Retrofitting suburbia | Ellen Dunham-Jones | TEDxAtlanta
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0:11 - 0:13So, retrofitting suburbia
-
0:13 - 0:17is the idea that I want to try
and share with you today. -
0:19 - 0:22We've had - the last fifty years -
we've been building the suburbs, -
0:22 - 0:25with a lot of unintended consequences.
-
0:25 - 0:27And I'm going to talk about
some of those consequences -
0:28 - 0:31and present a whole bunch
of really interesting projects -
0:31 - 0:35that I think give us tremendous reasons
to be really optimistic -
0:35 - 0:38that the big design
and development project -
0:38 - 0:41of the next fifty years
is going to be retrofitting suburbia. -
0:42 - 0:45So whether it's redeveloping dying malls
-
0:45 - 0:48or re-inhabiting dead big-box stores
-
0:48 - 0:52or reconstructing wetlands
out of parking lots, -
0:52 - 0:57I think the fact is the growing number
of empty and underperforming, -
0:59 - 1:02especially retail sites
throughout suburbia, -
1:02 - 1:04gives us actually a tremendous opportunity
-
1:04 - 1:09to take our least-sustainable landscapes
right now -
1:09 - 1:12and convert them into
more sustainable places. -
1:14 - 1:16And in the process
what that allows us to do -
1:16 - 1:20is to redirect a lot more of our growth
back into existing communities -
1:20 - 1:24that could use a boost
and have the infrastructure in place -
1:24 - 1:27instead of continuing to tear down trees,
-
1:27 - 1:30and tear up the green space
out at the edges. -
1:31 - 1:32So, why is this important?
-
1:32 - 1:35I think there are any number of reasons
-
1:36 - 1:39and I'm just going to not get into detail,
but mention a few. -
1:39 - 1:42Just from the perspective
of climate change -
1:42 - 1:46the average urban dweller
in the US has about one third -
1:46 - 1:50the carbon footprint
of the average suburban dweller -
1:50 - 1:53mostly because suburbanites
drive a lot more -
1:53 - 1:56and living in detached buildings
-
1:57 - 2:00you have that much more exterior surface
to leak energy out of. -
2:01 - 2:05So strictly from
a climate change perspective -
2:07 - 2:10the cities are already relatively green.
-
2:10 - 2:14The big opportunity to reduce
greenhouse gas emissions -
2:15 - 2:18is actually in retrofitting,
in urbanizing the suburbs. -
2:19 - 2:24Similarly, all that driving
that we've been doing out in the suburbs - -
2:24 - 2:29we have doubled
the amount of miles we drive -
2:29 - 2:33and so it's increased our dependence
on foreign oil -
2:34 - 2:36despite the gains in fuel efficiency.
-
2:36 - 2:37We're just driving so much more,
-
2:37 - 2:40we haven't been able
to keep up technologically. -
2:40 - 2:44Public health is another reason
to consider retrofitting. -
2:44 - 2:46Researchers at the CDC, and other places
-
2:46 - 2:50have increasingly been linking
suburban development patterns -
2:50 - 2:52with sedentary lifestyles
-
2:52 - 2:55and those have been linked then
-
2:56 - 3:00with the rather alarming growing rates
of obesity, shown in these maps here. -
3:02 - 3:03And obesity has also been triggering
-
3:03 - 3:07great increases in heart disease
and diabetes -
3:07 - 3:10to the point where today,
a child born today -
3:10 - 3:13has a 1-in-3 chance of developing diabetes
-
3:13 - 3:16and that rate has been escalating
at the same rate -
3:16 - 3:19as children not walking to school anymore.
-
3:20 - 3:23Again, because of our
development patterns. -
3:24 - 3:27And then there's finally,
the affordability question. -
3:28 - 3:34How affordable is it to continue to live
in suburbia with rising gas prices? -
3:37 - 3:42Suburban expansion to cheap land
for the last 50 years - -
3:42 - 3:46the cheap land out on the edge
has helped generations of families -
3:46 - 3:47enjoy the American Dream.
-
3:48 - 3:54But increasingly, the savings promised
by drive-til-you-qualify affordability -
3:54 - 3:58which is basically our model,
those savings are wiped out -
3:58 - 4:00when you consider
the transportation costs. -
4:00 - 4:02For instance, here in Atlanta
-
4:02 - 4:07about half of households make
between $20,000 and $50,000 a year -
4:07 - 4:11and they are spending 29%
of their income on housing -
4:13 - 4:16and 32% on transportation.
-
4:17 - 4:20And that's 2005 figures,
that's before we got up -
4:20 - 4:22to the 4 bucks a gallon.
