The real second generation

With the full support of local officials, a number of significant new urbanist projects are on the fast track. Most new urbanist projects are held back by something — incompatible zoning codes, lack of financing, inappropriate street standards, neighbors’ opposition, and/or developers and builders who are hostile to the idea. While these barriers damage many projects, they also offer some handy excuses: i.e. new urbanists could really overtake the competition if the regulatory playing field were level, if financing were more easily available, and if builders and developers were on board. A moment of truth may be at hand. For perhaps the first time in the movement’s history, a significant number of projects are moving forward with the full support of public officials combined with financially backed developers who really want to do the New Urbanism (NU). These projects will be test cases, where no one will be able to hide behind excuses. If generations are measured by the challenges they face, then virtually all of the previous projects can be categorized as “first generation.” The second generation, or at least its vanguard, is on the way. In this article we examine eight projects that really stand on the shoulders of the pioneering new urbanist efforts of the 1980s and 1990s. The table on page 4 gives the statistics and highlights of: Cherry Hill Village, Clark’s Grove, Craig Ranch, North Richland Hills Town Center, The Peninsula Neighborhood, Townsend, Washington Town Center, and the Waterfront District. Although there are other examples of this trend, such as Stapleton in Denver (see article on page 16), by and large these “second generation” projects are still the exception. Most new urbanist projects still face substantial barriers relative to conventional suburban development. Perhaps the biggest change is that the featured projects have the full support of public officials. In many cases, zoning is already in place and the community has already decided it wants NU prior to the developer entering the scene. This can lead to public/private partnerships, where the municipality works with the developer to get something the community wants: e.g., sites for civic and recreational facilities, job creation, affordable housing, or a community focal point. Most of these projects have moved forward on a fast track, and in the development industry, time is money. They all have been able to receive financing, as well, because there are successful examples of the NU in the region, and/or the developer has a strong track record — in some cases building first generation new urbanist neighborhoods. Physical differences The projects profiled are located on a mix of greenfield, infill, and brownfield sites. But even where projects are greenfield sites in the suburbs, the collaboration with the municipality can make a difference in the physical layout. Washington Town Center and Cherry Hill Village, for example, are similar in that they seem to grow organically out of old hamlets and settlements. Washington Town Center takes up both sides of a state highway, Route 33, and tames it in the process. Washington Township officials lobbied the state Department of Transportation to narrow it to two lanes and get on-street parking, a change that makes all the difference and would not have been possible without the township’s intervention. Similarly, Cherry Hill Village is the first traditional neighborhood development to occupy all four sides of a historic crossroads. Canton Township officials similarly intervened with county transportation planners, ensuring the heart of the town is not gutted by an overwide arterial. Officials in McKinney, Texas, where Craig Ranch is located, took a leap of faith that is both highly unusual in a suburban community, and significant from a new urbanist standpoint. They essentially gave up regulating density — preferring instead to focus on the relationship of buildings to each other and to the public realm. While there are some limits, they are set so high that developer Craig International will likely not reach them. “We felt that the market would take care of density,” says John Kessel, director of McKinney’s planning department. “We also felt that some of the things that we wanted to do could best be achieved with higher density, and we didn’t want to stifle a dense urban environment.” In these cases — and in North Richland Hills, Texas, and the Waterfront District of Hercules, California — a rapidly growing suburban municipality wanted to create a pedestrian-scale “heart.” The developer became a partner in the process using the vehicle of the New Urbanism. The Craig Ranch project grew out of a meeting of city officials less than three years ago, as the city was being inundated with growth, Kessel says. Officials agreed that McKinney needed a downtown focal point and hometown feel, and wanted to avoid becoming a suburban city clogged with traffic and visually indistinct from any other suburban area. Subsequent fiscal impact studies reinforced the idea that the greatest economic growth could be achieved through mixed-use development. “It really is about saying ‘we’re not going to be just another suburban city,’ “ he says. The city is taking some significant risks with the policy changes, Kessel says, but he remains very hopeful. “I think people will come to McKinney in the future and say, ‘wow, there are real quality of life choices here. It’s not like other suburban communities.’ ” Collaboration, not dictation In some of these cases, the developers were not initially sold on the new urbanist concept, but were pushed in a new direction by determined public planners and elected officials. In Washington Township, for instance, lead developer Sharbell Development Corp. initially feared that the adoption of the town center concept plan by Nelessen Associates would force the firm to build a project that the market would not accept, says township planner Bob Melvin. In frustration, Tom Troy, senior vice president of Sharbell, proposed a counter plan based on conventional separation of uses and housing types. “At that point we decided to work it out as a collaboration, as opposed to a dictation,” Melvin says. “Tom had a lot of learning to do in terms of urban design, and I had a learning curve in terms of what could actually be built.” In the company of a township attorney and Sharbell’s design consultant Roger Wells, Troy and Melvin sat down together and completed a code and a specific plan for the site in the winter of 1996-1997. According to Troy, the planning required a lot of give and take. “The township came in with absolutely no clue as to what things cost and with an open-ended list of demands.” Nevertheless, the in-house collaboration meant that both parties walked away from the table deeply vested in the plan. The public planners could not very well change the rules at a later date, and the developer could not claim that the project could not be built. The situation in Hercules, California, is somewhat analogous. A waterfront development on the site of an abandoned dynamite plant was first proposed by the Bixby Company just before the city hired new urbanist planning firm Dover Kohl and Partners to create a regulating plan