Infrastructure | IDEAS

Since 1978, these 30 years have been an era of rapid change for China as well as its real estate industry which has grown from non-existence to accounting for 11% of GDP and 60% of tax revenues in some municipalities. The speed and scale of change and wealth creation along the way is unprecedented, and… Read more »

I was invited to participate on a panel at the Urban Land Institute 2011 Fall Meeting discussing real estate development in China with K. B. Albert Chan (Director, Shui On Development Limited), Adam Yu Chikeung (Chairman, Beijing Winland Real Estate Co., Ltd), and Ronald A. Altoon (Partner, Altoon & Porter Architects, LLP).

Although my work here at SWA is predominantly in China during last 3 years, as an urban designer and landscape architect, I have been exposed to the development process mainly from the perspective of a designer. How do I structure a meaningful conversation with the audience mostly American developers? So in the final days leading up to the panel discussion, I happened to be traveling through China for work and I set out to expand my understanding of Chinese real estate development.

If SWA’s work history in China is an indication, the pace of development in this nation is increasing rapidly and doesn’t show any sign of slowing down. SWA began working in China in 1994, we’ve worked on 432 projects in more than 100 Chinese cities. More than 30% of this work has been done in 2011 alone, with 189 projects since the year began and 41 just since July.

Not only is there a rapid increase in new projects, but the pace of the project development cycle is also much faster than in the US. In 2007 total 2,040 million m2 gross floor space of buildings were completed in China. Construction usually begins before our design is complete. This is especially evident by the length and intensity of workdays worked in China. In the six days of my last trip to China, I traveled to Beijing, Peony River City, and Nanjing. My days began at 5am and ended at midnight with waking up in a different city every morning.

More than 35% of the 125 cities with more than 1 million residents are in China, according to the book Asia Beyond Growth (ORO editions, 2010). This is a direct result of the country’s drive for modernization around industry, defense, agriculture and science starting with Mao’s successor Deng Xiaoping in 1978. Since then, there has been a steady decrease in rural populations and increase in urban populations to supply the labor force for the nation’s industries. In 1990, less than 20% of the country’s residents, 191 million people, lived in China’s urban areas. This number grew to 502 million, more than 45%, by 2008 and this trend is projected to continue. By 2020, 60% of China’s population will live in cities. The economic spill-over of this growth: every 1% increase in the urban population feeds a 5% increase in consumption of construction and other raw materials.

Accompanying China’s modernization ambitions were a series of land reform decisions that have dramatically transformed how China’s urban landscape is developed – and the wealth of property owners. Beginning in 1982 as a part of Deng Xiaoping’s initiation of the “Socialist Market Economy”, the Fourth Constitution of the People’s Republic of China satisfied the interests of the majority of population (peasants) by giving the agriculture land to the collective ownership of its workers. The State maintained its grip on the urban land and its attached commercial value. That is until 1986, when the “Land Law” introduced the concept of the “right of use” for properties. By the next year, some cities began experimenting with trading these rights-of-use and gave birth to China’s real estate market. These trades were permitted between private citizens and businesses nation-wide in 1990. Within the first year of “rights of use” trading, 3700 authorized developers were in operation.

The market advanced again in 1998 when the government put an end to free social housing and began selling housing at steep discounts to residents. The rate of home ownership took off. By mid 2009 the share of real estate in the scope the total investment was 25% (up from 4% in the early 1990’s).

Today, the Chinese government is trying to balance the conflicting needs – protect agriculture lands needed to nourish the nation and import the necessary labor for continued industrial growth. So, to monitor this growth, developers are required to go through many levels of authorities – and each one has the authority to stop it completely. As a result lobbying at all levels has become essential for developers working in China, which makes it a highly localized industry and very difficult for foreign developers to break into.

Like many others of my generation, growing up in free social housing, we witnessed our parents’ owning their first home with deep discount from the State and many friends’ becoming millionaires through souring real estate investments. Since 1978, these 30 years have been an era of rapid change for China as well as its real estate industry which has grown from non-existence to accounting for 11% of GDP and 60% of tax revenues in some municipalities. The speed and scale of change and wealth creation along the way is unprecedented, and is the result of a strong, deliberate public policy aiming at modernizing China.

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Posted by QiuHongTang
in Urban Ecologies
on 21 January, 2012

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If there is magic on this planet, it is contained in water…. Its substance reaches everywhere; it touches the past and prepares the future; it moves under the poles and wanders thinly in the heights of air. It can assume forms of exquisite perfection in a snowflake, or strip the living to a single shining… Read more »

As urban designers we are at once moved by the tremendous challenges facing our urban imprint upon the land—the city; and its affect upon our planet—her atmosphere, oceans, and living systems. In our search for solutions, we look to nature for guidance; that perhaps within her experimentation with complex outcomes and interdependence there exists a clue to our built environment. The following three projects are an exploration of this relationship between nature and the city; of not only a latent attempt to emulate her beauty, but her processes as well.

