By
Sophie C. Martin
B.A. in Urban Studies
Stanford University
Stanford, California (2004)
Submitted to the Department of Urban Studies and Planning in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of
Master in City Planning at the
MASSACHUSETTS INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY
JUNE 2008
© 2008 Sophie C. Martin. All Rights Reserved.
The author here by grants to MIT the permission to reproduce and to distribute publicly paper and electronic copies of the thesis document in whole or in part.
Author
Department of Urban Studies and Planning
May 22, 2008
Certified by
Accepted by -_
MASSACHUSETTS INSMTE
OF TECHNOLOGY
Professor Eran Ben-Joseph
Department of Urban Studies and Planning
Thesis Supervisor
A p bProfessor Langley Keyes
Chair, MCI' CUommittee
Department of Urban Studies and Planning

By
Sophie C. Martin
Submitted to the Department of Urban Studies and Planning on May 22, 2008 in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master in City Planning at the
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
The U.S. Green Building Council, the Congress for the New Urbanism, and the Natural
Resources Defense Council are currently developing a rating system aimed at evaluating the environmental sustainability of new neighborhood developments. The system, known as LEED-
ND (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design for Neighborhood Developments), will be the first comprehensive set of planning and design standards that has the potential for widespread adoption by the development industry. In the absence of a set of standards like these, planners and developers have traditionally looked to older communities that exhibit wellregarded environmental design as models. Because LEED-ND has the potential to supplant these example as a model for guiding future environmental planning and design endeavors, the extent to which LEED-ND captures the values manifested in earlier models should be evaluated.
This thesis applies the LEED-ND standards retroactively to three existing communities that the planning and development professions have held up as good examples of environmentally sensitive design. Rather than using the new rating system to evaluate the developments, the developments themselves are used to evaluate LEED-ND and the degree to which it reflects the goals of traditional ecological planning. While the case studies each score high enough to be considered "LEED Certified" (on a modified version of the LEED-ND standards), they all follow a pattern of poor performance on several credits related to smart growth and New
Urbanist design ideals. These points indicate areas in which the environmental values of the planning profession have changed over time, and how these values may manifest themselves in the physical design of the built environment. The final analysis addresses the challenges of developing systems for evaluating and ranking development projects and how LEED-ND could be adapted to encourage environmentally sustainable design across the spectrum of urban to rural neighborhood development.
Thesis Supervisor:
Title:
Eran Ben-Joseph
Associate Professor of Landscape Architecture and Planning,
Department of Urban Studies and Planning

Introduction
LEED-ND in the Historical Context of Design Standards and Directives
Methodology
The Woodlands Phase I
Village Homes
Prairie Crossing
Synthesis and Discussion
Completed Scoring Table

7

Building on the success of the Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) standards for green buildings, the U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC) has teamed up with the Congress for the New Urbanism (CNU) and the Natural Resources Defense Council
(NRDC) to create a rating system for whole neighborhood developments, known as LEED-ND.
The rating system, still in its pilot phase, represents the first comprehensive evaluation program for urban design and planning that has the potential to be widely recognized by the development industry. Creation of the LEED-ND standards has been received positively by members of the planning and development communities alike. It is anticipated that the program will have the ability to formally guide municipalities and developers towards professionally pre-approved green design by taking some of the risk and guesswork out of a still non-standardized planning process.
Despite the LEED-ND standards' generally positive reception, the system and its adoption raise some concerns as well. The three entities (USGBC, CNU, and NRDC) that comprise the "core committee" creating the system share many values, but in some cases, they are at odds with each other. The standards must be "a finely-tuned mix of USGBC's materials and land use considerations, CNU's urban design guidelines, and NRDC's environmental and smart growth concerns" (Berg 2007, 2). However, in order to achieve this balance, compromises have had to be made regarding which elements of planning and design will be prioritized in the rating system. The precise way in which the organizations have weighted and balanced their objectives will have a large impact on what aspects of planning are rewarded and therefore encouraged through the rating system.
A second matter of concern for planning practitioners in both the public and private sectors is the potential for uncritical adoption of LEED-ND standards into municipal development codes, without adapting the system to be context sensitive. Just as zoning codes are not identical across municipalities, LEED-ND should not be adopted as a "one size fits all" solution for engendering sustainable urban development. Therefore, inquiry into how well the standards encapsulate a range of environmentally sustainable development scenarios is warranted.
Growing public awareness of climate change, resource scarcity, and other environmental problems in recent years has caused more and more citizens and professionals to be critical of

traditional patterns of suburban development. However, the current call to action is far from the first. Since the 1960s, consciousness of how our development patterns impact the natural environment has spurred innovation in planning and design. Numerous planned communities built over the past several decades have demonstrated alternatives to sprawl by implementing designs that have less environmental impact than their traditional suburban counterparts. Some have become particularly well known for their successes. In the absence of universal standards or rating systems for new development, many communities have looked to other "model" developments for inspiration in environmental design. Of course, these projects have their flaws.
But according to Ann Forsyth, who has extensively researched planned communities of the
1960s and 1970s, "Where they have weaknesses, so do the current proposals for a new generation of best practices, because in large part the new practices mirror this older generation of responses to urban sprawl" (2005, 271).
How well does LEED-ND capture the lessons of older but still relevant developments? This research applies the LEED-ND rating system retroactively to three residential developments that the planning and design professions have held up as particularly good examples of environmental planning over time to see how well they "pass the test." The purpose of the research will be to evaluate the LEED-ND rating system by applying it to these model communities, and it will address the following questions:
1) Does the LEED-ND rating system reflect design and environmental values manifested in traditional ecological design?
2) What are the design implications of the predominant environmental objectives embodied in the LEED-ND rating system?
The case studies to be used are Phase One of The Woodlands, developed in the mid-
1970s and located outside of Houston, Texas; Village Homes, developed in the late 1970s and located in Davis, California; and Prairie Crossing, developed in the 1990s and located north of
Chicago, Illinois. All three are well researched and documented, and are generally viewed as being excellent examples of innovative environmental design both for their time and in general.
However, LEED-ND is intended to evaluate new developments, not existing ones. Calculating the credits requires detailed information available to those involved in the project's planning, and the system does not lend itself easily to retroactive especially decades later application.
Therefore, this study takes some liberties with the LEED-ND standards, making adjustments to

its requirements so that they may be more easily applied to older communities. The details of this process are described in the Methodology section.
The research begins by contextualizing LEED-ND in the history of planning standards and directives, paying particular attention to the relationship between these efforts and the rise of environmentalism. After describing the methodology, the LEED-ND standards are applied to each of the three case studies. The research concludes with a discussion of the projects' performances, the urban design implications that may result from the values underlying LEED-
ND, and future directions that such a rating system might take.

13

The U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC), in partnership with the Congress for the
New Urbanism (CNU) and the National Resources Defense Council (NRDC), is developing a new set of standards for new construction at the neighborhood scale, known as LEED for
Neighborhood Developments, or LEED-ND. According to the USGBC website, the standards will serve as a third party verification for municipalities, consumers, and developers that the design and location of a new neighborhood has met a high standard of environmental sustainability. The website states that the benefits of developing a LEED-ND certified community include reducing urban sprawl, through choosing infill sites or those adjacent to existing development; promoting healthy living, by providing a walkable community with easily accessible goods and services; protecting threatened species, by not selecting sites that fragment habitat; and decreasing car dependence, by providing access to transportation choices and a mix of uses nearby homes. The credits that a development can earn towards becoming certified are broken into three main categories: "Smart Location & Linkage," emphasizing the smart growth concerns of NRDC; "Neighborhood Pattern & Design," highlighting CNU's focus on neighborhood density and walkability; and "Green Construction and Technology," bringing in
USGBC's expertise on green building (Henry 2008). Together, these categories combine the strengths of the three participating organizations and collectively attempt to address these various objectives through prerequisites and earnable credits.
LEED-ND is hardly the first attempt at developing a set of standards to guide and evaluate urban planning and development. Municipal zoning dictates location, use and bulk of development in most places; it is a directive that is legally binding. Throughout the twentieth century, more nuanced efforts by planners, policymakers, and designers have gone beyond what zoning requires to provide further guidance on the precise form that design and development should take. They have been motivated by health, economic, environmental, and social concerns. While some have been well incorporated into general planning and design practice, such as the tenets of New Urbanism, there has yet to be an actual rating system adopted by planners, public officials, and developers alike.

Why should LEED-ND be any different or more successful than its precedents?
Foremost is the USGBC's ability to leverage the success of its previous rating systems for green buildings (Newberg 2005). These standards have enjoyed relatively widespread acknowledgment amongst the architectural and construction industries and have greatly increased the USGBC's credibility. Moreover, the organization's name recognition has spread beyond just the professional communities to the consumers themselves; due to coverage and promotion by the popular press, many people who are otherwise unacquainted with green building practices now know and even demand LEED-certified green buildings. Recognition has bred further acceptance. Over their relatively short lifetime, the LEED standards for green buildings have helped many of those in architecture, and even more so in construction, come to understand and implement new "green" techniques that had previously been met with skepticism. Moreover, they are being applied in an increasingly cost effective way. Developers are more likely to deviate from conventional practices if they are assured a reward for their risk, and the LEED building standards have been able to provide this. Noting the success that their standards have had in encouraging green building practices, the creators of LEED-ND hope that the new rating system "will have a similarly positive effect in encouraging developers to revitalize existing urban areas, reduce land consumption, reduce automobile dependence, promote pedestrian activity, improve air quality, decrease polluted stormwater runoff, and build more livable, sustainable, communities for people of all income levels" (USGBG et al. 2007, 1).
Thus far, the development community's reception of LEED-ND has been largely positive. The development community has been anticipating the release of the standards; articles discussing the project have appeared in Urban Land, the monthly publication of the
Urban Land Institute, since 2005. Developers see the LEED brand identity as good for business
the ability to affix a respected "stamp of approval" upon one's development is highly marketable (Tarnay 2005). This leads to another, related, strength of the LEED standards in general. Developers wish to respond to market trends, however, consumers' demand for "green" is quite loosely defined. In this age of mass media coverage of climate change, resource scarcity, and environmental health scares, consumers have become increasingly concerned about the environment but lack a nuanced understanding of the form their desired products should take.
Additionally, the savvier consumers who are willing to invest more in an environmentally friendly home are an attractive market segment for developers (Murillo and Vargas 2007). The LEED

standards, for both buildings and now for neighborhood developments, clearly articulate in the form of a checklist what actually constitutes "green" for the built environment, providing clarity for both developers and their environmentally-conscious consumers.
Municipal planners, too, have generally welcomed LEED-ND (Murillo and Vargas
environmental sustainability into their general plans and consider it in their development approvals. In planning departments, the barrier to implementation is not a lack of knowledge on the part of the staff, rather, it is most often lack of funding for developing local sustainability principles or revamping the municipal code and entitlement process. The creators of LEED-ND anticipate that the standards may be used by municipalities to fill this gap, either as a tool to help planners evaluate projects, or to augment their own development code (NRDC 2007).
Some cities, such as Santa Monica, Chicago, and Arlington, Virginia, already have an expedited approvals process for LEED-certified buildings. The City of Boston, has recently decided to require LEED certification for all new buildings over 50,000 square feet. Municipalities could adopt a similar expedited review process for neighborhood developments. Using LEED-ND in this way would also public officials with some ammunition to use against citizens who tend to oppose new development proposals (often referred to as "NIMBYs," or "Not In My Back Yard") under the assumption that local residents would be less opposed to new development in their community that was more environmentally sound (Newberg 2005).
While LEED-ND will undoubtedly be a great service to municipal planners, particularly in smaller communities, some in the professional planning community have raised the concern that any rating system should not be adopted broadly and without adjustment into local code.
Not only is it unlikely that all aspects of the rating system will be precisely appropriate for all communities, such as density or affordable housing requirements, but it would also be much harder to make adjustments to the criteria after they have been adopted as law (Newberg 2005).
Of course, adopting developments standards as law in the form of local zoning ordinances is the most basic and enduring method of land use regulation in the United States.
Public health concerns and nuisances were the original impetuses behind the creation of zoning, which segregated uses thought to be incompatible with one another (Mandelker 1997). The

industrial revolution and the associated growth of urban areas in the second half of the
1 9 th century resulted in poor living conditions for inner city residents. Factories, ports, and manufacturing plants located adjacent to residential areas produced unhealthy pollution, bad odors, and noise (APHA 1948). However, it was not until the 1920s that a Standard State
Zoning Enabling Act was adopted by most states, authorizing cities to create municipal zoning codes that would address land use concerns in urban areas (Mandelker 2007).
Through the creation of use, location, and bulk regulations, municipal zoning regulations impacted urban form, but with the primary goal of segregating uses, most basic regulations did not provide comprehensive guidance for creating whole, functioning neighborhoods that would ensure adequate services for the residents within them. One organization that addressed this gap was the American Public Health Association's Committee on the Hygiene of Housing. Beginning in the 1940s, the committee created a series of reports called Standards for Healthful Housing, including "Planning the Neighborhood" (1948),
"Planning the Home for Occupancy" (1950), and "Construction and Equipment of the Home'
(1950). The Committee's publications also included An AppraisalMethodfor Measuring the
Quality of Housing: A Yardstick for Health Officers, Housing Officials and Planners (1950) and
Housing an Aging Population (1953).

ORHOt COMUIT FACIlIE
nd NpJ4tfcn
"Planning the Neighborhood" valued the adequate provision of community facilities.
Source: APHA 1948.
"Planning the Neighborhood" was reprinted as a standalone book in 1960. The 1940 census, which revealed that over 25 percent of non-farm dwellings were "substandard," spurred the project. The report went beyond those other in the series that targeted the home specifically, recognizing the importance of considering the neighborhood scale in creating a healthy living environment. Targeting planners, architects, engineers, developers, and public officials, "Planning the Neighborhood" was meant to provide both guidance to planners and designers as well as be a "framework against which the nontechnical policy-maker can test the adequacy of solutions finally presented to him by the technician." (APHA 1948, v). The chapters considered site selection, provision of utilities, planning residential facilities, provision of neighborhood services, pedestrian and automobile circulation, and density considerations.
Like LEED-ND, the authors advocated for a diversity of dwelling types, based on the number and makeup of households in the area, as well as diversity of land uses in order to best serve the residents. Just like today, these included schools, parks, churches, assembly spaces, libraries, shopping, and health centers (APHA 1948, 42-43).
Of great concern to the authors was the relationship between housing density, development siting, and access to daylight and fresh air. While they viewed this design problem

from the perspective of public health, its implications for good urban form (particularly in a neighborhood setting) are still relevant today for healthy living, energy, and environmental concerns. The authors also recognized that often these objectives may conflict with each other in their manifestations in design: "For instance, desirable orientation of dwellings for sunlight may conflict with orientation for summer breezes or for dissipation of noise... In general it can be expected that requirements for sunlight and for usable ground area will be controlling factors in the site plan" (APHA 1948, 28-29). In many cases there are tradeoffs to be made sunlight versus breezes, convenient public transportation versus noise, residential build-out versus nonresidential uses and as the authors of LEED-ND encountered, these design conflicts still exist. In its day, "Planning the Neighborhood" aimed to provide guidance for designers and public officials as they balanced these tradeoffs to create safe and healthy neighborhoods in an urban context.
Environmentalism and Ecology
In the decades following the end of World War II, the United States saw suburban expansion proceed at an unprecedented rate. Changes in mortgage structures, the Federal
Highway Act, and government aid to veterans all facilitated the movement out of central cities.
Families residing in the predominant form of new development low density subdivisions of single family homes were increasingly dependent on the automobile both for reaching jobs and accomplishing basic household errands. Despite - or perhaps due to the prosperity and materialism of the 1950s, the 1960s saw the first wave of environmentalism, widely viewed as being launched by Rachel Carson's 1962 publication of Silent Spring.
Even though the environmental movement dealt fundamentally with problems pertaining to how we use and treat the land, the dominant urban planning issues throughout most of the
1960s involved urban renewal and the contested vitality of city neighborhoods, without much focus on the form of new suburban development. Integrating environmental concerns with the form of the built environment was the domain of landscape architects, and in 1969, Ian
McHarg's published his seminal work, Design with Nature, based upon the premise that
We need nature as much in the city as in the countryside. In order to endure we must maintain the bounty of that great cornucopia which is our inheritance... We need, not

only a better view of man and nature, but a working method by which the least of use can ensure that the produce of his works is not more despoliation (5).
His language bears much resemblance to the current rhetoric of environmental sustainability, and his book described methods by which development could sit more lightly upon the land.
He proposed gathering and aggregating ecological data about a site its geology, vegetation, soils, topography, hydrology to inform what areas would be most appropriate for development or preservation. While McHarg was hardly the first to draw the crucial relationship between the built and natural environments, the first Earth Day in 1970 contextualized it in the broader environmental movement (Raymond, in Burchell and Sternlieb 1978, 3). McHarg's pioneering methodology of layering data was the predecessor to modern GIS, a highly technical tool, his book was more of a manifesto on a new approach to planning and design supported by several case studies, and did not serve as a detailed manual for designers who actually wished to implement his methods on a project-specific basis.
Implementation of ecological planning and design concepts generally required a more flexible zoning code than the standard Euclidean systems that most cities and towns had adopted. Planned Unit Development, or PUD, arose in the late 1960s and early 1970s as an evolved, flexible regulatory approach to land use control that allowed more creative design techniques including mixing land uses and residential densities and creating common open space.
Bridging the gap between small-scale, piecemeal subdivision developments and long-range, often vague general plans, PUDs were legally binding midrange plans that allowed large tracts of land to be built out over a fixed time period, providing both private and community benefits
(Burchell 1972, 2). PUD ordinances were best suited to the development of new towns, ranging from 1,000 to over 10,000 acres, in which master planning and phasing was of utmost importance to both the developer and the municipality (Burchell 1972, 39). PUDs also had the power to enable "tradeoffs" in a way that Euclidean zoning could not, both providing additional value to developers while simultaneously achieving environmental objectives (Mandelker 1997).
For example, under a PUD, the planning for a large tract of land could begin by identifying flood plains and sensitive environmental areas, and then clustering higher density development where it was more appropriate. Environmental areas could be preserved, and the developer would not lose units (Raymond, in Burchell and Sternlieb 1978, 7).

Energy
In any field, an increase in the urgency (real or perceived) of a situation can often be what prompts principles to transform into standards or even requirements. With this transformation comes the need for more specific and widely accepted guidance. Even in the fields of land use planning and site design, McHarg's ideas resonated but were not widely adopted. The dominant environmental design issues that McHarg and others addressed up until this point centered on ecology, but in the 1970s, the discussion changed to energy. While climate change the context in which planners tend to think of energy concerns today was not a factor in environmental planning and policy discussions at the time, the oil crises of 1973 and
1979 placed energy conservation at the forefront of the national agenda.
Environmental concerns of planners and designers thus expanded beyond ecology, hydrology, and toxins to include consideration of what the energy crisis meant for the built environment. One example of directives created for planners and designers at this time was architecture firms that addressed the need for designers to focus on "the land and the energy crisis" (1977, 1). Numerous federal programs and departments commissioned the document, including the Solar Energy Program of the Office of Housing and Building Technology, the
National Bureau of Standards, and HUD. Like both LEED-ND today and "Planning the government or other widely respected national organization supporting its directive. Published in 1977, the report provided landscape planners with specific tools for designing for energy conservation that incorporated climate, solar orientation, vegetation, and site analysis. The book's introduction is written in language that implies urgency regarding the climate, uncertainty about man's control over the environment, and faith in historically simpler ways of living (3). The methods it describes provide much more specific direction to planners and designers, replete with data tables, equations, and diagrams for how to properly design for energy conservation depending on the site's climate and other environmental attributes. However, the oil crises of the 1970s ultimately dissipated without creating a lasting connection in the public's mind between energy use and environmental problems.

l •n umer
Maximize shed in sumrnmer.
Ma*imize sun in winter.
ADAPTATIONS
Locate structure in deciduous woods or plant deciduous fot summer shade and winter sun.
In summer the structure should be shaded in the
lot morning and afternoon.
morning afternoon
Pnequently used outdoor spaces shaded from late morning and afternoon sun
Sin £umrrwa.
should be
Pedemstrin circulation routes should be shaded by vegettion. canopies. pergols or arcades.
Deciduous trees should be located on the south side of pedestrian paths to allow winter sun.
I
Source: American Society of Landscape Architects Foundation, 1977
The Ahwahnee Principles
Some activists from the 1970s remained committed to improving the form of the built environment. Judy and Michael Corbett, creators of Village Homes (one of the case studies used in this research) were committed to achieving greater traction for the ideas they employed in their flagship residential development. Judy Corbett founded the Local Government
Commission (LGC) in 1982, a nonprofit organization whose mission was to help local government officials learn about and implement sustainable design principles in their communities. The organization received a grant in 1990 from the California Air Resources
Board to develop a set of guidelines for improving air quality and reducing automobile use through better local land use planning. Several prominent architects and urbanists, including
Peter Calthorpe and Andres Duany, who would go on to found the Congress for the New
Urbanism (CNU) in 1993, joined the effort. The results were unveiled at the fall 1991 LGC conference held at the Ahwahnee Hotel in Yosemite National Park. Known as the Ahwahnee
Principles, they introduced principles of sustainable regional and community design and development to one hundred California mayors, council members, and county supervisors in hopes of providing tools with which alternatives to traditional sprawling suburban development

could be implemented (Corbett 2000). The principles combined the social and aesthetic goals of the New Urbanists with ecological concerns as well.
The movement for reforming urban design and development gained momentum; the first
Congress for the New Urbanism was held in 1993, and the CNU Charter was written and adopted in 1996, stating that
We stand for the restoration of existing urban centers and towns within coherent metropolitan regions, the reconfiguration of sprawling suburbs into communities of real neighborhoods and diverse districts, the conservation of natural environments, and the preservation of our built legacy (CNU 1996).
Later that year, the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development developed guidelines for grants and loans for neighborhood redevelopment that were largely modeled after new urbanist principles (Corbett 2000, 17). Efforts to transform the New Urbanist ideas from guidelines to an actual rating system for new development did not occur for nearly another decade. Instead, CNU members propagated this new planning and design paradigm through professional practice and publications. CNU is now a LEED-ND partner organization, enabling them to further codify their principles through the standards.
The smart growth movement paralleled the rise of New Urbanism in the 1990s.
Supporters of smart growth argued that true consideration of the environmental impacts of development required planners to look beyond design of a neighborhood to its regional placement and connectivity. While there was no singular organization representing smart growth advocates, the trend managed to produce some of the more successful systems of rating communities. Smart Growth Scorecards and endorsement cards caught on in the late 1990s and are a notable precursor to LEED-ND in that they formalize the evaluation of communities according to a set of principles surrounding environmental sustainability. The U.S. EPA Smart
Growth program has collected a list of scorecards from across the country and made them publicly available, allowing communities to learn from and build upon the examples. Two examples are the scorecards issued by the Washington, DC-based Smart Growth Alliance and the Greenbelt Alliance of the San Francisco Bay Area.

