrude slightly from facades, enticing people to slow down and take a look at the goods inside. Changing exhibits and events in the center of the complex keep it humming in every season, while artfully placed wooden benches enable people to pause, rest, reflect, and take it all in. Here, a modern aesthetic gracefully accommodates a great public space.

Contrast the original Rockefeller Center with the more recently developed Rockefeller Center West (built in the 1970s on the west side of Sixth Avenue), however, and you'll see a very different way of building which has no sense of place. The buildings here do not have human-scaled bases: Store windows and entrances are set back from the sidewalk by nearly 50 feet, and the space between the building and the curb is basically empty. The retail is hidden so few people go window shopping. There is no reason for people to linger or make a return visit.

Rockefeller Center and Country Club Plaza make it clear that success as a public space is independent from architectural style. But as Rockefeller Center West illustrates, newer buildings often fall short of the mark. This is also true regardless of style. In fact, many of the worst new buildings are those designed to look old or historic, which don't work because they hide their ground floor uses behind a "charming" facade.

So although great new buildings may be few and far between, I stand behind my emphatic "No" -- there is NO reason new architecture can't contribute to an enhanced sense of place in the public realm. I would love to hear from readers of this blog about new buildings that succeed at their base--that engage the sidewalk with transparent ground floors and a mix of retail and other uses. What new architecture is striving to create better places?

Sustainable Bags: "Freitag"

what: the Freitag bag, a Swiss-made carryall manufactured entirely from recycled materials. Invented by Swiss brothers Daniel and Markus Freitag, who wanted bags just like the ones used by New York bike couriers (bags that were practical, weatherproof, quick and easy to use), the Freitag bag is an urban tool, a saddlebag for the city, durable enough to be carried all over the world. Very attractive to a visually-trained eye, it’s a pleasant surprise in a world of standardised, mass-produced everyday objects.

who: Markus and Daniel Freitag — also known as the Freitag brothers — were heavily influenced by the motorway. Living in an apartment near a highway in Switzerland, they had easy access to watching the trucks rolling by, covered in thick tarpaulin. In 1993, the DoItYourself duo began to create one-of-a-kind bags made of recycled waterproof tarps, bicycle inner tubes and seatbelts. Before long they were trucking; the company outgrew the brothers’ apartment and moved to its own space in Zurich. Freitag opened flagship stores in Davos, Switzerland, and in Hamburg, Germany. Perhaps more importantly, it established an international presence online. The website allows online hipsters around the world to shop, create custom bags, learn more about the company, play branded games, and even apply for jobs.

sustainability features: the Freitag bag is tailor-made on a small-scale, of recycled materials. Made entirely by hand, the unpretentious Freitag bag has distanced itself from trendy, brand-driven products as a durable and radical ‘anti-brand’ alternative for youthful urbanites who have made it their choice for toting personal necessities. In addition to covering the history of the bag and its particular ecological, economic, and socio-cultural contexts, Freitag.com contains portraits of 3,000 Freitag bags and their owners, most of whom are members of a generation that is as vain as it is critical of consumerism -a generation for whom the Freitag bag is the ideal brand-name product.

Great Urban Streets Design Principles

Principle 1:
Manage CongestionCongestion is a fact of life in successful urban places. By definition, a place that supports a great concentration of economic and social activities within a pedestrian-scaled environment is going to be congested.

Principle 2:
Balanced/Active StreetsDowntown streets must balance the needs of pedestrians, bicycles, transit and the automobile in creating an attractive and viable urban core. Downtown streets are for people first, commercial second, parking third and through traffic fourth.

Principle 3:
Streets as PlacesThe Great Streets Program envisions downtown as a vital focus of city life, and as a primary destination. Our downtown streets are our most important and pervasive public space and common ground.

Principle 4:
Interactive Streets Urban Streets are the stages on which the public life of the community is acted out.

Principle 5:
Pride of PlaceVisible, caring and upkeep are critical to the vitality of urban street life.

Principle 6:
Public ArtArt in the public environment can help to establish a stronger sense of place and a continuity between the past, present and future.

