Interstate End State

When the last gasoline powered vehicle finally gives up the ghost, whither its residue? That question is beginning to interest a cohort of thinkers beyond the closed doors of the Sierra Club’s board of directors. Evidence can be found in many places, including now the editorial pages of the New York Times.

Yes, the antique car collectors will be vindicated beyond their wildest dreams, but what of the rest of us? Should Americans be concerned that most of the money from the $700 billion stimulus package is being used to repair the Eisenhower Interstate Highway System? Karrie Jacobs, a journalist for Metropolis magazine, likes the idea of fixing the Interstates, but not because it will keep more cars on the road. She is looking ahead, while most of the country is still mired in the bygone era of transportation liberty. One man, one vote, one car.

Her radical idea is that the tentacles of our massive road infrastructure be re-engineered to serve as rail or light rail corridors for a truly modern transportation network,  one that Europe is already building and Asia is planning. “The highway system can’t always be a ghetto for the internal combustion engine,” she argues. It should become an artery for new technologies that bring us closer to sustainability. She also suggests that highways be refitted to become clean energy pipelines, carrying not oil but electricity from alternative sources.

Like most of the dinosaurs left over from the age of big oil, the highway system should be retired. It should not, however, be demolished. Adaptive reuse must become a widespread strategy for re-envisioning the environment for a sustainable future. One of the frustrations of dealing with LEED standards for “greening” the built world is that the program has given little thought to re-use of resources like roads, bridges, and rail corridors. New York has taken the bold step of converting a rusting rail viaduct into a wonderful urban park–the High Line. Other cities are contemplating similar schemes for reusing infrastructure. The Interstates make up the biggest piece of man-made real estate in the U.S., and will soon be a white elephant.

We can still maintain Woody Guthrie’s “ribbon of highway” as a part of the American myth if we live up to the promise of ingenuity and imagination that underpins that great story. Admitting the folly of our dependency on gasoline is the first step. Making use of our expensive and redundant road system will be the next.

Shades of Green: Light, Dark, Brownish, Olive

Television has discovered sustainable architecture. The Sundance Channel is offering several shows that feature “green” themes. PBS has Building Green, a show with an attractive subject and a telegenic host–Kevin Contreras (who looks like he has just walked off the set of “The Bachelor”). Apparently following the formula of the “makeover” programs, Building Green offers the story of a house under construction in hopes of drawing in the curious home improver or builder. The premise of the program is that everyone with a little cash and an adventurous spirit can build an energy efficient home.

Contreras is a building contractor and the son of a contractor. He knows his way around a hammer and is enthusiastic about every new thing he sees. He lives in beautiful Santa Barbara, California. His new house has a little bit of a Spanish feel and sits on a spectacular mountain site. Central casting could not have chosen a better star or location.

Contreras follows the proven formula of “learning” about green building from experts who offer their views and products on the show, much as Bob and Norm did on This Old House. Viewers can take some of the advice with a grain of salt, as the self interest of the “green” merchants is pretty transparent at times. Like many PBS programs, the producers make an attempt to present a counter argument to many views. That being said, there are some problems with the views they do present as far as a “green”  pedigree is concerned.

Contreras and the producers of the program have chosen to construct their dream house out of a range of materials that offer savings in initial cost, embodied energy, and “life cycle” costs. However, not all the materials offer the same degree of “green” benefit. The shades of green are not the same when one considers, for instance, that the straw bales that are used for the walls cannot support the structure of the roof or floors of the building. Straw bales are alternative materials with wonderful insulating characteristics, and they can be used in applications where low tech construction reduces the energy consumed in framing the building. Unfortunately, the producers of Building Green elected to build the frame of their rather gigantic, luxury home out of steel. As the host admits, steel is not a particularly green material, as its production uses massive amounts of energy. So there is immediate paradox in the premises of the show–if only half your house uses alternative energy sources and materials, how “green” is it?

Other issues present similar dilemmas. The labor consumed in covering the straw bale walls with lime stucco was astoundingly costly, consuming “several months” according to Contreras. Thus any savings in material would be eclipsed by the cost of installation. The windows were fabricated out of reclaimed wood, but the cost of custom fabrication was many times that of standard wood windows. The host attempts to locate a manufacturer of low V.O.C. exterior paint and finds that no such product exists at the present time. The list goes on.

