Well, before start
telling this topic I like to make an idea clear to everyone that this is
neither a technical topic nor I like to enter into too much of complicacy. This
would be a clear type discussion among ourselves regarding the issues related
to smart growth of a city, town or neighborhood and we also like to focus on
whether this concept might be applicable to today’s context or not. Let me
start with the title “smart growth”-what does it mean or from where it was
evolved. This is basically an American term, the idea of smart growth started
in the USA and it was extremely successful in that region with their living
style and people appreciated it, they carried it and hope, still carrying this
idea. We are Architects or some of us are urban planners. We are very much
concerned about the quality of life and mostly responsible to plan and design
that quality. A growth is an addition. It may be addition to physical structure
of a town or may be in economy, infrastructure, education, settlements etc.
when we talk about a growth, it consists of many elements. Let us take an
example of a town or a city. A growth of a town may indicate its volumetric
increase in terms of housing, business centers, educational institutes,
transportation, employment generation, travel and tourism aspects etc. when a
growth is formulated by certain goal of planning; it is then called a
development. Even if at all we are discussing about a growth, many times we
neglect the prime factor; that is land. A land is such an element which can’t
be generated. Whatever piece of land you have, you need to use it. Therefore,
how smartly you are going to use the land and preserve it for your future
generation is the prime idea of a smart growth. It implies our inclination
toward a sustainable growth where we need to be less dependent on external
energy systems. Smart growth insists us to walk, to use sustainable
transportation system like bicycle etc. If we start from a small neighborhood
or gated community, then smart growth tells us to plan and design the
neighborhood such a way that we need not to use other mechanical vehicles to
travel inside of it. The neighborhood should be walkable by every corner and by
every people. The facilities and amenities should be plotted in such a way that
no one needs to go out for anything. If you are able to design such type of
neighborhood, then definitely you are saving time and money of the users. It is
very much philosophical that in today’s world people do not get much time to
spend with family and friends. We all accepted a mechanical life. A survey
showed that we spend 20% of time inside our cars or vehicles. If we can save
that 20% time and other factors related to it like fuel and money then probably
we may be able to save a lot. The concept of smart growth says that lets save
time and automatically time will save other elements.
Now, let us understand
as Architects that what we can do to bring smart growth in our design and how
to do these. Well, the experts said that there are several thumb rules or key
points regarding planning and designing according to smart growth.
Smart growth is related
to, or used in combination with the following concepts:
New Urbanism
New Community Design
Sustainable Development
Traditional
Neighborhood Development
Resource Stewardship
Land Preservation
Preventing urban sprawl
Creating Sense of Place
Development Best
Practices
Preservation
Development
Triple Bottom Line
(TBL) Accounting - People, Planet, Profit
The Three Pillars -
Human, Natural, and Created Capital
The smart growth
approach to development is multifaceted and can encompass a variety of
techniques. For example, in the state of Massachusetts smart growth is enacted
by a combination of techniques including increasing housing density along
transit nodes, conserving farm land, and mixing residential and commercial use
areas. Perhaps the most descriptive term to characterize this concept is
Traditional Neighborhood Development, which recognizes that smart growth and related
concepts are not necessarily new, but are a response to car culture and sprawl.
Many favor the term New Urbanism, which invokes a new, but traditional way of
looking at urban planning.
There are a range of
best practices associated with smart growth, these include: supporting existing
communities, redeveloping underutilized sites, enhancing economic
competitiveness, providing more transportation choices, developing livability
measures and tools, promoting equitable and affordable housing, providing a
vision for sustainable growth, enhancing integrated planning and investment,
aligning, coordinating, and leveraging government policies, redefining housing
affordability and making the development process transparent. Related, but
somewhat different, are the overarching goals of smart growth, and they
include: making the community more competitive for new businesses, providing
alternative places to shop, work, and play, creating a better "Sense of
Place," providing jobs for
residents, increasing property values, improving quality of life, expanding the
tax base, preserving open space, controlling growth, and improving safety.
Basic principles of
smart growth:
There are 10 accepted
principles that define smart growth:
1. Mix land uses
2. Take advantage of compact building design
3. Create a range of housing opportunities
and choices
4. Create walkable neighborhoods
5. Foster distinctive, attractive communities
with a strong sense of place
6. Preserve open space, farmland, natural
beauty, and critical environmental areas
7. Strengthen and direct development towards
existing communities
8. Provide a variety of transportation
choices
9. Make development decisions predictable, fair,
and cost effective
10. Encourage community
and stakeholder collaboration in development decisions.
You may find it awesome
that the authority of western countries like USA has given some “walk score” to
any kind of planned neighborhood communities. The more walk score means more
sustainable. Now, As an Architect, we need to understand the need of
sustainability. Preservation of land and to use and re use it again and again
by multiple functional ways. We may go for implementing the concept of “Brown field
development” where we can use abundant land or non agricultural land for new
construction. We can go for renovation of ancient structures to protect it and
to reuse it. Urbanization always affects our forest land and agricultural
lands. We lost 60% of agricultural lands whereas more than 45% of forest land
converted into habitable areas in past 100 years. We cannot escape from urban
amenities or to become urbanized. But the basic thing is that how smartly we
are designing an urban land to reduce negative impact on environment and how
far we are successful to preserve agricultural lands and make the maximum use
of a minimum piece of land is remarkable. How far we are designing a lifestyle
which requires less energy, less transportation and gets maximum time to spend
a happy life; are all about to thing from right now to grow smartly.
No comments:
Post a Comment