Pitiousa- Human Scale Development

The design for the town of Pitiousa recognises that every context is a self-regulating, living system; that the basic elements of urbanism are the urban block, the street and the square; that buildings should never be as large as the commission; and that they should use well-tried constructional techniques and materials. Pitiousa also recognises that " Classicism is not a Style ", but a tradition that has evolved from and coexisted with the vernacular. It is a living tradition open to adaptation and interpretation, and responsive to region, climate and nature. "

-Demetri Porphyrios

" Unlike the currently marketed conception of tradition as the "peddling of antiques", the classical project does not aim at upholstering a spurious restoration. Instead, its aim has been to ferret out in existing society those traditional elements that could foster the new. The story of cities has been the story of endless innovation. But the new has never been a mere novelty. The new has always been the result of a process of knowledge and merit. the various phases of history are additive and the storing of new experience has been the law of mankind. The exclusive characteristic of civilised man has been his ability to record and to retrieve from memory. In that sense, Classicism and the Traditional City are less absorbed in the dialectic between an imagined future and a nostalgic past ( as many critics have claimed ), than in the search for realistic projects. The ultimate criterion in the design of cities ought to be the public well-being of their inhabitants. "

-Demetri Porphyrios

Sustainable co-op supermarket?

from cool town studios

Good neighborhood supermarkets are hard to come by. Trader Joe's and Whole Foods are the de facto choices by the downtown crowd, though the former has a limited selection and the latter caters to an upper class income. The most progressive neighborhoods in forward-thinking cities like Madison WI, Burlington VT, Cambridge MA and Ann Arbor MI have it figured out - co-op supermarkets.

As you can see (above), co-ops have evolved - they're organized via grassroots efforts, but don't look like grassroots efforts. In fact, they're sharp-looking, well-managed, and price competitive because they follow the mass customization/crowdsourcing/beta community model of future patrons organizing to design and develop the grocery they want. In fact, as a result, most of them have built-in cafes (right) and community bulletin boards.

The question then becomes, how does one start a co-op supermarket? The answer is with the Food Co-op 500 (perhaps a play on the Fortune 500), cooperative effort to help establish a total of 500 co-op supermarkets in 10 years (there are 300 today).

The outline of the development guide can be found here, based on:

1. Four organizing principles:The 'Four Cornerstones' of Vision, Talent, Capital and Systems.
2. Three stages of development:Organizing, Feasibility and Planning, and Implementation.
3. Two sources of funding:- $10,000 matching Seed Fund grant for the first stage of development.- $25,000 matching Sprout Fund loan for the second and third stages of development.

Finally, you can 'find a co-op supermarket near you' with the Cooperative Grocer Directory... and if there isn't one, you now have an idea of how to solve that!

In Praise of Smaller Developments

by Trisha Riggs E-mail: priggs@uli.org

ULI’s Place Making Conference Explores Fundamentals of Designing and Building for Change

Conference panelists discussed the benefits of building smaller developments. The smaller the town center development, the more necessary it is to link with the surrounding neighborhoods, resulting in ample points of connection. Conversely, while larger developments have more capability to be self-sustaining, this can lead to isolation, participants noted. “Going small forces you to connect to what is around you, because you are not big enough to do things on your own,” said Richard E. Heapes, principal of Street-Works in White Plains, N.Y.

According to John E. Felton, principal and director of community design at Cline Design Associates in Raleigh, N.C., there are several steps that can be taken upfront to help smoothen the process of developing small, mixed-use projects, including conducting a full analysis of the entire site’s potential and the timing of the development of each use; developing a clear strategy for integrating each use; using a simple, efficient design; understanding that parking for each use is critical; and planning for the creation of an engaging place that draws people back for repeat visits.

Felton advised conference attendees to “go to where the people are” to find promising sites for smaller projects—including downtown infill locations, sites near transit, places close to universities or cultural centers, and old shopping centers. Many of these sites represent lucrative opportunities for adaptive reuse, he said.

Katherine Kelley, president of Green Street Properties in Atlanta, shared four key lessons learned in developing small-scale projects: 1) Be externally focused—build to the perimeter of the project so it connects to the external infrastructure. “This is beneficial to the surrounding community as well—each can enjoy the benefits of the other.” 2) Anchor the project with great restaurants. “They (restaurants) are a primary channel for the public, and they draw people to the adjacent retail.” 3) To the extent possible, arrange the project’s components horizontally. “If you have to layer vertically, make each building easily walkable to the next.” 4) Realize that something has to give to make the numbers work. “If you don’t have high density (which is sometimes a challenge to achieve in smaller projects) you have to look elsewhere for a sufficient revenue stream.”

