While the country staggers towards economic stability, the design professions are feeling their worst economic times since the Great Depression. Depending on the region of the country, the unemployment and underemployment rate for design professionals is anywhere from 20% to 50%. I feel this daily as President of the Kansas City chapter of the American Institute of Architects, and as an owner of a small architecture / planning firm.

What I hope to convey to you in this note is not just the seriousness of our situation, but how you can help at the Federal level while achieving your stated goals of preparing the country for long-term economic and environmental prosperity.

As someone who is generally an optimist, it pains me to write something that is so overly negative. However, the economic situation today is dire for architects, engineers, planners and anyone involved in design. Simply put, all of us have friends and colleagues who are highly qualified, talented individuals that have no work. All of us in ownership situations have had to lay off trusted employees, who have little hope of finding full-time employment. College graduates are facing a job market that is essentially non-existent.

It’s also safe to say that the majority of these folks are people who support the Administration’s agenda of progressive energy policy, transportation reform, environmental advocacy and health care reform. In other words, these are some of your core constituents, who have much talent to offer the country.

And with all due respect, tax credits for new employees, or tax credits of most any kind are worthless to those of us in the design industries. We cannot hire because there is no work, not because we need a tax incentive to do so. Our clients are not proceeding with projects, even in markets where the economy is stable, because lenders will essentially not do any new lending for development projects. The credit markets on Main Street are tighter than they have ever been in many of our lifetimes.

What can be done, then? Plenty. The Recovery Act had many of the right ideals, but lacked proper implementation of those ideals to help maximize the dollars spent. For example, focusing solely on “shovel-ready” projects only benefits a few contractors and subcontractors on the construction side. And, this is not to mention that many of those projects were “on the shelf” because they were poorly conceived, and didn’t meet the needs of the 21^st century.

Instead, any additional stimulus or Federal money spent going forward should focus on how to a) create as many jobs in the supply chain as possible, and b) match up with the Administration’s goals on Sustainability and Livability.

The best way to do this is to fund new efforts now that require the work of architects, engineers, planners and more. By doing so, not only do you help to create jobs in this important sector, but you also get the additional benefit of construction jobs on the back-end of the projects. Funding projects that require thoughtful design solves a) and b) above, and additionally benefits all taxpayers as we move towards more efficiency in the use of resources.

What are some examples of how to do this? The list is much longer than what I have noted below, but some examples include:

1. Grants supporting new plans for municipalities and local governments, emphasizing Livable Communities goals.
2. Grants supporting new form-based zoning and zoning reform for local governments
3. Grants supporting Complete Streets approaches to transportation, as well as planning for integrated land use and transportation plans.
4. Grants for design of civic structures and public parks and plazas
5. Bond issues for design and construction of new educational facilities
6. Seed money for micro-loan programs that implement the planning efforts above

Any of these efforts would be, like many New Deal programs, a long-term investment in the future health of our country. In fact, we can still point today with pride at many of the structures and public spaces that were built in the 1930’s as some of our most-loved places.

In addition, all of these prepare us for a more economically and environmentally sustainable future. Mr. President, you recognized early in your term that we cannot keep building sprawl forever and ever – that we realize now it’s too inefficient and doesn’t meet the needs of our citizens. This is never more evident than in an economic downturn, and it will be even more apparent as worldwide oil supplies put pressure on our lifestyle in the near future.

So in summary, what you have before you now is an opportunity to have a true win-win situation. Put people to work now. Create thoughtful long-term solutions. Help the country make the transition to a more prosperous and livable future.

Please do the right thing – we stand ready to help.

Sincerely,

Kevin Klinkenberg, AIA

Principal – 180 Urban Design & Architecture

AIAKC 2010 President

Posted by: Kevin Klinkenberg

It’s often said that Americans love their cars above everything else, and many question the demand for walkable neighborhoods. And yet, as this and other studies have revealed, quality walkable places are highly valued. This shouldn’t be surprising – as human beings, we inherently like to interact with others, and we prefer to have options on how to experience life. Walking/biking, etc are all just examples of how to achieve what’s in our nature.  This is a blog post that I would like to share written by Kaid Benfield, who is the director of the Smart Growth Program in Washington, D.C.

How walkable neighborhoods increase home values

Home values in walkable neighborhoods are measurably higher than those that are not, even when other relevant factors are controlled in the analysis.

Below is an illuminating slide show on the subject that was presented by economist Joe Cortright at a transportation colloquium recently hosted by the Congress for the New Urbanism in Portland. Some key points from the presentation:

• “Walkability” is not just about sidewalks. Are there places you can walk to?
• Examining data from 98,000 home sales in 15 metropolitan areas, and controlling for other relevant factors, each increase of one point on Walk Score’s walkability scale raises home values by $700 to $3000.
• In Charlotte, the increase in value was $1,986 for each Walk Score point.
• Improving walkability raises home values by $10-30,000.
• Because mixed-use development produces big gains in walkability, the findings are evidence of a strong market for mixed-use neighborhoods.