Unlike LEED-ND's national reach, smart growth scorecards are almost always created for a specific metropolitan area, and a local organization administers the evaluation process. A third-party stamp of approval by a respected organization can make a significant difference in the entitlement process and can educate the public and other involved parties (Porter 2006); in the case of smart growth, without a recognized national organizing body, this organization would be local. The fact that these programs are regional in scope is both an advantage and a drawback they more easily avoid the context-sensitivity criticism of LEED-ND, but they also are unlikely to gain widespread adoption and national recognition. The criteria they use are based on both generally recognized principles of smart growth and sustainable development, such as minimum densities and proximity to transit, but may also include less widely-applicable measures that are important to particular local constituencies (EPA 2008).
The closest precursor to LEED-ND, in both time and format, are the TND Design
Rating Standards. Traditional Neighborhood Development (or Design), otherwise known as
TND, is a term often used interchangeably with New Urbanism, and refers to a planning and urban design movement aimed at providing an alternative to conventional suburbs, with their rigid separation of land uses and reliance on the automobile. TND advocates a compact, walkable community with a discernible center (ideally focused on a transit station), a mix of land uses and services within walking distance of the majority of homes, and an equal emphasis on the design of the public and private spheres (TND Town Paper 2007). Laurence Aurbach authored the TND Design Rating Standards (the most recent version of which Version 2.2 was released in 2005), which attempted to translate the principles of New Urbanism into a more or less quantifiable evaluation system. Developments may earn from one to five stars, where five stars is equivalent to "a well-designed, early twentieth-century urban neighborhood in the United
States" (Aurbach 2005, 1).
Aurbach recognizes the value of rating systems for recognizing designers' and developers' accomplishments, educating others about ways in which development can be improved, and communicating good design principles objectively. He does acknowledge, however, that some elements of TND may not be easily measured and are quite subjective. Of the nine attributes of

TND that the rating standards evaluate, the first five are more objective and the remaining four are less so:
Quantifiable:
* Housing Choice: uses the Simpson Diversity Index, as LEED-ND does
* Mixed Use Non-Residential: counts nonresidential uses and their pedestrian accessibility
* Connectivity: measured in density of intersections per square mile
* External Connections: measured by the ratio of project perimeter to number of entrance/exit points
* Proximity to a Town Center (with a civic space, market, business, community service): measured by walking distance from majority of homes
Subjective:
* Location: in the metropolitan area, and on what kind of land (greenfield, brownfield, infill, within service areas, etc.)
* Streetscapes: no formal scoring system; aims to address street geometry, character of public frontage, garage visibility, etc.
* Civic Space: also no formal scoring system developed, and objectives have considerable overlap with Streetscape category; aims to consider good design of these spaces
* Architectural Aesthetics: very subjective scoring, based on considerations of contextual local character, balance of safety and accessibility, appropriate proportions and massing, appearance and durability of materials (Aurbach 2005, 3-17)
The TND Design Rating Standards are not nearly as comprehensive of a document as
LEED-ND; however, in several ways, the system has notable strengths. Its methods of calculation are not nearly as precise and specific as those in LEED-ND, but this system includes a narrative discussion of the rationale behind each element and its methods, often explaining why attempts to quantify may be problematic. Also, non-experts with basic information can complete the methods for evaluation that Aurbach suggests (1).
While it is clear that the current version of the TND Design Rating Standards is a work in progress, the rating system has a framework that could be successful. To move forward, the system would require further methodology clarification of the more subjective credits and heavy marketing by a widely recognized organization. This progression is unlikely to occur, however,

because according to his website, Aurbach is now contributing to the LEED-ND and sections of the TND Design Rating Standards are being incorporated into the newer system.
LEED-ND's first two categories of credits, Smart Location & Linkage and
Neighborhood Pattern & Design, build directly on both the ideas and the evaluation methods of the smart growth advocates and the New Urbanists. The third category, Green Construction &
Technology, is the primary contribution of the third (and lead) collaborator, the U.S. Green
Building Council, which has also clearly established its capability for creating actionable evaluation systems. With the combined strength of three organizations' national profiles, precedent rating systems, and the growing acceptance of the need to address climate change and other environmental issues, LEED-ND is poised to become the first widely implemented system for evaluating the design and performance of new development on the neighborhood scale.
LEED-ND has not yet been released in its final form, and already it is provoking the creation of new rating systems that seek to improve upon the model. It is worth noting one in particular, the Sustainable Sites Initiative, which would provide guidance for the creation of environmentally sustainable landscapes. Developed by a partnership between the American
Society of Landscape Architects (ASLA), Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center (located at the
University of Texas at Austin), United States Botanic Garden, the initiative's focus areas are hydrology, soils, vegetation, materials, and human well-being (providing space for physical activity, local food production, and social interaction). According to the Sustainable Sites
Initiative website, the initiative will produce a set of interim standards and guidelines by Spring of 2009, and aims to pilot-test their rating system in 2010. The eventual set of standards and reference guide will be available in 2012. These standards are written so that they may apply to landscapes both with and without buildings, thus differentiating them from LEED-ND, which applies only to built developments. Sites that participate in the program can be undeveloped land in conservation easements, parks, or buffer zones. Developed sites need not have a residential component, which is also a requirement of LEED-ND.
The Sustainable Sites Initiative's rating system will not be available until after the final release of the LEED-ND standards. But at that point, the creators of the Sustainable Sites
Initiative and the profession overall should be able to leverage the results of the LEED-ND

pilot testing phase to help produce a new rating system that complements LEED-ND, leverages its success, and addresses some critiques that have already been made.

29

This thesis treats the three selected case studies as well established, existing models of environmentally-sensitive communities against which a new model LEED-ND can be tested and evaluated. LEED-ND is serving as a representation of the most current and widespread (or soon to be widespread) thinking on what constitutes a good environmentally-designed neighborhood development. The communities chosen for this research have been heavily studied and written about; the goal is not simply to add to the literature of the evaluation of the design and performance of these places. Rather, heavily-researched communities were chosen for a reason because this indicates that the planning and design professions have recognized them as guides and learning tools. Therefore, the research is less focused on the specific number of points that each case study can earn, and more on how the rationale behind their design compares to the current standards that will soon be applied to new neighborhood developments across the United States and Canada.
the following criteria: a. The community must be an intentional, stand-alone "planned community;" in other words, the research will not consider informally-planned existing neighborhoods in already established urban areas (e.g. Boston's North End); b. The development has a significant residential component (at least 25 percent of the land use is classified as residential), so that LEED-ND is appropriately applicable; c. The build-out of the development is completed even if was not ultimately built to the fullest extent of its original plan, construction has essentially ceased and the majority of residents have moved in; d. The development is not participating in the current LEED-ND pilot testing; and e. The development has significant name recognition within the fields of urban planning/design, real estate development, and landscape architecture.

The final criterion is important because professional planners and designers look to wellknown communities as learning tools, using them as case studies and examples. In the absence of a fixed set of instructions or standards on how to design and plan environmentally sustainable communities, these models often illustrate best practices. In a sense, LEED-ND has the potential to supplant these earlier developments as an educational tool and best practice guide, so it is worthwhile to compare the old models to the new especially if the new model is likely to change the course by which environmentally-sensitive planning and design are practiced.
Environmentalism particularly as it pertains to urban planning and design in the
United States has occurred in two waves. The first was in the 1970s, with the advent of Earth
Day and substantial federal environmental regulation; the second, beginning in the mid to late
1990s and continuing to the present day, has been spurred by a renewed and increasing awareness of suburban sprawl, resource scarcity and global warming. Communities emphasizing
"green" design have been developed during both phases. Because each period of environmentalism was driven by somewhat different goals, this thesis's working hypothesis is that the communities designed during each time will also exhibit different environmental priorities, planning strategies and physical design. In order to determine the extent to which
LEED-ND captures a potential range of ideas, the selected developments include two older communities from the first wave of environmentalism (ca 1970s) and one from more recent decades (1990s through the present) after concepts of transit oriented development and smart growth took greater hold.
The following communities were identified. Each description includes an aerial photograph depicting the development in its regional context; site plans are included in the subsequent case study chapters.:
* Location: Twenty-five miles north of Houston, Texas
* Planned and Built: Early 1970s present

Ian McHarg, the celebrated landscape architect and author of Design with Nature, was hired as a consultant for the design of this large master planned community near
Houston. The development used McHarg's then-innovative technique of ecologically sensitive land use suitability planning and incorporated an extensive natural drainage system. It was also the first community to voluntarily prepare an
Environmental Impact Statemeri: (ES)'. Because the total Woodlands development consists of approximately 18,000 acres and is still being built out, only the first phase of development, the Village of Grogan's Mill, is evaluated. Phase One consists of
6,125 dwelling units on approximately 1,800 acres and also most closely adheres to the original design and planning concepts.
The Woodlands is approximately 25 miles north of Houston, Texas.

Phase One of The Woodlands, Grogan's Mill, is oudined.
* Location: Davis, California
* Planned and Built: Mid-1970s Early 1980s
* Widely regarded as one of the first and most successful examples of environmentally sustainable community design, Village Homes consists of 242 single- and multifamily homes with a small commercial center adjacent to the University of California at Davis. The 60-acre development incorporates an extensive open space network, community gardens and orchards, and an open channel drainage system. Homes feature solar orientation and natural cooling systems.

Village Homes, outlined, is just west of downtown Davis, California.

Prairie Crossing, outlined, is approximately 40 miles north of Chicago, Illinois.
* Location: Grayslake, Illinois
* Planned and Built: 1990s present
* Prairie Crossing is a 667-acre "conservation community" with 367 dwelling units, located approximately 40 miles northwest of Chicago. The site plan preserves 70 percent of the land as open space in the form of wetlands, a lake, prairie, and an organic farm. The single family homes are at a relatively low density but incorporate many energy efficient features; higher density homes are being developed close to the transit station that connects the development to downtown Chicago. The final, highest-density phase of Prairie Crossing (called Station Square) is participating in the LEED-ND pilot testing process. However, because this phase only represents a small fraction of the total development and does not include many of the concepts

that popularized the community originally, the development is still being used in this research.
2) Review of LEED-ND rating system (June 2007 Pilot Version) and modification as necessary.
This thesis is not attempting to produce a completely accurate application of the LEED-
ND criteria to the selected cases. As the designers and developers of the communities currently undergoing pilot testing of the standards are no doubt experiencing, evaluating a project along so many specific attributes is challenging and time-consuming. The LEED-ND criteria are very specific, and rightly so. That said, evaluating a project that is not of one's own creation, and with incomplete data, is difficult; evaluating one whose build-out completed more than twenty years ago, demands some sort of compromise.
To accommodate these shortcomings, especially with regard to the two older communities (Woodlands and Village Homes), the LEED-ND standards have been adjusted to create a somewhat modified rating system. Some items on the existing checklist are removed entirely. For example, two of the case studies were built prior to the creation of LEED standards for buildings. To level the playing field, the credit that rewards LEED-certified green buildings is not used for any of the case studies, even though the most recently developed might be able to address it. For others items, the criteria by which one establishes whether the development earns credit have been adjusted. This was particularly common for items in the
"Green Construction and Technology" section, in which the designers of the older communities were clearly attempting to achieve the same result that the LEED-ND is promoting, but the specific methods required for earning the credit cannot be applied, or did not exist at the time of construction.
The LEED-ND rating system is broken into several categories: "Smart Location &
Linkage," addressing site selection and connectivity to the region; "Neighborhood Pattern &
Design," addressing the physical design and planning elements of the site itself; and "Green
Construction & Technology," addressing the extent to which environmentally sustainable techniques were applied in construction, infrastructure, and buildings. Each of these three categories has two to six "prerequisite" credits, with which applicants must comply in order to participate and therefore for which no points are awarded. Because what constitutes a

prerequisite today is as much a value judgment as the inclusion and value of any other credit in the system, for the purposes of this research, the prerequisites are treated as optional credits like any other on the list. The points assigned to the non-prerequisite credits in the original system range from one to ten; the average is two. In order to emphasize the importance of what the
LEED-ND creators have deemed prerequisites, but to also keep them optional and prevent any of the case studies from being "disqualified," each of the prerequisites were assigned a point value of five.
The whole LEED-ND document is too large to be included as an appendix to this thesis. The intention behind most of the credits is easily inferred from the descriptions within the case studies' scoring sections that follow this chapter. However, the prerequisites are what determine a project's ability to participate in the process in the first place, so the specific intents are defined below. Where necessary, part of the requirements are also included (USGBC 2007).
Smart Location & Linkage
* Smart Location: Encourage development within and near existing communities or public transportation infrastructure. Reduce vehicle trips and miles traveled and support walking as a transportation choice (6).
* Proximity to Water and Wastewater Infrastructure: Encourage new development within and near existing communities in order to reduce multiple environmental impacts caused by sprawl. Conserve natural and financial resources required for construction and maintenance of infrastructure (9).
* Imperiled Species and Ecological Communities: Protect imperiled species and ecological communities (11).
* Wetland and Water Body Conservation: Conserve water quality, natural hydrology and habitat and preserve biodiversity through conservation of water bodies or wetlands (14).
* Agricultural Land Conservation: Preserve irreplaceable agricultural resources by protecting prime and unique farmland and forest lands from development (17).
* Floodplain Avoidance: Protect life and property, promote open space and habitat conservation, and enhance water quality and natural hydrological systems (20).

Neighborhood Pattern & Design
* Open Community: Promote communities that are physically connected to each other.
Foster community and connectedness beyond the development. Requirements: Designate all streets and sidewalks that are built as part of the project or serving the project directly as available for general public use and not gated (48).
* Compact Community: Conserve land. Promote livability, transportation efficiency, and walkability. Requirements: Build any residential components of the project at an average density of seven or more dwelling units per acre of buildable land available for residential uses; AND Build any non-residential components of the project at an average density of
0.50 FAR or greater per acre of buildable land available for non-residential uses (50).
* Construction Activity Pollution Prevention: Reduce pollution from construction activities by controlling soil erosion, waterway sedimentation and airborne dust generation (92). The prerequisite in this category was not used in this research because of the age of the projects studied.
LEED-ND also includes a final section entitled "Innovation and Design Process" that allows applicants to self-award points for what they perceive to be innovations in their own designs that go above and beyond the requirements set by the rating system. A total offive points, for five distinct innovations, are possible. A sixth point is available in this category for having at least one LEED Accredited Professional (or similarly credentialed professional by the
NRDC or CNU) as a principal member of the project design team. In order to minimize subjectivity, and because the LEED Accredited Professional program did not exist prior to this decade, none of this final category is used in this research.
The original and modified checklists are included at the end of this chapter.
3) Application of LEED-ND to each of the case studies.
For the two older communities, most of the information necessary for evaluation was accessible through documentation of the original plans, and through published academic and professional case study research. Of particular pertinence to The Woodlands and Village

Homes, the communities were evaluated based on the data and plans from their original design and development, as opposed to how they stand today. For example, the LEED-ND rating system inquires about site location with respect to surrounding land uses; what may have been a farm adjacent to the site in the 1970s could now be a residential subdivision. The original planners and developers could not control adjacent property, so the community will be evaluated according to the original intent. This also means that renovations that may have made individual homes more or less energy efficient were also not considered. Again, the focus here is on original intent and implementation, rather than the post-occupancy adjustments made over the years since the project's inception.
Based on the modified version of the LEED-ND checklist, the points earned by each community were added and a "score" established. Each line item in the rating system is given a point value that the development can achieve, and the final score is calculated as a percentage of the total points possible. More importantly than the final score, however, were the patterns of success or failure, particularly in the older communities, with particular attention given to where
LEED-ND has weighted its points more heavily or established a prerequisite. LEED-ND does not give all items equal weight in points, making clear what elements the creators of the system decided were more important than others. Therefore, it is quite possible that a development's score possibly making the difference between "passing" and "failing" or certification level achieved would change if it were recalculated based on a different weighting scheme, or an even distribution of points across categories to remove the creators' biases. Thus the final step taken in the process was re-scoring the communities based on essentially unweighted point values given to all items in the checklist: two points were given to each prerequisite, and one point given to all other credits.
The June 2007 Pilot Version of the LEED-ND rating system used in this study allows applicants to earn a total of 106 points, and certification levels are determined by point range.
The total points possible under the modified system used in this research is 129, after five points were assigned to each prerequisite and certain credits were removed. The total points possible under the "unweighted" scheme was 55. In order to compare certification levels across the

original and modified systems, the original certification point ranges were translated to percentages:
Certified 40 - 49 points
Silver
Gold
Platinum
50 - 59 points
60 - 79 points
80 - 106 points
38% - 46%
47% - 56%
57% - 75%
76% - 100%

(USGBC 2007, 4)
Smart Location & Linkage
Prereq 1 Smart Location
Prereq 2 Proximity to Water and Wastewater Infrastructure
Prereq3 Imperiled Species and Ecological Communities
Prereq 4 Wetland and Water Body Conservation
Prereq 5 Agricultural Land Conservation
Prereq 6
Floodplain Avoidance
Credit 1 Brownfield Redevelopment
Credit 2 High Priority Brownfields Redevelopment
Credit 3 Preferred Locations
Credit 4 Reduced Automobile Dependence
Credit 5 Bicycle Network
Credit 6 Housing and Jobs Proximity
Credit 7
School Proximity
Credit 8 Steep Slope Protection
Credit 9 Site Design for Habitat or Wetlands Conservation
Credit 10 Restoration of Habitat or Wetlands
Credit 11 Conservation Management of Habitat or Wetlands
Prereq 1 Open Community
Prereq 2 Compact Development
Credit 1 Compact Development
Credit 2 Diversity of Uses
Credit 3 Diversity of Housing Types
Credit 4 Affordable Rental Housing
Credit 5 Affordable For-Sale Housing
Credit 6 Reduced Parking Footprint
Credit 7Walkable Streets
Credit 8 Street Network
Credit 9 Transit Facilities
Credit 10 Transportation Demand Management
Credit 11Access to Surrounding Vicinity
Credit 12Access to Public Spaces
Credit 13Access to Active Public Spaces
Credit 14 Universal Accessibility
Credit 15 Community Outreach and Involvement
Credit 16Local Food Production
Prereq 1 Construction Activity Pollution Prevention
Credit 1 Certified Green Buildings
Credit 2 Energy Efficiency in Buildings
Credit 3 Reduced Water Use
Credit 4 Building Reuse and Adaptive Reuse
Credit 5 Reuse of Historic Buildings
Required
1
3
1
2
1
2-10
1-8
1
1
1
1
Required
Required
Required
Required
Required
Required
Required
Required
1-3
1-3
1-3
1-2

(USGBC 2007, 5)
Credit 6 Minimize Site Disturbance through Site Design
Credit 7 Minimize Site Disturbance during Construction
Credit 8 Contaminant Reduction in Brownfields Remediation
Credit 9 Stormwater Management
Credit 10 Heat Island Reduction
Credit 11 Solar Orientation
Credit 12 On-Site Energy Generation
Credit 13 On-Site Renewable Energy Sources
Credit 14 District Heating and Cooling
Credit 15 Infrastructure Energy Efficiency
Credit 16Wastewater Management
Credit 17Recycled Content in Infrastructure
Credit 18 Construction Waste Management
Credit 19 Comprehensive Waste Management
Credit 20 Light Pollution Reduction
Innovation & Design Process 6 Possible Points
Credit 1 Innovation in Design
Credit 2 LEED Accredited Professional
Project Totals 106 Possible Points
Certification Levels:
Certified 40-49 points
Silver 50-59 points
Gold 60-79 points
Platinum 80-106 points
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1-5
1
1
1
1
1
1-5
1

LEED-ND Points Used? Adjusted Points Unweighted Points
Prereq 1 Smart Location
Prereq 2 Proximity to Water and Wastewater Infrastructure
Prereq 3 Imperiled Species and Ecological Communities
Prereq 4 Wetland and Water Body Conservation
Prereq 5 Farmland Conservation
Prereq 6 Floodplain Avoidance
Credit 1 Brownfield Redevelopment
Credit 2 High Priority Brownfields Redevelopment
Credit 3 Preferred Location
Credit 4 Reduced Automobile Dependence
Credit 5 Bicycle Network
Credit 6 Housing and Jobs Proximity
Credit 7 School Proximity
Credit 8 Steep Slope Protection
Credit 9 Site Design for Habitat or Wetlands Conservation
Credit 10 Restoration of Habitat or Wetlands
Credit 11 Conservation Management of Habitat or Wetlands
Total
1
1
1
1
1
10
8
1
3
Required
Required
Required
Required
Required
Required
2
1 yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes
1
60
1
1
1
1
10
8
1
3
2
1
5
5
5
5
5
5
1
1
1
1
1
1
2
1
1
1
23
1
1
2
2
2
2
2
Prereq 1 Open Community
Prereq 2 Compact Development
Credit 1 Compact Development
Credit 2 Diversity of Uses
Credit 3 Diversity of Housing Types
Credit 4 Affordable Rental Housing
Credit 5 Affordable For-Sale Housing
Credit 6 Reduced Parking Footprint
Credit 7 Walkable Streets
Credit 8 Street Network
Credit 9 Transit Facilities
Credit 10 Transportation Demand Management
Credit 11 Access to Surrounding Vicinity
Credit 12 Access to Public Spaces
Crrcdit 13 A__ae In ArAtiv P.hli
Required
Required
7
4
3
2
2
2
8
2
1
2
1
1
1 yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes
2
2
4
3
2
8
5
5
7
2
1
2
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
11
1
1
1
2
2
1
Total
I ye I
47
'II
18
'I

