RE: [GBlist] re: Monster Buildings

["Ralph Bicknese" <ralph.bicknese@christnerinc.com>]

Chris made excellent points.

There has been too much focus on building size on this topic, as if it is
THE overriding concern, and not enough about what we want to accomplish with
our buildings.

I am an architect working to convince clients to go green.  Some clients are
surprisingly receptive. Others are surprisingly unreceptive.  If I try to
force my client to do something (green or not) that they really do not want
to do, they will tell me "no" politely or otherwise.  If I try to convince
them over and over again to try to do something they do not want to do they
are likely to tell me to "go jump in a lake".  After a few rounds using that
approach I will soon have a hungry family (and a maybe a smaller and cheaper
house, or no house at all).

I spend a great deal of effort to educate and encourage clients based on my
professional and personal opinions and ethics about what I consider right
for their needs based on they tell me their needs are. Often I can direct
their responses based on questions I ask and get them to agree they want a
greener building.  My professional and personal ethics include a strong
preference and urge to encourage clients to go green.  There are valid
business reasons to go green as documented in so many readily available
publications.  But, if I spend the time and resources of the company I work
for to do this and am not able to make a reasonable profit I will soon have
a hungry family (and a maybe a smaller and cheaper house, or no house at
all).

Sometimes a greener building means a smaller building.  Based on typical
assumptions, a smaller building usually means less initial cost and less
operational cost (and sometimes it does not). That being said, when I run
into budget problems in design, usually the first thing I focus on is size.
That means square footage and volume.  All other things being equal, if I
can cut either, the cost will usually come down. So in many cases both the
client and the designer has the incentive to keep the building as small as
they can and still serve the necessary and DESIRED functions.

My point is that the decisions of the size of a building are virtually
always made based on program (what one needs to accomplish in and with a
building), and budget.  The goal is to accomplish the program within the
budget.  When there is a conflict either the program needs to be cut, the
budget needs to grow, the project team needs to be craftier about how they
accomplish the goal, or a combination of the above needs to happen.  That
cost control strategy may include a look how one packs more into a building.
Sometimes that means multiple uses for some spaces and sometimes it does
not.  Sometimes accomplishing that means paying a higher cost per square
foot.  Quality over quantity is often the best approach.  Sometimes
short-term and long-term flexibility is a program requirement and sometimes
it is not.  Susan Susanka's books are pretty clear about the process.

There are consequences of whatever the priorities are.  Custom design gives
us the opportunity to explore these as needed for specific clients.  But how
can custom design work for successive generations of inhabitants.  Some of
our success with sustainable design will be how we get buildings that (in
many cases) we should design to last for over 100 years, to serve the next
user successfully.  After all the typical homeowner moves something like
every 5 years.  Tenants in apartments, retail centers, office buildings,
laboratories, and many other user groups are often equally transient.
Perhaps flexibility is a big part of the answer to that. But there are many,
many unanswered questions and considerable market transformation that must
take place. What is the green answer to billions of square feet of walls
that are torn down every year?

Our success will not be in trying to force consumers to do what they do not
want to do.  Success will be in educating and encouraging them to do what
needs to be done to serve their purposes in a way to serve all of our
purposes for a green world (whether they realize we are doing it or not).
Success will also remain in meeting the basics of program goals and budgets.

I will have to add further discussion about what we want to accomplish with
our buildings later.

Cheers,
Ralph Bicknese

-----Original Message-----
From: Chris Koehn [mailto:chris@koehn.com]
Sent: Tuesday, January 08, 2002 3:41 PM
To: GB List
Subject: [GBlist] re: Monster Buildings

As I recall this discussion was started in reference to  the 14,700 sq ft
home in Glen Ellyn IL and how it could purport to be green. A few thoughts:
€I just read the "mission statement" of the builder (in "Luxury Home
Builder"...) . He in no way purports the house to be green by any
conventional use of the term. The goal was to build a healthy house. It is
the first certified in IL by the lung assoc. Any "green-ness" seemed to be
incidental to using materials efficiently and wisely.
€The builder states- and I somewhat agree- that as long as there is wealth
there will be a desire to build luxury homes. We can either choose to build
them efficiently or not. If we, as a society, want to reject the values
expressed in the practice of building big, we should tax the heck out of big
houses. We have gas guzzler taxes for cars, right?
€What's wrong with homes costing a lot of money per square foot? There's
usually a correlation between how much it costs, and how well it's built-
and therefore how long it will last. One of the best ways to build green (I
would submit) is to build durable- and for flexibility over time. When I
worked for a builder in Germany in the '80's, the average sq ft cost for new
homes was over $200. And the average mortgage was 100 years. I see little
wrong with this equation. Which is certainly NOT an argument against
affordable housing.
€Do we really think most of the people of the World reject bigger, more
comfortable homes for moral or ethical reasons?
€When arguing for smaller homes, we need to keep in mind that how people use
their homes continues to evolve. 50 years ago the "home office" was
virtually unheard of, and telecommuting was nonexistent. 50 years ago the
average farm family where I come from had 4 kids and their house was
2-3,000 sq ft. 50 years ago our population was slightly more than half of
what it is today, and was more than 50% agrarian. THAT SAID I am currently
living in 950 sq ft, with a wife and two kids, and 1/3 of that space is
office..


______________________________________________________________________
This greenbuilding dialogue is sponsored by REPP/CREST, creator of
Solstice http://www.crest.org, and BuildingGreen, Inc., publisher of
Environmental Building News and GreenSpec http://www.BuildingGreen.com
______________________________________________________________________


______________________________________________________________________
This greenbuilding dialogue is sponsored by REPP/CREST, creator of
Solstice http://www.crest.org, and BuildingGreen, Inc., publisher of
Environmental Building News and GreenSpec http://www.BuildingGreen.com
______________________________________________________________________