Below are articles written about successful EcoVillage Development efforts that are happening globally...
CANADA
Original Article from Ecovillage News
“What makes you different from any other developer?”
The speaker, a middle-aged man with longish hair, was clearly on the offensive. It was October, 2002, and this was the first of our public meetings in the small, conservative farming community of Yarrow in southwestern British Columbia. We’d purchased a 25-acre former dairy farm right in the middle of town; whatever we did on the property would clearly affect Yarrow residents. We hadn’t prepared for this question, though, believing a more likely query would be something like, “Are you a cult?”
We had set so much stock in an open consultation process with the townspeople. Was it all going to go sideways? As I began to stammer out a reply, the man suddenly asked another question:
“How are you going to handle wastewater treatment? Our houses are on septic systems. There won’t be enough capacity to handle a whole bunch of new housing.”
This was a question we were prepared for. In fact, it was a nice segue to our slide show on wastewater treatment using solar aquatics.
As one of our members, Kim, flashed the first slide up on the wall, I could see that our antagonist was interested.
“What’s that in the corner of the picture?” he asked.
“A digester,” Kim replied.
“And those tanks?”
Kim explained the photos of a Solar Aquatics greenhouse (a.k.a. a
“living machine”)—a system using solar energy and aquatic plants and
other organisms to convert graywater and even blackwater into potable
water.
We all breathed more easily. The public consultation phase of our co-design process was on its way.
Our
group had formed in 1999 to consider purchasing a property located in
the interior of BC. That purchase didn’t happen but some members of the
group continued to meet to pursue the idea of creating an ecovillage in
the Fraser Valley. After we purchased the dairy farm property our group
grew quickly from its original six members, and within four months we
had a dozen folks committed.
We recognized that the traditional rural village has largely been
eclipsed in North America by the march to urbanization. We knew that
living in an ecovillage offered an alternative—attempting to recapture
what is special about the village way of life. But a village is not just
buildings; rather, it’s an intricate fabric of relationships among
ecovillage members and between ecovillagers and their neighbors.
So, first we worked hard at establishing a common set of values among ourselves. Following a workshop and extensive group discussions, we developed the vision and principles on which our community would be based.
We formed a legal cooperative, which seemed to be the way of organizing ourselves that best fit our values.
We began our permaculture-influenced design process. That meant living with the land. Permaculture looks at agriculture and human culture from the standpoint of nature. That wasn’t easy for many of us, as we’d been socialized to consider ourselves dominant over nature.
Seven
of our members started farming that first year. We eagerly plowed two
acres and planted organic crops. The land was good to us. It had been
fallow for 20 years and was fertile. Our crops flourished—but so did the
pests. And we soon found that, although our produce was eagerly bought
at farmers’ markets, we weren’t going to make much money selling it. We
thus began to discover the realities of modern agricultural economics.
Supporting wild nature, increasing biodiversity, and creating a balanced ecosystem became our strategies to control pests, rather than using pesticides. And since farmers on our land in the past had farmed right up to the banks of the little creek running across our property, we decided to try to turn that part of our land back to the way it would have functioned 100 years ago: we re-created a riparian buffer zone along the creek.
Unlike most developers, we had begun a quest to become more ecologically sustainable. We adopted strategies of minimizing ecological impacts and conserving resources. This hasn’t been easy. We humans tend to be good at rationalizing our disregard for nature. Our group looked for scientifically based measures of sustainability. Life-cycle analysis, ecological footprint analysis, and The Natural Step framework all proved useful. The Natural Step framework, for example, suggests four criteria for sustainability:
Such simple principles were helpful to refocus our thinking. As we
began to build on the land, we used life-cycle analysis to help us
determine the construction materials to use. This allowed us to look at
the energy inputs for a particular material in all facets of its use,
reuse, recycling, and disposal. It was a way to ensure that we looked at
not only economic factors in land development, but at social and
ecological ones as well (the “triple bottom line”). As we got into this,
we realized that to become, as Robert Gilman’s ecovillage definition
states, “harmlessly integrated into the natural world,” we were
committing ourselves to a lifelong process of learning and development.
