The Revitalist

The headline says it all: "'Green' Buildings Don't Have to Be New." The NY Times catches on to all the green renovations of existing buildings that are going on across the country using the US Green Building Council's LEED for Existing Buildings program—revised standards were released last October.

An ad from The National Trust's Sustainability Initiative

The PreservationNation blog points out a new Embodied Energy Calculator that is available at thegreenestbuilding.org website. You select your building type, put in your square feet, and the calculator spits out an estimate on the number of MBTUs per square foot that it took to build your building. The idea is to reinforce the concept that preservation is an inherently sustainable style of development because it capitalizes on the energy already expended to build our existing structures. The site also includes a Teardown Calculator that attempts to sum the lost embodied energy, the energy expended in the demolition and the energy investment in the new construction.

To take this one step further, the National Trust is working on a methodology for Life Cycle Assessment for historic structures, as part of their Sustainability Initiative. An LCA seeks to encompass all the energy and materials consumed throughout a building's lifecycle, including resource extraction, energy consumed in manufacturing, use and disposal, etc. That, of course, is a much bigger project, but it could make a compelling case for reuse over demo.

The US Conference of Mayors met last week in Washington DC. A couple of the mayors took a few minutes to sit in on a discussion on the Diane Rehm Show about the challenges that mid-size cities face today. It was a very interesting discussion about the effects that the housing decline is having on city revenues and their plans to take their cities into the 21st century.

A Venice waterbus.

Venice has too many tourists, and they are making life hard for the city's full-time residents. So, the city has just opened a new waterbus line that caters to residents; it only takes those with a Carta Venezia pass (the pass is discounted for residents, a kind of long-term subway pass). Residents had complained that the waterbuses were so jammed with tourists and their big suitcases that there was little room for regular riders. The mayor said, "If people want to come to Venice they can come, but we have to allow residents to live better." Can you imagine Bloomberg or Daley saying something like that?

The H.H. Richardson House in Brookline has a new owner. The house was listed on the National Trust's 11 Most Endangered Places 2007 list because it had been left unsecured against the elements for several years and then acquired by two concerned neighbors who were anxious to sell. The new owner is the H.H. Richardson Trust, whose spokesman is Michael Minkoff, who is also owner of National Development Corp, a D.C. based adative reuse developer. He says that his plans are to preserve the facade, several of the front rooms, Richardson's highly customized master bedroom, and other features. He will build an addition to the rear of the building. He did not say what use he plans for the house.

The devastated block at the corner of Parker and Market Streets in South Lawrence.

A seven-alarm fire destroyed almost an entire block in South Lawrence on early Monday morning. The fire, which is being treated as suspicious, started in the former Millennium nightclub that was undergoing renovations. It quickly spread to neighboring triple-deckers, leaving more than 150 people homeless. In the early hours of the morning, the temperature was in the low teens. Residents huddled across the street as their homes burned, and firefighters picked icicles off their gear. Crews from 14 neighboring towns responded the alarm. The Lawrence community is rallying together to support the displaced families.

The Globe as a sideshow of pictures and coverage of the relief efforts. 

Architect's rendering of the proposed Tyson's Corner station. (Di Domenico + Partners)

Here's an unintended consequence of the Big Dig: the Federal government is more reluctant to fund large scale transit projects (via Planetizen). The Dulles rail line in Washington DC that would connect the existing Metro system with the Dulles International Airport through Tysons Corner in northern Virginia. A recent report from consultants for the Federal Transit Administration said that the project met all the qualifications for federal funding. But FTA officials are now saying that the project may not be funded. (Previously, projects that met the qualifications were automatically funded.) The Congressional and State delegations that supported the project have been caught unawares. Anonymous officials are quoted in the article, saying that the Administration is "concerned about the price tag and the specter of another Big Dig. ... The agency has been reluctant to promote large-scale transit projects." Uh oh.

Ordinarily, I wouldn't touch politics here with a ten foot pole, but the story of Mount Myrtle caught my eye. It's a good example of a town showcasing its natural assets for the rare national audience that comes with a Presidential election. It's a huge sand sculpture of the Republican party candidates—47 truck loads of sand—built right before the debate. As a way of keeping the spotlight as long as they can, they are looking for a creative way to dismantle the Mount. Any Dems out there looking to sabotage a Republican?

The draft environmental impact report for Cape Wind is out, and the project gets the all clear. The report looks at the proposed wind farm's impact on noise, coastal vegetation, wildlife, fisheries, tourism and aviation, among others. A "moderate" impact on birds was determined, but the report concluded that these impacts could be mediated as the project goes forward. Only one "major" impact was noted—the ocean view from boats will be impeded. Disappointed opponents of the project were hoping that the impact report would give them renewed ammunition, especially with respect to the impact on wildlife. The President of Cape Wind said, "Any rational observer will understand that this project is not going to produce a negative environmental impact. . . . This report validates that this is the right project in the right place at the right time."

This past week's Smart City Radio program talked with Sustainable Urbanism author Doug Farr. He notes that urbanism is inherently more sustainable than other settlement patterns. But in order to address the 21st century's demands for more green, efficient, sustainable lifestyles, we are going to need something more than classic urbanism. He argues for more than just green buildings stuck into existing cities, but also a renewed focus on walkability, high performance infrastructure, and other interesting topics.