Retrofitting Suburbia. Ellen Dunham Jones

[Metro Jacksonville]

Retrofitting Suburbia.  Ellen Dunham Jones



Visionary Jacksonville Planning Department Director, Bill Killingsworth, recently brought the meteoric Dunham Jones to speak with our planning department.

Ellen Dunham-Jones teaches architecture at the Georgia Institute of Technology, is an award-winning architect and a board member of the Congress for the New Urbanism. She shows how the design of where we live impacts some of the most pressing issues of our times -- reducing our ecological footprint and energy consumption while improving our health and communities and providing living options for all ages.

Full Article
http://www.metrojacksonville.com/article/2010-jul-retrofitting-suburbia-ellen-dunham-jones

[simms3]

She is a professor at my school...I have seen her talk there and at ULI in Atlanta and have read her book and it is revolutionary!    We need to use her ideas everywhere, but her idea to retrofit old dead malls is especially good for Regency I think.  Another good read from faculty at Tech is Megaregions.  It is not as good as Retrofitting Suburbia though and it is another example of how people outside of Jax just don't think of Jax ever because that book talks about every other city in the SE/FL a lot more than Jax.

[Abhishek]

This is a fantastic talk on retrofitting Suburbia. This topic was briefly touched in the movie 'End of Suburbia'.
The mall at the corner of Old Baymeadows and Southside is being used by FSCJ. This goes in line with Ellen Dunham Jones's talk. I would like to see empty parking lots becoming wetlands.

All her examples seemed to talk about the involvement of transit. I wonder why!

[brainstormer]

I would like to see a reaction(talking points, vision) based on this video from mayoral candidates and council leaders.  I believe that public investments will need to be sustainability-minded in the future.  I think the ideas of retrofitting could do wonders for reinvigorating depressed neighborhoods throughout Jacksonville.  We've seen ideas like this for Regency and a few other areas but this concept isn't being driven by city leaders.  All of her examples show how public investment can drive private growth!  Our city has lots of money but is not using it wisely.  Transit and regreening would be a great place to start.

[tufsu1]

Another good read from faculty at Tech is Megaregions.  It is not as good as Retrofitting Suburbia though and it is another example of how people outside of Jax just don't think of Jax ever because that book talks about every other city in the SE/FL a lot more than Jax.

I have noticed that the Tech definition of Megaregions did not include Jax. as part of the Florida megaregion....that's why I lik the America 2050 version better.

btw, as the article noted, she spoke to Planning Department staff....but she was actually brought to town as part of the ULI Reality Check series.

[thelakelander]

To be fair, has the guy even been director a year yet?  It's hard to blame any newcomer for 1950s era sprawl and for the blight that has plagued downtown for decades.

[north miami]

A retrofit Regency Mall would be of little utility or perhaps not even possible as long as the surrounding neighborhood proves dangerous.

There are huge swaths of America in need of retrofit.I bet most of populated Florida is in need.

[thelakelander]

Town & Country Shopping Center - Arlington

A retrofitting of neighborhood shopping centers with high vacancies (like Town & Country) would be more important to communities like Arlington, Cedar Hills and Emerson than anything taking place at Regency Mall.  The redevelopment of these centers have the ability to spread infill and adaptive reuse to adjacent residential communities.  This would be more difficult to achieve with regional mall sites like Regency because our zoning regulations over the years have isolated them from residential areas. 

[kellypope]

Sign me up on asphalt and concrete ripping crew. I love revealing soil to the sky.

[Fallen Buckeye]

I think some of the trends in development are rooted in some of these ideas. You'll notice that the town center concept has overtaken the idea of shopping malls around the country although some of them are done very poorly. The idea of building new developments in walkable street grids is applaudable. The problem in our city and some others is that we're draining swamps and cutting down forests to build these places rather than retrofitting and there's still an abundance of surface parking in a lot of the town centers we're building so they aren't as dense as they could be. So what makes it so easy for developers to continue to sprawl in Jacksonville and what changes can we make to make infill and retrofitting more attractive than building on the fringes?


You can see what I mean looking at SJTC.

[thelakelander]

Easy.  A change in land use and zoning regulations.  There's no reason we must force development to have large front setbacks or a certain minimum number of parking spaces.  On the transportation side of things, there is no reason we can't require sidewalks on both sides of the street, pedestrian and bicycle amenities on all future streets.  While the market can certainly play a role in development style, in most cases our public entities are there worse enemies.

[Fallen Buckeye]

That's along the lines of what I was thinking. So I'm not so familiar with how zoning and land use regs work exactly, but the basic principle is that each parcel is assigned a specific designation telling what type of development is allowed on the property such as office space or residential and it designates guidelines for how buildings should be constructed on the property. Is this how it works? And I'm assuming there's a zoning board or commission for Duval county, so how are these people who make zoning decisions chosen?

[brainstormer]

^^ Both of you make excellent points.  We really should start with land use and zoning.  First of all, require every new development to connect to the surrounding developments with sidewalks, bike paths, etc.  This would then allow office parks to connect to surrounding retail and other offices.  People end up making paths through the bushes anyway!  Sidewalks should not even be negotiable, and both sides of the street should have them.  The city should also continue to incorporate more bike paths into street repaving.  I have liked how both Gate Parkway and now Touchton Road are getting bike paths as part of their upgrading.  Most of Belfort has a designated path as well.  It would also be a good thing to start saving room for bike paths through neighborhoods, but off the street.  Any new housing developments and infill/retrofitting should have these features.  It isn't unreasonable to ask this of developers.

[tufsu1]

And I'm assuming there's a zoning board or commission for Duval county, so how are these people who make zoning decisions chosen?

As is the case throughout Florida, zoning and land use are quasi-judicial issues...as such, they are handled by the elected body....which means City Council.

[Fallen Buckeye]

As is the case throughout Florida, zoning and land use are quasi-judicial issues...as such, they are handled by the elected body....which means City Council.

Duly noted. I will definitely consider this during the next election.