We knew we were very much a part of the wider society, and thus needed to get the local community’s input in our ecovillage design—although we had trepidation about this, too. (“If we ask them what they want, we might not like what we hear!” was a nagging concern for many of us.) Also, any development on the property would be strongly influenced by external forces such as the local real estate market and city ordinances.
So we came up with a fairly novel approach, which we bravely called “co-design.” It would consist of three steps, and we intended to repeat the steps as many times as needed. The first was for ecovillage members to brainstorm about what we wanted to do on the land. The second was to run these ideas by Chilliwack city officials (Yarrow is a part of Chilliwack) for their advice and changes. The third step was to hold public meetings with Yarrow residents in order to answer questions and get their input, critiques, and suggestions.
We already had a common vision and strategies. Would City Hall like our ideas? Would the townspeople buy in? We advertised “organic, local, or fairly traded refreshments” to people who dropped by to hear about our plan. And they came in good number: over 60 people attended the second public meeting.
In this meeting we asked the town residents, “What are Yarrow’s assets?” “What are its needs?” We got a lively response.
“We need a bakery,” said one man.
“A grocery store,” said a woman.
“A village square!” said another.
Most of these were similar to ideas we’d thought of ourselves. We relaxed. The public-input process was working.
While City Hall didn’t know what to make of us at first, by our third meeting they were engaged. They knew we’d need a special type of zoning, as none of the existing zoning categories seemed to work. We didn’t fit into the “Rural Residential” category, since we were planning cottage industries, businesses, and a learning centre, in addition to the organic farm. Nor did we fit the “Comprehensive” zoning category, as our project was more village-like and rural in character.
While some city planners and Yarrow residents were skeptical at first, there was always a core of support. Some planners were reminded of the planning principles of their university days. And many townspeople resonated with the village idea and the notion of creating a more sustainable form of community.
At the fourth round of consultations, we presented our specific concept plan. We wanted to create a mix of 35-40 individual residences, shared community spaces, cottage industries, and a learning centre. We would cluster the businesses closer to the road (the town’s main street) and locate residences and community spaces close to the 20 acres of agricultural land.
After four rounds of the co-design process, we presented our request for rezoning. The Chilliwack City Council unanimously approved our request!
“I really think it’s an idea whose time has come,” commented Council member Mel Folkman. He said Yarrow Ecovillage would solve some of the difficult problems that continually face suburban developments, including storm water management, and that our project “treated the environment with the utmost respect.”
Our rezoning process occurred in two stages. The first, approved in August 2004, created a commercial/residential zone on a small portion of our property along the main road. This would allow a mix of retail businesses on the ground floor and people living in apartments on the second floor. (Later, several Yarrow members bought and now manage a small deli business on the road adjacent to this part of our property.)
The second stage, approved in July, 2006, was for five acres of the property previously zoned “rural residential” to be rezoned as an “ecovillage zone,” which increased the land’s maximum density from 5 to 40 residences. Chilliwack Mayor Clint Hames called us “the first ecovillage zone in Canada.”
(However, in 2003 O.U.R. Ecovillage in Shawnigan Lake, BC, was granted “sustainability zoning” for their project. —Editor)
The two rezonings created an immediate boon for our project. The density increase alone increased the property value: overnight the land value increased to five times our purchase price. We can use our suddenly more valuable land as collateral for a substantial construction loan from the local credit union, which we’ll use to build our homes. We’ll pay back the construction loan by selling these housing units to our members—a complete win-win.
All because the City of Chilliwack granted us “ecovillage zoning.”
“Rezoning is a gift from the community,” is how Victoria land-use planning lawyer Deborah Curran put it at a workshop on cooperatives we had participated in several months earlier.