The place making trend, said Terry Shook, president of Shook Kelley in Charlotte, N.C., has resulted in a “new breed” of community developers who are catering to rising consumer demand for convenient living environments that save time by offering a variety of development uses close together. Town center development provides an opportunity to reclaim areas with no sense of community—particularly in suburban settings—by “turning the ordinary into the special, until we reach a point at which the special becomes the ordinary,” he said.

Shop in a Box

The latest in the world of pop-up retail? From Singapore comes the Venue VBOX, a portable store in a shipping container, which can be set-up temporarily. Any place. Any time.

The VBOX enables a brand or company to follow an event they wish to align their brand with, or pop up where consumers least expect it. Tag along with a photography exhibition or set up shop temporarily at a large sporting event. Brands can even showcase items that consumers may not otherwise be able to purchase elsewhere: just fill the VBOX with one-offs or special editions and you'll pull in consumers with the prospect that they'll able to purchase something unique.

The VBOX comes self-contained and equipped with an iMac and iPod HiFi. It's entirely ready to go; all that needs to be done is fill it with enticing products. To date the VBOX has housed collections by some of the fashion world’s most prestigious names: RAF SIMONS (Prada Group) and limited PUMA designer co-labs by Alexander McQueen, Christy Turlington, Mihara Yasuhiro as well as CDs, magazines/books and Motorola phones.

Whether the VBOX is placed in a remote village in Spain, on a beach in California or on the ski slopes of Canada, it's a refreshing way to inject fun and excitement into a brand and win over a swag full of new consumers. Japanese clothing brand UNIQLO used container stores for its recent launch in the United States. More about that here. And for much more on pop-up retail, check out trendwatching.com's overview.

People=Power!

By SAM COOPER

Fred Kent believes in people power.
You can have the most attractively built community in the world, he says, but if people don’t come together to mix in public spaces, it’s just dead space.

Kent recently spoke to the West Vancouver Chamber of Commerce and Mayor Pamela Goldsmith-Jones, in relation to the plans to renew Ambleside.
The world-renowned urban planning expert has worked with over 2,000 communities through his New York-based Project for Public Spaces consultancy, started in 1975.

His theory is that attractive, non-automobile dominated public spaces layered with multi-use functions will pump vitality back into communities that have become too isolated.

Educated at Columbia University, Kent brings studies of geography, economics, transportation, planning and anthropology, into his “place-making” philosophy. He’s taken about a million photos in communities around the world, using time lapse technology to understand the underlying motivation of people’s attraction, or repulsion, to certain public spaces.

“Foot movements are like a sort of language,” he explained of his photographic methodology, to a table of listeners including Goldsmith-Jones and Park Royal vice-president Rick Amantea, over a lunch of grilled salmon at Saltaire in Ambleside.
The group had earlier toured Ambleside and found traffic overpowered their conversations.
“Your main street is only functioning at 40 per cent of what it could be,” Kent said.
“When you look at your city, there are a lot of opportunities and a lot of things not happening.”

Kent’s group holds that great cities have a formula of ten great destinations. And each location should also be enriched by ten different activities, he says.
But a location doesn’t have to be an attraction like the Eiffel Tower to draw people.

For example, a city hall, library, laundry, coffee shop, and bank could be layered together.
“If you triangulate those things with other activities you’d have one of the busiest places in Canada.”

Busy is a positive concept for Kent, meaning regular people interacting.
“The important business of the city is in the social functions, not what happens in city hall,” he said.

Hearing this, Goldsmith-Jones nodded enthusiastically.
“I try to go to a different coffee shop every day and I find what I’m running into is so interesting, I have to move back my (municipal hall) meetings,” she told Kent.
Kent suggested West Vancouver citizens should be engaged in a process to imagine what new public spaces in Ambleside should encompass.

Investment Funding for New Urbanists

Exerpts From New Urban News

Since the late 1990s, a number of people have tried to form investment pools that would provide money for new urbanist developments. It has not been easy going.

The Traditional Neighborhood Development Fund, started in 1997 by new urbanist developers Robert Chapman, Rob Dickson, and Lloyd Zuckerberg, obtained backing from the multi-billion-dollar Hillman Company and from a major shareholder in Goldman Sachs, but was never able to place any significant capital.