I have to admit that the slide show was a little clunky on my computer (and there is no narration), but it is manageably short (24 slides) and well illustrated. Enjoy:

Click here to view

We’re obsessed with big: big houses, big churches, big cars, big stores, big food portions. It’s in our nature I suppose to be impressed with size.

When planning for our communities, though, it’s often best to think small. Not small as in small goals or dreams; but small as in the kinds of spaces that fill up our neighborhoods. This is especially true when it comes to spaces that sell things – shops, restaurants, etc.

What are the benefits of small spaces? For one, they are cheap to rent – very important to mom & pop operations and start-ups. If you want to encourage local flavor, local business, etc, thinking small is critical. An all-too-common mistake made by many new businesses is in trying to occupy a space too large from the beginning; especially for dining. But also, an abundance of small spaces creates more street life – just think of the impact of 10 small storefronts vs 2 large ones. And, more businesses means more competition, which is ultimately good for consumers as well. Places that are dominated by a handful of large operators are not only less interesting, but ultimately less responsive to their patrons.

But how to do small and cheap, especially with new construction? In this case, there’s no single answer, as it relies upon the creative possibilities inherent in each place and person. That said, a few examples keep coming back, including some themes we’ve discussed on this blog before. One story buildings that are modest in construction, for example; food carts, mobile stalls, etc. But another idea to examine is an updated version of market stalls, that can be inexpensively built and maintained. One of the best examples of this case is in the early New Urbanist community of Seaside, FL. You may know Seaside as a hallmark of pricey, resort-oriented New Urbanism. But the reality is it has some of the most effective approaches of any new community for how to create incubator retail with success.

Seaside’s town center has a variety of all the techniques mentioned above, in order to deal with the seasonal nature of its business. As the town has matured, more permanent structures have been able to work, but the bulk of the “selling” of things still happens in very informal, inexpensive construction (see photos). Some of the shops shown simply lock up their stall at night, and share a common courtyard with others. It’s a highly effective way to nurture small business in an emerging walkable environment.

Jane Jacobs used to write repeatedly about the virtue of cheap space for shops in an urban environment. She was writing to extol the benefits especially of older buildings. But in many cases we don’t have the older building stock to use, so instead, think about how to creatively build new space that has the same qualities. Small, flexible and cheap is good when it comes to successful, walkable retail.

Kevin Klinkenberg reviews Kansas City street design and the importance of getting the details right. By comparing and contrasting two sections of Westport Road, he looks at how each of the street designs work, the details of each and then show why one is so much better than the other.

Click here to watch video

Building upon previous posts on Path to Prosperity, here’s something simple and inexpensive that can help rebuild the market for successful, walkable communities. Again, it follows the principles of de-prioritizing long-distance fast traffic, and focusing on what works to create balance in a particular neighborhood. Success stories like this are popping up all over the country as cities rethink the policies that crippled their downtowns and older neighborhoods for decades.

The Return of the Two-Way Street

By Alan Ehrenhalt | December 2009

Why the double-yellow stripe is making a comeback in downtowns.
Over the past couple of decades, Vancouver, Washington, has spent millions of dollars trying to revitalize its downtown, and especially the area around Main Street that used to be the primary commercial center. Just how much the city has spent isn’t easy to determine. But it’s been an ambitious program. Vancouver has totally refurbished a downtown park, subsidized condos and apartment buildings overlooking it and built a new downtown Hilton hotel.

Some of these investments have been successful, but they did next to nothing for Main Street itself. Through most of this decade, the street remained about as dreary as ever. Then, a year ago, the city council tried a new strategy. Rather than wait for the $14 million more in state and federal money it was planning to spend on projects on and around Main Street, it opted for something much simpler. It painted yellow lines in the middle of the road, took down some signs and put up others, and installed some new traffic lights. In other words, it took a one-way street and opened it up to two-way traffic.

The merchants on Main Street had high hopes for this change. But none of them were prepared for what actually happened following the changeover on November 16, 2008. In the midst of a severe recession, Main Street in Vancouver seemed to come back to life almost overnight.

Within a few weeks, the entire business community was celebrating. “We have twice as many people going by as they did before,” one of the employees at an antique store told a local reporter. The chairman of the Vancouver Downtown Association, Lee Coulthard, sounded more excited than almost anyone else. “It’s like, wow,” he exclaimed, “why did it take us so long to figure this out?”

A year later, the success of the project is even more apparent. Twice as many cars drive down Main Street every day, without traffic jams or serious congestion. The merchants are still happy. “One-way streets should not be allowed in prime downtown retail areas,” says Rebecca Ocken, executive director of Vancouver’s Downtown Association. “We’ve proven that.”

The debate over one-way versus two-way streets has been going on for more than half a century now in American cities, and it is far from resolved even yet. But the evidence seems to suggest that the two-way side is winning. A growing number of cities, including big ones such as Minneapolis, Louisville and Oklahoma City, have converted the traffic flow of major streets to two-way or laid out plans to do so. There has been virtually no movement in the other direction.