-
4:23 - 4:27None of us really tend to do the math
on our transportation costs -
4:27 - 4:30and they're not going down anytime soon.
-
4:34 - 4:37So I've tried to make the case
that it's important to do this -
4:37 - 4:41whether you love suburbia's leafy privacy
-
4:41 - 4:43or you hate its soulless commercial strips
-
4:43 - 4:47there are reasons why
it's important to retrofit. -
4:47 - 4:49But is it practical?
-
4:49 - 4:51I think it is.
-
4:51 - 4:55June Williamson and I have been
researching this topic for over a decade -
4:55 - 4:58and we found over 80 varied projects
-
4:59 - 5:02but they are really all market driven.
-
5:02 - 5:05And what's driving the market,
in particular, -
5:06 - 5:09number one, is major demographic shifts.
-
5:09 - 5:13We all tend to think of suburbia
as this very family-focused place. -
5:14 - 5:17But that's really not the case anymore.
-
5:17 - 5:21Since 2000, already two-thirds
of households in suburbia -
5:22 - 5:24did not have kids in them.
-
5:25 - 5:29We just haven't caught up
with the actual realities of this. -
5:29 - 5:32The reasons for this have to do
with the dominance -
5:32 - 5:35of the two big demographic groups
right now - -
5:35 - 5:38the Baby Boomers - retiring,
-
5:38 - 5:40and then there's a gap -
-
5:40 - 5:44Generation X, which is a small generation,
they're still having kids, -
5:44 - 5:49but Generation Y hasn't even
really started hitting child-rearing age. -
5:49 - 5:51They're the other big generation.
-
5:52 - 5:57So as a result of that,
demographers predict that through 2025 -
5:58 - 6:0375-85% of new households
will not have kids in them. -
6:04 - 6:07And then the market research,
consumer research -
6:08 - 6:11of asking the Boomers
and Gen Y what it is they like -
6:11 - 6:14what they would like to live in,
-
6:14 - 6:17tells us that there is going to be
a huge demand -
6:17 - 6:22and we are already seeing it,
for more urban lifestyles within suburbia. -
6:25 - 6:28That basically the Boomers
want to be able to age in place -
6:28 - 6:32and Gen Y would like
to live an urban lifestyle -
6:32 - 6:36but most of their jobs
will continue to be out in suburbia. -
6:36 - 6:39The other big dynamic of change
is the sheer performance -
6:39 - 6:42of under-performing asphalt.
-
6:42 - 6:45Now, I keep thinking this would be
a great name for an indie rock band -
6:45 - 6:47(Laughter)
-
6:47 - 6:52but developers generally use it
to refer to underused parking lots -
6:53 - 6:56and suburbia is full of them.
-
6:56 - 6:59When the post-war suburbs were first built
-
6:59 - 7:02out on the cheap land, away from downtown
-
7:02 - 7:05it made sense to just build
surface parking lots. -
7:06 - 7:08But those sites have now been leapfrogged
-
7:08 - 7:12and leapfrogged again,
as we've just continued to sprawl. -
7:12 - 7:16And they now have
a relatively central location. -
7:17 - 7:20It no longer just makes sense.
-
7:20 - 7:23That land is more valuable
than just surface parking lots. -
7:23 - 7:29It now makes sense to go back in,
build a deck, and build up on those sites. -
7:31 - 7:35So, what do you do with a dead mall,
a dead office park? -
7:35 - 7:38It turns out, all sorts of things.
-
7:39 - 7:42In a slow economy like ours,
-
7:42 - 7:45re-inhabitation is one
of the more popular strategies. -
7:46 - 7:50This happens to be
a dead mall in St. Louis -
7:50 - 7:53that's been re-inhabited as art space.
-
7:53 - 7:56It's now home to artists' studios,
theater groups -
7:56 - 7:58dance troupes, and a variety of things.
-
7:58 - 8:02It's not pulling in
as much tax revenue as it once was -
8:02 - 8:05but it's serving its community,
it's keeping the lights on -
8:07 - 8:09it's a really great institution.
-
8:09 - 8:13Other malls have been re-inhabited
as nursing homes -
8:13 - 8:17as universities,
and as all variety of office space. -
8:19 - 8:21We also found a lot of examples
-
8:21 - 8:24of dead big-box stores
that have been converted -
8:24 - 8:28into all sorts
of community-serving uses as well: -
8:28 - 8:32lots of schools, lots of churches,
and lots of libraries. -
8:32 - 8:33Like this one.
