Kyriakos Pontikis - Using Generative and Sustainable Design Processes to Create Living Urban Form - CNU 17

Using Generative and Sustainable Design Processes to Create Living Urban Form: Case Study of a Courtyard Housing Design Competition Kyriakos Pontikis, Ph.D. Associate Professor California State University, Northridge

The Competition Brief In 2007 the City of Portland sponsored a competition to revive courtyard housing in the city Ideas for infill housing to provide a quality living environment at densities higher than conventional detached housing The focus of the competition was to use courtyards in providing: a. Attractive housing options for families with children b. Usable outdoor space while providing environmental sustainable benefits c. A livable setting for community interaction while also respecting privacy needs d. A pedestrian-oriented space while also accommodating cars pedestrian- e. Continuation to Portland's tradition of street-oriented urbanism street-

Considerations of Child-Friendly Design Child- Children need safe, outdoor play area close to their homes that can be easily supervised by parents. Outdoor spaces should be designed to accommodate a variety of play activities in both green and hard paved surfaces. Settings that provide for casual interaction between children and adults. Need for dwellings that have the right degree of privacy and community interaction. Need for indoor children play spaces and sufficient numbers of bedrooms. Accessible storage for strollers and bicycles.

Housing Affordability Need in Portland for housing ownership - housing that is affordable to low to moderate income households. The median sales price of a home in the Portland area was $282,500 (April 2007) $247,000 is the maximum amount considered to be affordable to a family of four earning the median family income of $66,900.

Two Infill Sites 1. 100’ wide by 100’ deep Housing program: 4-10 units oriented to a shared courtyard 4- One parking space per unit 2. 95’ wide by 180’ deep Housing program: 7-17 units oriented to a shared courtyard 7- One parking space per unit

Portland Courtyard Housing Precedents

Design Proposal by Building Process Alliance Members: Kyriakos Pontikis, Michael Mehaffy, Susan Ingham, Eileen Tumlin, Kathryn Langstaff, Stuart Cowan Design Principles 1. Pattern Language, 2. Generative Processes, 3. Form Language, 4. Ecological Design, 5. Carbon Neutral Building, 6. Ownership and Perpetual Affordability, 7. Urban Growth

1. Pattern Language The project brief has been translated into a project pattern language. Example of a pattern: Front Yard Play Area - Parents need to be able to see children while they play. But children need to be able to play outdoors, in an area that is not isolated. Therefore, create a small front yard area off the courtyard. Place the kitchen window nearby, so adults can monitor children [Kitchen Looking Onto Yard]

Other patterns: ♦ Porch Transition ♦ Private Outdoor Space ♦ Kitchen or Living Room Looking Onto Yard ♦ Farmhouse Kitchen ♦ Bed Alcoves ♦ Quiet Back Area ♦ Private Outdoor Space ♦ Balconies ♦ Private Backspace ♦ South Roof Garden ♦ Community Bike Storage ♦ Shared Stairwells ♦ Community Storage and Workshop ♦ Pervious Parking Gross Motor Play Area ♦ Flex Car Stations ♦ Shared Electric Vehicles ♦ South Facing Courtyard ♦ Main Entrance ♦ Gradients of Outdoor Spaces ♦ Outdoor Seating ♦ Water Fountain ♦ Terrace Vegetable Garden ♦ Children’s Puppet Theater ♦ Sandbox Play Area, et al.