The green building industry is struggling with many similar conundrums as it attempts to become part of the mainstream in the construction marketplace. It may be unfair to quibble about a few overly optimistic claims made in the interest of generating enthusiasm for a new approach to home construction that will have clear benefits in the future. However, it seems entirely fair to ask that the first television show to present these new options do so with scrupulous honesty and integrity. What shade of green should a prospective home builder expect in the current marketplace? Light green? Perhaps. Olive green? More likely? Bright, shiny, emerald green? Not a chance.

How Big is Too Big?

Dubai, United Arab Emirates, 2008: the world is watching as a building rises to surpass the height of all previous human-made objects. Its architects and builder will not reveal the final altitude of their creation. Size matters. They won’t accept second place in the tall building Olympics. How big will it be?

Most of us know the end of that story–the Burj Dubai became the world’s tallest building at 818 meters (2684 feet). We live in a society obsessed with growth, wealth, obsessive eating, size, mass, volume, area. It’s all about big. Huge even. Everything has to be bigger, better, faster, louder, more powerful, more luxurious. The Biggest Loser vies with Survivor for ratings on television. It’s ironic that the biggest losers will be humans when the global energy crisis leaves little to sustain life. The Survivors will be the cockroaches.

A profound new book by Quaker economists has posed the question of why seven billion people continue to behave as if the earth’s resources were infinite. Each month economists publish figures for GDP percentage increases, stock index gains, inflation, national wealth. The message is that growth in economic activity, increases in monetary wealth, and expansion of all kinds of technology will outpace the degradation of the earth’s systems and save the planet from ruin before 2100. Most ecologists are not sanguine about these prospects.

Instead, Peter G. Brown and Geoffrey Garver argue that humankind should seek a “right relationship” between sustainable economic activity and the earth’s delicate biosphere. All current evidence from climatologists, biologists, ecologists and other earth scientists is that the current pace of economic growth is not only too great, but that significant retrenchment will be required if humans are to save themselves and their environment from catastrophic ruin in the next century. What does this mean for a society that wants to build “bigger and better” with every new technological leap?

Among the prescient messages in this book is that one of our society’s most destructive obsessions is the quest for bigger economies and more stuff. While many of us profess a desire to live with less, we fail to understand that less does not mean a small step backward in personal wealth and consumption. Less means a complete transformation of our expectations for personal fulfillment, affluence, material wealth and physical well-being.

When it comes to how we live, and the spaces we inhabit, our vocabulary and standards for adequate accommodation are about to change in ways we never thought possible. Americans in particular will be forced to live with less. Our houses will be subdivided, our rooms diminished in size, our possessions curtailed. And we will become wealthier as members of the commonwealth of life on our planet, if not at the bank or stock brokerage.

Work 2.0–smell the sawdust

“Knowledge workers,” according to the conventional wisdom, are America’s ticket to prosperity and happiness in the 21st century. Armed with graduate degrees in obscure scientific, technological and financial subjects, these new workers will sit at computers endlessly reinventing the world as we know it, adding “value” to products and services, and generating billions in new wealth.

Why then, are so many younger people jumping off the bandwagon and starting small handicraft businesses? Why has “homemade” music entered the lexicon of popular culture? Why do many sustainability gurus advocate low tech, handmade solutions?

To those of us who deal with craftsmanship and handwork as a matter of course, the answer is simple–people need to feel connected to the things they produce. This principle guided the leaders of the Arts & Crafts movement over a century ago. It has come to mean more to today’s disaffected workers as the bubble economy fades each week amidst concerns about job security. This week’s New York Times Magazine legitimized this trend with an article by Matthew B. Crawford, a young man with a Ph.D. who works as a motorcycle mechanic and loves his job.

“The trades suffer from low prestige,” he writes, “and I believe this is based on a simple mistake. Because the work is dirty, many people assume it is also stupid. This is not my experience.” Crawford’s positive experience is a revelation only because our society has so skewed the relationship between work and what John Dewey called “the materials of life.” As children proceed in school, their learning takes them further and further from the hands-on joys of things like gardening, woodworking, household arts, and mechanical repairs. By the time our children reach college, they have been brainwashed into believing that working with their hands is a low class option. Even when they see plumbers, stone carvers and woodworkers earning higher wages than they do, they persist in reaching for “knowledge work.”