Green Costucio &Technolog 1 PotI p,
Credit 2 IEnergy Efficiency in Buildings
Credit3 Reduced Water Use
Credit 4 Building Reuse and Adaptive Reuse
Credit 5 Reuse of Historic Buildings
Credit 6 Minimize Site Disturbance through Site Design
I I
J
Credit 8 Contaminant Reduction in Brownfields Remediation
Credit 9 Stormwater Management
Credit 10 Heat Island Reduction
Credit 11 Solar Orientation
Credit 12 On-Site Energy Generation
Credit 13 On-Site Renewable Energy Sources
Credit 14 District Heating & Cooling
ICredit 16 Wastewater
Management
I I
1
1
3
I I
2 yes yes yes yes
|
I I
1
1
1
1
1
5
1
SI
I I yes yes yes yes yes yes yes
I I
I I
| |
1
5
1
1
1
1
1
I l
1
1
I1
3
2
...
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
I
1
1
1
1
Total
Inniovaiorn•g •l6=.ii Process Points pointsipossib le
22 13
Total
Orignal System -- Certified: 40-49 points, Silver: 50-59 points, Gold: 60-79 points, Platinum: 80-106 points
Modified System-- Certified: 38%-46%, Silver: 47%-56%, Gold: 57%-75%, Platinum: 76%-100%
0

45

The first phase of The Woodlands, located 25 miles north of Houston, Texas, opened in
1974. The overall 18,000 acre development is one of the largest and best known American
"new towns," the product of a planning and development movement prominent in the 1960s and 1970s. The Woodlands' developer, George Mitchell, was an oil and gas magnate who decided to diversify his energy company through real estate. He also had a personal interest in the state of urban development in the Houston area. Mitchell began to acquire large tracts of land mostly undeveloped property belonging to timber companies in the late 1960s, visualizing a self-sufficient, racially and economically diverse new community that would not add to the stresses that central Houston faced.
Mitchell decided to take advantage Title VII of the new Housing and Urban
Development Act of 1970 created federal government loan guarantees of up to $50 million for new town development. In order to qualify for the loans, the new towns had to incorporate certain social goals, specifically regarding affordable housing, job creation, and affirmative action.
Environmental goals were not part of the Act (Galatas and Barlow 2004). Not only was The
Woodlands the only new town under the program not to default on its loans, but its innovations in environmental planning were adopted by HUD and used as directives for other towns in the program.
Ian McHarg, the celebrated landscape architect and author of Design with Nature, was hired as a consultant for the design of this large master planned community. His firm, Wallace
McHarg Roberts and Todd (WMRT) used McHarg's then-innovative technique of ecologically sensitive land use planning through site analysis and layering of data pertaining to land conditions. Given the size of the development, the thoroughness with which WMRT approached the ecological site planning process is commendable. Mitchell's land presented numerous challenges, including poorly draining soils, lack of topography, and presence of floodplains, thus McHarg's work on The Woodlands is best known for his use of hydrology and natural drainage as the primary structuring element around which all other elements of the development were sited (WMRT 1974).

r" - "~~
I·1~ ,i: s-nu~~
C·.:i:
Th WOOLANC DEVEOMN CORPORATION
LLUSTRAT1VE MASTER PLAN
-
8
WMRT Illustrative Site Plan, 1973. Source: Morgan and King 1987
The Woodlands continues build-out to this day. While the large office complexes and shopping centers are more immediately visible, the designers' "behind the scenes" work represents some of the most comprehensive environmental planning work done for a development of this scale.
Because the total Woodlands development consists of approximately 18,000 acres and is still being built out, only the first phase of development, only the Village of Grogan's Mill, will be evaluated for this research. Phase I also most closely adheres to McHarg's original design and planning concepts. Many of the techniques WMRT used at The Woodlands have not been widely adopted; in fact, some of the firm's basic design principles were not followed in the development's later phases. However, The Woodlands is still an informative and worthwhile

case study, as Ann Forsyth, who has researched the development extensively, says: "With 40 years of history behind them, developments like The Woodlands can tell us a lot. They show us how hard it is to implement sustainable development practices. And they show us what tradeoffs are needed in the case of the Woodlands, a tradeoff that pitted water quality against energy efficiency" (2003, 10).
More than the other two communities investigated here, The Woodlands highlights the conflict that often exists between the physical manifestations of different environmental objectives. For example, planning primarily around an extensive natural stormwater drainage system tends to produce a lower density of development, thus leading to higher transportation and energy costs. On the other hand, designing a walkable, higher density urban form runs the risk of minimizing the ecological functioning of the site by creating more impervious surfaces and disconnected open spaces that have little habitat value. By valuing and planning around hydrology more than any other factor, The Woodlands fails the "density test" that New
Urbanists would apply (Forsyth 2005, 226 and 257). This is also a tension that plays out in
LEED-ND, particularly through the point values that are assigned to the various credits.
The Woodlands performs well on the prerequisites, particularly those in the Smart
Location & Linkage category a result that might come as a surprise for a community located on a greenfield site 25 miles north of Houston with no regional public transportation access.
The first prerequisite, Smart Location, intends to "encourage development within and near existing communities or public transportation infrastructure" (USGBC 2007, 6). A community achieves this credit automatically by being located on an infill site; for those not on infill, other options are available. Close proximity (a quarter to half a mile walk) to at least four to six diverse, non-residential uses will qualify, as will similarly proximal location near existing or planned public transit. The "diverse uses" are listed in an appendix in the LEED-ND standards.
Grogan's Mill does not precisely fulfill these criteria, in that the diverse uses were built as part of the project, rather than being preexisting. The transit, in the form of commuter buses to
Houston, was also initiated after construction. The ultimate intention behind The Woodlands

was to make a self-sufficient new community, that included non-residential uses ranging from a schools and a country club to industrial space. These uses are not all as "walkable" as the
LEED-ND standards would require, but the mixed use and transportation planning initially involved are still deserving of four out of the five points available under the modified ranking system.
Grogan's Mill receives full credit for the second prerequisite, Proximity to Water and
Wastewater Infrastructure. This is another credit in which it is easiest to qualify by locating on an infill site, where presumably water infrastructure would already be in place. For greenfield sites, the developer must provide new infrastructure for the project, and the site must be located in a legally adopted service area. In the case of The Woodlands, six wells were drilled to service
Grogan's Mill, and an additional 33 were ultimately drilled for the entire community. A municipal utility district was created for The Woodlands, financed by state bonds and voted upon by the citizens (Morgan and King 1987).
The next two prerequisites for Smart Location & Linkage address ecology, which is a strong point of The Woodlands. WMRT's incredibly thorough analysis and ecological inventory was unprecedented for a new community of this size and scale. For the Imperiled
Species and Ecological Communities credit, LEED-ND requires compliance with a Habitat
Conservation Plan (HCP), an Endangered Species Act program that postdates phase one of The
Woodlands' planning and construction. Even in the absence of this policy, McHarg's team performed a detailed inventory of habitat, soil type, species and vegetation and used this to inform their land use decision-making. This site planning method also earns the community full credit for the Wetlands and Water Body Conservation credit, which restricts the percentage of on-site wetland and water body impacts based on street grid density of the project. The site's hydrologic system formed the foundation of the WMRT plan. Rather than damaging wetlands to develop buildings, structures were restricted to drier land that could tolerate the impact, and wetlands conservation was maximized for their natural draining capabilities (WMRT 1974).
The site planning process for Grogan's Mill began with the delineation and separation of natural drainage areas, which by definition include any wetlands. The soil on The Woodlands site is so poorly draining that it would not have been appropriate for agriculture; therefore, the development also earns the Agricultural Land Conservation prerequisite simply by virtue of not having any agricultural land to preserve.

i,
It11 IMPERMEABLE SOIL
N SLOPE LESS THAN 1% ON IMPERMEAL.E
SOIL. TO BE DEVELOPED BY COVERAdGE
CLEARANCE PERCENTAGES ON CHART.
/ PERMEABLE SOILS OR SLOPES GREATER
THAN 1%.TO DEVELOPED ACCORDING
TO COVERAGE/CLEARANCE PERCENTAGES
ON CHART.)
Natural Drainage plus Soils plus Vegetation plus
WMRT's land analysis methodology layered attributes like modern GIS. Source: WMRT 1974
The final Smart Location & Linkage prerequisite is Floodplain Avoidance. One third of the whole Woodlands site is in the 100 year flood plain of Panther, Bear, and Spring Creeks
(WMRT 1974). Only Spring Creek and its associated floodplain are located in Phase One.
Part of the golf course infringed on the floodplain, and additional swales were required to steer flow away from adjacent development, but no actual structures were sited in the floodplain
(WMRT 1973b).
There are two prerequisites for the Neighborhood Pattern & Design category, the first of which is for ensuring that the development is an "open community," in that it is fully accessible to the public and not gated. Some later phases of The Woodlands include high end developments that are gated, but according to The Woodlands sales center, this is not the case in Grogan's Mill. The second prerequisite is for Compact Development, requiring a net

residential density of at least seven dwelling units per acre. Net residential density at Grogan's
Mill is approximately four dwelling units per acre; gross residential density is just 1.5; therefore the project cannot get credit for this prerequisite (WMRT 1973b; Forsyth 2005). Failure to qualify for this or any of the prerequisites according to the actual LEED-ND system would preclude the development from being able to participate at all.
While there is one prerequisite under the Green Construction & Technology category,
Construction Activity Pollution Prevention, it is not being utilized in the modified rating system used here because of the difficulty in finding documentation of these practices for the older case studies.
While a greenfield development 25 miles outside of Houston may not seem as though it would score highly on LEED-ND's smart growth-oriented Smart Location & Linkage section.
However, The Woodlands scores better than either of the other case studies in this category, and higher in this category than it does in either Neighborhood Pattern & Design or Green
Construction & Technology.
The bulk of The Woodlands' strength in this category is due to the points garnered from the prerequisites. Moving on to the regular credits, it does not receive any points for either of the brownfields items. The land was primarily used for logging prior to development, so it was not in a pristine state, but there is no indication of contamination (Morgan and King 1987).
The biggest loss for The Woodlands is in the ten-point Preferred Locations credit. The intent of this credit is to "encourage development within existing communities and developed places to reduce multiple environmental harms associated with sprawl" (USGBC et al 2007, 27), and it examines both site selection and street grid density. The Woodlands' site was a greenfield surrounded by more greenfield in a relatively rural area, thus disqualifying it from earning any points under this credit.
Up to eight points are available in the next credit for Reduced Automobile Dependence.
No public transportation system was in place when The Woodlands was first built. The developers were quite concerned with transportation options at the time not because of global warming or other environmental concerns, as we are now, but because the OPEC oil crisis threatened to make gasoline too expensive for people to commute to Houston. A vanpool

ridesharing program was initiated very early on to address the problem. Larger fifty-person buses operated by the Brazos Transit Authority based out of park-and-ride lots soon replaced the vans, and these are still heavily utilized today (Galatas and Barlow 2004). While fifty percent of dwelling units in Grogan's Mill are not within a quarter mile walk from the service, as the
LEED-ND credit would require, this effort was innovative for the time, and it is probably still worth one point as the difference of driving to a park-and-ride lot instead of all the way to
Houston is considerable.
Several credits address connectivity to jobs and community assets in and around the community. Grogan's Mill does have ample provisions for connectivity for non-motorized travel, earning the neighborhood one point for the Bicycle Network credit. A comprehensive multi-use path system weaves behind the houses and connects to the Commercial Leisure
Center, the primary non-residential use area of the neighborhood (Forsyth 2005). The paths are approximately six feet wide and accommodate both pedestrians and cyclists. Originally as well as today, these paths were used primarily for exercise and recreation rather than for destinationoriented transportation. Most Woodlands residents worked in Houston, and the community would not have earned the credit for Housing/Jobs Proximity at the time of its initial development. Even though a substantial commercial, office, and industrial component was included in The Woodlands general plan for the longer term, the economic downturn in the late
1970s and early 1980s made for long vacancies and slow absorptions. The employment centers that exist now are largely on the periphery, generally not within a half-mile walk of the existing dwelling units. One point can be earned for School Proximity, however. Two schools were built as part of Phase One (WMRT 1973b); now two elementary schools and two junior high schools are on the site.

-~~- -
Moad plus Cowurs plus Community Feailtli and Pathways
An iteration of the Grogan's Mill site plan shows how community facilities are sited amidst the natural drainage system. Source: WMRT 1973b.
The remaining credits in the Smart Location & Linkage category address ecological aspects of site selection and planning, an area for which The Woodlands is best known. The site automatically earns a point for the Steep Slope Protection credit by virtue of the fact that there are no steep (greater than 15 percent) slopes on the site. On the contrary, the site is quite flat and poorly drained. The site also earns a point for the Site Design for Habitat or Wetlands
Conservation. McHarg and his team recognized that the site's natural constraints flatness, unusually poorly draining soils, streams with high peak flows and broad floodplains made the hydrological system the primary design concern (WMRT 1974). Site design for wetlands conservation and water quality maintenance was McHarg's guiding principle, and land use decisions were based directly on what the landscape was capable of tolerating while still maintaining this important natural system. The Woodlands does not, however, get a point

under LEED-ND for the Restoration of Habitat or Wetlands. The site qualifies as a greenfield, and despite being utilized for lumber, the natural wetland systems remained more or less intact.
While The Woodlands does not have a formal management plan for its wetlands of the type described by the LEED-ND standards in the last credit, Conservation Management of Habitat or Wetlands, many of the site planning practices that contribute to maintaining the hydrologic functioning of the site (such as minimizing ground and lot clearance) are written into the community's covenants (Forsyth 2003). In spite of some residents' complaints about the unusual and unkempt-looking physical manifestations of this type of design, the developers remained largely committed to McHarg's ecological planning methods over the years, thus deserving one point under this credit.
The planning and design teams' decision to prioritize ecology and hydrology over density severely impacted The Woodlands' performance in the Neighborhood Pattern & Design category. Beyond those directly addressing density, many of the credits here reward a type of urban form that Phase One of The Woodlands just does not embody. While some of the more recent phases of development were designed to be more "walkable," the whole community is still quite car-dependent, and these design changes were done at the expense of some of the ecological planning principles (Forsyth 2005). The original WMRT plan suggested a much higher proportion of higher density homes than was common to the Texas market at the time, a finding which was supported by market research by the Gladstone Group, Mitchell's economic consulting firm (Morgan and King 1987). That said, the residential density, not being high enough to earn points for the prerequisite, is therefore also ineligible for any additional density points under the first credit for Compact Development. The minimum density for getting any extra points here is ten dwelling units per residential acre.
Grogan's Mill can earn one point for the Diversity of Uses credit. Up to four points are available, for neighborhoods with at least 50 percent of dwelling units proximate to ten "diverse uses" (defined by an appendix in the 2007 LEED-ND standards and including uses such as banks, schools, restaurants, and supermarkets). The neighborhood earns one point for having enough dwelling units close enough to two diverse uses schools and a community center (the
Commercial Leisure Center).

Through the credits pertaining to housing types, The LEED-ND standards reflect the current definition ofsustainability as including social equity. The logic behind the credit rewarding a diversity of housing types is that more people of different household types and economic backgrounds would be able to live in a given community. The credit provides a formula by which the housing diversity can be calculated, known as the Simpson Diversity
Index: 1 I (n/N)
2
, where n = the total number of dwellings in a single category (e.g. duplex) and N = the total number of dwellings in all categories (USGBC 2007, 56). In an interesting nod to environmental science, the Simpson Diversity Index was originally developed by ecologists to measure species diversity (Aurbach 2005). Three points are available under this credit; to earn at least one, the project must score at least 0.5 on the Simpson Diversity Index.
(A score of 0.5 can be interpreted as if two dwellings were picked at random, there would be a
50 percent chance that they were different types.) There are 6,125 dwelling units in Grogan's
Mill, and a precise breakdown of all the different dwelling types is not available from The
Woodlands. Morgan and King (1987, 36-37) document the projected housing for-sale housing program for the entire development, which can be used as a rough estimation for Grogan's Mill for the purposes of this credit. Most of these housing types are represented in Phase One, in the form of market rate for-sale units, market rate rental and below market rate rental (Morgan and
King 1987).
Single Family Estate
Single Family
Patio Home
Townhouse
800
6,150
2,600
8,000
4%
31%
13%
40%
1,300 7% Garden Condominiums
Elevator Condominiums
Total
1,000
19,850
5%
100%
As part of the requirements of the Title VII funding from HUD, The Woodlands had to provide substantial affordable housing for low- and moderate-income households. The final

agreement with HUD specified 12.8 percent of total units to be affordable to low-income households, and an additional 14.5 percent for moderate income households. These could be provided through subsidies and inexpensive market units (vague, but plausible given the already low home prices in suburban Houston at the time). If these targets were not met and maintained over time, HUD would require the developer to set aside ten percent of net earnings for an affordable housing fund (Forsyth 2005). While today approximately five percent (1,100) of all dwelling units at The Woodlands are subsidized, the early commitment to providing affordable housing is enough to earn one point each for the Affordable Rental and For-Sale
Housing credits.
The influences of the Congress for the New Urbanism (CNU) are most evident in the
Neighborhood Pattern & Design category, which contains numerous heavily weighted credits relating to dense, street-focused urban form. For the New Urbanists, the street is the centerpiece of the public realm, and they encourage neighborhood design to focus activity there.
This is accomplished through minimal building setbacks, ample sidewalks, narrow streets, activated ground floor spaces, and short blocks. However, it is generally not compatible with the traditional ecological design approach to neighborhood planning, which tends to diffuse street activity to non-sidewalk paths. Thus phase one of The Woodlands takes another big hit on the eight-point Walkable Streets credit. In order to earn any of the eight points available under this credit, five requirements must be met. One of these is the provision of sidewalks on both sides of all streets in the neighborhood (with some exceptions made for extreme topography and other physical constraints). In Grogan's Mill, sidewalks were removed and paths placed between and behind houses to minimize impervious surfaces and facilitate managing stormwater from the roads (Forsyth 2005). There is also a credit for minimizing the parking footprint on site, the purpose of which is to both create a better pedestrian environment and reduce the adverse environmental effects of surface lots. Grogan's Mill cannot fulfill the requirements for this credit because the lots associated with the Commercial Leisure Center are not placed at the side or back of the building. The streets within Grogan's Mill are also too few and far between to earn any points under the Street Network credit. LEED-ND provides an method for calculating the street grid density of a project: the ratio of centerline miles to project square miles (USGBC et al. 2007, 69). One point can be earned for a street grid density of 20-

29, and two points for more than 30. Completing this calculation for Grogan's Mill yields a ratio of nine, too low to earn any points under this credit.
The Neighborhood Pattern & Design category includes two credits pertaining to transportation. The first, Transit Facilities, concerns the comfort and safety of transit stops or stations; the second, Transportation Demand Management, focuses on the implementation of plans to reduce automobile use. Both are worth one point each. The first of the park and ride bus stations was built in Grogan's Mill, at the southern end of the development. According to the service provider's website and The Woodlands information center, the station is well lighted and maintained with a schedule posted, earning one point for the Transit Facilities credit. The
Woodlands earns a point for transportation demand management through the provision of their commuter service to Houston. The program began in phase one with the vanpool service, which was very well utilized due to the concurrent oil crisis (Galatas and Barlow 2004).
Beyond access to the surrounding area through public transportation, the standards also include a credit that measures access to the vicinity through the actual number of through streets that connect the development to its surroundings. In order to earn a point under this credit, there must be at least one through street at the project boundary every 800 feet, with exceptions made for freeways, rivers, and other prohibitive borders. Grogan's Mill is bordered by Interstate 45 on its eastern side, and has some border areas consisting of wetlands or drainage areas, but even on the remaining side the road network does not fulfill this requirement.
The next two credits deal with access to public spaces, both parks, paths, and plazas as well as more "active" spaces (meaning playfields or other recreational facilities). Most of the open space facilities in Grogan's Mill are paths and golf courses, which both count as active public spaces. Therefore, the neighborhood can earn a point for the Access Active Public Spaces credit, but not for the Access to Public Spaces credit because there are not enough parks and plazas in close enough proximity to the residences in order to qualify.
The final credit is for Local Food Production, achieved by explicitly allowing community gardens and farms through the community's CC&Rs, by purchasing Community Supported
Agriculture (CSA) shares for residents, or by providing a farmers' market. Grogan's Mill did not incorporate any of these and does not earn this credit.

