Green building can be called one of the feel-good movements in residential real estate development of the last decade.
The concept is to build homes and communities that conserve resources, limit construction waste going into landfills, are in harmony with nature and promote healthy lifestyles.
Some developers are committed to it, environmentally conscious customers support it, and big-city mayors such as Chicago’s Richard M. Daley are actively promoting the practice.
But it still represents a new way of thinking about development, and sometimes runs up against rules, regulations, conventions and assumptions that are in conflict with what is being attempted.
“Sometimes city ordinances can be your worst enemies,” said Bill Wiet, community development director for Aurora, which is launching a major green development on its west side called the Countryside Vision Plan. About 1,000 homes will be built on 4,000 acres, much of it owned by the Kane County Forest Preserve District and will remain open and wild.
To do this, Wiet said Aurora “literally had to rethink” its storm water management codes because the development calls for narrower streets with no gutters, and the use of natural vegetative swales instead of storm sewers to deal with rain water.
There are advantages to using a natural drainage system of open land with deep-rooted native plants, according to proponents of green building. This practice not only helps maintain habitats for a variety of plant and animal species, it provides a natural filtration system to remove pollutants from storm water, and gives the ground and plant life more time to absorb rainwater that might otherwise cause flooding and erosion.
The same thing was done at Prairie Crossing in Grayslake, one of the Chicago area’s first “green” developments, and was proposed in Aurora’s HomeTown development more than 10 years ago. It did not get approved there because at the time it was still a tough sell, a reflection of how attitudes have evolved as some of the faces have changed, said Perry Bigelow, president of Bigelow Homes, which built HomeTown.
Back then, Bigelow said, storm water management was more concerned with getting water off of the homeowner’s property.
“It’s very poor environmental practice, but it keeps them from getting calls from citizens complaining about water sitting around,” Bigelow said. “Younger engineers coming up through the ranks now are much more prone to environmental considerations.”
While Bigelow did not get approval of the storm water drainage system he wanted, he was able to achieve many of his environmental goals because the 177-acre site he developed was designated a planned urban development, or PUD.
Bigelow said this allowed him “to use superior planning methods to create better living environments” that might not have been possible under the conventional zoning code. He was able to build what he calls a compact and neighborly community of 1,288 energy-efficient, single-family homes with areas of restored native vegetation that is pedestrian friendly, so that residents can leave their cars at home.
PUDs allow the municipalities to work outside the constraints of their zoning codes on large projects when those codes stand in the way of desired results. They were used in Prairie Crossing and Countryside to get around the more conventional models for subdividing sites into large, evenly spaced lots in favor of preserving large sections of open land, a practice that proponents of green building say is better for the environment.
“When you’re doing a house on 1 acre, 2 acres or 5 acres, you come out like a checkerboard with one house in the middle of each square,” said Victoria Ranney president of Prairie Holdings Co. “That’s what causes sprawl.”
Prairie Crossing’s 360-plus homes are clustered together into neighborhoods separated by large tracts of public open space, with foot paths, that supports native plants and wildlife.
Aurora’s Countryside was designated for 1-acre lots under the city’s comprehensive plan. Instead they are creating lots of 13,000 to 30,000 square feet with some sideyard setback adjustment to allow a limited amount of clustering. But each home will back onto large tracts of open public space with a network of walking trails, creating the perception and the lifestyle of living on a larger lot, Wiet said.
Other variations from standard engineering and zoning codes in these developments include narrower streets, requiring sidewalks on only one side of the road and eliminating curbs and gutters. Some of these fly into the face of standards that engineers are accustomed to, and what public works and emergency services departments typically require, but they also mean less asphalt and concrete is poured, and less ground disturbed.
Green ideas like recycling rain water for flushing toilets, installing waterless urinals and dual-flush toilets, and eliminating or limiting parking space requirements on residential properties in densely populated areas near public transportation come into conflict with rules and past practices.
The obstacles can occur because the idea is prohibited outright, represents a gray area that is not expressly addressed in local codes, or just doesn’t conform to the norm. But it’s not a deliberate attempt to prevent green building, proponents of green building say.