-
8:33 - 8:35This was a grocery store,
-
8:35 - 8:39a Food Lion grocery store,
that is now a public library -
8:39 - 8:43in addition to, I think,
doing a beautiful adaptive reuse -
8:43 - 8:45they tore up some of the parking spaces
-
8:45 - 8:48put in bioswales to collect
and clean the run-off -
8:48 - 8:52put in a lot more sidewalks
to connect to the neighborhoods -
8:53 - 8:57and they've made this, what was
just a store along a commercial strip -
8:58 - 9:01into a community gathering-space.
-
9:03 - 9:08And this one is a little L-shaped
strip shopping center in Phoenix, Arizona. -
9:09 - 9:13Really what they did was
they gave it a fresh coat of bright paint, -
9:13 - 9:14a gourmet grocery,
-
9:14 - 9:17and they put a restaurant
in the old post office. -
9:17 - 9:20Never underestimate the power of food
-
9:20 - 9:23to turn a place around
and make it a destination. -
9:24 - 9:25It's been so successful
-
9:25 - 9:27they've taken over the strip
across the street -
9:27 - 9:32the real-estate ads in the neighborhood
all very proudly proclaim, -
9:32 - 9:35"Walking distance to La Grande Orange!"
-
9:35 - 9:38Because it provided its neighborhood
-
9:38 - 9:41with what sociologists
like to call a "third place." -
9:42 - 9:45If home is the first place,
and work is the second place -
9:45 - 9:50the third place is where you go
to hang out and build community. -
9:50 - 9:54And especially as suburbia
is becoming less centered on the family -
9:54 - 9:56the family households,
-
9:56 - 10:00there's a real hunger
for more third places. -
10:01 - 10:05So, the most dramatic retrofits
are really those in the next category. -
10:06 - 10:08The next strategy: re-development.
-
10:08 - 10:12During the boom, there were several
really dramatic re-development projects -
10:12 - 10:15where the original building
was scraped to the ground -
10:15 - 10:19and then the whole site was rebuilt
at significantly greater density -
10:19 - 10:22as sort of compact,
walkable urban neighborhoods. -
10:22 - 10:24But some of them
have been much more incremental. -
10:24 - 10:28This is Mashpea Commons,
the oldest retrofit that we found -
10:28 - 10:31and it's just, incrementally,
over the last 20 years, -
10:31 - 10:34built urbanism on top of its parking lots.
-
10:35 - 10:39So the black-and-white photo shows
the simple 60's strip shopping center -
10:39 - 10:43and then the maps above that
show its gradual transformation -
10:43 - 10:47into a compact,
mixed-use New England village. -
10:48 - 10:51And it has plans now
that have been approved -
10:51 - 10:54for it to connect
to residential neighborhoods -
10:57 - 11:00across the arterials
and over on the other side. -
11:01 - 11:04So sometimes it's incremental,
sometimes it's all at once. -
11:05 - 11:08This is another in-fill project
on the parking lots -
11:08 - 11:12this one of an office park
outside of Washington, D.C. -
11:12 - 11:15When MetroRail expanded transit
into the suburbs -
11:15 - 11:18and opened a station nearby to this site
-
11:18 - 11:22the owners decided to build
a new parking deck -
11:22 - 11:26and then insert
on top of their surface lots -
11:26 - 11:29a new main street, several apartments,
and condo buildings -
11:29 - 11:33while keeping
the existing office buildings. -
11:34 - 11:37So here is the site in 1940
-
11:37 - 11:40it was just a little farm
in the village of Hyattsville. -
11:41 - 11:45By 1980 it had been subdivided
into a big mall on one side -
11:45 - 11:47and the office park on the other
-
11:47 - 11:51and then some buffer sites for a library
and a church to the far right. -
11:52 - 11:56Today, the transit, the main street,
and the new housing have all been built. -
11:57 - 11:59Eventually, I expect that the streets
-
11:59 - 12:02will probably extend
through a redevelopment of the mall. -
12:02 - 12:05Plans have already been announced
-
12:05 - 12:09for a lot of those garden apartments
above the mall to be redeveloped. -
12:09 - 12:12Transit is a big driver of retrofits.
-
12:13 - 12:15So here's what it looks like
-
12:15 - 12:17you can sort of see the funky
new condo buildings -
12:17 - 12:19in-between the office buildings
-
12:19 - 12:21and the public space
and the new main street. -
12:22 - 12:25This one is one of my favorites, Belmar.