After editing the original LEED-ND Green Construction & Technology section to remove credits that are unfeasible for this research, fourteen credits remain, for an unweighted total of 23 points. The credits broadly address energy and water efficiency in buildings, building reuse, site contamination and disturbance, renewable resources, solar aspects, waste management, and stormwater. While The Woodlands is highly regarded for its ecological planning and design, this applied primarily at the landscape and site level; environmental principles did not extend to individual buildings or specific technologies. That said, The
Woodlands only scored points for three credits in this category. Rather than work through the details of every credit in the category, for which the community did not receive points, this section will focus on the credits for which it did: Minimize Site Disturbance through Site
Design, Stormwater Management, and Heat Island Reduction.
Again, the WMRT approach to site planning qualifies The Woodlands for the Minimize
Site Disturbance through Site Design credit. The intention behind this credit is to use good site design to preserve the tree canopy and other aspects of the natural landscape while encouraging compact development (USGBC 2007, 108). For a site of The Woodlands' density, at least 20 percent of the previously undeveloped land on site must be left undisturbed, which Grogan's
Mill achieves (WMRT 1973b).
Due to the natural conditions of the property, managing stormwater on site through natural drainage was one of McHarg's primary goals in site design. In later phases of development, traditional curb and gutter was substituted for open channel drainage system due to residents' complaints about standing water and aesthetics, but in the first phase, McHarg's design was implemented (Forsyth 2005). In their early documentation of The Woodlands ecological design process, WMRT identified seven environmental goals that would guide the general land use planning. The first three were minimum disruption of surface and subsurface hydrology, preservation of the hydrologic environment, and establishment of a natural drainage system (WMRT 1974). Grogan's Mill incorporates such a system on both public and private property throughout the development. Linear street-side swales collect, filter, and drain sheet flow from roads, and small bioretention ponds in backyards collect and manage rainfall on individual lots.

Having such a heavy tree canopy has both positive and negative functioning with regards to solar energy. Most solar techniques aimed at utilizing the sun either actively or passively for heating homes are not effective when structures are nearly completely shaded. The shade does provide passive cooling, however, as well as minimize the urban heat island effect. The heat island effect is a phenomenon whereby urbanized areas are made several degrees warmer than their suburban and rural counterparts due to the amount of dark, nonvegetated surfaces that absorb and retain solar energy. By virtue of its tree canopy, Grogan's Mill qualifies for the
LEED-ND Heat Island Reduction credit, in that at least fifty percent of the non-roof impervious landscape is shaded.
Overall, Grogan's Mill at The Woodlands earned 41 percent of the points possible through the modified version of LEED-ND applied in this research. Thirty-eight percent is the minimum score that a neighborhood can achieve and still qualify as LEED-certified. The neighborhood scored the highest in the Smart Location & Linkage Category, with 58 percent of the points. Again, its high rating in this category is largely due to its fulfillment of the majority of the prerequisites as well as the ecological components of the site design. The development scored only 21 percent for Neighborhood Pattern & Design. The low density of development and nontraditional street and sidewalk pattern constrained Grogan's Mill the most in this category, where the New Urbanist design approach is emphasized heavily. The neighborhood scored only marginally better in Green Construction & Technology, with 30 percent. The site's strongest contribution to this category was its natural stormwater management system, which
LEED-ND also weights heavily. However, the development was not particularly innovative in other forms of technology, even for the time, and thus did not achieve a high score here.
The picture changes somewhat when the LEED-ND point weighting is removed and the scores recalculated based on an even distribution of points across all credits (with the prerequisites still being worth slightly more). The Smart Location & Linkage score jumps to 78 percent, enough to earn LEED Platinum if it were based on this category alone. When ecological factors such as wetlands and habitat conservation are given as much weight as factors pertaining to the development's regional location, Grogan's Mill scores remarkably highly. The recalibration of points in the Neighborhood Pattern & Design category did not have as dramatic

of an effect. The development's score did increase from 21 to 39 percent, but overall, the community's basic urban form is out of synch with the objectives that this section of LEED-ND aims to encourage. In the Green Construction & Technology Section, The Woodlands' score actually decreased, from 30 percent to 21 percent. The community did not receive any points at all for the majority of the credits in this section; where it did earn most of its points was in an area stormwater management that LEED-ND valued highly. When this credit was devalued to match the rest, the neighborhood's score decreased as well.
The first phase of The Woodlands' performance on the LEED-ND standards indicates that in today's planning and design climate, a solely ecological approach to site design is not enough, particularly if ecological objectives such as open space, wetland, and habitat conservation are accomplished at the expense of density and active street life. It is important to remember that the plan for The Woodlands went beyond ecology, however; George Mitchell integrated social and economic aspects of planning from the start, partly as a function of the
Title VII federal funding requirements, but also because he believed that a new town would only be successful if economic development and affordability were taken seriously. Still, the physical form that the first phase of The Woodlands took is ultimately too car-reliant for LEED-ND. In addition, The Woodlands' innovations did not extend to the design and construction of the buildings within it. Certainly, green building technology has advanced since the 1970s, but basic energy conservation methods did exist at the time, and were not incorporated into the development in the way that they were at Village Homes, which was designed and built almost concurrently.

SLL Prereq 1: Smart Location
At least four "diverse uses" are within Phase I (Community center, school, medical office, place of worship) and bike/ped paths link throughout the development. No public transit but ridesharing set up vanpooling since 1974 (out of oil price concerns); then with Brazos Transit
Authority, set up 50-passenger buses (park and ride).
POINTS: 4
SLL Prereq 2: Water/Wastewater Infrastructure
Six wells drilled for Grogan's Mill Village (additional 33 at buildout). Wastewater: municipal utility district created in the Woodlands, developer reimbursed by state, originally paid for by bonds, voted by citizens (Morgan and King 1987).
POINTS: 5
SLL Prereq 3: Imperiled Species and Ecological Communities
No Habitat Conservation Plan (HCP) policy in place when the analysis took place; however,
WMRT's work more thoroughly identifies species and ecological communities and takes them into consideration in placing development (WMRT 1973b).
POINTS: 5
SLL Prereq 4: Wetland and Water Body Conservation
The Woodlands must fulfill the requirements under Option 3 undeveloped sites with wetlands and/or water bodies. The street grid density surrounding the site is less than 10 centerline miles per square miles, therefore the project may not impact more than five percent of onsite wetlands. Stormwater best management practices must be in place in the impacted area. The
WMRT plan delineates natural drainage areas first, which by definition include any wetlands.

These protected areas constitute well over five percent of the site (WMRT 1974, 12-15; 1973b,
65-71).
POINTS: 5
SLL Prereq 5: Agricultural Land Conservation
The heavily wooded site with poorly draining soils was not suitable for agriculture, so no agricultural land needed to be conserved.
POINTS: 5
SLL Prereq 6: Floodplain Avoidance
One third of total Woodlands site is within 100 year floodplains of Panther, Bear, and Spring
Creeks. Spring Creek is located in Phase One, and the only part of development that infringes on its 100 year floodplain is part of the golf course (WMRT 1973b).
POINTS: 5
SLL Credit 1: Brownfields Redevelopment
Brownfields legislation not defined at the time of construction, but it was a greenfield site regardless.
POINTS: 0
SLL Credit 2: High Priority Brownfields Redevelopment
Redundant given above.
POINTS: 0
SLL Credit 3: Preferred Locations
Looks at both adjacency and street grid density, but no points are available if you're not an adjacent, infill, or previously developed site. This place is a greenfield surrounded by much more greenfield.
POINTS: 0

SLL Credit 4: Reduced Auto Dependence
The developers did initiate the vanpool program pretty early on, as well as the park and ride bus system (Galatas and Barlow 2004). The project may be deserving of one point here despite the fact that these services are not quite close enough to as many homes as the LEED-ND standards would require.
POINTS: 1
SLL Credit 5: Bicycle Network
Six miles of pathways within Phase One link neighborhoods to the Commercial Leisure Center and eventually the rest of The Woodlands. Paths are at least 6 feet wide to accommodate bikes and pedestrians (WMRT 1973b). According to the sales representatives, there is also ample bicycle parking at the recreation centers.
POINTS: 1
SLL Credit 6: Housing/Jobs Proximity
Not eligible for any points. There were no pre-project jobs (Option 1) and it is not an infill site
(Option 2).
POINTS: 0
SLL Credit 7: School Proximity
Two elementary schools (Lamar, Hailey) and two junior high (Knox, Wilkerson) within Phase
One.
POINTS: 1
SLL Credit 8: Steep Slope Protection
No pre-project slopes greater than 15 percent, so not a concern.
POINTS: 1

SLL Credit 9: Site Design for Habitat or Wetland Conservation
Again, very comprehensive from this standpoint. Several endangered species were identified, and their habitat requirements were included in the consideration of the size and location of preserved open space (WMRT 1973b).
POINTS: 1
SLL Credit 10: Restoration of Habitat or Wetlands
The project cannot earn any more points here because it is a greenfield site per the LEED-ND definition; the habitat/wetlands were not disturbed prior to the site's development.
POINTS: 0
SLL Credit 11: Conservation Mgmt. of Habitat/Wetlands
This credit asks for a "long-term" (>10 years) management plan for on-site habitat and/or wetlands. McHarg's plan certainly addresses the long term, and the development build-out greatly exceeded 10 years; his principles were carried through, more or less, and worked into covenants for future building. As residents expressed some dissatisfaction with the natural drainage system, this was modified in later phases.
POINTS: 1
NPD Prereq 1: Open Community
There are some areas in the entire Woodlands that are gated "Country Club" Communities.
The Woodlands Country Club is located in Grogan's Mill Village, but the homes around there are not gated and never have been. Called sales center.
POINTS: 5
NPD Prereq 2: Compact Development
Net residential density at Grogan's Mill is approximately four dwelling units per acre; gross residential density is just 1.5; therefore the project does not meet the requirements for this prerequisite (WMRT 1973b; Forsyth 2005).
POINTS: 0

NPD Credit 1: Compact Development
This credit rewards further dense development at 10 dua and up, and 0.75 FAR and up.
Because the development doesn't meet the density requirements of prerequisite 2, it will not get any additional points here.
POINTS: 0
NPD Credit 2: Diversity of Uses
Fifty percent of dwelling units must be within a half-mile walk of at least two "diverse uses" to earn one point under this credit. Up to four points are available for additional uses. Enough homes are close enough to two uses schools and a community center for the project to earn one point.
POINTS: 1
NPD Credit 3: Diversity of Housing Types
In the absence of a detailed housing program for the 6,125 dwelling units at Grogan's Mill, the original overall projected housing program for The Woodlands can be used as a proxy for this credit. Morgan and King (1987) provide the Gladstone Group's breakdown for the for-sale units:
Housing Type Number of
Units
Percent of Total
Single Family Estate 800 4%
Single Family
Patio Home
Townhouse
Garden Condominiums
6,150
2,600
8,000
1,300
Elevator Condominiums 1,000
Total 19,850
Simpson Diversity Score: 0.71 (3 points)
31%
13%
40%
7%
5%
100%

Grogan's Mill has most of these housing types, particularly the attached units, which were quite popular at the time.
POINTS: 3
NPD Credit 4: Affordable Rental Housing
Credit given because of the Title VII HUD requirement to provide housing affordable to lowand moderate-income households. 12.8 percent for low, 14.5 percent for moderate, spread across rental and for-sale.
POINTS: 1
NPD Credit 5: Affordable For-Sale Housing
Credit given because of the Title VII HUD requirement to provide housing affordable to lowand moderate-income households. 12.8 percent for low, 14.5 percent for moderate, spread across rental and for-sale.
POINTS: 1
NPD Credit 6: Reduced Parking Footprint
The first requirement under this credit is for parking lots associated with multifamily and nonresidential buildings to be located at the side or back of the buildings, leaving the frontages and streetscapes parking-free. The Commercial Leisure Center does not meet this requirement.
POINTS: 0
NPD Credit 7: Walkable Streets
Similar to the two other case studies, there are not sidewalks on both sides of every street because of design for better natural drainage, so therefore the community can't get any points here.
POINTS: 0

NPD Credit 8: Street Network
To earn one point, ratio of street centerline miles to project square miles must be at least 20.
Grogan's Mill has a ratio of about nine, so no points earned.
POINTS: 0
NPD Credit 9: Transit Facilities
One park and ride station was originally constructed within Grogan's Mill, at the south side of the development. The facility is well lighted and maintained (Woodlands Home Sales Center;
District Transportation www.btd.org)
POINTS: 1
NPD Credit 10: Transportation Demand Management
Phase One of The Woodlands began build-out in the mid to late 1970s, amidst growing concern about the price of oil. The vanpooling program developed at this time was well-utilized early on by Grogan's Mill residents (Galatas and Barlow 2004).
POINTS: 1
NPD Credit 11: Access to Surrounding Vicinity
In order to earn the points for this credit, there must be at least one through-street at the project boundary every 800 feet. Exceptions are made for freeways, extreme topography, rivers, etc. The site is bordered to the east by 1-45, but even on the remaining sides, the intersections are greater than 800 feet apart.
POINTS: 0
NPD Credit 12: Access to Public Spaces
While Grogan's Mill contains ample unbuilt areas, the types of spaces are primarily oriented towards active recreation and are not all "parks, green plaza[s] or square[s]" (USGBC 2007,
78). Little League Park: approx 56 ac. While there are several well-sized parks (Tamarac Park:
8.4ac. Sawmill Park: also approx 8.4ac.) not enough homes are close enough to the type of public space that this credit specifies. The next credit deals with "active" public spaces.
POINTS: 0

NPD Credit 13: Access to Active Public Spaces
The golf course, as an outdoor recreation area, counts as "active" space rather than public space.
Most residences also have immediate access to the multi-use path along roads and behind houses, and the Little League park.
POINTS: 1
NPD Credit 14: Universal Accessibility
Not used.
POINTS: 0 - N/A
NPD Credit 15: Community Outreach/Involvement
Not used.
POINTS: 0 - N/A
NPD Credit 16: Local Food Production
Not present in phase one; may be present in later phases.
POINTS: 0
GCT Prereq 1: Construction Activity Pollution Prevention
Not used.
POINTS: 0 - N/A
GCT Credit 1: LEED Certified Green Buildings
Not used. LEED standards did not exist in the 1970s, and other elements of energy efficiency and green building will largely be captured by other credits in this section
POINTS: 0 - N/A
GCT Credit 2: Energy Efficiency in Buildings
The criteria that this credit specifies cannot be applied to The Woodlands, because they utilize standards that were not defined at the time of the project's construction. The homebuilders did

not incorporate any notable energy efficiency techniques into their home construction, so no points are earned under this credit anyway (per email exchange with Forsyth, 2008).
POINTS: 0
GCT Credit 3: Reduced Water Use
Not incorporated into homes or other buildings. (Per email exchange with Forsyth, 2008)
POINTS: 0
GCT Credit 4: Building Reuse and Adaptive Reuse
No existing structures were on the site before development, so no reuse.
POINTS: 0
GCT Credit 5: Reuse of Historic Buildings
No existing historic structures were on the site before development, so no reuse.
POINTS: 0
GCT Credit 6: Minimize Site Disturbance through Site Design
For previously undeveloped sites, the percentage of land to be left undisturbed depends on development density. For The Woodlands, this is 20 percent, which Grogan's Mill achieves
(WMRT 1974).
POINTS: 1
GCT Credit 7: Minimize Site Disturbance through Construction
Not used.
POINTS: 0 - N/A
GCT Credit 8: Contaminant Reduction in Brownfields Remediation
Site was not a brownfield, so no credit here.
POINTS: 0

GCT Credit 9: Stormwater Management
Managing stormwater on site through natural drainage was one of McHarg's primary goals in site design. His original plans were implemented most thoroughly in Phase I. The natural stormwater management system incorporates a system of swales along streets and bordering public amenties throughout Grogan's Mill, and bioretention ponds on both public easements and in backyards (WMRT 1974; 1973b).
POINTS: 5
GCT Credit 10: Heat Island Reduction
This may not conform exactly with the LEED-ND requirements, but the tree canopy is so extensive across the entire development that it effectively reduces the heat island. That should qualify for Option 1 Non-Roof, in which 50 percent of the non-roof impervious landscape is covered in shade. Well over 50 percent of the entire development, roof and non-roof, is shaded by trees.
POINTS: 1
GCT Credit 11: Solar Orientation
At least 75 percent of the homes (along their long axes) must be oriented within 15 degrees of the east-west axis; looks as though less than 50 percent of homes in Grogan's Mill are oriented this way. Even the ones that are so shaded that this would detract from their solar gain as well, which is part of the credit (Forsyth 2003).
POINTS: 0
GCT Credit 12: On-Site Energy Generation
Not present on site.
POINTS: 0
GCT Credit 13: On-Site Renewable Energy Sources
Not present on site.
POINTS: 0

GCT Credit 14: District Heating and Cooling
Not present on site.
POINTS: 0
GCT Credit 15: Infrastructure Energy Efficiency
Not used.
POINTS: 0 - N/A
GCT Credit 16: Wastewater Management
McHarg's design for stormwater management focused on recharging the aquifer; water was not captured with the purpose of replacing potable water. The sewage system is a conventional one; the plan originally considered using the treated effluent to irrigate the golf course and fill the lakes, but this was not implemented (Morgan and King 1987).
POINTS: 0
GCT Credit 17: Recycled Content in Infrastructure
Not used.
POINTS: 0 - N/A
GCT Credit 18: Comprehensive Waste Management
Recycling was not a common practice at the time of Grogan's Mill's construction, and curbside recycling didn't start until 1994 (Forsyth 2005). This credit will not be used because recycling was not practiced in general at the time both The Woodlands' and Village Homes' construction.
POINTS: 0 - N/A
GCT Credit 19: Comprehensive Waste Management
Not used.
POINTS: 0 N/A

GCT Credit 20: Light Pollution Reduction
Not used.
POINTS: 0 - N/A

75

f
Designed, developed, and built by the husband-and-wife team of Michael and Judy
Corbett in the 1970s, Village Homes in Davis, California, is one of the best recognized and studied built examples of environmentally sustainable neighborhood design in the United States.
The neighborhood consists of 242 single- and multi-family homes on 60 acres, linked by bicycle and pedestrian paths and surrounded by resident-maintained gardens and orchards. The development is known not only for its innovative environmental features but also for the sense of community amongst residents that its design has garnered throughout the years. Even in current literature, Village Homes is consistently cited as being an excellent model of innovative green design techniques, particularly in the way that it fosters both environmental quality and a sense of community amongst residents (Arendt 1999; Cooper Marcus 2000). Nyren in Urban Land
(2006): names ten "green urbanist" neighborhoods that are models of how sustainability goes beyond just green buildings. Village Homes is among the list; every other one is from the 1990s onward.
LUI V 1I14.. L uIUICa. OvUL I ildll1i.J L-UJ

Village Homes has been, and remains, a fascinating model for suburban residential development due to its simultaneous ordinariness and its innovations. It is ordinary in its size, scale, and location a 60-acre, predominantly single family home development on the outskirts of a small but thriving city, constructed on and bordered by farmland. A quick glance at an aerial photograph reveals little to distinguish it from its neighbors. This description could apply to a great number of subdivisions being created today all over the United States. Yet within this seemingly standard example of a neighborhood development are remarkable environmental innovations, considered as such at the time of development as well as today solar orientation and water heating, natural drainage, abundant community gardens and orchards, drastically reduced impervious surfaces. Consistently high resale prices (relative to neighboring homes) and abundant praise by planning professionals have borne out the attractiveness of these features over the last three decades, and yet this style of development has gone largely unrepeated
(Corbett 2000). Applying LEED-ND to Village Homes then provides an opportunity to see how these standards compare to the features of a well-respected model of ecological design, as well as how they evaluate a typical American subdivision.
There are several general aspects of LEED-ND that surfaced as somewhat problematic in the Village Homes case study (and that have come up again in the subsequent communities studied in this research). It is worth mentioning these up front before delving into the details of how Village Homes scored on the rating system. First, LEED-ND is somewhat problematic in the way that it appraises neighborhoods built on agricultural land. Many items in the list of credits have different standards for "infill" or "previously developed" projects, defined as follows, versus projects that are built on undeveloped land:
Infill site A site having at least 75% of its perimeter bordering sites that have been
previously developed. For the purposes of this definition, a street or roadway does not constitute previously developed land. Any fraction of the perimeter that borders waterfront will be excluded from the calculation (USGBC et al. 2007, 149).
And