Some visionaries may wonder why we got so deeply engaged in the realities of local zoning and finance. Yet ecovillage founders must become so engaged, as land use, engineering standards, and financing methods are tightly regulated and controlled in most western countries. And by actively seeking support from city planners, townspeople, professionals in the community, and the local credit union, we have given our own meaning to the term “land developers.”
Now . . . where is that fellow who asked what made us different from any other developer? I’ve finally got an answer for him.
Michael Hale, a long-time environmental and community activist, worked for the Government of Canada for many years. In 2002, tired of lying down in front of bulldozers, he helped found Yarrow Ecovillage.
___________________________________________
UNITED STATES
CANADA
How Yarrow Ecovillage Got "Ecovillage Zoning"
By Michael HaleOriginal Article from Ecovillage News
 | |
| Author
Michael Hale in the 25-acre field where Yarrow Ecovillagers are practicing sustainable farming. Their dairy barn and silo in background. |
The speaker, a middle-aged man with longish hair, was clearly on the offensive. It was October, 2002, and this was the first of our public meetings in the small, conservative farming community of Yarrow in southwestern British Columbia. We’d purchased a 25-acre former dairy farm right in the middle of town; whatever we did on the property would clearly affect Yarrow residents. We hadn’t prepared for this question, though, believing a more likely query would be something like, “Are you a cult?”
We had set so much stock in an open consultation process with the townspeople. Was it all going to go sideways? As I began to stammer out a reply, the man suddenly asked another question:
“How are you going to handle wastewater treatment? Our houses are on septic systems. There won’t be enough capacity to handle a whole bunch of new housing.”
This was a question we were prepared for. In fact, it was a nice segue to our slide show on wastewater treatment using solar aquatics.
As one of our members, Kim, flashed the first slide up on the wall, I could see that our antagonist was interested.
“What’s that in the corner of the picture?” he asked.
“A digester,” Kim replied.
“And those tanks?”
Kim explained the photos of a Solar Aquatics greenhouse (a.k.a. a
“living machine”)—a system using solar energy and aquatic plants and
other organisms to convert graywater and even blackwater into potable
water.We all breathed more easily. The public consultation phase of our co-design process was on its way.
Yarrow Ecovillagers on day of spring work party.
So, first we worked hard at establishing a common set of values among ourselves. Following a workshop and extensive group discussions, we developed the vision and principles on which our community would be based.
We formed a legal cooperative, which seemed to be the way of organizing ourselves that best fit our values.
We began our permaculture-influenced design process. That meant living with the land. Permaculture looks at agriculture and human culture from the standpoint of nature. That wasn’t easy for many of us, as we’d been socialized to consider ourselves dominant over nature.
Seven
of our members started farming that first year. We eagerly plowed two
acres and planted organic crops. The land was good to us. It had been
fallow for 20 years and was fertile. Our crops flourished—but so did the
pests. And we soon found that, although our produce was eagerly bought
at farmers’ markets, we weren’t going to make much money selling it. We
thus began to discover the realities of modern agricultural economics.Supporting wild nature, increasing biodiversity, and creating a balanced ecosystem became our strategies to control pests, rather than using pesticides. And since farmers on our land in the past had farmed right up to the banks of the little creek running across our property, we decided to try to turn that part of our land back to the way it would have functioned 100 years ago: we re-created a riparian buffer zone along the creek.
Unlike most developers, we had begun a quest to become more ecologically sustainable. We adopted strategies of minimizing ecological impacts and conserving resources. This hasn’t been easy. We humans tend to be good at rationalizing our disregard for nature. Our group looked for scientifically based measures of sustainability. Life-cycle analysis, ecological footprint analysis, and The Natural Step framework all proved useful. The Natural Step framework, for example, suggests four criteria for sustainability:
- Reduce dependence upon substances extracted from the Earth’s crust (fossil fuels, minerals).
- Reduce dependence upon synthetic chemicals.
- Reduce encroachment upon nature.
