The High Point master plan is an effort to undo the unexpected consequences of sprawling suburbs and separate-use zoning laws: congested roads, tailpipe pollution and bland strip malls.
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| Planted with hearty grasses, trees and shrubs, this roadside ditch in High Point soaks up runoff and filters pollution. Photo by Michael Burnham. |
Most High Point buildings sit within 15 feet of narrow, car-lined streets. The goal is to slow traffic and encourage pedestrians to stop and chat.
"By parking here, you're making the street an active place," contends Brian Sullivan, who worked as Mithun's lead architect on the project. "A little messiness is a good thing."
So is a little variety. The Housing Authority chose from among 27 building designs and 11 colors. Five private developers chose complementary designs and colors. The result is economy of scale in materials but diversity in design, says Sullivan, who is now a development program manager with the Housing Authority.
All units must achieve at least a three-star rating under the Master Builders of King and Snohomish Counties' "Built Green" standard -- a close cousin of the U.S. Green Building Council's Leadership in Energy & Environmental Design (LEED) certification system.
High Point's units are designed to achieve at least 15 percent energy-and-water savings over conventionally designed buildings by employing double-pane windows, super-tight building envelopes and resource-efficient fixtures and appliances, says Aaron Adelstein, who directs Built Green.
The organization awarded High Point the highest-ever score for a community, but Adelstein says he is more impressed by what he calls the development's "social equity."
"Having mixed incomes is one of the things that is often overlooked by environmental groups, but it's really important in terms of community health," Adelstein adds. "Green building has to be accessible to all levels of income."
Even the size of High Point's homes -- most between 1,200 and 1,300 square feet -- is a throw-back.
A new home in 1950 was less than 1,000 square feet, on average, and it didn't have a garage or carport, according to U.S. Census Bureau data. Half a century later the typical new home would be more than twice as big with a garage for several cars.
The average size of an American home is expected to grow by almost 12 percent between 2007 and 2030, according to U.S. Department of Energy data analyzed by Greenwire. During the same period, energy consumption and greenhouse-gas emissions from households are expected to grow by 17 percent and 26 percent, respectively.
"We need to get the footprint of all buildings down because that is what is driving global warming," says Edward Mazria, a Santa Fe, N.M., architect and expert on the building sector's role in climate change.
DOE data show buildings consume 76 percent of the nation's electricity and emit almost half its greenhouse gases, Mazria explains. But here's the rub: Each year, developers raze about 1.75 billion square feet of commercial and residential buildings and renovate or add another 10 billion square feet of space. Why not make it green, he asks.
Mazria's organization, Architecture 2030, is leading the "2030 Challenge," which calls for staggered reductions in fossil-fuel energy use and making new buildings carbon-neutral by 2030. The American Institute of Architects, USGBC and others have endorsed the initiative.
The U.S. Conference of Mayors is also calling upon on its members to adopt the 2030 Challenge by improving energy efficiency in buildings. Seattle, Boston and other large cities are already doing so in creative ways. However, mayors of small, fast-growing suburbs say they face a tougher challenge in legislating greener building practices.
Ken Fellman, mayor of Arvada, Colo. -- a booming suburb northwest of Denver -- says he's succeeded in persuading developers to build green in "infill" areas rezoned for mixed uses. But, he says, most new development is occuring on open land toward the Rocky Mountains, where sprawling subdivisions remain the rule.
"The first question developers always ask us is what kind of regulations are you going to impose upon us and will they cost us more," Fellman says. "I think their point has some merit; they're producing affordable housing already, and any regulation we impose upon them is going to increase the cost of housing."
Most homebuyers can't readily measure the benefits of going green, aside from the promise of lower utility bills, says Harvey Hartman, chief executive of The Hartman Group, a Bellevue, Wash., market-research firm.
"Most people are invested in their personal well-being first, then their family's good, then their community's, then the world's," Hartman says. "Those rare people who seek out a green home in a green community are likely to embrace all four."
Still, he says, a house with windows that optimize natural light and air flow or materials that don't emit harmful chemicals might lure buyers -- if it is marketed for how it can improve their health.
"There are a lot of people who are willing to pay more to add value to their lifestyle,"Hartman says.