Previously developed Having pre-existing paving, construction, or altered landscapes. This does not apply to altered landscapes resulting from current agricultural use, forestry use, or use as preserved natural area (USGBC et al. 2007, 150).
However, often landscape alterations due to agricultural use are as damaging to the original ecosystem than paving or construction. Agricultural land is often heavily graded and drained of wetlands. Industrial farming can result in soil and water quality degradation due to irrigation and the application of chemical fertilizers and pesticides. When applying the LEED-
ND standards to Village Homes, Prairie Crossing, and other communities developed on agricultural land, one is required to follow the standards for undeveloped sites, when in fact these developments seem to occupy a gray area between raw land and what LEED-ND defines as "previously developed." The standards for "infill" and "previously developed" sites may be more applicable. This is of considerable concern given that converted farmland accounts for a large percentage of the land upon which new suburban neighborhood developments are built.
The subject areas for which this is a particular problem are those addressing habitat and wetlands.
Second, LEED-ND represents a joint effort between the U.S. Green Building Council, the Congress for the New Urbanism, and the Natural Resources Defense Council. While all of these organizations share many fundamental goals and beliefs, they are separate groups with unique missions that could manifest themselves in different approaches to environmentallysustainable neighborhood design. For instance, a dense development with a fine grained street grid, lots of sidewalks, and high FAR may discourage automobile use and its associated energy consumption and emissions; at the same time, such a development is likely to generate high volumes of stormwater runoff and minimize habitat and species diversity. A question throughout this process has been how their disparities might be balanced in the final LEED-ND rating system whose design philosophy will "win"? Running Village Homes through LEED-
ND, particularly the Neighborhood Pattern and Design section, highlights some of these competing interests. Some of the most innovative elements of the Village Homes design, particularly relating to the street and pathway network, actually work against the development in the LEED-ND system, even though many of these design concepts are still widely respected and practiced in ecological planning and design today. In her article, "Looking back at Village
Homes: Has New Urbanism thrown the baby out with the bathwater?" Clare Cooper Marcus

raises similar concerns about the ability of a New Urbanist model to adequately recognize the achievements of ecologically-designed communities. In particular, Cooper Marcus points out the fundamental design difference between the New Urbanists, who view the street as the center of social activity, and the Village Homes approach, which treats the interstitial public open space as the focal areas for community life (2000).
Bearing these general issues in mind, the first consideration in evaluating Village Homes' performance on LEED-ND is the prerequisites. As explained in the methodology, for the purposes of this research, the prerequisites as defined by LEED-ND were not treated as such; rather, they became heavily weighted (five point) optional credits. The purpose of this distinction was so that the communities being used for research would not be automatically disqualified on the basis of a credit deemed mandatory by today's measures. At the same time, special attention is paid to instances in which communities do not earn the "prerequisite" credits, for then it would be clear that a disconnect may exist between the model communities and what is considered by LEED-ND to be a particularly important characteristic.
Village Homes performed marginally well on the "Smart Location & Linkage" prerequisites. The development successfully avoided developing in a floodplain and was located within the City of Davis's water and wastewater service area. However, it is less certain whether
Village Homes' location qualifies as "smart" under the first prerequisite, which requires location on a) an infill site, or b) near existing or planned transit service, or c) within a quarter mile walk of at least four "diverse uses," or d) in a region served by a metropolitan planning organization
(MPO) that has been proven to have fewer vehicle miles traveled than the region as a whole. At the time, the Village Homes site was considered to be infill, despite being agricultural land. The
City of Davis had put a moratorium on construction outside of a certain boundary, and the site was within the allowable area (Corbett 2000). According to the LEED-ND definition, however, the site would not have qualified as infill, as it was not 75 percent surrounded by previously developed land. Similarly, it was not close enough to diverse uses outside of the project boundary. YoloBus, the public transit service for Davis, did not start operating until more than five years after Village Homes' development. Finally, the development predated the contemporary concept of an MPO, although subsequent calculations of vehicle miles traveled

show that residents of Village Homes do drive less than their neighboring counterparts (Local
Government Commission 2008). Thus, at the time of development, the site would probably have been considered a "smart" location given that it was within the allowable growth area of the City of Davis. By LEED-ND's standards, however, it would have been dubious.
Regarding the other prerequisites, the development scored well on wetland and water body conservation (because, treated as a site that had not been previously developed, the wetlands destroyed by farming are considered to be negligible) and agricultural preservation
(from which it would technically be exempt anyway because of the abundance of high quality soil in the Davis area; however, fifty percent of the land on site is still in cultivation). The only
Smart Location & Linkage prerequisite for which no points could be earned was "Imperiled
Species and Ecological Communities." While the community predates the Habitat
Conservation Plan (HCP) policy, it is also true that habitat conservation (or restoration, as the site had been farmland) was not an area of focus for the developers and that this aspect of environmental planning is not emphasized in the literature.
The Neighborhood Pattern & Design category has two prerequisites, "Open
Community," which requires a non-gated development, and "Compact Community," which sets a density benchmark of seven dwelling units per acre of developable land. Village Homes qualifies as an "open community" by not being gated, but the density is more problematic. The net residential density is seven dwelling units per acre, which would meet the standard set for
"Compact Community," except that the prerequisite requires the inclusion of all developable land in the density calculation. Areas such as wetlands or other types of land on which development is prohibited by law are excluded, but the common open space and agricultural land at Village Homes must be included in the calculation. When these areas are added in, the residential density is just four units per acre, not high enough to meet the prerequisite's requirement.
On the remaining credits in the Smart Location & Linkage category, Village Homes earned points on approximately a third. Bicycle Network and School Proximity earned points due to conscious design decisions on the part of the planners. Steep Slope Protection, on the other hand, could be obtained without effort because none of the site has slopes at 15 percent or

greater or even five percent, for that matter. On the credits regarding habitat or wetland, the site is at an unresolved disadvantage due to its location on previously agricultural land, as mentioned above. Regarding wetland conservation in SLL Credit 9, the site cannot be treated as "previously developed" (Option 2) even though the landscape alteration that occurred for farming almost certainly destroyed preexisting wetlands (Corbett 2000). Therefore, having predated the Natural Heritage Program (Option 1), the site must attempt to comply with
Option 3 "for sites with wetlands or and/or water bodies" which of course it no longer has, thanks to the agriculture. Thus the site cannot receive credit for this item. Granted, the predevelopment wetlands on the Village Homes site were not fully restored during development, even though signs of a seasonal creek bed were discovered during construction and natural drainage system was put in place throughout the site, the Corbetts were "not sure that there would have been any advantage to restoring the channel in its original location" (Corbett 2000,
45). Even if the LEED-ND standards would consider a natural drainage system to qualify as wetlands restoration, they require that these areas be placed in a conservation easement to protect them from development, which was not done at Village Homes. One must assume, however, that there would be little desire for future construction on top of the community's stormwater drainage system.
Despite making conscious efforts to achieve the effect desired by the LEED-ND standards, Village Homes does not quite reach the bar set for Reduced Auto Dependence and
Housing and Jobs Proximity. YoloBus, Yolo County's public transit service, did not begin operating until after Village Homes was built, though it now serves the site at its southern border. A calculation of annual Vehicle Miles Traveled (VMT) by the Local Government
Commission finds Village Homes residents' VMT to be approximately 84 percent of those living in the vicinity a notable difference, but not low enough to pass muster for the credit, which requires 80 percent.
The Preferred Locations credit has two parts, both of which must be fulfilled in order to get any points. First, the street grid density of the surrounding land within a one mile radius of the site must equal at least ten centerline miles per square mile. More points are available for higher surrounding street grid densities. Then, at minimum, one side of the site must also be located adjacent to existing development. More points are available if the site is previously developed and/or infill. At the time of Village Homes' construction, some residential

development existed adjacent to the site. However, the street grid density within a one mile radius is only approximately six centerline miles per square mile, because just beyond the neighboring subdivisions which are actually relatively dense the land is agricultural with few roads.
Regarding housing and jobs proximity, Village Homes also comes close, but not close enough. While the UC Davis campus, a major source of jobs in the area, forms the site's southern border, the part of the campus that borders the site is its agricultural property. The real job center is more than half a mile away.
Village Homes' performance in the Neighborhood Pattern and Design category of credits is a similarly mixed bag. As mentioned above, Village Homes meets the criteria for the
Open Community prerequisite, but not the Compact Community prerequisite. The development also earns credit for access to parks, open space, and public places, local food production (one of the development's major defining features), and reduced parking footprint
(whereby no more than 20 percent of the total development footprint may be used for surface parking, and no individual lot may be larger than two acres. )It is also rewarded for its provision of affordable owner-occupied homes. Sixteen percent of the original homes were allocated to low-income migrant workers, who contributed sweat equity towards their down payment
(Corbett 2000). All of these credits are worth one to two points according to LEED-ND.
Through its mixed use community center and proximity to downtown Davis, Village Homes earns two points (out of four possible) for Diversity of Uses.
The same design philosophy that allowed the development to earn credit for the reduced parking footprint precludes it from earning any of the eight points allocated to the Walkable
Streets credit even though the original community design, which planned the path network before the streets, was meant to encourage connectivity and reduce auto travel (Francis 2002).
The combination of narrow, dead end streets without sidewalks and a grid of wide, multi-use paths make walking and biking make traveling on foot or by bicycle much more efficient and pleasant than using a car, while at the same time reducing the amount of impervious paved surface in the development (Corbett 2000). However, to earn any LEED-ND credit for
Walkable Streets, all streets in the development must have continuous sidewalks on both sides

of all streets in the development a clearly New Urbanist design perspective. It is likely that many new neighborhood developments trying to incorporate multi-use paths will encounter similar problems with this heavily weighted item. Village Homes' dead end streets and ring of agricultural land also prevent it from earning the Access to Surrounding Vicinity credit; similarly, its street grid density is not high enough to qualify for credit even though a dense network of multi-use paths facilitates connectivity.
Homes in plan view show the relationship between dwelling units, the street, and the shared green space.
Source: Corbett 2000
Despite the 1970s technology with which the creators of Village Homes were working, the development scores quite well overall in the Green Construction and
Technology category. Granted, the precise methods for evaluation described in LEED-
ND could not all be applied because of technological and regulatory changes (for example, the Energy Star requirement for the Energy Efficiency in Buildings credit), but at the same time, many elements of green construction and design are not technology-dependent, such as solar orientation. Many of the credits in this category pertain to infrastructure features and construction practices, which are too difficult to track down after the fact for such an old development, and are therefore not included in the modified rating system used in this study.
The designers and Village Homes incorporated many energy-efficient features into the individual structures as well as in the design of the neighborhood. The homes included double paned windows, rooftop solar water heaters, excellent sealing and insulation, high-mass building materials, tree shade, earth and light-colored cement tile roofs, and solar orientation. All of these factors earn the development points for the credits for Energy Efficiency in Buildings, Heat
Island Reduction, Solar Orientation, and On-Site Renewable Energy Sources. The design of

Village Homes' natural stormwater drainage system is integrated into the landscape between homes. Source:
Corbett 2000
Village Homes' stormwater management system, featuring low impact swales capable of handling the runoff of its own community as well as that of the communities around it in major storm events, also earns full credit in the rating system.
The development did not earn points for reuse of historical structures or brownfields remediation, as neither of these were present on the site prior to construction. The developers attempted to install a wastewater recycling system that would have reused gray water on site, but this was one deviation from the norm that the local government would not approve. Even today, gray water systems remain very difficult to implement due to local regulations and liability fears. Additionally, while the development did employ rooftop solar water heaters on individual houses, these energy sources were not linked together into a district heating and cooling system.
Village Homes evaluated at the time of initial construction and occupancy scored a total of 53 points out of a possible total of 126 (on the modified rating scheme used for this research), or 41 percent. While earning less than half of the available points might seem to be a dismal performance, this would be enough to qualify the development as LEED Certified (for neighborhoods scoring 38 to 46 percent). The site scored best in the Green Construction &
Technology category, with 59 percent; followed by Smart Location & Linkage, at 43 percent; and worst in Neighborhood Pattern & Design, at 30 percent.
The power of pure physical design accounts for both a portion of the successes in the green building category as well as for the poor scoring in the neighborhood pattern category.
For instance, solar orientation of all streets and houses, as well as a completely natural drainage system throughout the community, weigh heavily in the former category. Regarding neighborhood design, however, the discrepancy is largely due to the conflict between the New

Urbanist design approach and the approach utilized by the Corbetts, which is based heavily upon the early principles of Howard's Garden City ideal, emphasizing shared open space and as the connective tissue of the community instead of roads (Corbett 2000, Francis 2002).
When the credit point values are unweighted, Village Homes' overall score jumps to 56 percent, which corresponds to a LEED Silver rating. The Neighborhood Pattern & Design category sees the greatest increase, from 30 percent to 50 percent. Smart Location & Linkage increases from 43 percent to 57 percent. In both of these categories, the big jump is due to the de-emphasis on the heavily weighted credits on which Village Homes does not score well -
Preferred Location, Reduced Automobile Dependence, Compact Development, and Walkable
Streets. As a result of the unweighting, the Green Construction & Technology score actually decreases, from 59 to 54 percent, because of the minimization of the stormwater management credit.
The method employed in this research of evaluating communities as they existed at the time of original development, places Village Homes at a disadvantage in the first category, which assesses the location and other larger-scale aspects of the development. If the community were evaluated according to how it currently relates to its surroundings, it would undoubtedly do better on the credits that evaluate connectivity, surrounding density, transit access, and proximity to diverse uses. However, there are plenty of new neighborhoods being built today on sites even further removed from urban areas than Village Homes was from downtown Davis in the 1970s, so this is by no means an unfair evaluation. Many of the Corbetts' goals, such as building a community close to services and residents' places of work, are in synch with the rationale behind LEED-ND today.

SLL Prereq 1: Smart Location
In the literature, the Village Homes site was called "infill" at the time of purchase because it was within the boundaries of the city of Davis, and the city had put a moratorium on growth.
However, it was agricultural land and under LEED-ND does not count infill and therefore cannot satisfy Option 1. Option 2 requires "adequate transit service" within the first year of occupancy; Davis transit did not meet this requirement within the time frame. Regarding the option that is based on reduced Vehicle Miles Traveled (VMT) and location in a Metropolitan
Planning Organization (MPO), the development predates these definitions and calculations.
The developers estimate after the fact that residents travel on foot or by bicycle more than average, but this was not established at the time of development. Later data calculates that
VMT for VH residents is 11,300/year, versus 13,400 in the vicinity (LGC 2007).
POINTS: 3
SLL Prereq 2: Water/Wastewater Infrastructure
Project is located within city of Davis's service area. Originally planned on building their own wastewater/graywater recycling system but were forced to do a conventional system because of regulatory barriers (Corbett 2000).
POINTS: 5
SLL Prereq 3: Imperiled Species/Ecological communities
No Habitat Conservation Plan (HCP) concept in place when Village Homes was being planned, and there is no indication that planning for imperiled species was a component of the project rationale or design.
POINTS: 0

SLL Prereq 4: Wetland/Water Conservation
The site's original drainage system was destroyed when the land was leveled for farming. The
Corbetts found signs of an old seasonal streambed on the property, but it was not restored. The drainage channels that now exist were created by grading and conform to the street plan
(Corbett 2000, 44-45). To be on the safe side, we must assume that the site does include wetlands or water bodies (because there is some evidence of these in the past), which means it must conform to Option 3. It does succeed in implementing stormwater management Low
Impact Development (LID) best practices, a requirement in this case, and handles at least 90% of the runoff. Development has not occurred on the site of where the supposed old stream was.
POINTS: 5
SLL Prereq 5: Agricultural Land Conservation
This category does not apply to areas where the majority of the land is prime agricultural soil, which is the case for Davis. The development did convert a tomato farm to residential use, but the developers estimate that 50% of the land is still under cultivation.
POINTS: 5
SLL Prereq 6: Floodplain Avoidance
Per FEMA maps, the site is not in a 100 year floodplain.
POINTS: 5
SLL Credit 1: Brownfields Redevelopment
Brownfields legislation not defined at the time of construction, but it was an agricultural site regardless.
POINTS: 0
SLL Credit 2: High Priority Brownfields Redevelopment
Redundant given above.
POINTS: 0

SLL Credit 3: Preferred Locations
The credit has two requirements: first, the site must be located such that the street grid density within a one mile radius is at least ten centerline miles per square mile, then the site must also be adjacent to existing development on at least one side. More points are available for higher surrounding street grid density, and higher levels of connectivity with the existing urban fabric
(for being an infill and/or previously developed site). There was development on at least one side of the Village Homes site at the time of development, but the surrounding street grid density is too low because of the large amounts of farmland less than a mile from the site.
POINTS: 0
SLL Credit 4: Reduced Auto Dependence
Now, YoloBus serves the site, but it has only been in operation for 25 years (i.e. it started after
Village Homes was built) so the site does not satisfy Option 1. The VMT calculated after the fact by the Local Government Commission (2007) show Village Homes' car usage to be 84 percent of the surrounding vicinity's level, which also doesn't pass the Option 2 80 percent criterion.
POINTS: 0
SLL Credit 5: Bicycle Network
Bicycle trails border nearly all of the homes in the community, providing linkages within the project and to the surrounding area.
POINTS: 1
SLL Credit 6: Housing/Jobs Proximity
Pre-project jobs existed at UC Davis, and while many at Village Homes work there and bike there (Francis 2003), the center of campus is not within a half mile walk. POINTS: 0
SLL Credit 7: School Proximity
Ralph Waldo Emerson Jr. High is 0.25 miles from the center of VH; Patwin Elementary is 0.4
miles.
POINTS: 1

SLL Credit 8: Steep Slope Protection
No pre-project slopes greater than 15 percent.
POINTS: 1
SLL Credit 9: Site Design for Habitat or Wetland Conservation
Native wildlife habitat not addressed. Site as purchased did not really have remaining wetlands or water bodies because of its prior agricultural use, with the exception of the remnants of the seasonal stream. While the stream was not restored to its natural state, the topography was respected and that area is used more extensively for drainage but this is not true "design for wetland conservation."
POINTS: 0
SLL Credit 10: Restoration of Habitat or Wetlands
Like the credit above, pre-development wetlands were not really restored to their original condition, though the drainage has been reconstructed in a "natural" way. Land has not been preserved in a conservation easement or land trust, either it is collectively owned and maintained by the residents.
POINTS: 0
SLL Credit 11: Conservation Management of Habitat/Wetlands
The natural drainage system and open spaces are maintained by the residents, but this is not the type of land nor type of management to which this credit refers.
POINTS: 0
NPD Prereq 1: Open Community
Not a gated community.
POINTS: 5

NPD Prereq 2: Compact Development
Net residential density is seven dwelling units per acre, but LEED-ND requires residential density calculations to include all buildable land. Therefore once the common open space and agricultural areas are included in the calculation, density drops to four dwelling units per acre, which is not high enough to qualify. This is a good example of how making the decision to preserve open space on site could actually disqualify a project from participating in LEED-ND.
POINTS: 0
NPD Credit 1: Compact Development
This credit rewards further dense development at ten dwelling units per acre and up, and 0.75
FAR and up for nonresidential uses. By not reaching the required density in the prerequisite above, Village Homes also cannot gain any additional points for density under this credit.
POINTS: 0
NPD Credit 2: Diversity of Uses
Fifty percent of dwelling units must be within a half-mile walk of at least two "diverse uses."
Through the school(s) and the community center, which at least now houses more than 15 offices and/or small businesses, Village Homes qualifies for at least four uses, worth two points.
POINTS: 2
NPD Credit 3: Diversity of Housing Types
The specific unit size breakdown within each housing type is not available, so the calculation was performed using just the broad housing type categories. According to the basic mix of SFD,
Duplexes, MF, and Cohousing, the Simpson Diversity index is 0.44, which is just shy of the 0.5
required for a point under this credit. However, the dwelling units range from 600 to 3,000 square feet (Francis 2003), so it is highly likely that if the specific numbers of each unit size were available, the calculation would yield 0.5.
POINTS: 1

NPD Credit 4: Affordable Rental Housing
All affordable housing was all owner-occupied (Corbett 2000).
POINTS: 0
NPD Credit 5: Affordable For-Sale Housing
Sixteen percent of original homes went to low-income families, primarily migrant workers who contributed sweat equity towards their down payment (Corbett 2000).
POINTS: 1
NPD Credit 6: Reduced Parking Footprint
Residences front onto pathways. No street parking allowed; instead, parking bays allow for narrower streets than conventionally allowed (Francis 2003). Less than 20 percent of development footprint is devoted to parking.
POINTS: 2
NPD Credit 7: Walkable Streets
The project cannot fulfill the requirements for the first four points because there are not continuous sidewalks on both sides of all the streets. A good example of how a conscious design decision does not mesh with the LEED-ND priorities.
POINTS: 0
At Village Homes, the pedestrian paths are separated from the streets and located on the opposite side of homes. This conscious design choice has environmental and social benefits but does not match New Urbanist ideals. Source: Anne
Whiston Spirn 1990

NPD Credit 8: Street Network
Not counting boundary roads (Arlington Blvd. and Russell Blvd.), street grid density = 16.8
centerline miles per square mile. A project needs a street grid density of at least 20 for a point under this credit, so none are awarded. This is another example of conflicting goals: Village
Homes manages to maintain good circulation even while minimizing pavement through their street layout, but they are penalized for both.
POINTS: 0
NPD Credit 9: Transit Facilities
At the time of development, there was no public transit, so the site cannot get this credit. Now,
YoloBus has a stop adjacent to the site.
POINTS: 0
NPD Credit 10: Transportation Demand Management
Again, at the time of development, no transit served the area. Transportation demand management was mostly addressed through provision of bicycle facilities.
POINTS: 0
NPD Credit 11: Access to Surrounding Vicinity
Dead-end streets along the entire western side of the development prevent it from earning this point. Even along the eastern edge, where there is the best connectivity, intervals range up to over 900 feet.
POINTS: 0
NPD Credit 12: Access to Public Spaces
Parks and public/common space is interspersed throughout the entire development; every house fronts onto a park or public area.
POINTS: 1

NPD Credit 13: Access to Active Public Spaces
The project fulfills Option 2, wherein at least 50 percent of dwelling units and business entrances are located within a quarter mile of multi-use trail and/or bikeway.
POINTS: 1
NPD Credit 14: Universal Accessibility
Not used.
POINTS: 0 - N/A
NPD Credit 15: Community Outreach/Involvement
Not used.
POINTS: 0 - N/A
NPD Credit 16: Local Food Production
Neighborhood farms and gardens are one of Village Homes' most prominent features (Corbett
2000; Francis 2003). The project's CC&Rs do not restrict growing produce.
POINTS: 1
GCT Prereq 1: Construction Activity Pollution Prevention
Not used.
POINTS: 0 - N/A
GCT Credit 1: LEED Certified Green Buildings
Not used.
POINTS: 0 - N/A
GCT Credit 2: Energy Efficiency in Buildings
The homes on the site cannot qualify as EnergyStar, because the development predates establishment of the program and it is not feasible to conduct a whole building energy

simulation. However, energy conservation in homes was an area of focus for the developers homes included double-paned windows, solar water heaters, excellent sealing and insulation, high-mass building materials, tree shade and solar orientation. Certainly progressive for the time.
POINTS: 3
GCT Credit 3: Reduced Water Use
Again, due to age, the site cannot comply with modern standards and it is not feasible to personally test the structures. Water conservation devices were installed with the rooftop solar water heaters (faucet constrictors, pipe insulation, etc.), and estimated household water savings could be up to 25 percent (Corbett 2000; LGC 2007). Landscaping used drought-resistant vegetation (with the exception of the agriculture).
POINTS: 1
GCT Credit 4: Building Reuse and Adaptive Reuse
No indication of building reuse; the site was agricultural land before development.
POINTS: 0
GCT Credit 5: Reuse of Historic Buildings
Redundant given above
POINTS: 0
GCT Credit 6: Minimize Site Disturbance through Site Design
While this credit aims to "preserve existing tree canopy, native vegetation and pervious surfaces while encouraging high density, smart growth communities" (USGBC 2007, 108), it is a little unclear how it should best apply to agricultural land that has been substantially altered from its natural state. Again, the site must follow the requirements under Option 2 for previously undeveloped sites, which stipulates that for the project's density range (< 15 dwelling units per acre), at least 20 percent of the site must remain undisturbed and protected from future development. Village Homes qualifies with 25 percent of the site preserved as community and

public open space (Francis 2003).
POINTS: 1
GCT Credit 7: Minimize Site Disturbance during Construction
Not used.
POINTS: 0 - N/A
GCT Credit 8: Contaminant Reduction in Brownfields Remediation
Site was not a brownfield.
POINTS: 0
GCT Credit 9: Stormwater Management
Village Homes' pioneering use of natural drainage in stormwater management captures and naturally filters over 90 percent of surface runoff on site (Corbett 2000; Francis 2003). Davis has an annual rainfall of around 18"/year.
POINTS: 5
Curb cuts along streets allow stormwater runoff to flow into open drainage swales.
Source: Anne Whiston Spirn 1990