- Meet human needs fairly and efficiently.
Such simple principles were helpful to refocus our thinking. As we
began to build on the land, we used life-cycle analysis to help us
determine the construction materials to use. This allowed us to look at
the energy inputs for a particular material in all facets of its use,
reuse, recycling, and disposal. It was a way to ensure that we looked at
not only economic factors in land development, but at social and
ecological ones as well (the “triple bottom line”). As we got into this,
we realized that to become, as Robert Gilman’s ecovillage definition
states, “harmlessly integrated into the natural world,” we were
committing ourselves to a lifelong process of learning and development.We knew we were very much a part of the wider society, and thus needed to get the local community’s input in our ecovillage design—although we had trepidation about this, too. (“If we ask them what they want, we might not like what we hear!” was a nagging concern for many of us.) Also, any development on the property would be strongly influenced by external forces such as the local real estate market and city ordinances.
Community members at a natural building workshop.
So we came up with a fairly novel approach, which we bravely called “co-design.” It would consist of three steps, and we intended to repeat the steps as many times as needed. The first was for ecovillage members to brainstorm about what we wanted to do on the land. The second was to run these ideas by Chilliwack city officials (Yarrow is a part of Chilliwack) for their advice and changes. The third step was to hold public meetings with Yarrow residents in order to answer questions and get their input, critiques, and suggestions.
We already had a common vision and strategies. Would City Hall like our ideas? Would the townspeople buy in? We advertised “organic, local, or fairly traded refreshments” to people who dropped by to hear about our plan. And they came in good number: over 60 people attended the second public meeting.
In this meeting we asked the town residents, “What are Yarrow’s assets?” “What are its needs?” We got a lively response.
“We need a bakery,” said one man.
“A grocery store,” said a woman.
“A village square!” said another.
Most of these were similar to ideas we’d thought of ourselves. We relaxed. The public-input process was working.
While City Hall didn’t know what to make of us at first, by our third meeting they were engaged. They knew we’d need a special type of zoning, as none of the existing zoning categories seemed to work. We didn’t fit into the “Rural Residential” category, since we were planning cottage industries, businesses, and a learning centre, in addition to the organic farm. Nor did we fit the “Comprehensive” zoning category, as our project was more village-like and rural in character.
While some city planners and Yarrow residents were skeptical at first, there was always a core of support. Some planners were reminded of the planning principles of their university days. And many townspeople resonated with the village idea and the notion of creating a more sustainable form of community.
At the fourth round of consultations, we presented our specific concept plan. We wanted to create a mix of 35-40 individual residences, shared community spaces, cottage industries, and a learning centre. We would cluster the businesses closer to the road (the town’s main street) and locate residences and community spaces close to the 20 acres of agricultural land.
After four rounds of the co-design process, we presented our request for rezoning. The Chilliwack City Council unanimously approved our request!
“I really think it’s an idea whose time has come,” commented Council member Mel Folkman. He said Yarrow Ecovillage would solve some of the difficult problems that continually face suburban developments, including storm water management, and that our project “treated the environment with the utmost respect.”
Our rezoning process occurred in two stages. The first, approved in August 2004, created a commercial/residential zone on a small portion of our property along the main road. This would allow a mix of retail businesses on the ground floor and people living in apartments on the second floor. (Later, several Yarrow members bought and now manage a small deli business on the road adjacent to this part of our property.)
The second stage, approved in July, 2006, was for five acres of the property previously zoned “rural residential” to be rezoned as an “ecovillage zone,” which increased the land’s maximum density from 5 to 40 residences. Chilliwack Mayor Clint Hames called us “the first ecovillage zone in Canada.”
(However, in 2003 O.U.R. Ecovillage in Shawnigan Lake, BC, was granted “sustainability zoning” for their project. —Editor)
The two rezonings created an immediate boon for our project. The density increase alone increased the property value: overnight the land value increased to five times our purchase price. We can use our suddenly more valuable land as collateral for a substantial construction loan from the local credit union, which we’ll use to build our homes. We’ll pay back the construction loan by selling these housing units to our members—a complete win-win.