The Fund for New Urbanism, started in 2002 with Andres Duany, Sam Young, and businessman Wayne Huizenga as partners, hoped to finance several projects but is now limiting itself to just one — a 930-acre development near Edenton, North Carolina. Another pool, the Green Living Fund, which Kacey Fitzpatrick in the San Francisco Bay Area expected to have in operation by late 2006, has delayed its startup by at least several months.

Yet while some investment pools are being postponed or pared down, others are springing into existence. In January, the Denver-based Revival Fund Management of Dennis Fleming and Charlie Randall started its Urban Green Fund, which will invest in walkable, mixed-use developments within a half-mile of mass transit. Also importantly, philanthropies are coming forward. The New York-based FB Heron Foundation, for example, is investing in New Urbanism through funds such as the Bay Area Smart Growth Fund and the California Smart Growth Fund.

What seems to be under way is a sorting out of investment concepts and participants. In some instances, new urbanists tried to start funds before conditions were ripe. “We were way premature nine or 10 years ago,” says Chapman, who leads an established new urbanist development company, the North Carolina-based Traditional Neighborhood Development Partners. “I think the time is absolutely right now. We’ll make an announcement in midsummer about a new fund that will have a sustainability and green building aspect.”

Some funds have run into difficulty because they employed methods that diverged too much from the real estate field’s usual ways of doing business. DPZ’s Fund for New Urbanism, whose research and organizing were carried out primarily by Young and Demetri Baches, had what seemed an ingenious idea: The Fund would identify eight sites “ideally located for smart growth,” design plans and codes for them, secure entitlements so that construction could occur as-of-right, and transfer the approved plans to developers prepared to follow the plans.

There turned out to be at least two flaws in the Fund’s premise, according to sources consulted by New Urban News. First, developers resisted paying to obtain planned, entitled projects. “A developer doesn’t want to pay retail,” Chapman says. “He wants to pay wholesale.” Second, the Fund suffered from being seen as more a planning operation than a development organization. Baches acknowledges that DPZ did not want to devote time and energy to becoming a full-fledged developer itself. With a busy international planning practice, DPZ would have had a hard time managing several development projects. Thus the Fund settled upon carrying out the one project it had pushed the furthest — Sandy Point.


THE NEED FOR PATIENT CAPITAL
Analysts agree that there is clearly a need for pools of “patient capital.” Mainstream real estate financiers mostly have “a time horizon that is so compressed that you have to make [undesirable] compromises,” Chapman observes. A new urbanist development will surpass a conventional subdivision in value in the long run, he says, but first a great deal of money and time must be invested. It’s not uncommon for 15 years to be needed.

“We need to understand real estate as a 40-year asset class again,” says Fleming. Fleming expects to put money into a project for eight to nine years and to have a provision allowing the investment to be renewed twice. By comparison, conventional real estate funds usually “have a time horizon of five [years] plus two [extensions] or seven [years] plus two [extensions].”

Revival Fund Management expects its Urban Green Fund to amass $250 million and will invest it in approximately 20 to 30 projects in “progressive real estate markets” such as Denver, Seattle, Dallas-Fort Worth, Boston, Washington, and the Bay Area (except the purportedly overpriced city of San Francisco). Each project will get $7 million to $12 million from the Fund, says Fleming, the managing director. Properties will typically be “within a half-mile radius of frequent transit service” and will feature energy-efficient technologies, a fund statement says.

Once the first Urban Green Fund is established, a second fund would be started, and so on. Eventually Revival would like to establish a real estate investment trust (REIT) for properties that are new urbanist and “green.”

Criteria similar to Revival’s are already being used by the $100 million Rose Smart Growth Fund, which developer Jonathan Rose established about a year ago. After buying two buildings in downtown Seattle for $23 million last April, the Rose fund announced its second investment in November: half of the $38 million needed to convert the historic Clipper Mill buildings in northern Baltimore to 51,000 sq. ft. of arts and crafts studios, 62,000 sq. ft. of offices, 36 loft apartments, and other uses. The Rose Fund became a 50-50 partner with Struever Bros. Eccles & Rouse, which is developing the project, with Cho Benn Holback + Associates as architects. The property adjoins a light-rail stop in Jones Falls Valley.