GCT Credit 10: Heat Island Reduction
Used light colored concrete roof tiles on every home; some houses also have earth roofs (Corbett
2000). White concrete tile has an SRI of 90; offwhite concrete tile has an SRI of 92; light beige concrete tile has an SRI of 76 (Lawrence Berkeley
National Laboratory 2008). The credit requires
75 percent of roof surfaces to have an SRI of 78 or greater for low-sloped roofs, and/or green roofs, or a combination.
POINTS: 1
Example of a green roof at Village Home $s.
Source: Anne Whiston Spirn 199 0
GCT Credit 11: Solar Orientation
All homes were built along north/south orientation, with streets running basically east-west. To the extent that there are "blocks," they are definitely wider in the east-west direction. However,
I'm giving them the points here even though the development didn't earn points in NPD
Compact Development credit.
POINTS: 1
GCT Credit 12: On-Site Energy Generation
No on-site energy generation.
POINTS: 0
GCT Credit 13: On-Site Renewable Energy Sources
Homes have rooftop solar water heaters, which can meet 100 percent of homes' hot water needs in summer and 50 percent in winter (Corbett 2000). While they meet thermal power needs rather than electrical, the extent to which they function is deserving of a point.
POINTS: 1

GCT Credit 14: District Heating and Cooling
Not present on site.
POINTS: 0
GCT Credit 15: Infrastructure Energy Efficiency
Not used.
POINTS: 0 - N/A
GCT Credit 16: Wastewater Management
Wastewater recycling program was rejected by the government at the time of development
(Corbett 2000).
POINTS: 0
GCT Credit 17: Recycled Content for Infrastructure
Not used.
POINTS: 0 - N/A
GCT Credit 18: Construction Waste Management
Not used.
POINTS: 0 - N/A
GCT Credit 19: Comprehensive Waste Management
Not used.
POINTS: 0 - N/A
GCT Credit 20: Light Pollution Reduction
Not used.
POINTS: 0 - N/A

100

Prairie Crossing, located in Grayslake, Illinois, is a 667-acre development of single- and multi-family homes on a former corn and soybean farm 40 miles northwest of Chicago. What differentiates Prairie Crossing from its neighboring subdivisions is the extent to which the natural prairie ecosystem has been restored and conserved on the site. The restored prairie grasses and wetlands are an integral part of the natural stormwater management system, and the site contains substantial habitat. Only 20 percent of the property is developed, and 150 acres of the farm continue in operation. The final phase of development is a higher density mixed use component adjacent to two Metra commuter rail stations, creating significant transit orientation beyond what is typical of exurban sites.
Prairie Crossing has become widely regarded as an iconic example of a "conservation community." The term was coined and popularized by Randall Arendt, who originally described it in his 1994 book Rural by Design. Arendt's work builds on the concept of cluster development, a design principle often practiced in early Planned Unit Developments (PUDs), in which homes are grouped together at a higher density than allowed by right and thus preserving more open land around them (Burchell 1972). Prairie Crossing is featured as a case study in the
1999 companion volume, Growing Greener, which goes beyond design concepts and helps communities build provisions for conservation design into their local ordinances. Prairie
Crossing has been the recipient of numerous awards, including Honor Award from the Illinois
Chapter of ASLA in 1994; the Gold Key Award from the Homebuilders Association of Greater
Chicago in 1996; and the Certificate of Recognition from the National Association of
Homebuilders in 1995. The development has also been viewed as an integral part of the revival of neotraditional planning in the Midwest (Knack 1993).
101

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Prairie Crossing site plan shows ample preserved land and clustered development. Source: Kane 2003
A facet of LEED-ND that lowers the rating of developments like Prairie Crossing is the system's tendency to lump habitat and wetland protection into single item, often worth only one point, thus not allowing communities that preserve or enhance both to get double credit. This
102

is not done in the Smart Location & Linkage prerequisites, in which there are two separate line items addressing "Imperiled Species and Ecological Communities" and "Wetland and Water
Body Conservation." However, in the subsequent credits, the two are combined. It is true that in many cases, wetland is habitat, and so perhaps the rationale is that communities should not be able to "double count" for wetland protection.
Prairie Crossing falls prey to many of the same traps that Village Homes encounters in
LEED-ND. It is similarly situated on farmland, whose previous agricultural uses seriously disrupted the original natural systems, although it is farther removed from its urban center of
Chicago than Village Homes is from downtown Davis. Also like Village Homes, efforts at
Prairie Crossing to minimize impervious surfaces, maximize drainage, and provide a real trail network are out of line with the New Urbanist mandates for a tight road network with double sidewalks lining every street. Its size and location could also be described as "typical" -
Midwestern, exurban, predominantly single-family, on farmland. Its accomplishments are made all the more remarkable by the fact that what the designers and developers did could have been done on virtually every neighboring subdivision.
Regarding the LEED-ND prerequisites, Prairie Crossing's exurban location and overall low density would have precluded the development's participation in the program. For the first prerequisite, Smart Location, the site is not infill, and despite being adjacent to one existing and one planned commuter rail station, the low density design of the community is such that the majority of dwelling units are more than a quarter mile walk from the stations. It should be noted at this point that Station Village, the final high density and more transit-oriented phase of
Prairie Crossing, is participating in the LEED-ND Pilot testing program. As its name suggests, the dwelling units in Station Village are clustered around the station and would qualify for this prerequisite; however, this research is analyzing the entire Prairie Crossing development, which is primarily low density single family residential. A development may also qualify for this prerequisite if it is within an area served by a Metropolitan Planning Organization (MPO) whose research has demonstrated lower-than-average projected Vehicle Miles Traveled for the site. The MPO that serves Chicago is in the process of conducting such research for its entire
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service area, but according to the CMAP (Chicago Metropolitan Agency for Planning) website, data for Prairie Crossing's location is not yet available.
However, Prairie Crossing does do well on the remaining prerequisites for Smart
Location & Linkage. The site had some existing water infrastructure due to its previous agricultural use. Additionally, it is incorporated into the Village of Grayslake and is therefore in the village's water and wastewater service area according to the Village of Grayslake website.
The developers also provided additional water and wastewater infrastructure on the site.
Some of the items that were more difficult to evaluate for the older communities (Village
Homes and The Woodlands) are somewhat easier for Prairie Crossing. For instance, the
Habitat Conservation Plan (HCP) policy part of the Endangered Species Act was adopted at the time of Prairie Crossing's development. Prairie Crossing did comply with an HCP for the ecological communities identified (AES 2008). The site also fulfilled the requirements for
Wetland and Water Body Conservation by, unlike at Village Homes, restoring the preagriculture wetlands that had been filled and leveled for farming. Though, like Village Homes,
Prairie Crossing is located in an area in which virtually all the soil is prime for agricultural use. If this is the case, and if the community is adjacent to another development on at least 25 percent of its boundary, the prerequisite does not apply. While the development did convert an existing corn and soybean farm to residential use, 150 acres of the original farm are preserved through a farmland conservation easement (Kane 2003).
The final LEED-ND prerequisites are those in the Neighborhood Pattern & Design category. Prairie Crossing is not gated, so it passes the Open Community test. It is not, however, a Compact Community as LEED-ND defines it in the second prerequisite. Far from the required seven dwelling units per residential acre, the single family area of Prairie Crossing averages 2.4 dwelling units per acre. Even when the higher density condominiums of Station
Village are included, there are too few of them to make up the difference; the total net residential density would be 2.6 dwelling units per acre.
Given the nature of Prairie Crossing's successes and failures on the prerequisites for this category, its performance on the remaining credits pertaining to Smart Location & Linkage is fairly predictable, and its subsequent ranking is considerably affected by the weighting ascribed
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to various credits by the LEED-ND creators. On the four credits that relate to ecological factors wetlands, habitat, slopes Prairie Crossing rates very highly. However, each of these credits is given a point value of one, for a combined point value of four. On the credits that relate more to location and connectivity, the community does less well. These five credits have a combined point value of 23. Given that Prairie Crossing is marketed as a "conservation community" and is located well outside of Chicago, it is set up to do better but then score less
on the former set of credits.
The two credits that do not fall into either category described above are the two pertaining to brownfields. Prairie Crossing was built on farmland and therefore does not receive points for either of these. Moving then to the ten-point Preferred Locations credit, Prairie
Crossing is only eligible for one point, which it earns one for being an "adjacent site" (meaning that at least 25 percent of it borders on previously developed land) that was not previously developed itself. It could earn additional points if the street network surrounding the site were more dense, but because the project is bordered by the prairie preserve and other low density suburbs, this is not the case. The next credit, addressing Reduced Automobile Dependence, expands on the requirements of the first prerequisite for Smart Location. And again, the project's density shortcomings making too many of the homes more than a quarter mile walk from the transit station preclude it from earning any extra points here despite the fact that it is directly served by commuter rail. This is an eight-point credit for which Prairie Crossing cannot earn anything, although compared to many other similarly situated exurban developments, its transit access is well above average.
The community does score one point for its bicycle network. Ten miles of trails on site provide good non-automobile connectivity within the neighborhood, and the trails link to the neighboring Liberty Prairie Reserve and Village of Grayslake trail systems, making it actually feasible to access the town by bicycle (Kingsbury 1995, Terrain.org 2001). Regarding proximity to jobs, Prairie Crossing is ultimately a bedroom community. While the site is very close to neighboring Grayslake, the village is a very small town and not a large source of pre-project jobs.
The Metra commuter rail connects Prairie Crossing to O'Hare Airport and downtown Chicago, where residents are more likely to work. However, these employment destinations are nowhere close enough to the development (a half mile walk) to qualify for the LEED-ND credit. Prairie
Crossing does get a point for the School Proximity Credit, however. The Prairie Crossing
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Charter School, built on site, is an integral part of the developers' guiding principle of "lifelong learning and education" (Prairie Crossing 2008). Located within a half-mile walking distance of
50 percent of homes thus earning the credit the school has an environmental curriculum and has been the site of public environmental educational efforts for the community at large (Kane
2003).
The remaining four credits in the Smart Location & Linkage category address ecology and natural systems, playing to Prairie Crossing's strength in conservation design in that it
"originated from a goal to demonstrate how development can improve the environment"
(Balster, quoted in Kane 2003, 129). First, like every case study examined in this research, the site automatically earns credit for steep slope protection because none of it has a pre-project slope greater than 15 percent. The next credit, Site Design for Habitat or Wetland
Conservation, allows one point to be earned for either habitat or wetland conservation design.
Prairie Crossing accomplishes both, but can only earn one point. The neighboring Liberty
Prairie Reserve is home to thirteen threatened and endangered species, and significant prairie habitat now exists on the site, and these common areas are held and managed by a conservation easement (Kingsbury 1995). The development also restored more than one hundred native plant species that had been eradicated by farming (Spiegler 1996). Once the agricultural drainage tiles were removed, the drainage patterns on the site returned to their original patterns, following the topography and forming significant wetlands. Prairie Crossing was designed to maintain an appropriate buffer around these wetlands, and they are utilized for water quality maintenance, stormwater management, and habitat protection (Kane 2003, Prairie Crossing
2008). These efforts related to design for habitat and wetlands restoration, maintenance, and management also earn the neighborhood one point each for the remaining credits of Restoration of Habitat or Wetlands and Conservation Management of Habitat or Wetlands.
Prairie Crossing's low density of less than three dwelling units per residential acre has already been established as a LEED-ND stumbling block in the prerequisite for this category of credits. Similar to how extra points beyond the prerequisite may be earned for Preferred
Location, a development can earn extra points for density beyond the prerequisite in this category (seven, a big-ticket item), but Prairie Crossing cannot do this. And indeed, the
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project's density has been the source of most of the criticism in professional responses to the development (Kane 2003). Despite actually having higher residential density than its (albeit quite rural) neighbors and being touted as incorporating principles of New Urbanism, it is clear that Prairie Crossing's low density design does it a disservice from the perspective of walkability and urban form. Knack (1993) maintains that density in most of the Midwest remained a hard sell despite growing concerns about housing affordability, at least at the time of Prairie
Crossing's planning; the more recent phases of development adjacent to the Metra stations remedy some of this criticism (Terrain.org 2001). On the other hand, the cluster design of the single family homes do increase density somewhat while at the same time allowing more contiguous land to be preserved as natural open space and habitat (Arendt 1999).
The next set of credits focuses on diversity of land uses, housing types, and income.
The Diversity of Uses credit looks at how many non-residential uses (listed in an appendix of
LEED-ND) are within a half-mile walk of at least 50 percent of dwelling units. Prairie Crossing earns one point for having enough homes close enough to two uses the school and the community center, which houses recreational activities and the neighborhood farmers' market.
The next credit is Diversity of Housing Types, predicated on the intent that a range of housing offerings will enable a wide range of economic and age groups to live in a community. The
Simpson Diversity Index (adapted from Laurance Aurbach's TND Design Rating Standards) is calculated and points awarded based on the value. Prairie Crossing has two housing categories defined by LEED-ND for this credit: "Detached Residential Large (greater than 1200 square feet)" and "Multifamily dwelling in an elevator building, four stories or fewer Large (greater than 750 square feet)." The Simpson Diversity Index yields a score of 0.17; at least 0.5 is required to earn a point for this credit. Prairie Crossing is hampered by the fact that the number of single family homes far outnumbers the number of condominiums.
The affordable housing credits address economic diversity directly. Prairie Crossing cannot earn anything for Credit 4, Affordable Rental Housing, because all of the dwelling units in the neighborhood, including the multifamily units, are for sale and not for rent. For the
Affordable For-Sale Housing credit, none of the single family homes were explicitly sold below market rate even though "economic and racial diversity" is a stated guiding principle on the
Prairie Crossing website. The developers claim that they have tried to keep costs down, and that they hope that the sales of the less expensive condominiums will boost economic diversity
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in the neighborhood, but perhaps in this respect Prairie Crossing is a victim of its own success: largely due to the community design and amenities, the single family homes have been selling at an average of 20 to 30 percent higher than comparable neighboring communities (Kane 2003).
Most of the remaining credits focus on design elements promoted most prominently by the New Urbanists, though many are now becoming widely acknowledged as best practices in design in general. Prairie Crossing earns two points for Credit 6, Reduced Parking Footprint, which improves the pedestrian orientation of a neighborhood and minimizes the negative environmental impacts of surface parking in particular. Parking for all of the single family homes is in garages on private lots, and the condominium buildings each have one story of underground parking. Surface parking for the nonresidential uses is on the side or behind the buildings, and both the multifamily residential and the nonresidential buildings provide bicycle parking as well.
The Walkable Streets credit is one of the highest valued in the rating system, and also one of the most stringent. In order to achieve any of the eight points, five basic criteria must be met. Functional entries to buildings must face public places; at least 30 percent of streets must meet a 1:3 building-height-to-street-width ratio; residential streets (new and existing) must be designed for a maximum speed of 20 mph and nonresidential streets designed for 25 mph; and continuous sidewalks must be provided along both sides of all streets in the project. This last qualification is the most problematic for Prairie Crossing and indeed, for all of the developments examined in this study. When developments integrate a natural drainage system into their design, modifications to the street and sidewalk networks are almost always an important component. Streets are narrowed and sidewalks removed, reduced or separated in order to both facilitate street drainage and minimize impervious surfaces. Prairie Crossing is no exception, having a comprehensive network of multi-use (pedestrian and bicycle) paths adjacent to almost all streets in the neighborhood, and they are made of gravel instead of asphalt (Spiegler
1996). While this design was borne of a conscious ecological principle, it precludes the community from earning any of the eight points allocated to Walkable Streets.
The next credit addresses streets as well, evaluating street grid density. In order to earn points for this credit, the ratio of street centerline miles per square mile in the project must be at least 20. Prairie Crossing's street grid density is 6.45. Projects that place large amounts of land in conservation are put at a disadvantage for this credit, because preserved land generally has few or no roads running through it but still must be included in the calculation; admittedly, Prairie