All because the City of Chilliwack granted us “ecovillage zoning.”
“Rezoning is a gift from the community,” is how Victoria land-use planning lawyer Deborah Curran put it at a workshop on cooperatives we had participated in several months earlier.
Some visionaries may wonder why we got so deeply engaged in the realities of local zoning and finance. Yet ecovillage founders must become so engaged, as land use, engineering standards, and financing methods are tightly regulated and controlled in most western countries. And by actively seeking support from city planners, townspeople, professionals in the community, and the local credit union, we have given our own meaning to the term “land developers.”
Now . . . where is that fellow who asked what made us different from any other developer? I’ve finally got an answer for him.
Michael Hale, a long-time environmental and community activist, worked for the Government of Canada for many years. In 2002, tired of lying down in front of bulldozers, he helped found Yarrow Ecovillage.
___________________________________________
UNITED STATES
Planning and Zoning for Ecovillages--Encouraging News
Communities Magazine, Number 91, Summer 1996
By Rachel Freifelder, Gina Baker, and Steve Lafer
Ecovillage
founders not only need to convince people of the benefits of community and
pedestrian access, but must become versed in planning and zoning issues as
well. Land use and building regulations vary widely among regions, states,
counties (and countries). In some areas, laws and regulations can be major
barriers; in others, enlightened agencies or individuals may open doors for
newly forming or retrofitted ecovillage communities. Here is a summary of what
we have learned about working with local government agencies. We hope this information
helps your project.
(Please note, this
is based on our experience and may not be true for all areas of North America.
Please check the data with knowledgeable people in your own area.)
During the second
year of dialogue in the Dancing Rabbit community's process of creating an
ecologically sound ("radically sustainable") new town, as we
researched possible land sites in Oregon, we learned that land use planning and
local zoning rules were crucial to the suitability of a given site! In Oregon,
cautious land use management attempts to protect rural land from suburban
sprawl by setting a minimum parcel size of 40 to 160 acres, with some smaller
parcels designated "rural residential." These designations restrict
construction to one, or sometimes two, houses per parcel. We crossed Oregon off
our list of possible locations, because in many cases this kind of zoning
actually perpetuates the very sprawl the regulations were created to prevent.
More recently we
have considered the possibility that local governments that manage land use
carefully may actually be the ones most likely to cooperate with a new paradigm
for human habitat. So we have begun to focus our research on the following two
questions: 1) Where do local regulations or lack of regulations remove barriers
to ecovillage development? 2) Where do progressive sentiment and a growing
understanding of the needs of the new paradigm actually facilitate ecovillage
development?
We are currently
researching northern California, my home territory. It is one of the most
tightly regulated regions in the country, but also a region fighting to protect
its ecosystems and natural resources.
As we've learned
more about building codes and zoning ordinances we've found that often, the
building methods and materials that are the most ecologically sound are
prohibited or severely restricted by statute. We have asked about greywater
systems, composting toilets, strawbale and rammed earth construction, and
general exceptions to the Uniform Building Code, which is used by most building
departments (in the United States) as the template for local codes.
Some local
jurisdictions allow these innovations--simply because they allow most
everything. Others are aware of these "appropriate" technologies and
have begun to write them into their local codes.
A Sampling of What We Found
In many rural
counties in the United States, building regulations are lax or nonexistent in
unincorporated areas. This is true in Missouri, Vermont, Ohio, and Tennessee,
among other states. You can inquire in your county by calling the local
planning and building departments. If there are none, you may be home free,
statutorily. (Of course this doesn't mean you won't run into any number of
social barriers, such as initial resistance from rural neighbors).
If either planning
departments or building departments do exist in an unincorporated county you're
checking out, ask their staff for a general idea of what kinds of building
restrictions apply to new construction. If the story is short enough to tell you
over the phone, you shouldn't have much trouble.
