hank dittmar

Building Communities and Transforming Lives in the Urban Century

Hank Dittmar

T H E P R I N C E ’ S F O U N D A T I O N T E A C H E S a n d D E M O N S T R AT E S S U S TA I N A B L E D E V E L O P M E N T PLACING COMMUNITY ENGAGEMENT at the HEART of its WORK.

• Lively, interesting high streets with a mix of local shops and quality brands.

• Streets and neighbourhoods that are well designed, that reflect local character and feel safe to walk along.

• Parks, schools and shops within walking distance of our homes.

• Homes that look like they belong, that reflect local identity but are also contemporary and comfortable inside.

World Population

An Urban CenturyThe pace of global urbanisation -- 2 billion more city dwellers by 2030 -- leads to an assumption of mass production, assembly line cities and tower block living. This endangers local culture and distinctiveness, leads to social disruption and possible future problems.

The Future?

"International Style" or Homogenisation?

THE OPPORTUNITY ACCORDING TO MCKINSEY: A LARGER CONSUMING CLASS

If we are to have 3 billion more consumers, can we also see global urbanisation as a way to engage billions in the production of our communities?

THE EVIDENCE ABOUT SLUMS

• . . .increasingly points to them being a stage in the process of urbanisation, a platform for individuals and families,and having complexity and social organisation of their own.

• The 20th Century notion of an International style has dominated approaches to meeting this challenge.

• A another model is to build on local identity, allowing cultures to participate in the global economy from a place of strength and awareness.

• Place can be a framework for

building this, reinforcing social integration and community cohesion.

About The Prince's Foundation The Prince's Foundation has been working in communities from Galapagos to Kingston to empower community groups, build skills & social capital and demonstrate models of urbanisation that build sustainability by recognising local adaptation. We believe there are some helpful tools: • Enquiry by Design: Community Empowerment and Engagement • A Culture of Building: Training and Skills • Building Community Capital: An Integrated Approach • Green and Natural Building for Resilience: Learning from Nature and Culture

A tool bringing the right people together to create real solutions through intensive workshop sessions designed to accommodate continuous feedback. These stakeholders are actively engaged in the planning and design of their community, ensuring practical, achievable solutions for the vision to be taken forward beyond the workshop.

CORE TEAM Eg. ARCHITECTS, LANDOWNERS LOCAL AUTHORITY

STAKEHOLDER AND ADVISORY AGENCIES Eg. EDUCATION AUTHORITIES HERITAGE BODIES, LOCAL BUSINESS

WIDER STAKEHOLDER GROUP Eg. LOCAL RESIDENTS GENERAL

ENQUIRY BY DESIGN

EMPOWERING COMMUNITIES

W E O F T E N H E A R A B O U T N I M B Y s , B U T I S N ' T NIMBYism, OFTEN A RATIONAL RESPONSE TO THE FACT THAT MUCH NEW DEVELOPMENT DEGRADES OUR COMMUNITIES? CAN COMMUNITY AND S T A K E H O L D E R ENGAGEMENT LEAD TO Q U A L I T Y I N M Y BACKYARD?

PLANNING REFORM

England has now reformed its planning system, introducing a focus on localism and community engagement.

• Presumption for Sustainable Development

• Neighbourhood Plans

• Community Right to Build

• Custom or Self Build

• Social Investment: "Big Society Bank"

LOCALISM BILL & NEIGHBOURHOOD PLANNING

"Neighbourhood planning will let people come together at a very local level and decide, together, where the new homes, shops and businesses should go, and what they should look. . . This is a very significant change in the way we think about planning. This is not a chance to be "consulted then ignored," but to wield real power. If approved by a majority of residents in a local referendum, a neighbourhood development plan must be brought into force by the local authority.

Our aim with the Localism Bill is not to prevent new building, but to promote it." Greg Clark, Speech to Adam Smith Institute, 2 Feb 2011

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Neighbourhood planning in practice across England.