2. Generative Design Processes The Courtyard Project is created through a series of generative design processes creating life and wholeness at various scales. Generative Architectural Design Process: This process starts by first delineating the courtyard and is successively refined through creating building volume, entrances, dwelling units, terraces, and fine details. Generative Interior Design Process: This process starts by generating public and private zones within the dwelling and then it further delineates living room, kitchen, dining room, bedrooms, bathrooms, etc. Landscaping Design Process: This process deals with the generation and refinement of the central courtyard and its entities along with the further delineation and detailing of dwelling terraces. Urban Design Process: A generative process is also taking place at the neighborhood scale by creating shared parking driveways and bigger shared open spaces

Generative Design Process STEP 1: COURTYARD STEP 2: BUILDING VOLUME Place the courtyard Locate the volume of the building around courtyard STEP 3: ENTRANCES STEP 4: UNIT AREAS Place the entrances to create life in Place the individual units relative to the courtyard the entrances

STEP 5: UNIT LAYOUT STEP 6: COURTYARD AND TERRACES Layout the individual spaces in each Articulate and intensify the courtyards and terraces unit, placing the living room and kitchen first with similar elements such as planters, trees, and benches STEP 7: ADJACENT GROWTH STEP 8: URBAN TRANSFORMATIONS OVER TIME Create opportunities to share resources Step-by- Step-by-step evolution and growth of neighborhoods to such as driveways, and connect open create harmonious and sustainable cities spaces to form larger whole

Square Footage of Units: Ground Floor (no balconies or terraces included) Three bedroom - 930 Three bedroom - 910 Three bedroom - 900 One bedroom - 548 One bedroom – 488 Second Floor Three Bedroom - 1216 (+Terrace) Two Bedroom - 1100 (+ Terrace) One bedroom - 817 (+Tower) Total Square Footage 6909 Ground 3776 Second 3133

Apartment Layout Process Step 1. Determine apartment social zone Step 2 Determine apartment private zone Step 3. Define verandah next to social zone Step 4. Create apartment room layout Step 5. Provide small balconies next to rooms Room Layout Step 1. Position of room Step 2. Spatial volume Step 3. Main center in the room Step 4. Windows and light Step 5. Secondary centers Step 6. Design and embellishment of surfaces and structure Step 7. Tranquillity

3. Form Language The geometrical elements and characteristics of buildings that have arisen from a particular building culture, historical styles, or personal styles of architects and designers. Form language inspires us to continue local building traditions and create structures of enduring comfort and beauty.

Portland Courtyard Housing Form Language Shape of building: U-shape building form U- Shape of open space: Rectangular or square courtyard

Local construction system: timber frame Local materials used in the area: stucco finish or horizontal wood board siding for exterior walls

Doors: wooden doors Windows: grouping of wooden windows, bay windows

Roof: sloped roofscape Roof details: wide eaves and knee braces

4. Ecological Design Energy use is 60% less than a conventional building and renewable generation reduces carbon footprint by 80%. Rainwater will be collected in a cistern and reused for toilet flushing and landscaping. All storm water will be filtered and infiltrated on-site. Potable water on- and wastewater will be reduced by 50%. Materials will be non-toxic and high recycled content with an emphasis on local non- production. Landscaping will include a combination of low-irrigation natives and edible low- landscaping. On-site food production includes fruit and nut trees and terrace herb and On- vegetable gardens. There will be low-irrigation native landscaping. low-

5. Carbon Neutral Building Courtyards Which Live will have a carbon footprint that is 30% that of a conventional building. It will use 60% less energy use than Oregon energy code requires through: - a community ground source heat pump - advanced window glazings - insulated concrete forms - structural insulated panels - heat recovery ventilation - passive solar design, and other strategies. The project will generate almost 30% to 50% of its total energy needs from a combined solar photovoltaic – solar thermal system. The remaining carbon footprint will be offset with carbon credits, creating a Carbon Neutral Building.