for the city’s central area. The planning commission rejected Bixby’s conventional plan and demanded something of higher quality. The developer responded by hiring town planner David Sargent, who produced a mixed-use plan that fit the city’s vision for the future. Bixby thus became a leader in the effort to create a downtown based on new urbanist principles. The collaboration turned out to be beneficial to both parties. Steve Lawton, former chair of the Hercules planning commission and now community development director, notes that the graphics produced for Bixby’s Waterfront District proved instrumental in convincing the development community that the larger Dover Kohl plan was feasible. “It was a tremendous help to have the pictures of what one company was willing to put their money behind,” he says. From Bixby’s perspective, the company needed to have the support of the city on design issues, since the company’s contract with the production builders did not give it final design control. The planning commission has taken on details such as whether to use flat muntins or simulated divided light windows in the homes and has backed up Bixby in the call for higher quality. According to John Baucke of the Bixby Company, “ it’s a fact that the planning commission and the community development staff are on top of everything. In most communities they would just say ‘who cares what windows go in there?’” While the city has stuck to its guns, it is also careful to listen. “The most important thing is to understand and respect everybody’s business model,” Lawton says. “You can stretch the builder’s model, but you can’t break it.” Being there from the word go A publicly instigated charrette usually involves a design team and local stakeholders, while the developer is only brought in at a later date. Many good projects have slowly died before the search for an appropriate developer can be concluded. In Covington, Georgia, a more fruitful dynamic has been at play: developer and city officials were on the same page even before the charrette began. The Clark’s Grove property is owned by Rob Fowler, a member of a prominent, local banking family. Fowler learned about the NU from Georgia planner Randy Vinson and was introduced to Joel Embry, developer of Amelia Park in Fernandina Beach, Florida. Through these personal relationships, Fowler got interested in using the family’s property as an example and worked on getting local officials behind the plan. Embry in turn recommended Duany Plater-Zyberk as master planner, and a charrette, funded mostly by Fowler, was held in September 2000. “We had serious support from the mayor and the city manager before the charrette,” Embry says. “By the time we were submitting ordinance amendments, they knew why we were doing this, they knew the principles that were necessary to create a good neighborhood. They caught the vision.” Since the charrette, the city has amended its planned unit development (PUD) ordinance to include a traditional neighborhood section, which according to Embry contains very accurate descriptions of TND principles. Having passed the amendment in June, the city moved directly into rezoning the property and has approved the first phase plat. Embry says the rapid advances were possible because the permitting was “based in trust and open communication with elected officials and staff,” and because the charrette included meetings with the entire public works and fire departments. Backlash Occasionally, a tight working relationship between city and developer can create enmity in the rest of the local development community. The Peninsula Neighborhood in Iowa City has moved forward quite rapidly since the development group Peninsula Partners was chosen by the city in early 2000. The first homes are currently under construction, and developer Terry Stamper describes the public/private partnership as “about as good as I have ever seen.” But when the city recently granted Peninsula Partners a $690,000 infrastructure loan, members of the local home builders association showed up in force at the city council meeting and protested the loan. The city stood by its decision, and Stamper speculates that developers and builders may fear the Peninsula Neighborhood because it raises the bar for projects in the area. Moreover, he says, “we have set an example that gives the city a voice and a lot of control over the coding and design. Other developers may be afraid that this means more restrictions for them in the future.” Civic facilities City and county officials are looking to Craig Ranch to site a $100 million soccer facility with 24 soccer fields, indoor and outdoor arenas, softball fields, and a separate indoor sports center and training facility. Craig International, which owns the land, is planning to sell the property at below market rate for the public sports complex. Officials anticipate that the facility will draw national tournaments and possibly a professional team, generating substantial tax revenues and economic activity. David Craig of Craig International sees the benefit of three million visitors annually who will be drawn to the town center. In North Richland Hills, officials saw the town center as a good location for important civic buildings, and as part of a larger economic development strategy. The city has borrowed $40 million to build a regional health and recreation facility, a conference and performing arts center, and a library. “The health and recreation center provides the total wellness part of our economic development strategy, and the city’s as well,” says Bill Geitema of Arcadia Realty, the developer. Arcadia provided the city with what Geitema calls “an advantageous pricing for the land” for these parcels. The town center, and every aspect related to it requiring approval, received 29 consecutive unanimous favorable votes, Geitema says. “No one ever spoke against us,” he adds. “We didn’t get everything we wanted, but we got what we needed.” Townsend in Gainesville, Florida, was the first project to seek approvals through the city’s TND zoning ordinance. Townsend is an infill site in the midst of disjointed suburban development. For thousands of residents who live within about a mile, Townsend will provide much needed public spaces and pedestrian-scale shopping and civic facilities. David Coffey, one of the developers of Townsend, reports that neighbors of the 52-acre property were vehemently protesting a nearby conventional development proposal of only three units per acre. Townsend was proposed to be developed at eight units per acre, with additional commercial space. The developers invited the neighbors out to Haile Village Center, the acclaimed TND that they had begun in 1994 outside of the city. “They all just said, ‘if you are talking about something like this, then that’s okay,” Coffey recalls. “So the entire approval process occurred without any objections, except one guy who said that we were too timid asking for only 80,000 square feet of commercial. He had a list of all the retail uses he would like to walk to, and he wasn’t sure we could fit them all in. They understood that what we were proposing was dense, urban, and unlike anything in the city, and yet they loved it, because we had a model to show them.”