In The Art of Ecology we attempt to paint urban solutions as an artist paints the landscape, with an eye towards boldness; but understanding that our limited attempt is only the first step in unlocking the relationship between ecology and urban development.

The inspiration behind Jining New City, Rugao District, and the Shunde Guipan Riverfront lies in capturing what is unique and most beautiful about the place and enhancing it. In all three, we explore the most fundamental landscape element of the site, the river, and its affect upon urban pattern.

In all three, though representing various scales of development, the idea of water or canal is rooted in the history of the place and has influenced the growth of their respective locations since their inception. In all three, emulating the art of ecology is less about imitating her physical beauty, but more about learning from her processes.

Imitating Ecology

Beyond the mere inspiration of her beauty and formal language, we must begin to understand natures processes in our attempt to imitate her. From the air, we are inspired by natures patterns; of vast forests and grasslands, weaving mosaics of color, but must ask ourselves, what is the science behind this painted canvas? Are there natural laws that govern her art?

For example, flat terrain often leads to braided water systems that seek to find paths of least resistance, responsive to the forces of fluid dynamics. The end result are often tree-like patterns that grow and branch, moving and changing relative to fluctuating environmental conditions. As the finer-grained water systems branch out, increased edge conditions result, giving way to a variety of opportunities. Environmentally these opportunities manifest in the increased ability for nutrient exchange (along the edges of wetland marsh) and organism exchange (predator and prey along open water edges versus protected grassy waters). Maximizing edge surface area increases opportunity for exchange. Within the urban context, a similar relationship can be said to exist between circulation (roads) and real estate (commercial property); and yet again between residential property values and green space (parks). And so the opportunity exists to exploit this corollary between edge intensity; namely water and real estate, evolving this braided ecology into a kind of braided urbanism.

Filtering Ecologies, Filtering Urbanism

At the same time, all three sites exhibit a need to improve water quality. At Jining, the project area exists at a critical threshold between existing city and major lake; at Rugao, the proposed development straddles a key bend along a polluted river; and at Shunde the proposed river park lies between a new city and a culturally important waterway. As an ecological principle, braided systems have the ability to increase filtration capacity through increased edge condition and nutrient exchange. Thus, by incorporating this braided design as a fundamental framework for urban development, we can conceptually increase the filtering capacity of city-making.

These braided water patterns then give rise to braided districts and braided neighborhoods, each varying in land use (commercial, residential) and density. Furthermore, density (apartment towers versus single family) can have a direct correlation with water pattern; more course and larger waterways create larger islands and greater flexibility for higher densities, while finer-grained waterways create opportunities for more secluded low densities (single-family residential). A wholistic pattern begins to emerge in which real estate and development objectives coincide with and compliment environmental ones. A braided ecology becomes a braided and filtering urbanism.

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Posted by SeanOMalley
in Arts and Culture
on 21 January, 2012

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As developers strive to find a balance between profits and environmental responsibility, many are looking to water resources as more than just a way to demonstrate sustainability. A connected system that starts at the small scale and eventually returns higher quality water back to the river, lake, bay or other body of water can become… Read more »

Posted by SeanOMalley
in Urban Ecologies
on 21 January, 2012

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This year’s Urban Land Institute (ULI) Fall Meeting was held in Los Angeles and I had the opportunity to speak on a panel titled, “From Eye Sore to a Must See: Creating Urban Parks from Thin Air and Adding Real Estate Value” moderated by Kirk Humphreys of Humphreys Corporation (and former Oklahoma City mayor) and alongside Daniel Biederman of Bryant Park Management Corporation and Biederman Redevelopment Venture Corporation and Vaughn Davies, Principal at AECOM. My presentation focused on what creative solutions can be brought to our aging urban infrastructure.

I shared case studies of SWA projects such as Milton Street Park, the Buffalo Bayou Promenade and Katy Trail to demonstrate how public open space can be integrated into a city’s infrastructure to enhance community use, increase value in adjacent properties and nurture a new, attractive destination in the public realm.

The aim of my talk looked at two questions:

1) Can infrastructure be multi-functional? and

2) Can newly created open space increase land value while solving issues of ecology, programming, safety and access?

In the Buffalo Bayou Promenade example, office building rents dramatically increased in 2006-2007, the same year that the promenade was completed. The rents in these buildings have since stabilized at that rate, despite the downturn in the economy.

Biederman’s focus demonstrated the real value that can be seen in creative programming to revitalize a park. Notably, he shared data on Bryant Park’s transformation in the 90’s having dramatically benefited the adjacent Grace Office Building, which experienced a 114% increase in rents from 1990-2002, versus comparable rents adjacent to times Square rising 67%, Grand Central’s 55% and Rockefeller Center’s 41%.