Ecological Design Patterns ♦ Small Footprint ♦ High Density ♦ Open Space♦ Woonerf ♦ Walkable Neighborhood Space♦ ♦ Alternative Transportation ♦ Pedestrian Access ♦ Courtyard Community ♦ Healthy Restorative Environment ♦ Lower Energy Costs ♦ Heat Exchange♦ Radiant Floors ♦ Exchange♦ Energy Recovery Ventilators ♦ On Demand Hot Water Heaters ♦ Energy Star Appliances ♦ Compact Flourescent Bulbs ♦ Courtyard Evaporative Cooling ♦ Deciduous Trees ♦ Edible Landscape ♦ Native Landscape ♦ Vegetative Infiltration Basins ♦ Community Recycling ♦ Compost ♦ Flexcar ♦ Shared NEV’s ♦ Durability of Materials and Systems ♦ Fly-ash concrete ♦ low-embodied energy ♦ FSC lumber ♦ 85% Fly- low- Recycled Content ICF ♦ Natural Ventilation ♦ Flexible Floor Plans ♦ Rainwater Catchments and Storage ♦ Bio-swale ♦ Dual Flush Toilets ♦ Low-flow water heads Bio- Low-

6. Ownership and Perpetual Affordability A Sustainable Land Trust operating as a non-profit developer, will own the non- land. Homes and improvements will be owned by residents. An initial land subsidy is provided in exchange for 75% of property appreciation reverting to Sustainable Land Trust on sale and 25% remaining with owner. Owners will qualify for location efficient mortgages (LEMs) and energy efficient mortgages (EEMs), allowing quality materials and green technologies to be employed. A turnkey third-party provider will own the project’s solar array of 7kW third- allowing residents to buy energy at below-market rates. below- Oregon Department of Energy and Energy Trust incentives will aid project financing.

7. Urban Growth Adjacent Growth: Create opportunities to share resources such as driveways, and connect open spaces such as courtyards to form a larger whole Urban Transformations Over Time: Step-by- Step-by-step evolution and growth of neighborhoods to create harmonious and sustainable cities

Teamwork/ Google sketchup/ model making/ sketches sketchup/

Competition Entry

Winning Entries Shortcomings of the winning entries: 1. Courtyards: a. Cars penetrate the site and interfered with the courtyard, contrary to brief ’s requirements. b. Building massing and orientation prevents sun reaching the courtyard. c. The courtyard does not have a meaningful shape; it is a “left over space”. d. Courtyard lacks at times the right degree of community and privacy. 2. Units: a. Units do not have variety of size thus lucking affordability to families of various incomes. b. Most proposals have identical floor plans so they lack variety and individuality. c. Some units are too exposed to the public realm and therefore lacking needed privacy.

Shortcomings of the winning entries (continued): 3. Building: a. Most buildings have monolithic volumes and their forms do not respect the local ones. b. Material use and building detailing have nothing to do with the local building culture, thus lacking continuity and integration. For example, building fenestrations with too much glass surface ignore Portland’s climatic conditions. 4. Neighborhood: a. Most proposals do not deal with the urban scale structure. b. Most proposals are connected to their neighboring buildings and open spaces in a meaningful way. c. Some proposals ignore the street as a shared public realm. d. The buildings do not add to the sense of community and belonging as they have an aversion to precedents and have a universal character.

Conclusion • Focus of such competitions, like the profession as a whole, is on novel proposals rather than demonstrating humane re-generation and re-adaptation of housing typologies. • Contemporary methodology disregards user needs, context, and local building culture. • It has an aversion to precedents and relies on image-based proposals that are rooted in novelty and experimentation with unproven approaches. • Focuses on ecological and economical building sustainability while ignoring for the most part social and humane building sustainability. • Green building fails in creating living and socially equitable communities as a foundation for true sustainability. • There is a need to integrate green building with humane building, where architects give more control to users in forming their own environments. • Architects should not focus upon pre-planned or standardized formal designs but deal with processes which can bring upon “wholeness” in the urban housing form. • There is a need to focus on local and unique designing and making processes where the urban forms emerge through gradual, step-wise, unfolding processes similar to the organic processes employed in traditional city-building. • Architects should focus on city-making processes such as social interaction, site diagnosis, building densities, geometric unfolding of buildings and public open spaces, financial arrangements, cash flow, craft and construction, and construction management.

Kyriakos Pontikis - Using Generative and Sustainable Design Processes to Create Living Urban Form - CNU 17

by Congress for the New Urbanism on Jul 02, 2009

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