In our quest for
the perfect location, we took a mail survey of existing intentional communities
all over the United States, and asked, among other questions, whether they had
encountered any zoning laws or building codes that prevented them from building
houses or doing anything else they wanted to do.
Many of the
respondents simply said "no," or that they were unaware of any
regulations that applied to them. This was true for communities in rural
Massachusetts, Maine, and New York. In eastern Washington, buildings require
permits and must follow codes, but there are no zoning laws. On the downside, a
community in Nevada County, California, said they had been required to remove
an unpermitted building, showing that their local building inspector was
serious about enforcing the codes. As yet there are no regional generalizations
possible from our results.
Northern
California
The states of
California and Oregon, threatened by rampant development, have regulations of
one kind or another covering almost every inch of ground, in the form of
"General Plans" for each city and county. General Plans are
especially aimed at new development. Founders of any intentional communities that
plan to build housing (or anything!), even if clustered, on a meadow or a
woodland, are considered "developers."
The good news is
that to many county and city officials in more progressive areas, the concept
of sustainable development is not foreign. They want to see more bike and
pedestrian paths, clustered and shared housing, edible landscaping, community
gardens, natural drainage. Unfortunately, most of these communities have the
most stringent regulations on any kind of new construction, and the local citizens
may be adamantly opposed to new development, even developments (ecovillages,
intentional communities) that are designed by idealists committed to working in
the public interest. Also, land may be quite expensive in these very desirable
locations. Still, there is an effort on the part of forward-thinking local
governments to make it easier for community builders who want to create their
own utopias.
Local Land Use Planning Tools
The reason behind
local zoning and planning regulations is one of good intentions--to protect the
health, safety, and welfare of the local residents. It is, in effect, a police
power given to nearly all county, city, and town governments by state
legislation. With roots in the early twentieth century, the new discipline of
"planning" began as an instrument to protect property values from
adjacent potential nuisance uses, such as the rapidly expanding and polluting
industries of that era. Unfortunately planning has often become a tool which
significantly fragments land uses to protect the public sector's perception of
convenience, efficiency, equity, and environmental integrity.
Most local
governments concentrate their efforts in several areas: the General or
Comprehensive Plan, zoning, and subdivision ordinances. A General Plan creates
an image of what the community will be like in the foreseeable future by
designating what land uses, population densities, and public facilities will be
permitted or encouraged in each area. The General Plan consists of public policies
and measurable goals. Zoning regulations put General Plan land use goals into
enforceable regulations. Subdivision ordinances govern how land may be divided
in terms of ownership, in order to permit the various land uses.
The General Plan
and related regulations are areas where many local governments need help, and
where ecovillage developers can provide an important public service. The goals
and objectives of General Plans often do not address sustainability in an
integrated or holistic way. For instance, a goal to achieve more affordable
housing many not address the use of local and recycled building materials,
renewable energy, job training and other livelihood opportunities, composting,
organic gardens, soil regeneration, waste to resource planning, greywater
recycling, parking space reductions, car co-ops, public transit proximity,
bicycle amenities, and so on.
There may be no
special incentives, such as tax breaks, for integrating these kinds of
sustainable criteria into a development project. Sustainable community founders
can help local authorities realize that concepts such as an "ecovillage
demonstration" or "sustainable neighborhood zone," are well
within the scope of their General Plans and zoning regulations.
Similarly, local
government officials may need information or a little guidance in how to revise
zoning and subdivision ordinances in order to permit innovative ideas for
sustainable communities.
Ecovillage
developers know that, in the long run, sustainable communities will
significantly reduce the burden of government. That's a carrot we can hold out
to local planners and elected officials who generally fear the ongoing erosion
of the tax base with what they perceive are increasing needs for expensive
public services.
