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How stormwater regulations can hamper smarter growth, infill and redevelopment - and what to do about it
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A Browner Shade of Green
Good intentions, half measures, and why that path to Hell is not paved with pervious concrete ……
About this Presentation
Bad Cop – Lisa NisensonGood Cop – Dan SloneGood Cop – Dave Sargeant
Themes
Just because there is green language in the plan and code…..
How language gets watered downIt’s not just the code – other factorsWhat to do about it
A quick review on why we are here
How do new urbanism and smart growth support the environment?
Prevents pollution through vertical density and compact design.
Responds to the interlinking aspects of place-making with mutually supportive policy bundles, economic development support and codes.
Orchestrates the public and private elements of place-making to exploit shared amenities and efficient use of land.
Promotes reuse of existing built-upon areas of a city, county or crossroads.
Facilitates tripmaking by multiple modes of transportation.
90 Seconds on what conventional codes and plans give us…
Let’s look at common green elements of plans and codes….
Clustering
Access
Impervious cover limits
Mixed Use
Clustering
Clustering
"Environmentally Sensitive Development" Qualifications: houses that cover 15% or less of the site on at least two acres or clustered housing in subdivisionsSource – Note zoning code, but stormwater permit – grants credits against stormwater requirements.
ACCESS and the end of the cul-de-sac
Planning with Power
Source: www.Sprawlaction.org
Impervious Cover Limits
Simi Valley Town CenterLifestyle center with connection to apartments
Walkway with stairs to the Town Center here
At the bottom of the stairs closest to apartments – Candy store and Abercrombe and Fitch
Planned Development Mixed Use“It is further intended that PDMU development shall be in complexes with carefully located
buildings, parking and service areas, open space and use mixtures which are scaled and balanced to reduce general traffic congestion, by providing interdependent uses and uses which are compatible with adjacent and surrounding land uses.”
CVS
Starbucks
Grocery Store
Understanding Reality – the Policy Environment
Obsession with Zoning
Just put it in codes and developers have to do it
Reinforces the Euclidian focus on individual sites
The Clean Water Act’s slow morph into Land Use Planning
Not altogether a bad thing
“By ordinance or other regulatory mechanism” zoning
Planning outcomes focus on a handful of “reportables” such as runoff, sediment removal, stormwater rate of release.
Maintains CWA emphasis on mitigation – not prevention◦ Power of smart growth & new urbanism lost - both are largely
preventative in nature.
Areas most in need of planning not regulated by CWA◦ Makes the uneven playing field between new development and
compact/redevelopment more uneven.
Understanding the Policy Environment
How to Pay for It
◦ Development-specific
◦ When mandates hit the Nolan/Dolan buzzsaw
Proportional share – cover impacts that are most readily measured
Nexus – easy to favor capacity in proximity to project
◦ Cities/Counties are broke – don’t have the resources to do plans at the important “middle” scales
Single Action Bias – “Why Isn’t the Brain Green?”
◦ Tendency to engage in one single action to remove threat or hazard
◦ Menu of Best Management Practices less of menu, more like “pick one”