“It’s not as though these barriers are intentionally in the code, it’s just that green building is new,” said Sadhu Johnston, assistant to the mayor for green initiatives in Chicago, which has been promoting green building in public projects, and has launched two residential initiatives — the Green Bungalows and Green Homes for Chicago programs.
Johnston said the city has met with builders, recognizes the problem and is conducting a review of its codes to see what changes can be made to encourage green building.
For example, local ordinances requiring lawns be kept short or prohibiting standing water are under review because they run contrary to the message Chicago is sending to plant more prairie wildflowers and create rain gardens to contain storm water, Johnston said.
Health and safety concerns often come into play.
When Geroge D. Sullivan, president of Eco Smart Building, was rehabbing a building in Rogers Park, plans included a passive solar energy system on the roof — essentially a greenhouse that captures the warmth of the sun’s rays and radiates it back — and a cistern to collect rain water and reuse it for watering his rooftop garden. Because of concerns by the city’s building department that residents might access the non-potable water in the cistern, and over the structural soundness of the greenhouse, Sullivan said he had to take extra precautions to put them at ease.
“They were not happy with the way we were doing the build-out,” Sullivan said. He modified his designs to address those concerns, like building a greenhouse he insists could withstand hurricane-force winds, but causing additional expense and delay.
He believes the inspectors were uneasy about his passive solar energy system, because they had not seen anything like it before and so wanted it “over-built” to guard against future issues. To put the system in, he said he had to cut into and raise a portion of the roof at a 45-degree angle and install south-facing windows on the raised side to catch the sun.
Lois Vitt Sale said she encountered a problem with what she believes is an outdated ordinance while putting a second-floor addition onto her Downers Grove home. She wanted to use factory-made polyurethane and wood panels that were more energy-efficient and would have created less landfill waste than stick-built panels. Vitt Sale, an architect with Wight & Co. in Chicago, is also vice chairman of the Chicago chapter of the U.S. Green Building Council, which developed the “Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design” certification program for green buildings.
But she was denied because under the Downers Grove building code, those panels were defined as manufactured housing and prohibited. That law is intended to protect against the use of substandard materials historically associated with manufactured housing, Vitt Sale said.
“It’s not that the building codes don’t want to entertain green building technologies, it’s that they haven’t seen them,” Vitt Sale said, adding that the inspector’s hands were tied and the village did help her find an environmentally friendly alternative.
Designers and developers committed to the green movement understand the reluctance to adopt new approaches.
“Liability is the issue,” said architect Bill Sturm, whose firm, Serena and Sturm in Northbrook, has been engaged in green building for 20 years.
He recently encountered a regulatory hurdle when state officials denied a permit to install a system that collected storm water for use in flushing toilets in the new Ryerson Woods Visitors Center in Lake County because of concerns the piping might get confused with the drinking water supply, even though he insists the design of the system precludes such a mix-up.
Bob Speckmann, facilities development manager for the Lake County Forest Preserve District, said the permit was denied because the State Health Department’s plumbing code does not specifically identify the use of that kind of water for that purpose.
“We were denied it because the code is silent on the issues,” Speckmann said. “It doesn’t say we can, it doesn’t say we can’t.”
“Any discussion of anything beyond the norm opens up liability,” Sturm said.
Some say there is even resistance within the building and design professions. Sullivan said he repeatedly ran into situations where tradesmen and designers tried to bring down the costs of his projects by suggesting more conventional techniques.
“The mindset was cheap, cheaper and cheapest,” Sullivan said.
Things are changing. Vitt Sale said there was a time when someone here interested in designing a green building would have “to go to Phoenix” to find an architect. Today, she heads a department in her firm that specializes in sustainable development.
But she also thinks it’s up to professionals in these industries to take a lead in promoting green development
Kevin Pierce, a principal with the architectural firm of Farr Associates in Chicago, which specializes in green development, agrees.
“It does take a different mindset, but it doesn’t have to be seen as an extra constraint on your work,” Pierce said. “It just reminds us that we have the ability to connect with our natural environment and all the resources that nature provides for us. The sun, the wind, all those things are a resources for us.”