A new urbanist investment of more limited duration is “mezzanine capital,” which Philip Blumberg’s American Ventures Realty in Coral Gables, Florida, supplied to projects such as market-based, moderate-income housing in the Little Havana section of Miami and the luxury-class Gold Avenue Lofts in downtown Albuquerque. Mezzanine financing — so called because it occupies a level between loans and long-term equity— generally is paid off after about 18 months. Blumberg says the investments made through his company’s South Florida Urban Initiatives Fund and New Mexico Urban Initiatives Fund, both of which are near being closed out, have performed well, delivering operating returns of 15 percent or better.

Blumberg says plans for a third urban initiatives fund, in New Jersey, fell through when Governor Jim McGreevey, with whom the fund organizers were working, unexpectedly resigned in November 2004 (after the governor admitted having an extramarital affair with a male state employee). “Given the current down cycle in residential real estate, we’re evaluating what would be the next form for a fund,” Blumberg says, noting that he remains “bullish” on this kind of investment.Chapman views better financial structures as a key to improving the quality of community development in America. When he rolls out a new fund later this year, many of his investors are expected to be “foundations, endowments, and other socially conscious organizations” comfortable with a long timeline.

A growing number of foundations are putting money from their endowments into environmentally and socially responsible real estate development. The Heron Foundation has placed $11 million (3.5 percent of its endowment) into the Bay Area and California Smart Growth Funds and the Canyon-Johnson Urban Fund, Genesis Workforce Housing Fund, and UrbanAmerica funds.

California has become a hotbed for smart growth funds, which often favor energy-efficient buildings along with urban locations near mass transit. The California Public Employees’ Retirement System (CalPERS) has invested in funds such as the Green Development Fund — which was begun with the Houston-based real estate firm Hines, for construction of LEED pre-certified office buildings — and the $676 million CIM Urban Real Estate Fund. Two of the fund management companies most active in California are Pacific Coast Capital Partners and Pacific Realty Group. Among the sponsors of such funds is the Bay Area Council, which in 2002 started the $66 million Bay Area Smart Growth Fund I for projects in or near neighborhoods of below-median income and which has since launched a second fund.

Baches is now managing partner of DPZ Pacific, a firm licensed by DPZ to produce plans, designs, and codes in Australia, New Zealand, China, and other parts of East Asia. “ He expects to start funds in that part of the world, where he thinks the prospects for New Urbanism are bright.

Sustainable Fresh Local Markets

Excerpt from New York Times

PORTLAND, Me. — Until last summer, the 136-year-old building at 28 Monument Square had been one of the most visible eyesores at the center of this energetic Atlantic Coast city. You would never know it now.

Most days, a steady stream of customers follow their noses, thirst and appetites into the building, home of the new Public Market House, where in a narrow corridor flanked by vendors they can buy fresh-cut flowers, cheese from Maine farms, a sandwich on fresh-baked bread and beer from state microbreweries.

The seven-month-old market occupies the basement and first floor of the partly renovated four-story building at the heart of downtown, which was last home to a failing surplus store.
Kris Horton, whose K. Horton Specialty Foods has become a local landmark, led an active public campaign last year to establish the new market after the Libra Foundation, a philanthropic organization in Maine, sold the last of its real estate holdings in Portland, including the larger indoor Portland Public Market, two blocks away. Ms. Horton and other food and farm-product vendors had worked in that market since 1998.

The new Public Market House, situated in a square that has supported a large outdoor seasonal farmers market for decades, has become the latest example of how fresh local food and downtown markets can stimulate activity in American cities, big and small.

Although the Public Market House is and will continue to be significantly smaller in size and sales than the old market it replaced, it will not be subsidized. Moreover, the Public Market House’s proximity to the existing outdoor Wednesday farmers’ market prompted the authors of a new economic study to propose promoting the indoor market as the centerpiece of a “market district.”

“Markets bring life to a city,” said Nelle Hanig, a business development specialist in Portland’s Economic Development Division, who helped accelerate the permit process to have the market built. “This one is already a destination. The location of the Public Market House is important to its success. It’s right in the middle of town. It’s becoming a focus of activity, and that’s always good in a city.”

The study, completed last month for the Portland Downtown District, an economic development agency, said that the Public Market House is already attracting enough shoppers to generate $1.2 million annually in sales. The building’s owner is planning to renovate the second floor to provide space for four or five more vendors, who could generate a further $1.2 million in sales.
The market district, the study said, might also include a covered outdoor market with 25 vendors on nearby Lancaster Lane, as well as producers selling goods on “day tables” in Monument Square.