This situation contributes to a sickness in our society. People in all walks of life are suffering from anxiety, low self esteem, despair over their future, and a general malaise in the workplace. Especially among the so-called working class and recent immigrants, the misplaced desire for betterment through “higher” education robs children of their natural intelligence when they are discouraged from working with their hands.

There is only one college in the United States devoted solely to the building trades–The American College of Building Arts in Charleston, S.C. Europe has myriad schools of this kind, and children there find alternative courses that lead to jobs in the culinary arts, handicrafts and other endeavors that do not require advanced degrees. It is time that American educators recognized the need for such avenues to self-fulfillment. Perhaps with the demise of Wall Street, we will wake up and smell the sawdust.

Mortars, pestles and limes

Since readers seem to have liked my last post on preservation issues, here is another pet peeve of mine. I have worked for years with historic masonry and, like many architects who appreciate the best craftsmanship, have been consistently frustrated by the poor quality of re-pointing in many restorations. Even when the mortar used is a so-called “soft” or “historic” mix of Portland Cement, sand, and lime, the resulting mortar never looks as beautiful as the historic example that is being “replicated.” My colleagues in the field explained years ago that it was impossible to duplicate these natural lime and sand recipes because they were weak and would never stand up to modern codes. Besides, where was one going to get old fashioned slaked lime?

Well, after years of wandering in the wilderness, preservationists have a saviour. Virginia Limeworks is a company that believes in old fashioned construction techniques and has backed up their preference with products that perform beautifully and have been tested to modern standards. I have used their products and swear by them. Mix’n'Go is a premixed mortar containing only sand and natural lime. It is a mason’s dream, according to tradespeople I’ve talked to. The advantage to lime mortar is twofold: 1) the resulting mortar is completely breathable, just like the stone and brick it complements; and 2) the natural color of the sand stands out as in no other mortar mix. One never has to use a colorant or admixture. Simply get the local sand that the original masons used and combine it with lime for a beautiful wall.

Check out Virginia Limeworks when you do your next repointing project, or insist that your mason call them up. And if you are a purist, simply buy their natural lime and mix everything yourself. No need to slake the lime or grind the mortar with a pestle. Unless of course you want to risk burning your eyeballs out.

Preservationists Don’t Do Windows

As one who has spent his career trying to convince others of the value of historic buildings, I am amused by the new alliance between the green energy folks and the National Trust for Historic Preservation. The Trust has its purpose in this democracy–mainly to remind civic minded people that “heritage” matters–but it often sounds as if it is preaching to the choir rather than leading a new movement. The Trust is always behind the curve, proclaiming yesterday’s news to people who love the past enough to tolerate a little deja vu.

The most recent issue of Historic Preservation magazine, the Trust’s main mouthpiece, featured another “green” issue, close on the heals of the first one issued last year. Not much has changed in a year as far as preservation technology is concerned, but one or two things emerged that caught my attention.  Articles on the adaptive re-use of historic buildings started to make sense as models of energy efficiency, not because the buildings were better insulated or more advanced than new structures, but because they maintained their “old” materials and technologies. It turns out that when considered holistically, older structures often make sense as examples of environmental conservation even if they haven’t been modernized.

To an architect who lived through the first energy crisis in the 1970s, and saw the preservation movement through its highs and lows, this revelation was not news. Many traditional buildings use passive heating and cooling, clever means of ventilation, and inherently sustainable materials. One bugaboo, however, has existed since I began restoring houses 30 years ago–the question of what to do about “leaky” single glazed windows. Conventional wisdom was to throw them away in favor of double glazed sashes that would seal the house and keep heat and cold inside in hostile climates.

Finally the tide has changed and preservationists have started to look at windows as pieces of the treasured fabric of older buildings that don’t need to be sacrificed to the altar of sustainability. It turns out, according to recent research, that a well-made wooden double-hung or casement, equipped with tight-fitting wood storm sash, can perform almost as well as a double-glazed unit in terms of thermal resistance and infiltration. Moreover, the cost of replacing beautifully-crafted wooden sash continues to rise, increasing their potential “embodied energy.” There is really no compelling reason to remove character-defining wood windows from any historic structure, if storm/screen units can be installed outside.