Now,
sustainability issues are addressed in some General Plans, but not in ways that
are linked. Most planners, who are required by their supervisors to quantify
and defend all their planning decisions, simply don't understand the strategies
to achieve sustainable communities. And generally planners are not permitted to
do social-change planning per se, although recently economic planning has made
it into General Plans in a big way. The results, unfortunately, are often the
further fragmentation of our cities and towns.
At the same time,
founders of sustainable communities often don't understand, or only poorly
understand, the specific terms and concepts used by planners. When ecovillagers
do grasp the planning process, the time required to teach public agencies about
the merits of ecovillages can take much valuable time away from actually
building the community.
Zoning is an
important form of development control. Most zoning ordinances regulate land
use, density, building mass, and parking. First used in the United States in the
1920s, some zoning ordinances are applied as if conditions have not changed
since then.
The problem with
much zoning is that it rarely considers the environment in a wholistic way.
Social and economic factors are not approached in an integral way. Land uses
are not mixed to attain the "full-featured" qualities (such as
residences and businesses in close proximity) essential for ecovillages.
Fortunately, in
recent decades helpful planning tools have been adopted in many jurisdictions
around the country. Their use for sustainable community development requires
the right combination of vision and chemistry from both local officials and
ecovillage developers. The following is a summary of some of these beneficial
planning tools:
Planned Unit
Developments permit an integrated design approach to a large site, so that housing
can be clustered, open space interconnected, and public facilities made more
efficient. This is in contrast to the old single-lot-by-single-lot approach.
Performance
zoning sets project-specific criteria for such factors as noise, access to sunlight,
pedestrian access, and the emission of pollutants. The older and still
prevalent approach is to set zoning standards that may have limited relevance
to the site or environmental conditions.
Special
exceptions or special land use districts are areas designated in General Plans
for case-by-case review when developers wish to proceed with projects that meet
the General Plan's intent for those areas. This tool is intended to permit
greater flexibility or to achieve innovative types of projects and works only
where it is not abused and maintains the integrity of the general plan. This
planning tool was used for EcoVillage at Ithaca.
Bonus
regulations can be a win-win, trade-off system. The jurisdiction can permit
higher densities, exceptions to parking requirements or other bonuses if the
project in turn provides public improvements, helps preserve open space or
achieves other planning goals.
Local
governments can allow negotiated development, sometimes in the form of
"development agreements." This tool can: 1) permit some exceptions to
local policies, if it can be demonstrated that the proposed project is
beneficial to the community; and 2) assure both the jurisdiction and the
developer that each party will carry out its part of the agreement.
Cluster
development permits the placing of all of the allowed dwelling units close
together rather than evenly distributed across the landscape. Most
jurisdictions allow clustering permit so long as the "area average"
remains the same. That is, if you have a 440-acre parcel zoned R-40, you are
allowed to build 11 houses. Traditionally, you were required to put each house
on its own 40-acre parcel. By clustering you can put all the units on one acre,
so that the rest of the land is preserved as open space.
San Luis Obispo
County, on California's central coast, recognizes clustering as a positive
planning tool. San Luis Obispo has a designation called "agricultural
cluster" in which the number of allowable houses on the property can be
doubled, provided that they are all concentrated on 5 percent of the land,
leaving the other 95 percent as open space or in agricultural use. This means
that on the 440 acres described above, 22 houses could be built but on no more
than 22 acres. An ecovillage, of course, would want to have more than 22 units
of housing, along with a variety of other uses, all compactly built.
Even to create an
agricultural cluster zone, San Luis Obispo county requires an environmental
impact report. These reports are often time consuming and expensive and may be
generally irrelevant to ecovillage development, because the process may provide
little opportunity to explain the regenerative aspects of ecovillages. The
latest word from San Luis Obispo is that the county supervisors are working to
create a new zoning designation that will further recognize the value of
sustainable development.
Building codes are
intended to impose quality control: to protect unsuspecting buyers from
unscrupulous builders and incompetent do-it-yourselfers from themselves.
