CCT434Week05

** Week 5: 10/06/11 **

 * CCT434 Lesson #5 In Class Assignment: New Urbanism, the Zero Energy House and How Cars have Changed Cities **


 * Professor Littlejohn **


 * Name: Kelly Kornet **


 * Read the article at Automobile in American Life and Society **
 * ‘The Automobile Shapes The City’ by Martin V. Melosi at [] : **
 * The Timeline of the Electric Car at []and the definition of New Urbanism article, and review the web site at [] **
 * And ‘Zero Energy meets New Urbanism’ **


 * Lesson 5 In Class Assignment: 45 minutes **


 * Answer the following questions: **


 * 1. List the 10 principles of new urbanism- cut and paste if you like, but have on hand as part of your notes: **

1. Walkability. This principle promotes most places to be within a 10-minute walking distance of home and work paired with infrastructure that is designed to be pedestrian friendly (buildings close to street; porches, windows & doors; tree-lined streets; on street parking; hidden parking lots; garages in rear lane; narrow, slow speed streets)

2. Connectivity. The use of an interconnected street grid network results in traffic dispersion and eases walking. The creation of a high quality pedestrian network with a hierarchy of narrow streets, boulevards and alleys; results in a pleasurable walking experience.

3. Mixed-Use and Diversity. Planning of the city fabric with on site shops, offices, apartments and homes within neighborhoods, blocks and buildings allow for access to many facilities. New Urbanism also reflects diversity of people in age, income level, culture, and race.

4. Mixed Housing. The variation of type, size and price of housing all arranged in closer proximity

5. Quality Architecture & Urban Design. Architecture is to emphasize beauty, aesthetics, and human comfort while built at the human scale with beautiful surroundings to nourish the human spirit. The urban design is to regard special placement of civic uses and sites within community.

6. Traditional Neighborhood Structure. The urban planning should enforce a discernable center and edge with public space at the core. A quality public realm should be established with open space designed as civic art. Transect planning should be present with the highest densities at town center, progressively declining towards the edge. This allows for the creation of a series of specific natural habitats and/or urban lifestyle settings, integrating the environmental methodology for zoning of community design and blurring the boundary between the natural and man-made.

7. Increased Density. New urbanism design principles are to be applied at the full range of densities of city fabric (small town to large city) and are to enforce more buildings, residences, shops, and services within close proximity for efficient and accessible resources. Thus resulting in an enjoyable place to live and ease of walking.

8. Green Transportation. The city fabric should reflect a pedestrian friendly design encouraging a greater use of bicycles, rollerblades, scooters, and walking for daily transportation. There should also be a network of high-quality trains to connect cities, towns, and neighborhoods together.

9. Sustainability. The development and operations should have a minimal environmental impact with respect for ecology and value of natural systems. Planning should use eco-friendly technologies, less use of finite fuels, more local production, more walking/less driving, and more energy efficiency.

10. Quality of Life. Taken together these add up to a high quality of life well worth living, and create places that enrich, uplift, and inspire the human spirit.


 * 2. Describe why "The sum of human happiness increases because of New Urbanism" -[|Andres Duany] **

The sum of human happiness increases as a result of New Urbanism because the suggested planning benefits residents, businesses, developers, and municipalities. The improvement of infrastructure creates a more pleasurable and safe environment, improves health, creates meaning among community, increases sales and therefore profits, and less traffic congestions. The benefits are varied and numerous and all contribute to human happiness on an individual and societal basis.


 * 3. List six Geos zero energy strategies for zero-energy housing units. **

1. Compaction: Geos homes will range from 750 square feet to 2,400 ft2 (average 1,250 ft2) and will be units of townhouse/multifamily buildings –reduction of exterior wall increases energy efficiency.

2. High performance shell: tight and well-insulated envelopes with automated interior insulated shades to allow solar heat into the house during the day and to retain heat at night

3. Geo-assisted energy recovery ventilation (ERV) system: the retention of replacement air in an underground tube around the building which will then utilize the earth’s temperature to then pre-cool summer air and pre-heat winter air. *Air is filtered before entering the tubes to prevent mold and will pass through an energy recovery ventilator to recoup energy from the building’s return air before being exhausted to the outside

4. Geothermal domestic hot water and space heating: (GSHP) ground source heat pump systems to run from solar electricity and heat the water for the units – cheaper than a natural gas tankless water heater

5. Passive solar: units will take advantage of both active and passive solar, ceiling drywall will contain additional thermal mass to retain the energy gained passively and release energy when needed.

6. Solar photovoltaic (PV) panels to provide electivity by building a multi-utility and gaining economies of scale, panels will be on rooftops but distributed amongst dwellings


 * Describe how the automobile has transformed the American (and Canadian) city. (2 paragraphs) **

The automobile transformed the American (and Canadian) city in innumerable ways. With the advent of the personal vehicle, pedestrians became second-class as the infrastructure of North America began developing with cars in mind. Shopping malls with large parking lots accommodated the needs and space for drivers, allowing one stop trips and encouraging consumption that would benefit department stores as opposed to local businesses. The infrastructure is not limited to the roads and external features as Melosi mentions the replacement of front porches by the garage. The automobile has allowed for urban sprawl and thus has changed living patterns and settlement of previous cities. Suburban areas allowed breathing room for those who needed access to the city center but wanted to avoid the congestion and density. Such changes were only possible for citizens that could afford to do so.

What is of greater significance is the effects this physical alteration has provoked in regards to the social dynamic of the city. With these changes, city life has become more privatized with the aide of suburbs; allowing for isolation and remoteness among the vast scale and density of the area. Neighbors are no longer expected to be as tightly-knit as a result of decreased social interaction associated with urban sprawl. With the advent of the automobile and the subsequent "freeway" period, the social dynamic transformed drastically. Citizens were granted direct transportation to their destination, allowing them to frequent areas inaccessible by foot and limiting time spent on commuting.


 * Describe the three- or four-stage transportation chronology for the American city mapped out by historians **

Transportation is a ‘key variable’ in the chronology of the American city. The effects of transportation on urban growth can be broken down to a three or four-stage model. 1. The first stage, known as the walking city existed up until 1880. Characteristics were of compact city fabrics, mixed patterns of land use, intermingling of residences and workplaces, and narrow/meandering/unpaved roads. The use of steam locomotives was sparse and the use of cablecars and horse-drawn streetcars (horsecars) foresaw the use of the electric streetcars of the following era. 2. The second stage was the “streetcar era”from 1880 to 1920 where industrialization changed the design of the city. From here, industrial cities began concentration of accommodations/commerce/trade at the core and suburbs began to develop for residence of the upper/middle class. At this time, low-fare electric streetcars replaced the slower horsecars and the urban development began to concentrate around the streetcar lines. 3. The third stage is that of “the automobile city” from 1920 onwards. Following WW1, advent of the automobile continued the decentralization of the population and dispersal of people into suburbs and locations aware from the city core. Urban infrastructure (in some areas) then began to adapt to motorized vehicles at the cost of the urban pedestrian lifestyle. *As the text notes, one historian has divided the automobile city into two periods – the “recreational vehicle” from 1920 to 1945, and the “freeway” period from 1945 to present.