Crossing's street grid density would be low even without land in conservation due to its low density of development.
The development's two Metra commuter rail stations fulfill the requirements for well maintained and publicized transit facilities, although a transportation demand management program as described in Credit 10 has not been implemented.
Most of the remaining credits in the Neighborhood Pattern & Design category involve access to assets in the surrounding community and on the site. Prairie Crossing's design is fairly insular, due in part to its geography and surroundings, and in part to design decisions. The railroad tracks and Liberty Prairie Reserve border the site to the south and west, and most of the land placed under conservation is along these edges. Along the north and east boundaries, only four roads connect through the property to the surrounding vicinity. These few connections are not enough to earn a point in the credit for Access to Surrounding Vicinity, which requires at least one through street every 800 feet along the project boundary (borders formed by railroads, extreme topography, easements, freeways or similar are exempt). Prairie
Crossing does earn a point each for the next two credits, addressing Access to Public Spaces parks, plazas, or squares and Access to Active Public Spaces other active open space facilities like sports fields. Nearly all homes front on a park, town green, or other public open space, and they are also appropriately close to multi-use trails, tennis courts, and other recreational facilities. The neighborhood also easily fulfills the requirement for having access to locally produced food. Like Village Homes, the working farm and community gardens are some of
Prairie Crossing's most notable features. Residents also have the opportunity to buy into the farm's Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) program (Spiegler 1996, Prairie Crossing
2008).
Unlike at the Woodlands and Village Homes, where the standards had be to interpreted more liberally to account for the developments' predating contemporary technology and regulations, many more of the technologies described in the Green Construction & Technology section could actually apply to Because Prairie Crossing. Even still, a "soft" interpretation of the standards in this category was used in some cases, in order to treat this case study more like the others.
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Up to three points may be awarded in the Energy Efficiency in Buildings credit for homes achieving certain levels of Energy Star ratings. The Station Square condominiums are all built to Energy Star standards, and the single family homes were built to the standards of the
Building America program, which is similar to Energy Star, but operated by the Department of
Energy instead of the EPA. The homes use 50 percent less energy for heating and cooling than comparable homes in the area (U.S Department of Energy 1999). Homes also include faucet aerators and low flow toilets, but it is unclear whether the fixtures meet the requirements specified in LEED-ND.
This category also recognizes the value in building reuse as a means to reduce raw material consumption and impacts of construction. The Byron Colby Barn, present on the site prior to development, was built in 1885. The building was donated to the project, rehabilitated in 1996, and is used as a community center on site. It earns one point for the
Building Reuse and Adaptive Reuse credit, but does not get an additional point for the historic structures credit.
Several credits address disturbances or improvements made to the site in construction.
Prairie Crossing fulfills the requirements for Minimizing Site Disturbance Through Site Design, through its cluster design and noninterference with the majority of previously undeveloped site area. The credit for minimizing site disturbance during construction is not being used because of the difficulties involved in evaluating this for the older communities, and Prairie Crossing does not get points for the brownfields contaminant reduction credit because it was not built on a brownfield.
The credit given the most weight (five points) in this entire category is that for
Stormwater Management an area in which Prairie Crossing has invested heavily. The developers retained Applied Ecological Services, Inc., an ecological consulting and restoration firm, to design and create both the wetlands restoration and the stormwater management system
(of which the wetlands are a crucial part). The system is called the "Stormwater Treatment
Train," alluding to the step-by-step process by which runoff moves through open swales, prairie grasses, wetlands, and finally into Lake Leopold, substantially reducing runoffvolume, rate and pollutant load (AES 2008). The system produces surface runoff volumes that are more than 65 percent less than typical suburban developments, and reduces suspended solids and pollutant load by 85 to 95 percent (Apfelbaum et al. [no date]).
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Prairie Crossing does not fulfill the requirements for the majority of the remaining credits in this category. The Building America home construction does not include provisions for reducing the heat island effect through its roofing, so Prairie Crossing does not earn this credit. The neighborhood's site layout also does not qualify for the Solar Orientation credit, whereby at least 75 percent of the structures must be oriented along the east-west axis. The development has no provisions for increasing the efficiency of the power delivery system (for On-
Site Energy Generation, Credit 12), although it does have one windmill that would qualify as an on-site renewable energy source under Credit 13 (Kane 2003). However, in order to earn a point under this credit, the energy source must produce at least five percent of the project's electrical load, and the windmill only provides power for the irrigation, lights, and computing system for the neighborhood's farm. Prairie Crossing does not have any district heating and cooling, thus not earning a point for the next credit either. For wastewater management, the development has a conventional sanitary system and does not incorporate any graywater recycling. The project does, however, earn points for the final credits for Construction and
Comprehensive Waste Management. The development employed a construction waste recycling program that turned into a comprehensive waste recycling program after construction terminated (Kingsbury 1995). The farm also practices composting.
Prairie Crossing scored a total of 53 points out of a possible 126 (on the modified rating scheme) or 41 percent quite close to Village Homes' score of 57 points (45 percent). Under the current definition of LEED-ND certification levels, Prairie Crossing would qualify as LEED
Certified. The site scored the highest in the Smart Location & Linkage category, with 55 percent; followed by Green Construction & Technology, with 36 percent; and lowest in
Neighborhood Pattern & Design, with 26 percent.
Prairie Crossing's most notable contributions to environmentally sustainable design are related to its cluster design and associated habitat, wetland, and farmland conservation, which does not produce the type of New Urbanist design most amply rewarded by LEED-ND. While the final, higher density phase ascribes more closely to this pattern of design, it makes up such a small portion of the overall site that the requirements for many of the credits cannot be achieved. As discussed earlier in the chapter, Prairie Crossing's achievements in wetland and
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habitat conservation are not fully rewarded due to the LEED-ND standards' tendency to lump these two categories into single credits.
When these two main areas of bias emphasizing New Urbanism and deemphasizing ecology are removed using the "unweighted" scheme, Prairie Crossing makes very notable improvements, adding approximately twenty percentage points in the first two categories. The project scores 74 percent in Smart Location & Linkage; 44 percent in Neighborhood Pattern &
Design, and remains nearly unchanged in Green Construction & Technology with 38 percent.
Clearly, judgment calls must be made in creating and assigning values to a rating system, and often different but equally valid environmental goals manifest themselves in designs that contradict each other. Prairie Crossing serves as an excellent example of the multiple forms that effective ecological design and alternative subdivision plans can take, but end up minimally rewarded by LEED-ND.
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SLL Prereq 1: Smart Location
Not an infill site. The newest phase of development, Station Village, is within a quarter mile walking distance from the existing and planned transit stops, but the rest of the community is not. One point could be awarded for proximity to a transit stop, but not the whole amount.
POINTS: 1
SLL Prereq 2: Water/Wastewater Infrastructure
The site had some water provision originally because of the agriculture. Developers did provide their own water infrastructure, and the site was within the service area of the Village of
Grayslake, according to the town's website.
POINTS: 5
SLL Prereq 3: Imperiled Species/Ecological communities
Prairie Crossing complied with a Habitat Conservation Plan (HCP) to restore habitat for the fish species returned to the lake on site (Terrain.org 2001, AES 2008).
POINTS: 5
SLL Prereq 4: Wetland/Water Conservation
Original drainage system had been destroyed when the land was leveled for farming. Wetlands have been restored on the site and an artificial lake, which aids in site drainage and stormwater retention, was created. Rather than existing wetlands being impacted, damaged ones were restored (Prairie Crossing 2008, AES 2008).
POINTS: 5
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SLL Prereq 5: Agricultural Land Conservation
This category does not apply to areas where the majority of the land is prime agricultural soil, which was also the case for Davis. The development did convert a corn and soybean farm to residential use, but 150 acres of working farm are preserved through an easement (Kane 2003).
POINTS: 5
SLL Prereq 6: Floodplain Avoidance
The only portion of the site that may be within a 100-year floodplain (Zone A, no base flood elevation determined, according to 1997 FEMA data) is where Lake Leopold is located, and development does not infringe on this area.
POINTS: 5
SLL Credit 1: Brownfields Redevelopment
Site was agricultural land.
POINTS: 0
SLL Credit 2: High Priority Brownfields Redevelopment
Redundant given above.
POINTS: 0
SLL Credit 3: Preferred Locations
The project receives one point for being an "adjacent" site, having been built next to some existing development, but it is not infill, nor is the surrounding density high enough to merit any additional points under this credit.
POINTS: 1
SLL Credit 4: Reduced Auto Dependence
Even though the site is adjacent to one existing and one planned transit stop, it does not achieve the requirement that 50 percent or more dwelling units be within a quarter mile walk. Prairie
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Crossing is located within the region served by Chicago's MPO, which according to the website is currently undergoing a travel survey of residents in the region, but it is not yet completed.
POINTS: 0
SLL Credit 5: Bicycle Network
Ten miles of trails link throughout the development to the rest of the Reserve, a school, and the rail station. Once the shops are developed, this will count as more diverse uses that will be accessible by bike. Several other commercial uses are within a three mile radius (restaurant, medical, church, pharmacy, etc.), the bike path on site connects to a regional trail that goes along Harris Road north to the Village of Grayslake and its trails (Kingsbury 1995, Melekian
2006).
POINTS: 1
SLL Credit 6: Housing/Jobs Proximity
The job centers here that residents primarily access here are downtown Chicago and potentially
O'Hare airport. Grayslake is a very small community and would not qualify as a major source of pre-project jobs. Regardless, employment in Grayslake is not a half mile walk from 50 percent of the dwelling units.
POINTS: 0
SLL Credit 7: School Proximity
Prairie Crossing Charter School is on site, within a half mile walk of at least 50 percent of dwelling units.
POINTS: 1
SLL Credit 8: Steep Slope Protection
No pre-project slopes greater than 15 percent.
POINTS: 1
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SLL Credit 9: Site Design for Habitat or Wetland Conservation
Habitat conservation enabled through easements associated with the Liberty Prairie Reserve. If the site were treated as "previously developed" because of its former use as agriculture, Option 2 would apply and native/non-invasive plants were used throughout the landscaping.
POINTS: 1
SLL Credit 10: Restoration of Habitat or Wetlands
Pre-agriculture wetlands were restored, over 100 native plants reintroduced, and local threatened fish species restored to a manmade lake on site. All public space is held in a conservation easement for this purpose (Terrain.org 2001, Dunlap 1999).
POINTS: 1
SLL Credit 11: Conservation Mgmt. of Habitat/Wetlands
All public space is held in a conservation easement in association with the Liberty Prairie
Reserve and the Conservation Fund, who manages this land in cooperation with the Prairie
Crossing Homeowners Association. The developers of Prairie Crossing also employ Michael
Sands, an environmental engineer, as an on-site environmental manager/administrator
(Terrain.org 2001, Spiegler 1996).
POINTS: 1
NPD Prereq 1: Open Community
Not a gated community.
POINTS: 5
NPD Prereq 2: Compact Development
Net residential density of the SFD area is 2.4 dwelling units per acre. Even with the additional
36 condominiums on approximately 5 acres, the new net residential density would only be up to
2.6 dwelling units per acre.
POINTS: 0
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NPD Credit 1: Compact Development
No additional points achievable for compact development because the net residential density, per the credit above, is too low.
POINTS: 0
NPD Credit 2: Diversity of Uses
Fifty percent of dwelling units must be within a half-mile walk of at least two "diverse uses."
Prairie Crossing has the charter school and the community center, which focuses on recreational activities, as well as the farmers' market. Two uses earns one point.
POINTS: 1
NPD Credit 3: Diversity of Housing Types
All single family detached homes are greater than 1,500 SF, so they all fall into one category. If we include the condominiums, that is two housing types, and the project scores a 0.17 according to the Simpson Diversity Index. It needs at least 0.5 to earn one point.
POINTS: 0
NPD Credit 4: Affordable Rental Housing
All housing, including higher density, is owner-occupied.
POINTS: 0
NPD Credit 5: Affordable For-Sale Housing
Affordable owner-occupied housing is not part of the development program.
POINTS: 0
NPD Credit 6: Reduced Parking Footprint
The development is primarily residential with attached garages and no street parking. The small surface lots associated with the school and community center do not make up more than 20 percent of the development footprint. Parking at the multifamily housing is below grade.
Bicycle parking is provided at the multifamily housing as well as the commercial center in the
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newest phase.
POINTS: 2
NPD Credit 7: Walkable Streets
The project cannot fulfill the requirements for the first four points because there are not continuous sidewalks on both sides of all the streets.
POINTS: 0
NPD Credit 8: Street Network
Not counting boundary roads (Casey Rd., Rte. 83, Rte. 45), street grid density = 6.5. Need at least 20 for a point, so none awarded. This is another example of conflicting goals: Like Village
Homes, Prairie Crossing manages to really minimize pavement both through this street scheme as well as through minimized sidewalks, but they are penalized for both. Additionally, this credit seems to be problematic for developments that have a significant conservation element to them, because the roadless conservation areas are still part of the project considered for certification and must be included in the street network calculation.
POINTS: 0
NPD Credit 9: Transit Facilities
The facilities at the Metra stations one existing, one under construction fulfill this requirement. (Kane 2003).
POINTS: 1
NPD Credit 10: Transportation Demand Management
Not implemented.
POINTS: 0
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NPD Credit 11: Access to Surrounding Vicinity
The site is bordered by highways on two sides, which are exempted from this requirement.
However on the remaining sides, there are not through streets every 800 feet or better. It is clear from the design that connectivity to the surroundings was not a priority.
POINTS: 0
NPD Credit 12: Access to Public Spaces
Almost all homes front on prairie, village green or other public space. Those that don't have frontage are certainly within a 1/6 mile of it.
POINTS: 1
NPD Credit 13: Access to Active Public Spaces
Similar to the above credit, almost all homes are immediately proximate to a multi-use trail.
Tennis courts and other recreational activities are also present on site and easily accessed by the majority of households.
POINTS: 1
NPD Credit 14: Universal Accessibility
Not used.
POINTS: 0 - N/A
NPD Credit 15: Community Outreach/Involvement
Not used.
POINTS: 0 - N/A
NPD Credit 16: Local Food Production
Working farm and community gardening is one of the project's most prominent features.
Residents may also participate in a CSA from the farm on site (Prairie Crossing 2008, Spiegler
1996).
POINTS: 1
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GCT Prereq 1: Construction Activity Pollution Prevention
Not used.
POINTS: 0 - N/A
GCT Credit 1: LEED Certified Green Buildings
While the LEED green building standards have been in place during the construction of some phases of PC, and the schools on the site have been designed to LEED standards, out of
"fairness" to the older communities, this credit is not used.
POINTS: 0 - N/A
GCT Credit 2: Energy Efficiency in Buildings
Station Square condominiums achieve highest Energy Star rating. The single family homes are marketed as being using only fifty percent of the energy of comparable surrounding homes, but they were built to the Department of Energy's "Building America" energy efficiency standards, which differ somewhat from Energy Star. Several of the single family homes are Energy Star and have a HERS rating of 90, which individually would be enough to earn three points in this credit (U.S. Department of Energy 1999).
POINTS: 2
GCT Credit 3: Reduced Water Use
Sources mention the use of low-flow toilets and faucet aerators, but precise flow rates are not known.
POINTS: 1
GCT Credit 4: Building Reuse and Adaptive Reuse
Byron Colby Barn was built in 1885, donated to the project, and fully restored in 1996 (Prairie
Crossing 2008).
POINTS: 1
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GCT Credit 5: Reuse of Historic Buildings
No indication that the barn was listed as a historic structure.
POINTS: 0
GCT Credit 6: Minimize Site Disturbance through Site Design
The definition in the guidelines does not treat agricultural land as previously developed, so the site must follow Option 2 for greenfield sites. It qualifies for the one available point, in that the residential density is less than 15 dwelling units per acre and more than 20 percent of the site was left undisturbed.
POINTS: 1
GCT Credit 7: Minimize Site Disturbance during Construction
Not used.
POINTS: 0
GCT Credit 8: Contaminant Reduction in Brownfields Remediation
Site was not a brownfield.
POINTS: 0
GCT Credit 9: Stormwater Management
Grayslake, IL annual precipitation: approximately 35". Prairie Crossing's "Stormwater
Treatment Train" is estimated to produce runoff volumes that are 65% less than comparable typical communities but does not state precisely how many inches of rainfall it absorbs
(Apfelbaum et al. [no date]).
POINTS: 3
GCT Credit 10: Heat Island Reduction
Does not meet requirements for roofing materials or for shading impervious surfaces (U.S.
Department of Energy 1999).
POINTS: 0
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GCT Credit 11: Solar Orientation
At best, 50 percent of homes are oriented with their long sides along the east-west axis; 75 percent must be oriented that way to earn a point.
POINTS: 0
GCT Credit 12: On-Site Energy Generation
No on-site energy generation.
POINTS: 0
GCT Credit 13: On-Site Renewable Energy Sources
PC does have a windmill that produces power for the irrigation, lights, and computers of the farm but this does not constitute 5% of total energy consumption (Kane 2003).
POINTS: 0
GCT Credit 14: District Heating and Cooling
Not present on site.
POINTS: 0
GCT Credit 15: Infrastructure Energy Efficiency
Not used.
POINTS: 0 - N/A
GCT Credit 16: Wastewater Management
Wastewater system is conventional and does not include any graywater recycling.
POINTS: 0
GCT Credit 17: Recycled Content for Infrastructure
Not used.
POINTS: 0 - N/A
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GCT Credit 18: Construction Waste Management
Development had a construction waste recycling program that then turned into comprehensive recycling after construction ended (Kingsbury 1995), but this credit is not used out of fairness to the older developments, built when recycling was not common practice.
POINTS: 0
GCT Credit 19: Comprehensive Waste Management
Development had a construction waste recycling program that then turned into comprehensive recycling after construction ended (Kingsbury 1995). However, the credit is not used for the same reasons as stated in Credit 18.
POINTS: 0
GCT Credit 20: Light Pollution Reduction
Not used.
POINTS: 0 - N/A
123

124

125

126

I
Category
Smart Location and Linkage
(SLL)
Neighborhood
Pattern and
Design (NPD)
Green Const.
and Tech.
(GCT)
I
FThe Woodlands
I
I
BIelow Certified cutoff (< 38% of total points)
LEED Certified (38% 46% of total points)
LEED Silver (47% 56% of total points)
LEED Gold (57% to 75% of total points)
LEED Platinum (76% to 100% of total points)
The table above summarizes the projects' scores in each category and overall, showing both the LEED-ND weighted scoring system and the unweighted scoring system. The colors refer to the level of LEED certification that each score would earn. Interestingly, despite significant differences in the distribution of points across the categories, all three case studies end up with virtually identical final weighted and unweighted scores. According to the regular scoring scheme, they would all qualify as LEED Certified; when the credits are unweighted, all three scores jump to the LEED Silver level. In all three, unweighting the points caused scores to increase in the SLL and NPD categories but decrease in the GCT category (or remain almost unchanged for Prairie Crossing). Specific credits are responsible for these changes all of the case studies scored zero or few points on the credits that LEED-ND values the highest
(Preferred Location and Reduced Automobile Dependence in the SLL category, and Compact
Development and Walkable Streets in NPD) and scored well on the one heavily weighted GCT credit (Stormwater Management) that was then devalued in the unweighted scheme.
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The weakest category for all three cases was Neighborhood Pattern and Design. With the original LEED-ND weighted point values in place, none of the three scored above 38 percent, the cutoff for being LEED Certified. (Of course, the total scores are the only ones that determine a project's level of certification, but it is still a useful way to evaluate the projects' performance in different categories.) The three projects are all in essentially suburban locations where low density development is the norm. Additionally, the design elements that improve the ecology and hydrology of the sites, such as development clustering, open space conservation, and sidewalk removal, are at odds with the New Urbanist-style street systems and public realms that
LEED-ND values highly.
However, it is not the performance in the individual categories that matters; ultimately, the case studies did score enough points to qualify as LEED Certified (albeit on the modified scheme used for this research). This result suggests that even neighborhood developments that do not conform to New Urbanist design principles or incorporate many green construction techniques, for example, can still earn enough points from their strengths to succeed.
What accounts for the outcomes of the case studies' scoring and, given that the communities all "passed" in the end, does it matter? Looking at the principles behind LEED-
ND and these communities' designs can elucidate whether there are philosophical differences in both the approach to design and the prioritization of environmental objectives between the new set of standards and the values espoused by the older models. If there are significant differences, they can help inform future directions that LEED-ND or other standards for green design can take.
The Woodlands, Village Homes, and Prairie Crossing are all very purposefully planned developments; clearly articulated principles, many of which relate to environmental or sustainability objectives, informed their designs. In each case, the principles strongly reflect the time periods in which the developments were conceived and built. The Woodlands and Village
Homes are products of the first wave of environmentalism in the 1960s and 1970s and focus more heavily on ecology and environment, whereas Prairie Crossing reflects the 1990s' more multifaceted definition of sustainability.
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WMRT's key environmental goals of The Woodlands land use plan (1974, 29-30)
1. Minimum disruption of surface and subsurface hydrology
2. Preservation of woodland environment
3. Establishment of natural drainage system
4. Preservation of vegetation noted for species diversity, high quality, stability, and uniqueness
5. Provision of wildlife habitats and corridors
6. Minimize development cost
7. Avoidance of hazards to life and health
(It is important to note as well that other, non-ecological goals guided design decisions at The
Woodlands as well, particularly the affordable housing requirement of the Title VII funding.
However, placement of affordable housing or really any development at all was still predicated on the WMRT land analysis and site planning.)
Design and planning concepts for Village Homes (Corbett 2000, 28-47; Francis 2003, 34):
1. Community
2. Energy Conservation and Use of Solar Energy
3. Walking and Bicycling
4. A Design Closer to Nature
5. Neighborhood Agriculture
6. Natural Drainage
Prairie Crossing's Ten Guiding Principles (Prairie Crossing 2001):
1. Environmental Protection and Enhancement
2. A Healthy Lifestyle
3. A Sense of Place
4. A Sense of Community
5. Economic and Racial Diversity
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6. Convenient and Efficient Transportation
7. Energy Conservation
8. Lifelong Learning and Education
9. Aesthetic Design and High-Quality Construction
10. Economic Viability
The plans' structuring elements also reveal the philosophies behind the design what systems and factors guided the actual physical design, and even the chronological order in which they were considered. At Phase I of the Woodlands, for example, WMRT (1974) describes their structuring elements as beginning with natural drainage, followed by roads, then golf course alignments, and finally location of community facilities and pedestrian circulation. McHarg and his team employed a rigorous land analysis methodology to determine where development was appropriate, categorizing and analyzing the soil, hydrologic, and vegetation conditions on every part of the site and determining the tolerance for a range of intensities of land uses. At Village
Homes, the pedestrian and bike paths were laid out before the roads (Corbett 2000). At Prairie
Crossing, the original plan had houses ringing preserved farmland; this idea was rejected for fear that the farm would inevitably be developed. Instead, the final plan set aside working agricultural land and preserved prairie habitat in conservation easements, and then planned the houses in a more clustered arrangement (Spiegler 1996).
LEED-ND
The LEED-ND standards and rhetoric reflect the contemporary definition of
"sustainability" as being more than just the environment, encompassing economy and equity as well (Berg 2007). The introduction to LEED-ND summarizes their goals as follows:
It is the hope of the partnership that LEED for Neighborhood Development will have a... positive effect in encouraging developers to revitalize existing urban areas, reduce land consumption, reduce automobile dependence, promote pedestrian activity, improve air quality, decrease polluted stormwater runoff, and build more livable, sustainable communities for people of all income levels (2007, 1).
One can cross-check these stated goals with the prerequisites and point values ascribed to the various credits in the rating system. The credits for which projects can earn five or more points are
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* Preferred Location, addressing proximity to other existing development (2-10 points);
* Reduced Auto Dependence (1-8 points);
* Compact Development (1-7 points);
* Walkable Streets (4-8 points); and
* Stormwater Management (1-5 points).
These heavily-weighted points match up fairly well with the goals articulated in the system's introduction, with the exception of the mention of "people of all income levels." While there are several credits that reward provision of affordable housing, they are not heavily weighted.
The prerequisites add another more tacit layer of priorities on top of these stated goals.
These items add in a few more ecological measures (wetland protection, imperiled species protection, floodplain avoidance), reinforce the commitment to density by requiring "compact development" of at least seven dwelling units per acre, and impel pollution prevention during construction activity.
Comparison
The majority of the goals and principles are repeated across projects and LEED-ND.
Interestingly, the only one that all four share is natural drainage and stormwater management.
Four out of The Woodlands' six goals pertain to ecology, but even most of these are mirrored by at least one other project, or by the LEED-ND prerequisites. There are three principles that are shared by at least two case studies but that not by LEED-ND: sense of community, energy conservation, and economic viability/minimize cost. "Sense of community" is, admittedly, hard to measure. The creators of LEED-ND, particularly those representing the
New Urbanists, would probably argue that the design standards in the NPD section essentially create a space that fosters community, but as Clare Cooper Marcus points out, many of the most successful community-building features at Village Homes (such as cul-de-sacs and shared outdoor space between homes) are not encouraged by New Urbanism (2000). Energy conservation could be read as an indirect principle of LEED-ND. Revitalizing existing areas, reducing land consumption, and reducing automobile dependence imply energy conservation as a goal, but it is not stated outright. Energy conservation in homes and buildings is a credit within the LEED-ND standards. Economic viability and minimization of development cost
(albeit slightly different, but within the same category) would also be somewhat difficult for
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LEED-ND to quantify and score. It is also a somewhat trickier issue achieving a quality sustainable design often involves more upfront costs than traditional development, and encouraging cost minimization might send the wrong message.
Vegetation preservation (The Woodlands), neighborhood agriculture (Village Homes), education and quality design (Prairie Crossing) are the few principles that LEED-ND does not mirror at all. LEED-ND also introduces new goals that the older case studies do not mention: revitalize existing areas, reduce land consumption, improve air quality, build compactly, and prevent pollution in construction.
What LEED-ND includes and the case studies leave out particularly the goals related to smart growth are most indicative of a shift in normative planning theory since the earlier years of new community development: one that sees every new development as part of a regional urban system that exists in an environment of scarce resources. Interest in managing growth and reducing automobile dependence grew in tandem with the second wave of environmentalism in the 1990s and growing concern about global warming, an issue that was not salient when The
Woodlands and Village Homes were in development. Whether this general change in the field of planning has left behind elements of design that have proved to be successful in the past is better examined by looking at what these case studies have actually become known for.
While all of these case studies are referred to as being enduring "models" for other planners and designers, for all of these projects' qualities and accomplishments, what aspects of them are actually highlighted and replicated? Perhaps it is more important that LEED-ND captures and rewards the aspects of the projects that are commonly recognized by the professional community, paying less heed to the stated principles behind their design that may or may not have actually materialized in the projects' implementation.
What seems to make these communities models is that they are actually implemented successfully, and that the environmental elements to their designs, which often required longfought battles with local approval agencies, provide real benefits to residents and add significant value for the developer. This is precisely what LEED-ND promises to do for developers of today.
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Village Homes is consistently described as "pioneering" and as exemplifying a commitment to creating community, which can be overlooked in sustainable design today
(Nyren 2006). At the same time, it exhibits good environmental design, with 40 percent open space, a natural drainage system, and agricultural land. Clare Cooper Marcus in Landscape
Architecture (2000) states that some of the features that make Village Homes so popular are eschewed by New Urbanism cul-de-sacs, shared green space between homes (instead of alleys and public parks bounded by streets). Arendt (1999, 112-114) also cites Village Homes as an early example of conservation subdivision design. He attributes its large amount of open space to compact lot sizes, which average 4,500 square feet, and the orientation of dwellings to the street and the adjacent shared open space. He also references the social aspects of the community as an accomplishment, continuing the emphasis on the way in which Village Homes' good design which is also green design can engender social relationships, another fundamental tenet of sustainability.
Prairie Crossing is a model of how, through design, a new neighborhood can create and maintain a real connection to the landscape on which it sits (Kane 2003, 126). It is best recognized as a prominent example of conservation design, but stands out among other conservation communities because of its additional inclusion of prominent "green" features like natural drainage, narrow streets, a working farm, and energy efficient homes. Prairie Crossing also employs innovative land management techniques, through the maintenance of the land through a resident environmental scientist and an ongoing endowment fund that receives one half of one percent of the sales price of each home sold. Knack recognized that as early as 1993,
Prairie Crossing was being viewed as a "model of enlightened development" (31) and quotes the developer, George Ranney, Jr., as saying that "We're hoping to set a new standard for suburban development." The project's social agenda also figures prominently through its education program; the project has an onsite school as well as adult environmental education for both residents and non-residents (Kingsbury 1995, 73). The educational component is key because so many of the more ecological aspects of Prairie Crossing (and other communities, particularly
The Woodlands) are largely unnoticeable to the average resident's untrained eye.
Village Homes despite its age and Prairie Crossing appear more regularly in the literature of best practices, whereas The Woodlands was more of a model in its time, demonstrating a new approach to designing large master planned communities. It enjoyed
133