Building codes tend to be a bit narrow-minded, assuming that every house built
is going to fall down if it doesn't have walls made of two-by-fours on 16-inch
centers. Houses that don't follow the building code to the letter can still be
permitted, but often require a licensed architect and a structural engineer to
sign off on the plans, adding several thousand dollars to the cost.
The California
building code now includes an owner-built designation ("Class K"),
which basically says that if you build your own house it's your own business.
But there are still requirements, such as a percolation test for the septic
system, electrical common sense, and minimal earthquake safety restrictions.
The code also recently added specifications for strawbale construction.
Technically,
everything you do to a building's structure requires a permit, short of
changing paint or trim. Greywater systems are now legal in the State of
California with a number of restrictions.
A Report from
Arcata, California
There are a number
of city and county officials in California who not only know what sustainable
community development means but are anxious to help it happen. In San Luis
Obispo, Mendocino, and Humboldt counties, we spoke with county supervisors who
would very much like to see such developments in their jurisdictions. Humboldt
County Supervisor Julie Fulkerson said, "The county is just waiting for
someone to do it."
Some of these
forward-thinking officials are members of the Local Government Commission, a
nonprofit organization which promotes livable communities and sustainable
development practices. The Local Government Commission functions as an
information clearinghouse on such issues and sponsors an annual conference on
the subject. (For more information, call 916-448-1198).
In Arcata
(Humboldt County, California), the city government is actually planning the
bare bones infrastructure of an ecovillage: a "pedestrian-oriented
clustered mixed-use development with provision for urban agriculture."
Rather than establishing a special zoning designation, the city intends to
create a more detailed "specific plan" (as distinct from a General
Plan) that will include community gardens, natural drainage areas, and bike
paths. The site was once a timber mill. When the plan is approved, the city and
the timber company will be looking for a developer to make it happen.
The situation
isn't perfect, of course. Like any new development, the proposed plan is
meeting opposition from local residents who don't want more people or more buildings,
ecologically designed or not. The City of Arcata plans to annex the site and
hook it up to city water and power. Because the site is not contiguous with the
city limits, this promises to cost several million dollars. Further, the
intervening land, currently in pasture, would likely be developed as well. This
too is generating local opposition, but it is clear that in general the
community would like to see green development happen.
And in Los Angeles
As a result of the
long-term advocacy efforts of CRSP (a resource center for small ecological
cooperative communities), the Housing Element of the Los Angeles General Plan
actually contains a proposed program for a "Model Environmental
Village," which will demonstrate sustainable neighborhood development in
which physical, social, and economic systems are effectively integrated
(Program-80). That policy became official in 1993, and this year the L.A.
Community Redevelopment Agency and Housing Department have allocated funds to
CRSP for its first apartment building acquisition in the L.A. Eco-Village
demonstration neighborhood, which CRSP coordinates. The two block Eco-Village
neighborhood is located in a much larger community redevelopment area which is
committed to being "guided by the principles of sustainable
development," another public policy that's been put in place by forward-thinking
public officials.
Los Angeles's new
General Plan Framework makes provisions for transit and pedestrian-oriented
mixed-use communities around transit stations. This is true in a number of
other cities across the country, as well.
These examples
show that intentional community founders committed to sustainability and
willing to move to locations where public policy is already favorable to
ecovillage development, could make a very big difference in a relatively short
time!
Rachel Freifelder
is in the Ph.D. program in Agroecology and Sustainable Community Development at
U.C. Davis. She lives in the N Street Cohousing Community in Davis and is an active
member of the Dancing Rabbit network which continues its research for planning
a "radically sustainable" community. She can be reached at
rrfreifelder@ucdavis.edu.
Gina Baker is a
graduate student in Architecture and Urban Studies at the University of
Virginia doing research on ecovillages andsustainable communities. She can be
reached at glb3r@palladio.arch.virginia.edu. Steve
Lafer is a planning consultant who lives in Oakland.