Davies’ brought to the table the conceptual design of cap parks over freeways and its promise of connectivity and beautification for urban areas, specifically AECOM’s proposal for a linear cap park over the 101 freeway in Los Angeles.

This open forum discussion is another step in furthering the conversation of Landscape Infrastructure and its potential to make our cities better.

[For a CD copy of the presentation, please contact us as mdolejs@swagroup.com.]

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Posted by GerdoAquino
in Landscape Infrastructure
on 20 January, 2012

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The Olympic Games brings people together from all over the world in the spirit of competition. The challenge for any Games creation is to create a festive experience for the participants, visitors, and crowds during the time of the games, while also creating a place that can last past the short-lived Olympic ceremonies. In this… Read more »

Posted by GerdoAquino
in Landscape Infrastructure
on 20 January, 2012

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September 2011 marks the three year anniversary of the opening of the new California Academy of Sciences museum. As the project landscape architect — led by John Loomis in our Sausalito office — we look back at the green roof design and its performance. Living Roof Performance Stormwater Capture The 106,500 square foot green roof… Read more »

Living Roof Performance

Stormwater Capture

The 106,500 square foot green roof absorbs 3.5 million gallons of rainwater each year, reduces stormwater runoff by 93%.

Natural Building Ventilation

Cool air runs down the steep slopes of the hills on the roof, funnels it into the open-air plaza and vents warm air from the building through the skylights. Skylights are mounted with sensors that gauge the interior temperatures and automatically open at a given threshold. The roof keeps the interior temperature an average of 10 degrees cooler than a standard roof would and, thanks to the evapo-transporation of the retained moisture on the roof surface, animals and people benefit from its natural cooling effect.

Energy Production

The 60,000 photovoltaic cells that surround the living roof creeate shade for pedestrians below and generate approximately 213,000 kilowatt-hours of energy per year. This prevents the release of 405,000 pounds of greenhouse gas emission into the air.

Public Education

Its role in promoting public awareness of living roofs was part of the reason the project was awarded LEED Platinum certification. The museum expected to see 1.6 million visitors annually, but the actually visitor count has far exceeded those projections.

Native Habitat

The living roof is planted with nine native California plant species including Fragaria chiloensis, Prunella vulgaris, Armeria maritime, Sedum spathulitholium, Layia platyglossa, Lupinus bicolor, Eschscholzia californica, Plantago erecta, and Lasthenia californica. Each native plant attracts a variety of native insects, birds, moths, wasps, bees, and other bugs essential to the bay area ecosystem. We tested, with the help of our ecology consultant Rana Creek, a total of 25 native plant species on site for their resilience within the micro climate of the museums location. Read the California Academy’s living-roof habitat monitoring report.

Heat Island Mitigation

While evidence of heat island mitigation is anecdotal, The museum area is cooler than average surrounding area temperatures, but this could be largely attributed to its location within Golden Gate Park. The fact that the roof is irrigated to keep the plants looking good all year likely contributes to lower termperatures than if the plants were allowed to go dormant during the warmest months. The new building footprint is also 1.5 acres less than the original and these 1.5 acres were returned to the site as green space. On the flip side, arguments can be made that the building itself obstructs cool air movement from the ocean. There are currently no reports that confirm or deny these claims.

Cost Comparison

- The total project cost was $488 million.

- The final construction cost was $258 million.

- The cost of achieving LEED Platinum was 8 percent of the hard cost of the project.

- The cost of the green roof was $19 per square foot.

- The cost of the green roof construction was an additional $9-16 per square foot, yielding a total of $28 – $35 per square foot, approximately 3 to 4 times the cost of traditional roofs (including cool roofs qualifying for LEED solar reflectance credit), which cost approximately $6 to $10 per square foot.

Challenges

- The use of irrigation on the green roof over time is still subject to a debate. While the design intent is to remove irrigation systems and let the green roof run dry during the summer seasons (representative of a native California landscape) – the image of the green roof has become so iconic that the roof is still being maintained – and irrigated – today. The long-term vision is to remove the irrigation system.

- The roof can only be accessed through the elevator to the roof. Unfortunately, the maintenance crew has to use the same elevator – and there is no storage capability for supplies on the roof.

- It remains to be seen how the roof will last over time. Most buildings require long-term weathering and re-waterproofing. In 40- or 60-year’s time, what will be the procedure for updating and maintaining the roof and building, particularly one of innovative and unique construction?

- Deemed a “high maintenance superstar,” by writers such as Linda McIntyre (LAM), the roof is both celebrated and lamented for its high cost in time, money, and energy. While critics state that the cost is excessive and could have been used to implement a greater quantity of green roofs; McIntyre points out the difficulty of quantifying the success of a design that “captures the imaginations of millions of people,” that teaches and educates millions of people, communicating that design and sustainability matters and inspiring dozens of new green designs as a result.

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