Though this may not sound revolutionary, it frees preservationists from one of the most vexing problems in building conservation. If one wants to be green, don’t install windows made of green wood. Why? The seasoned, old-growth wood in most historic windows will continue to perform better than either new wood units or comparable synthetic or metal sashes (metal conducts heat faster than wood). It turns out that when it comes to windows, they really don’t and can’t make ‘em like the used to.

From now on my answer to clients who tell me their energy bills will be intolerable if they don’t replace their “leaky” windows will be: it’s not easy being green; add some foam to the roof deck.

CNU gets Green

For those looking for a website that explains green design evolution rather than a techno-revolution, check out Steve Mouzon’s excellent Original Green initiative. He is looking for support so that the ideas presented to the Congress for the New Urbanism (a wonderful organization that promotes true urban principles) may be considered by the Obama transition team. The ideas are simple and persuasive. Traditional buildings were green by necessity.

CNU has been talking about sustainability since its beginnings in the early 1990s, but has not gotten traction with many official organizations such as LEED until recently. Mouzon’s nascent organization is trying to make sure that the new administration, and the design community as a whole, take traditional buildings seriously when looking for “new” ways to build the infrastructure for America’s energy efficient economy.

The Green Machine–an oxymoron?

On the promise of “green technology” I am clearly a skeptic. Sustainable building is another matter altogether. Traditional architecture is by definition sustainable, for pre-industrial builders had only the earth’s longstanding resources to draw upon. Trees, clay, earth pigments, stone, bamboo, and various metal ores were in abundance. They are still relatively abundant and take little energy to harvest and process in comparison to “high tech” materials.

The LEED system that is all the rage in the United States is a wonderful thing, as far as it goes. Developed by engineers, it is linear and process driven. It encourages “innovation” over proven solutions, and rewards “design creativity” over common sense, pragmatic thinking. In its early stages it did not provide credits for historic preservation and had too little to say about adaptive reuse.

That is changing, thank goodness. The concept of “embodied energy” is just beginning to influence environmentalists. Certain materials and technologies consume more energy in production than others. The University of Bath has a calculator for embodied energy, and publishes charts that will help anyone assess the amount of energy that went into building any structure. You can get the information online by demonstrating your seriousness about fighting climate change.

One of the things that distinguishes the “crunchy granola” environmentalists from architects is their serious investment in earth-friendly materials, systems and techniques for everything from blowing your nose to constructing a windmill. The Whole Earth Catalogue crowd are still very much alive, and there are still many communal experiments in sustainable living that do not involve architects. One of these, in Canaan, New York, is run by my bretheren, the Quakers of New York Yearly Meeting. It is exciting and innovative, but there is no LEED architecture on the site.

The folks at the QIVP are serious about earth care. They construct their own houses using things like timbers, wattle and daub, SIP panels, rammed earth and straw. Everything looks like it belongs in the rolling hills of this part of the Hudson Valley. The families raise their children to speak truth to power, and to think independently of what most of society gives them. They grow a lot of their own food. There are university professors, economists, former Wall streeters, and a few ex-Hippies in the group. Its one of the most radically sustainable places I know about.

These are the kinds of endeavors that come to mind when I look at a typical piece of award-winning, LEED certified architecture. Most of what I see in that category leaves me nonplussed and disappointed. I’m particularly bothered about the praise given to Thom Mayne (Pritzger Laureate) and Morphosis’s CALTRANS District 7 building in Los Angeles. Like most of this architect’s work the building is an overblown, agressive monster that resembles a giant air-conditioning plant with overtones of Russian Constructivism. The architect is at war with the California sun. The south wall has a complicated, mechanized system of sunscreens and ventilators that are computer controlled and that will most likely break down irreparably within a year or two. It’s a machine made to control the environment by brute force of technology. There is nothing passive about it.

The American Institute of Architects and the Environmental Protection Agency are doling out awards for these mechanized muscle buildings right and left. As they do so, they send messages to the public and the design professions that our environmental crisis will be erased soon by the scientific and technological know-how that created the A-bomb, the Polaris submarine, and the Beijing airport. The folks a QIVP are not betting on the U.S. government or the Defense Department. They’re going it alone, and doing a lot better than CALTRANS on their energy bills.