The extension of suburbs further and further out from the core of businesses and services not only consumes acres of land, with its attendant loss of woods, fields, wetlands, farmland, and animal habitat, but it also requires miles of pavement, and the attendant infrastructure (sewers, phone and power lines, etc.) to support the new development. Residents of these displaced communities are forced to rely on cars for more and more of their access to various services and amenities, and very often travel greater distances to work as well as other destinations. This increases both the consumption of fuel resources and the pollution caused from the extra travel.

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Sometimes, some of the greenest solutions come from the simplest of ideas.  Take the cottage community.  What could be simpler than the idea of building houses that are radically smaller in square footage than the national average?  Not everyone wants all that extra space, and many would rather have a smaller home built well than a cheaply made box full of emptiness.

Cottage communities are not yet widely known in planning and development.  Cottage communities are primarily located in the Pacific Northwest, though there are indications of interest, if not actual communities yet built, in other parts of the country.

The individual cottages have a small footprint.  The first cottage community built in Langley WA had half the cottages no bigger than 800 square feet, and the other half no bigger than 700 square feet.  These homes are far smaller than the average size house in the U.S. (which was almost 2,400 square feet in 2004).

Cottages serve a niche community.  Obviously, a family of more than 3 or 4 people would start to feel crowded living the typical American lifestyle in such a space.  But many households have only one or two people, and a 700-800 square foot house is perfectly adequate for them.

Cottages work best where several cottages can be placed near one another.  If you still require a full size lot for every home, a cottage doesn’t really do anything towards reducing sprawl.  But a cottage development typically has twice the number of houses as would normally be permitted.  So a piece of land that could normally accommodate four houses can be developed with eight cottages.  By developing as a community, cottages also benefit from common amenities such as landscaping and shared parking areas.  (The small size of the cottages precludes attaching garages to them.)

While cottages reduce the amount of land needed for development, they also reduce the volume of resources needed in their construction.  It is intuitively obvious that an 800 square foot cottage takes much less material, from studs and shingles to pipes and cupboards, than an average sized 2,400 square foot home.  In addition to all that material saved, the smaller cottages also need fewer resources to keep them heated and cooled.

Cottage communities can break up the texture of an otherwise undifferentiated development, and provide opportunities for other kinds of owners to be added into the housing mix.  While they serve the needs of a limited part of the population, they can contribute to better communities with just a simple idea.

See other related Green Building Elements stories:
Green Communities, Part 1: New Urbanism
Traditional Neighborhood Development and LEED Go Hand in Hand
Living Green in the 21st Century

images via: The Cottage Company

In a not so pastoral location surrounded by freeways and railroad tracks, the Eco Village offers a green sanctuary to local youth who wish to find a green place to learn and relax. The farm grows a variety of vegetation including: fruit trees, Oaks, Beach, Banana, California Buckeyes, Bay Laurels, Blackberries and Walnuts.

The recently added solar system not only will decrease their energy bill but many young Richmond residents received an opportunity to help install the system. The program sponsored by Solar Living Institute, Solar Richmond, Rising Sun Energy Center, Sun Light & Power, SunPower Corporation and Bay Area Air Quality Management District brought a human element to the system by providing access for disadvantaged children to gain skills and interest in the green business movement.

We’re big fans of this project not just because of the reduced carbon footprint but the program gives youth an opportunity to become more eco-literate, as it creates a cross cultural dialogue and moves across economic lines as well. Learning about Green power, grey water harvesting and urban food production isn’t just for people who can afford it.

We’d like to see more solar training and eco-literacy spread from the suddenly Green city of Richmond.

A green condo can be a wonderful alternative for (the vast majority of) those of us who cannot afford to build a new green single-family home.  We want sustainable design, solar panels, energy-efficient appliances and so much more, but we can’t afford to build.  Viola– the green condo!

This week we cover many of the excellent green condos available in the Western United States.  There are so many to choose from it’s tough to pick just a selection to highlight here!

In the Los Angeles Area

Evo South is an exciting development in the heart of downtown LA.  It is an urban tower of steel and glass– 23 stories with 311 residences.  They are in the process of seeking LEED certification for the building.  The units feature such eco-friendly elements as Bosch Energy Star appliances, low-flow water fixtures, Nature’s Choice carpeting and more.

If you prefer the beachy side of life, Green On 19 is a cool townhouse development in Santa Monica. These townhomes are the first of their kind in Santa Monica, and there are five units in the development.  Architect Jesse Bornstein has integrated modern style, light and sustainability into his design.  The units meet Energy Star New Home standards and feature solar power, bamboo and concrete floors, LED landscape lighting, xeriscape landscaping, and more.

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But do you know about all the amazing green condo developments cropping up across the country? There are gorgeous, cutting-edge eco-friendly condos available or being built now in cities all around the U.S. We can’t possibly cover them all in this post, but we’ve selected a good sample. I will cover green condos in the West next week. Read on to find what might become your dream green home!