-
12:25 - 12:28I think they really built
an attractive place here. -
12:29 - 12:31And it just employed
all-green construction -
12:31 - 12:36there's massive PV arrays on the roofs,
as well as wind turbines. -
12:36 - 12:40This was a very large mall
on a 100-acre superblock -
12:40 - 12:43it's now 22 walkable urban blocks
-
12:44 - 12:47with public streets, two public parks
-
12:47 - 12:508 bus lines, and a range of housing types.
-
12:51 - 12:54So it's really given Lakewood, Colorado,
-
12:54 - 12:58the downtown that this particular suburb
never had. -
12:59 - 13:02Here was the mall in its heyday.
-
13:02 - 13:05They had their prom in the mall,
they loved their mall. (Laughter) -
13:05 - 13:09So here's the site in 1975 with the mall.
-
13:10 - 13:13By 1995 the mall has died.
-
13:13 - 13:15The department store has been kept.
-
13:15 - 13:17And we found this was true in many cases
-
13:17 - 13:20the department stores are multi-story,
they're better built, -
13:20 - 13:21they're easy to be readapted.
-
13:21 - 13:24But the one-story stuff,
that's really history. -
13:26 - 13:28So here it is at projected build-out.
-
13:28 - 13:30This project I think,
-
13:30 - 13:33has great connectivity
to the existing neighborhoods -
13:33 - 13:37it's providing 1500 households
with the option of a more urban lifestyle. -
13:38 - 13:41It's about two-thirds built out right now.
-
13:43 - 13:47So here's what the new main street
looks like - very successful. -
13:48 - 13:53And it's helped to prompt eight
of the thirteen regional malls in Denver -
13:54 - 13:58have now, or have announced plans
to be retrofitted. -
13:59 - 14:01Once the private sector
and the private sector -
14:01 - 14:03both sort of figure out what to do
-
14:03 - 14:05it really has a trigger effect.
-
14:07 - 14:10But it's important to note
that all of this retrofitting -
14:10 - 14:12is not occurring
-
14:12 - 14:16just, bulldozers are coming
and just plowing down the whole city. -
14:16 - 14:18No, it's pockets of walkability
-
14:18 - 14:21on the sites
of underpreforming properties. -
14:23 - 14:27And so it's giving people more choices,
but it's not taking away choices. -
14:28 - 14:33But it's also not really enough
to just create pockets of walkability. -
14:33 - 14:37You want to also try to get
more systemic transformation. -
14:37 - 14:40We need to also retrofit
the corridors themselves. -
14:40 - 14:45So this is one
that has been retrofitted in California. -
14:46 - 14:50They took the commercial strip
shown in the black-and-white images below -
14:50 - 14:52and they built a boulevard
-
14:52 - 14:55that has become
the main street for their town -
14:55 - 15:00and it transformed from being
an ugly, unsafe, undesirable address -
15:01 - 15:06to becoming a beautiful, attractive,
dignified, good address. -
15:07 - 15:09Now we're hoping we'll start to see -
-
15:09 - 15:11they've already built city hall,
attracted two hotels -
15:11 - 15:15I could imagine beautiful housing going up
along there, -
15:15 - 15:17without tearing down another tree.
-
15:18 - 15:20So there's a lot of great things.
-
15:21 - 15:23I'd love to see more corridors
getting retrofitting. -
15:23 - 15:27But densification
is not going to work everywhere. -
15:27 - 15:31Sometimes re-greening
is really the better answer. -
15:33 - 15:36There's a lot to learn
from successful land-banking programs. -
15:36 - 15:38Cities like Flint, Michigan
-
15:38 - 15:41and there's also a burgeoning
suburban farming movement -
15:41 - 15:44sort of a victory gardens
meets the Internet. -
15:44 - 15:46All sorts of possibilities.
-
15:46 - 15:50But perhaps one of the most important
re-greening aspects is the opportunity -
15:50 - 15:54to restore the local ecology,
as in this example outside of Minneapolis. -
15:55 - 15:58When the shopping center died,
-
15:58 - 16:00the city restored
the site's original wetlands -
16:01 - 16:05creating lakefront property
which then attracted private investment -
16:06 - 16:08the first private investment
-
16:08 - 16:10to this very low-income neighborhood
in over 40 years. -
16:11 - 16:14So they managed to both
restore the local ecology, -
16:14 - 16:16and the local economy at the same time.
-
16:17 - 16:20This is another re-greening example.
-
16:20 - 16:23It also makes sense
in very strong markets. -
16:23 - 16:27This one in Seattle
is on the site of a mall parking lot -
16:27 - 16:29adjacent to a new transit stop
-
16:29 - 16:31and the wavy line is a path
-
16:31 - 16:34alongside a creek
that has now been daylit. -
16:34 - 16:37The creek had been culverted
under the parking lot. -
16:37 - 16:40Daylighting our creeks really improves
-
16:40 - 16:43their water quality
and contributions to habitat. -
16:44 - 16:47So I've shown you
some of the first generation of retrofits. -
16:48 - 16:49What's next?