The old market’s sale last August and the steady departure of vendors until its formal closing in January stirred passions throughout the city. Downtown workers and weekend shoppers from the suburbs loved the old market’s homegrown vendors and special events.

But vendors paid less than $20 a square foot to rent space in a market that cost the foundation as much as $75 a square foot, said Morris Fischer, president of CB Richard Ellis-the Boulos Company, which represented Guggenheim Real Estate, the New York investment firm that bought the market last August.

“I believe in the spirit of a public market being a community,” said Ms. Horton, while attending to early afternoon customers. “We found out that a lot of other people in Portland feel the same way.”

Inner City Retail

post from Marvin a.k.a. eMarv

I was just reading the "Welcome to Metropolis" article in Retail Traffic magazine. The article states that "MacFarlane already has 2.2 billion to invest. Meanwhile, DLC Management Corp. Has joined with G.L. Blackstone & Associates to form DLC UrbanCore LLC and is sitting on $100 million in capital." Imagine that! (I wish I had $100M to sit on!) I actually know of a couple of potential infill sites in Baltimore that could be ideal for redevelopment.

BTW, for those that are not convinced about inner city retail, here's an impressive stat from the retail traffic article: "In 2002, ...inner city shoppers went outside their neighborhoods to buy $42 billion in goods, or 25 percent of the total $122 billion retail demand of those consumers, according to a study for the Boston-based Initiative for Competitive Inner City by Boston Consulting Group Analytics with Claritas Inc."

Another benefit (according to executives in the know) is the good returns. G. Lamont Blackstone of UrbanCore states that they are exceeding 13 percent returns and Victor MacFarlane says "the return rate for an initial $50 million (of a total $3 billion) invested by the California Public Employees' Retirement System was 30 percent in 1996."

Still not convinced, here's another extract from the article:
Baldwin Hills-and other inner city successes like Harlem USA, and Gulfgate Center in Houston-are convincing a widening pool of players that investment in minority communities is a good bet. "It will increasingly become mainstream as retailers recognize that there are few other commercial real estate opportunities in this country of the magnitude these present," says Capri CEO and Chairman Quinton Primo, III.

So where are the big inner city players looking next? (I thought you'd never ask... :)
According to Retail Traffic, they are looking in Seattle, Phoenix, Tucson, Dallas, Denver, Fort Worth, Austin, Fort Lauderdale, Tampa, Miami and Jacksonville. While Pittsburgh, Philadelphia and Detroit are flat.

AIA Top 10 Green Winner

The Z6 House

Location: Santa Monica, Ca
Building type: Single-family residential
New construction
2,480 sq. feet (230 sq. meters)
Project scope: a single building
Urban setting
Completed August 2006
Rating: LEED for Homes v1 --Level: Platinum


The Z6 House is a single family residence that was added to a multi-family zoned lot with an existing duplex. The residence has 4 bedrooms and 2 1/2 baths., although the bedrooms open up to the rest of the house for added space when needed.

The house is constructed of factory built modules that were delivered to the site and erected on the site-built foundation over a period of 13 hours; the structural slab on grade serves as the finish floor for the first level. A roof deck takes advantage of views and a green roof with vegetation native to southern California.

This project was chosen as an AIA Committee on the Environment Top Ten Green Project for 2007. It was submitted by LivingHomes, in Santa Monica, California with Ray Kappe Architects, in Pacific Palisades, California. Additional project team members are listed on the "Process" screen.

Environmental Aspects
A commitment to minimizing the ecological footprint informed all aspects of the homes' design. The project team used the phrase "Six Zeroes" to describe the goals of the project: zero waste, zero energy, zero water, zero carbon, zero emissions, and zero ignorance.

The design maximizes the opportunities of the mild, marine climate with a passive cooling strategy using cross-ventilation and a thermal chimney. A 2.4-kilowatt photovoltaic array and a solar hot water collector take advantage of the sunny location, as does the daylighting strategy for the interior.

To create flexible interior spaces, all bedrooms have moveable wall partitions that can be opened to common areas for more space. Large exterior doors and large expanses of glass connect inside to outside and allow living space to expand to the outdoors.