In Chicago, eco18 is an interesting development currently underway. Located in Chicago’s South Loop area, it provides access to plenty of public transportation options and also green spaces. eco18 is striving to attain a Gold Certification under the LEED program of the US Green Building Council. This is a lofty goal and we hope they make it! Their plans include a massive green roof, solar water heating, geothermal heating and cooling, rainwater reuse, energy-efficient lighting and much more. You can get a 1 bedroom/1 bath unit for around $285,000 or a 2 bedroom/2 bath unit for about $430,000. Learn more about eco18 here.

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UniverCity recently received the 2008 National Planning Excellence Award for Innovation in Green Community Planning from the American Planning Association (APA). Utilizing mixed-use planning principles, the finished project will consist of several neighborhoods, each with its own town square, as well as its own school, community and childcare center, and parks. Once completed, UniverCity is expected to house 10,000 people on 200 acres.

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New Urbanism (sometimes referred to as Traditional Neighborhood Design) is a movement spearheaded by the The Congress for the New Urbanism (CNU). Its goals are “promoting walkable, neighborhood-based development as an alternative to sprawl. CNU takes a proactive, multi-disciplinary approach to restoring our communities.” Improving sustainability is one of the Principles of New Urbanism (see below),additionally, New Urbanism advocates a number of benefits. Although there are broad overlaps between using historical, traditional housing forms (or, unfortunately more often, faux-historical looking buildings) and New Urbanist principles, there is nothing magical about gabled roofs and wood siding, and New Urbanism does not require retro-styled throwbacks (although many examples of it do combine visual historical revivalism with the good community principles it supports).

Much of the attention we pay to green building deals with the parts and pieces and how our buildings work. Greener buildings use less energy for thermal comfort (heating and cooling) and less energy for lighting and draw on fewer resources (and less impact from the materials that are used) in their construction. All of these are good and useful steps to take. However, all of this just takes into account the building itself, and perhaps the site it rests upon. With this kind of focus (or lack thereof) one could envision a community of dispersed “green” buildings all individually well designed and well made, but, in the aggregate, contributing hugely to the destruction of habitat, the depletion of resources, and the net degradation of the environment.

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Sustainability Victoria

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This fall, the City of Portland sponsored the Portland Courtyard Housing Design Competition, which solicited ideas for urban infill housing that would appeal to families with children. In the face of rising housing costs, Portland has identified shared courtyards as offering similar lifestyle benefits to detached housing, while remaining affordable and increasing urban density.

The competition brief requested that entrants pay particular attention to the potentially conflicting roles of the courtyard space itself. Could a recreational space share turf with automobiles? Could the courtyard offer homeowners some privacy while still being connected to the larger streetscape? And could it fulfill all of these criteria while still functioning sustainably?

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Portland has been recognized for decades as a leader in urban planning. Today its progressive philosophies are being applied to environmental policy-making. Tackling sustainability on an urban scale, the Portland Development Commission has conceived a model neighborhood known as the Lloyd Crossing Sustainable Urban Design Plan. A massive undertaking, the Plan sets goals and objectives that are intended to guide development over the next 45 years.

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Vail Resorts, Inc. (NYSE: MTN) just announced an ambitious plan to build a new green resort development in North America. Ever Vail will be a $1B, 9.5 acre, multi-use resort village on the current site known as West Lionshead. If approved for development, Ever Vail will be the largest LEED-certified project for resort use in North America and one of the earliest developments to come under the LEED Neighborhood Development certification program.

In all, the total development will be about one million square feet, with 150-250 whole ownership condominium units, 75-125 fractional ownership condominium units, a 100,000 sf hotel, 100,000-150,000 sf of commercial retail, office, and restaurant space, and 100,000 sf mountain operations facility.

Importantly, Ever Vail plans are still being finalized and haven't been submitted to the Town of Vail for approval. Once approved, sales will start in about 2009, so this is very much a prospective project. Vail Resorts has partnered with Callison to help design and plan the development. Callison Principal Steve Harmon remarked on the partnership: "Callison believes sustainable design is good business and is honored to partner with Vail Resorts on leading the effort to create an innovative, smart-growth destination that uses land more responsibly, reduces resource consumption and minimizes sprawl."

As our writers here on Green Options have reported, environmentalism and climate change is always on the mind of winter resort operators, so seeking LEED certification is another way for resorts to consider the impact of their operations. The LEED for Neighborhood Development certification program (actually still in the pilot program stage) was officially inaugurated on February 1, 2007. It's a rating system established by the U.S. Green Building Council that integrates principles of smart growth, urbanism, and green building on a neighborhood level. Vail Resorts plans also to develop all of the buildings at Ever Vail to LEED criteria.

Image Credit: Vail.