Minneapolis opened its First Street and Hennepin Street commercial areas to two-way traffic on October 11, hoping to pump some life into a stagnant corridor. It’s too early to draw any firm conclusions, but the early responses were mixed. First Street is home to several nightclubs, and some of them complained that bringing in two-way traffic made it difficult for bands with large trucks to park. “The city has royally screwed us,” one club manager declared. The city basically shrugged those complaints off. Its planners claimed the clubowners were making self-interested arguments that ignored the common benefits of a healthier street life.

Before World War II, one-way commercial streets were pretty rare in the United States. People frequented downtowns in which buses and streetcars negotiated two-way traffic, and they got off to shop at the stores that lined both sides of the street. Those who drove could park right along the sidewalk.

After the war, a couple of things happened. Civil defense planners, taking seriously the threat of nuclear attack, worried that residents trying to escape would create gridlock on the crowded two-way streets, imprisoning themselves in smoldering cities and causing many more casualties. The arterial streets were the only escape routes they had. Making them one-way, on an alternating basis, would speed things up and save lives. Or so it was thought.

But atomic bombs were only one factor that made civic leaders and transportation planners partial to one-way streets in the postwar years. They were worried about congestion, period. Some thought that the frustrations of moving through downtown the old-fashioned way were driving people to do their shopping in the suburbs. More mobility might mean more customers. Others, in those pre-Interstate days, cared mainly about the satisfaction of the suburbanites themselves. These people were using the arterial roads to commute in and out of the city, and there was little dispute that one-way streets could get them back and forth more quickly.

By the 1970s, though, there were new urban realities. Large portions of the Interstate Highway System were built, so nobody would have to flee the Soviets on gridlocked city streets. More important, downtown retail customers were shopping at suburban malls no matter what the local chamber of commerce did to try and stop them. Downtown had begun its long, familiar decline. The one-way streets fashioned in the 1950s and 1960s were still pretty good at whisking people out of central cities, but far fewer area residents wanted to enter the cities in the first place. Many downtown one-way streets became miniature speedways that served largely to frighten anyone who had the eccentric idea of strolling down the sidewalk.

Anyone who travels a lot to the center of big cities has had an experience like this: You arrive at night, and start looking for your hotel. You find it, but you can’t drive to the entrance because the street is one-way the other way. Finally you come to a street that goes the way you want, but once you get close again, the signs won’t allow you to make the turn you need to make. You can waste 20 minutes this way. And as you keep driving, you notice that the streets are empty anyway. Any reason that might have existed for turning them into single-purpose speedways simply did not apply anymore.

Meanwhile, local governments were slowly learning that the old two-way streets, whatever the occasional frustration, had real advantages in fostering urban life. Traffic moved at a more modest pace, and there was usually a row of cars parked by the curb to serve as a buffer between pedestrians and moving vehicles. If you have trouble perceiving the difference, try asking yourself this question: How many successful sidewalk cafés have you ever encountered on a four-lane, one-way street with cars rushing by at 50 miles per hour? My guess is, very few indeed.

So over the past 10 years, dozens of cities have reconfigured one-way streets into two-way streets as a means of bringing their downtowns to life. The political leadership and the local business community usually join forces in favor of doing this. There are always arguments against it. Some of them are worth stopping to consider.

Among the critics are traffic engineers and academics who were taught some fixed principles of transportation in school decades ago and have never bothered to reconsider them. Joseph Dumas, a professor at the University of Tennessee, argued a few years ago that “the primary purpose of roads is to move traffic efficiently and safely, not to encourage or discourage business or rebuild parts of town . . . . Streets are tools for traffic engineering.”

If you agree that streets serve no other purpose than to move automobiles, you are unlikely to see much problem with making them one-way. On the other hand, if you think that streets possess the capacity to enhance the quality of urban life, you will probably consider the Dumas Doctrine to be nonsense. That is the way more and more cities are coming to feel.

There are other arguments. It’s sometimes said that more accidents occur on two-way streets than one-way streets. The research that supports this claim is decades old, and to my knowledge, has not been replicated. Even if you accept this argument, though, you might want to consider that, at slower speeds, the accidents on two-way streets are much more likely to be fender-benders at left-turn intersections, not harrowing high-speed crashes involving cars and pedestrians.

Finally, there are complaints from fire departments that it takes them longer to reach the scene of trouble when they have to thread their way around oncoming traffic, rather than taking a straight shot down a one-way speedway. I can’t refute this, and in any case, I don’t like arguing with fire departments. But I have to wonder how many people have died in burning buildings in recent years because a fire truck wasn’t allowed to use a one-way street.

I wouldn’t argue that two-way streets are any sort of panacea for urban revival, Vancouver’s experience notwithstanding. And I understand that they are not always practical. Some streets simply are too narrow to have traffic moving in both directions; others have to be designated one-way because their purpose is to feed traffic onto expressways.

What I would say is this: When it comes to designing or retrofitting streets, the burden of proof shouldn’t fall on those who want to use them the old-fashioned way. It should be on those who think the speedway ideology of the 1950s serves much of a purpose half a century later.