-
16:49 - 16:52I think we have three challenges
for the future. -
16:52 - 16:54The first is to plan retrofitting
-
16:54 - 16:58much more systemically
at the metropolitan scale. -
16:58 - 17:02We need to be able to target:
which areas really should be re-greened? -
17:03 - 17:05Where should we be re-developing,
-
17:05 - 17:07and where should we be encouraging
re-inhabitation? -
17:08 - 17:10These slides just show two images
-
17:10 - 17:14from a larger project that looked
at trying to do that for Atlanta. -
17:15 - 17:19I led a team that was asked to imagine
Atlanta 100 years from now. -
17:20 - 17:25And we chose to try to reverse sprawl
through three simple moves. -
17:26 - 17:28Expensive, but simple.
-
17:28 - 17:32One, in 100 years: transit on all major
rail and road corridors. -
17:33 - 17:38Two, in 100 years: thousand-foot buffers
on all stream corridors. -
17:39 - 17:41A little extreme,
but we've got a little water problem. -
17:42 - 17:45In a hundred years,
subdivisions that simply end up -
17:45 - 17:49too close to water or too far
from transit, won't be viable. -
17:50 - 17:52And so we've created the Eco-Acre Transfer
-
17:52 - 17:56to transfer development rights
to the transit corridors -
17:56 - 18:00and allow the re-greening
of those former sub-divisions -
18:00 - 18:02for food and energy production.
-
18:05 - 18:08So, the second challenge is to improve
-
18:09 - 18:12the architectural design quality
of the retrofits. -
18:13 - 18:16And I close with this image
of democracy in action. -
18:17 - 18:22This is a protest that's happening
on a retrofit in Silver Springs, Maryland -
18:22 - 18:25on an AstroTurf town green.
-
18:26 - 18:30Now retrofits are often accused
of being examples -
18:30 - 18:33of faux-downtowns and instant urbanism.
-
18:34 - 18:36And not without reason.
-
18:36 - 18:39You don't get much more phony
than an AstroTurf town green. -
18:40 - 18:42I have to say,
these are very hybrid places. -
18:43 - 18:45They are new, but trying to look old.
-
18:45 - 18:49They have urban streetscapes,
but suburban parking ratios. -
18:50 - 18:54Their populations
are more diverse than typical suburbia -
18:55 - 18:57but they're less diverse than cities.
-
18:58 - 19:02And they are public places,
but that are managed by private companies. -
19:05 - 19:08And the surface appearances are often
-
19:08 - 19:12like the AstroTurf here,
you know, they make me wince. -
19:14 - 19:17I mean, I'm glad
the urbanism is doing its job. -
19:17 - 19:20The fact that a protest is happening,
really, -
19:20 - 19:23it does mean that the layout
of the blocks, the streets and blocks -
19:23 - 19:26the putting in of public space,
compromised as it may be -
19:26 - 19:29is still a really great thing.
-
19:29 - 19:31But we've just got to get
the architecture better. -
19:31 - 19:34The final challenge is for all of you.
-
19:34 - 19:36I want you to join the protest,
-
19:37 - 19:40and start demanding
more sustainable suburban places. -
19:40 - 19:42More sustainable places, period.
-
19:44 - 19:48Culturally, we tend to think
that downtowns should be dynamic, -
19:48 - 19:51and we expect that but we seem
o have an expectation that the suburbs -
19:51 - 19:54should forever remain frozen
in whatever adolescent form -
19:54 - 19:56they were first given birth to.
-
19:57 - 19:59It's time to let them grow up.
-
20:00 - 20:05So I want you to all support
the zoning changes, the road diets, -
20:06 - 20:09the infrastructure improvements,
and the retrofits that are coming soon -
20:09 - 20:11to a neighborhood near you.
-
20:11 - 20:13Thank you.
(Applause)
- Title:
- Retrofitting suburbia | Ellen Dunham-Jones | TEDxAtlanta
- Description:
-
Ellen Dunham-Jones fires the starting shot for the next 50 years' big sustainable design project: retrofitting suburbia. To come: Dying malls rehabilitated, dead "big box" stores re-inhabited, parking lots transformed into thriving wetlands.
- Video Language:
- English
- Team:
- closed TED
- Project:
- TEDxTalks
- Duration:
- 20:18
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