unique financial success in the Title VII program even while incorporating an ecological design, which might have been seen by other developers as risky (Forsyth 2005, 13). Techniques employed at The Woodlands are really emblematic of larger changes in design thinking that
McHarg introduced. Best known for its natural stormwater management system that laces through public, private, and recreational areas, The Woodlands is a model for thoroughness in site analysis and ecological design (Spirn 1984, 163-166). While Forsyth contrasts The
Woodlands' hydrology-driven approach as less contemporary than the more recent emphasis on habitat, which conserves larger contiguous areas that are less integrated into the fabric of the neighborhood (2005, 226), these two approaches to open space conservation reflect two different means to an end, and the Woodlands model is still utilized. In the world of large master planned community development, The Woodlands also is a model of social integration, in that homes for residents across the income spectrum are spatially intermixed (Ewing 1991,
68), and of design control (89).
Of these features, a few stand out as missing from the LEED-ND standards. Some are missed opportunities; some, it seems, are intentionally not incorporated. One missed opportunity is the element of education, which Prairie Crossing exemplifies in particular.
Education in the context of sustainable design should go beyond the provision of schools.
Planners should recognize instead that creating a lasting commitment to sustainability requires more than living in a well designed community; it requires changing behavior. Incorporating an educational component into a new neighborhood development can actually have positive physical impacts on the site as well. At Prairie Crossing, residents learned about the project's drainage system and how they could use their own yards to create rain gardens and help manage runoff from their lots on their own (Kane 2003, 156). While some aspects of the case studies discussed earlier would be difficult to build into a rating system, it seems as though provision of a "green community education" program could actually be included in a set of standards.
A larger source of conflict between the case studies and LEED-ND is the issue of designing to create community. This has, on its face, more to do with the social aspects of sustainability than with the environmental aspects, but it ultimately has environmental implications that inform LEED-ND's rationale. The type of suburban design that all three case studies typify is decidedly not New Urbanist, as confirmed by the projects' relatively poor scoring on the Neighborhood Pattern and Design category of the LEED-ND standards. Low
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density is the main culprit, followed by a lack of sidewalks that in turn removes the focus of public life from the streets. However, the rhetoric surrounding Village Homes in particular celebrates the cul-de-sacs and shared, semi-private open space behind homes as being the design elements that best create a sense of community despite Cooper Marcus's article quoting
Andres Duany as saying that "Landscaped space at the backs of houses never, ever, ever works"
(2000, 128). However, the argument over which style of neighborhood design more effectively creates a sense of community is somewhat beside the point. From the perspective of the LEED-
ND authors, what the Village Homes design ultimately creates is lower density, and lower density is generally associated with greater land consumption, greater automobile consumption, and greater energy use. The rating system makes clear through its stated goals and prerequisites, and through its partnership with smart growth advocates, that the type of neighborhood design that can ostensibly create a sense of community while avoiding these pitfalls is preferred.
LEED-ND also ends up eschewing conservation design, which Prairie Crossing employs so effectively. The requirements for numerous credits, including the calculation of residential density based on gross buildable project acres, ends up penalizing projects that preserve large tracts of open space within the boundary of the project, whether for habitat or farmland.
Particularly in more rural environments, conservation design may be the most appropriate design solution. But again, the prioritization of smart growth objectives makes it unlikely that any project in a more rural location would become certified by LEED-ND, or even qualify to participate in the rating program to begin with. It is clear that this was a conscious decision by the creators of LEED-ND. However, the questions of density and of what types of design are appropriate for different locations bring up some ways in which LEED-ND or another rating system could be expanded or modified in the future.
If the creators of LEED-ND (or anyone crafting a subsequent rating system) wished to recognize or certify sustainable design efforts beyond the rather narrow range of projects that would pass the current density prerequisites, one option would be to build off the well established existing model of the transect. Andres Duany, one of the founders of the New
Urbanist movement, acknowledges that there is no one-size-fits-all formula for development.
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His concept of the transect, taken from ecology itself, shows the changing relationship of built form and the natural environment as one moves from the dense central city through the suburbs and out to the rural countryside:
A transect is a geographical cross-section of a region used to reveal a sequence of environments. For human environments, this cross-section can be used to identify a set of habitats that vary by their level and intensity of urban character, a continuum that ranges from rural to urban. In transect planning, this range of environments is the basis for organizing the components of the built world: building, lot, land use, street, and all of the other physical elements of the human habitat.
...
Wide streets and open swales find a place on the transect in more rural areas while narrow streets and curbs are more appropriate for urban areas (Duany Plater-Zyberk & Company, 2005, 2).
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The rural-to-urban transect shows changing landscapes and densities. Source:
DP'Z 2005
The "Smart Code" that Duany's firm develops, a model code that communities may adopt to address sprawl no matter where they are located on the transect, clearly acknowledges this continuum. Why then, should LEED-ND not? By including more rural areas in the Smart
Code, Duany is not denying the rights of these communities to develop in a manner suitable to their location. Often, less densely developed counties and towns are in a better position to make meaningful contributions to environmental quality: large areas of habitat or farmland can be conserved; stormwater can be well managed upstream of urban areas, reducing flooding in their downstream neighboring communities; and new developments, not beholden to an existing street network, can be designed to regulate temperature naturally. Places in locations able to achieve these goals are unlikely to make it past the prerequisites to become LEED-ND certified.
It is clear that a certain density and location of development are of paramount importance to this rating system. In order to even begin the process, a development must have at least seven
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units to the acre and be either transit-accessible or otherwise less car-dependent. By having prerequisites, and by definition excluding projects that do not meet these basic standards, the creators of LEED-ND imply that they do not want the rating system's name and stamp of approval on anything that does not achieve them.
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The "Smart Code" has different specifications for different zones. Source: DPZ 2005
Assuming that the authors of the rating system were willing to affix the LEED name to a wider range of sustainable developments, LEED-ND could adopt a gradation similar to the transect, by which communities were held to somewhat different standards based on their urban or rural nature. However, doing so would put at risk one of the beauties of the LEED systems in general, and what has in no small part contributed to their success: the simplicity of the checklist. Architects and builders know that no matter where they working, their buildings are held to the same standards. This system works well for individual buildings
their outward design will change to complement the context, but the green technology that underlies the fagade is not dependent on location. As this research has explored, urban design is not nearly as immune to locational differences. Similar to the previous, building-oriented LEED rating systems, the Green Construction & Technology section of LEED-ND is not of such great concern, but the Smart Location & Linkage and Neighborhood Pattern & Design sections would require substantial reworking, and subsequent loss of simplicity and comparability, in order to better reflect the context-sensitive aspects of planning and design. Developers might fight against this innovation from the standpoint of ease and efficiency (by which they could receive their certification label so important to marketing). But in fact, a more nuanced, placebased LEED-ND that credited a broader range of design would ultimately allow more developers to achieve certification (and deserve to do so), and garner a greater willingness on the part of more innovative designers to support and take part in the program.
At the same time, the appeal and facility of the checklist is too important to a rating system's success to completely discard it in favor of a complex matrix that takes locational
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factors into account for every credit. Such a complete overhaul would only be necessary if the system's creators wished to allow more flexibility in the prerequisites, particularly the density requirement. However, the LEED-ND standards are based on principles just as the case study communities were, and the prerequisites essentially reflect those principles. It is probably not fair or realistic to expect the standards' authors to alter the qualifying criteria that reflect those standards.
Beyond the prerequisites, there is generally enough flexibility built into the system, in that applicants can choose from a "menu" of credits to earn and still receive certification despite deficiencies in some areas like the case studies evaluated here. And to some extent, LEED-ND includes a range of context-sensitive options already. Many credits include multiple ways to meet the requirements that are based on a project's density, size, or location. However, there is certainly room for greater flexibility within some of the more stringent credits, particularly in the
Neighborhood Pattern and Design category. One example is the Walkable Streets credit. In this credit, sidewalks are required on both sides of every street (barring a few instances of physical impracticalities). But even sites that have an average of seven dwelling units per acre
(high enough to pass the prerequisite) may well have areas of lower density. Here, narrower shared streets or separate multi-use paths could be substituted for sidewalks, reducing impervious surfaces and facilitating natural street drainage while creating a more varied and natural aesthetic. There is no reason to be quite so prescriptive in design when multiple solutions exist for different contexts and may even provide increased environmental benefits.
The transect model is a useful way to think about how LEED-ND (or another similar rating system) might in time be adapted to recognize a wider range of environmentally sustainable design. Given the creators' principles and the simplicity of the checklist format, however, it is neither likely nor recommended that the "matrix" format be integrated across the entire LEED-ND rating system. Instead, in recognizing the importance of context sensitive solutions, the transect concept should be used to critically evaluate places where LEED-ND could incorporate greater flexibility into its requirements and thus encourage a greater range of appropriate design ideas.
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Following their final release, the LEED-ND standards are likely to be incorporated in one way or another into municipal code and/or approval processes across the country (Murillo and Vargas 2007). Used correctly, the standards have great potential to help cities and towns encourage and reward environmentally sustainable design and development practices. However, planners and public officials must take care to adopt the standards in such a way that is appropriate to their location and needs. The Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC), one of the LEED-ND partner organizations, describes on their website how municipalities will be able to take advantage of the development standards advanced by LEED-ND:
Municipal Leaders Creating Tax and Zoning Incentives: Many municipalities are eager to adopt smart-growth zoning and tax incentives, but lack the budget resources to develop their own standards. LEED-ND can fill the gap. Because the standards have been developed through an extensive consensus-building process, we expect local officials to have a high degree of confidence in their usefulness as an objective measure for determining the best locations, designs and building practices for superior community development. The LEED criteria for green buildings have already been successfully adopted for public initiatives in this way. Baltimore County, Maryland, for example, offers a 10-year property tax credit to new commercial buildings that qualify for a LEED silver-level rating (NRDC 2007).
While budget concerns are a valid concern for many local governments, LEED-ND should not be treated as an automatic substitute for place-based standards written for an individual community. The comparison to cities' adopting LEED standards for green buildings is not an appropriate one, as buildings stand alone as independent entities. It is the relationship
what LEED-ND hopes to evaluate. LEED-ND would better serve as a means to an end a jumping-off point for municipalities in establishing their own guidelines and regulations for sustainable development, rather than an end itself. (Berg 2007).
Jennifer Henry, director of the LEED-ND program for USGBC, believes that the rating system can be a valuable tool for municipalities if used appropriately. Existing zoning code must be carefully analyzed with respect to the requirements of LEED-ND before the rating system could be made mandatory; for example, if a town's code zones residential land for less than seven

units to the acre, then no property would be able to meet the LEED-ND prerequisites. At worst, broad application of LEED-ND in this scenario could be viewed as a regulatory taking.
Henry stresses that this is unlikely, but in order to prevent such an instance, USGBC has produced a document aimed at helping local public officials and policymakers use the system properly, whether they choose to integrate it into their zoning, use it to evaluate the quality of their existing code, or use it as the basis for providing structural or financial incentives to developers. The document projects that LEED-ND will be most likely used in three ways:
to evaluate current policies and practices to reveal existing code barriers to sustainable development (such as high parking requirements or restrictions on solar panels);
as a basis for structural incentives (such as density and height bonuses or expedited permitting)
as a basis for financial incentives (such as lower impact fees or qualifying for Tax
Increment Financing) (USGBC 2008, 3-4).
The document also cautions against wholesale adoption of the LEED-ND standards as a mandatory condition of development approval, noting in particular the prerequisites regarding location and density. Additionally, it makes the point that in some places, local requirements may actually be more stringent than what LEED-ND requires, particularly regarding stormwater management. LEED-ND would certainly not be intended to override these regulations, and instead should be used to encourage places with lower baselines to meet a higher standard
(USGBC 2008, 5).
According to Henry, one of the most common questions about the LEED-ND standards is whether another rating system will be developed for evaluating existing neighborhoods. What many people find, and what the New Urbanists have been pointing out from their organization's inception, is that existing urban neighborhoods seem to meet many of the LEED-ND requirements without having to develop anything new at all. In particular, prewar neighborhoods, built before the automobile achieved total dominance, often have the diversity, transit orientation, parks, and mix of uses that would easily comprise a winning LEED-ND project. What existing neighborhoods lack might be some of the newer green technologies that
140

make individual buildings more efficient, or adequate protection of wetlands or other natural resources that were not prioritized during the area's initial development.
A rating system for existing developments could take two approaches. The first would be to evaluate a neighborhood simply as is. Such a system could become a valuable marketing tool for local governments wishing to promote neighborhoods within their city, both to attract new residents who would be drawn to living in a green, sustainable environment, and to attract new businesses that would then have to adhere to certain standards when building in the neighborhood.
The second approach would be one for helping to guide local planning departments in their efforts to improve or revitalize existing neighborhoods. Under this scheme, the rating system would work similar to how LEED-ND may be used during a project's planning phase to help inform the design. Municipalities wishing to invest in neighborhood improvements could pick from a menu of interventions that, when implemented, would collectively help the neighborhood achieve a level of LEED certification.
Sustainable Sites Initiative
The belief in the importance of smart growth and smart location choice is entrenched in the LEED-ND approach to evaluating communities. A very strong argument is made in support of this a neighborhood can be as internally dense and walkable as possible, but if it is located such that one is forced to drive to get there, the neighborhood does little to further the cause of energy conservation and may well promote suburban sprawl by "leapfrogging" development.
However, development is likely to continue to occur in rural communities in the United States regardless of the persuasive power of LEED certification, and there are better and worse ways to go about designing these new places.
As discussed earlier, sometimes less urban environments are better testing grounds for implementing green design techniques, particularly those meant to manage ecosystems while allowing for some development simultaneously. If the LEED program chooses not to embark on the task of evaluating and certifying this type of design and development, perhaps this is where the Sustainable Sites Initiative can play a prominent role. The guidelines created through this initiative look as though they will be able to call attention to the role that sustainable
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management of larger, less urban landscapes can play in addressing global warming, promoting biodiversity, and enhancing human health.
The LEED standards for neighborhood development will undoubtedly prove to be an effective and valuable tool for promoting the creation of more sustainable new communities.
Their success will be due to the combination of the increasing public awareness of environmental issues, the clout of the LEED brand name, and the relative ease by which planners and developers will be able to recognize and reward good design by using a checklist.
The standards do a relatively good job of capturing the elements of good green design that the planning and design professions have recognized over the years, as reflected in a number of model communities. Where they depart from what these models demonstrate is indicative of changing trends in design for urban neighborhoods, typified by the New Urbanist approach, and the increased emphasis on the importance of smart growth and development location in combating climate change and resource depletion.
The LEED-ND standards will continue to evolve over the next year as the pilot testing phase concludes, and the authors may incorporate some changes into the current rating scheme before the standards' final release. Looking further into the future of the LEED-ND standards and any other subsequent system for evaluating green design, there are plenty of opportunities for expanding upon LEED-ND's initial contribution and finding ways to encourage quality sustainable design across the spectrum of urban and rural environments.
Next Steps
Further research on this topic can proceed in both the short and long term. In the short term, the logical next step for research on this topic would be to address the results of the
LEED-ND pilot testing phase, evaluating what changes (if any) were made to the standards as a result of the feedback from the participating pilot projects. Several years from now, after the standards have been released in their final format and new projects have participated in the program, new research could investigate various trends in both the design quality of these new participating neighborhood developments, as well as the economic impacts of certification on market response and developers' decision-making.
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143

144

LEED-ND
Points Used?
Adjusted
Points
Unweighted
Points
Preeq 2
Credi 3
Credt 4
Cred 5
Crei 7
........ ....
Smart Location
Imperiled Species and Ecological Communities
Wetland and Water Conservation
Farmland Conservation
Floodplain Avoidance
High Priority Brownfields Redevelopment
Preferred Location
Housing and Jobs Proximity
School Proximity
Steep Slope Protection
Credi 10
Restoration of Habitat or Wetlands
Management Habitat or Wetlands
Total
|
Prereq Op Community
Prereq 2 Compact Development
Credit Compact Development
reit 2 Diversity of Uses
Credit Diversity of Housing Types
Cret 4 Affordable Rental Housing redit Affordable For-Sale Housing
Credit Reduced Parking Footprint redit Walkable Streets
Creadit Street Network
Creit 9 Transit Facilities
Credt 10 Transportation Demand Management
Cred 11 Access to Surrounding Vicinity
Credt 12 Access to Public Spaces
13 Accass to Active Public Soaces yes yes yes yes uns yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes
Required
Required
7
4
2
2
3
2
8
2
1
2
1
1
1
Required
Required
3
Requiren
Required
Required
Required
2
1
1
1
13
--I
8
1
-3
3
1
1
1
I
30 yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes
2
1
2
1
2
8
1
1
3
2
2
7
4
5
5
1
1 t
1
23 i
1
2
1
1
1
1
1
2
2
2
2
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
2
2
1
1
1
2
1
10(
8
1
-7
5
5
5
5
5
5
1
1
3
1
1
1
60
1,..- 1- .. .
I 1 .
I I 1
47
47 1
18 I
35 58%
1
1
0
0
5
0
0
1
3
1
1
0
0
5
5
0
0
5
5
5
0
1
Woodlands Phase I
2
2
0
0
0
1
2
2
2
1
1
18 780%
1
1
0
0
1
0
0
0
1
1
0
2
1
0
0
0
C
5
0
0
0
C
C
26 43%
1
0
1
0
2
5
0
0
0
0
2
0
1
1
5
0
Village Homes
2
2
2
0
2
0
0
1
0
0
0
1
0
0
13 57%
1
1
0
0
1
0
0
0
1
0
1
1
2
0
4 0
' V
9
50%
50%1
II I
1 306
30%
33 55%
2
0
0
1
0
0
0
0
1
1
0
1
0
5
0
' I
9 50%1
2
'I
6
12 26%
0
0
1
0
C
5
5
5
5
5
Prairie Crossing
1
0
1
0
O
2
2
2
2
2
17 74%
0
1
0
0
0
0
1
2
0
0
1
0
0
1
'
8 44%1
I

! " lE~
Ced3 Reduced Use u,,uongs
Ced4 Building Reuse and Adapive Reuse
Cred5 se of Historic Buildings
6 Minimize stbane through Design
I I
Crei 8 Contaminant in Brownfields Remediation
Cre 9 Stormwater
Credit10Hea
Island Reduction
red11Solar Orientation
Cred 12 0n-Site Energy Generation
Cred 13 On-Site Renewable Energy Sources
Cre 14 istrict Heating & Cooling
ICre 1 IW..t.wtarM .
I I
I I
3 yes
I I
2
1
1 yes yes yes
1
1
1
1
1
1 yes yes yes yes yes yes yes
1
1
1
5
10
1
I I
30
2
1
11
11 I I I 1 I
1
1
1
1
1
1
'I
0
0
5
1 n
0
0
0
0
0
1
1
0
I
I
0
5
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1
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1
I
JI
1
0
0
0
1
1
0
1
0
1
0
0
I
| •
:1
1
1
0
!
0
0
0
0
3
0
I1
1
1
0
1
0
0
0
0
1
0
0
J
I
I
22 13 7 32% 3 23%1 13 59% 7 54%1
8 36%
5
38%1
56 43% 30 56%1 53 41% 29 54%I
53 41%
30 S6%1 es. Platinum:
Modified-

147

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