The National Association of Home Builders, whose members will build about 80 percent of the more than 1.56 million new housing units projected for 2007, estimates that it can cost a builder anywhere from 2 to 10 percent more to build green, depending on what materials are used in the home and where it is located.
And to grab a credible marketing edge, developers could spend several hundred dollars to certify a home's green characteristics and several thousand to certify a whole community with the U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC).
This spring the organization plans to introduce its LEED for Homes rating system, which scores projects based on indoor air quality, energy consumption and recycled materials use.
The Washington, D.C.-based organization will also begin the pilot phase of LEED for Neighborhood Development. The rating tool would score projects on "smart" land-use principals, such as locating development near public transportation or avoiding damage to wetlands, says Emily Mitchell, the council's program manager. If a project scores 90 out of a total 109 points, it gets a LEED "Platinum" rating, which the developer could use as a marketing tool.
But Calli Schmidt, an NAHB spokeswoman, worries about how much green building materials and certification means to newlyweds, empty-nesters and those in between. "If it's too expensive, it won't play in Peoria," she cautions.
What constitutes too expensive? An American Institute of Architects poll last year found 90 percent of respondents would pay $5,000 more for a house that would "use less energy and protect the environment."
But an NAHB survey told a slightly different story. Asked how concerned they were about their home's effect on the environment, 17 percent said they would pay a premium for a green home, while 42 percent said they would like a green home but would not pay more. The rest said the environment would not figure in their home-buying decision.
"Until people feel it's important to pay for it, they won't demand it," Schmidt adds. "They'll take a granite countertop over energy efficiency."
With consumer attitudes mixed, cities and counties are asking whether they should mandate green development.
For example, the Denver suburb of Longmont is crafting an ordinance that would integrate green building principles into all new residential projects. Builders seeking permits would have to earn 30 points from the city's green-building scorecard, said Phil DelVecchio, the city's development director.
The Home Builders Association of Metro Denver, an NAHB affiliate, is urging Longmont lawmakers to reject the ordinance. About 23 percent of all single-family homes built in the greater Denver area are registered with the association's voluntary Built Green program, making it the most widely used local green building standard in the country, says Kim Calomino, Built Green Colorado's director.
A key reason for the program's popularity, she contends, is developers use Built Green to give their homes an edge in a competitive marketplace. Requiring green home-building in Longmont -- or anywhere else -- would take away developers' incentive to compete or innovate, Calomino contends.
"The industry recognizes that we need to lead or we'll be regulated," she says.
But while the U.S. Green Building Council and NAHB agree that building green should remain a voluntary, market-driven virtue, regulation is gaining popularity. Eleven federal agencies, 17 states and 63 cities and counties require public-building designs to be consistent with LEED or comparable standards, USGBC officials say.
Washington, D.C., recently became the nation's first big city to require all new buildings 50,000 square feet and larger to earn LEED certification. Boston blazed a similar trail for its biggest residential and commercial buildings, and the city has earmarked $2 million to build greener low-income housing.
Meantime, dozens of smaller municipalities have passed laws that require housing developers to build green. In Colorado, alone, Boulder, Telluride, Aspen and Vail require green home certification, notes Kim Master, a Boulder-based consultant.
"Typically, localities reach out to us," explains USGBC Vice President Michelle Moore, who says her nonprofit doesn't lobby lawmakers to require LEED. "It's very much letting a thousand flowers bloom."
But will LEED for Neighborhood Development someday be the law of the land? Tom Wolfe, AIA's top federal lobbyist, says it's not likely to happen soon.
"You have to look at the politics of the possible," Wolfe says. "If we went out there and said that all private-sector projects would have to meet specific green-building certification standards, we would be banging our heads against some major interest groups that have a lot more money than we do."
So instead, AIA is developing green-building case studies and model code language for mayors, as well as a list of 50 energy-efficient design strategies for contractors and architects.
"We're still dealing with the education of contractors about alternatives to business-as-usual development," AIA President RK Stewart says. "It's more than just teaching them about lowering energy costs. It's about the sustainability of the planet and what type of world we would like to live in."
Seattle Housing Authority's Phillips says that message hits home in High Point. He recently put his own money down on an energy-efficient condo in the city's first green neighborhood -- an environmental, economic and social experiment six decades in the making.
He hopes it won't be the last.
"I want to be involved in High Point," he says. "It will work only if the residents here make it work."