MAKING IT REAL - Community & Neighbourhood Planning Engagements

A CULTURE OF BUILDINGThe Prince's Foundation's Summer School blends theory and practice, integrating practical building, architecture and urban design with drawing and seeing the local DNA of a place. The course culminates in a community project.

SKILLS AND SOCIAL CAPITAL

After a number of years of conducting summer schools and courses in the UK, we have done them in New Orleans after Katrina, in Jamaica in the Kingstonn ghetto of Rose Town and in Freetown, Sierra Leone. This builds skills as well as building social capital.

HRH The Prince of Wales, Richard Dimbleby Lecture, July 2009:

“We need to ensure that community and environmental capital is indeed put alongside the requirements of financial capital.

An example that would enhance both community and environmental capital, lies in the way we plan, design and build our settlements. This approach emphasizes the integration of mixed-use buildings and the use of local materials to create local identity which, when combined with cutting-edge developments in building technology, can enhance a sense of place and real community.”

COMMUNITY CAPITAL

• Form follows function only works if function doesn't change, but it always does: failure of tower blocks, US suburban collapse and flooding from channelizing river systems are all examples of failed single order hard wired solutions, predominant in the 20th Century.

• A C21 alternative is to design in resilience, with simple, hackable and adaptable systems that respond to changed conditions, whether social economic or environmental

• We can learn how to do this by studying and adapting from natural systems and many traditional cultures: river systems and sustainable urban drainage for example, thermal mass and passive ventilation for another.

RESILIENCE

Sustainable urban drainage, Upton

Water meadow, Salisbury

THE ARGUMENTS AGAINST:

1. The problem of large numbers: going to scale is presumed to require standardisation and mass production.

2. The presumed cost of building well and for the long term.

3. Increased urban population demands mega densities.

4. Lack of awareness: it is a condition to be endured not a problem to be solved. "Demand pull"

1. The Problem of Large Numbers: Learning from History • Faced with the problem of accommodating a rapidly urbanising population during the Industrial Revolution, Georgian builders responded by building simple, replicable streets of attached houses with pattern books and then modern methods of construction. • They then individualised with a craft layer, allowing adaptation to place, to individual, and at the same time creating a space for high value creative work. This use of craft has substantial social capital and human capital benefits.

• Apple's App Store is a standardised platform with protocols that ensure transferability and reliability, while encouraging creativity adaptation and specialisation. • Might a similar approach be taken to city infrastructure and building?

The Problem of Large Numbers: Learning from the App Store

RATES OF CHANGE

• Blending fast and slow, with slow adding value and difference.

• Green and low tech.

• A tool for

understanding how to provide local identity while competing in a global economy

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Sustainable mixed-use/ income neighbourhoods increase values.

Savills and PFBE, Valuing Sustainable Urbanism, 2007.

2. Addressing the added cost of quality.

Research: Strategic Land Investment

Model

RISK

RETURN

2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019 2020 2021 2022 2023 2024 2025 2026 2027 2028 2029 2030 2031

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100

80

60

40

20

0

20

PROMOTERCOSTS

LAND OWNERCOSTS

INVESTORCOSTS

REVENUETO PARTNERS

PLANNING PHASE INFRASTRUCTURE PHASE

INFRASTRUCTURE COSTSPLANNINNG AND

PROMOTION COSTS

£m

Cash Flow Profile of a Typical Project

Phases 2,3,4 and 5 also see a value upliftdue to the sale od previous phase

ADDRESSING THE COSTOF BUILDING WELL

Providing a model for building well which moves from prototype through value engineering to production, addressing challenges of customisation vs supply chain efficiency.

THE NATURAL HOUSE

FABRIC FIRSTNatural Thermal Enhancement

IMPROVINGEnvironmental Performance through passive means

COOL in summer, WARM in winter

INCREASE AFFORDABILITY OF RUNNING COSTS

MOISTURE & VENTILATION

Moisture should be kept between 40% and 60% Relative Humidity, The Prince’s House has a natural strategy for moisture control

The Natural House Is a prototype for a low carbon home that is natural, easy to operate, and aimed at ordinary people. Built at the Building Research Establishment, it is undergoing testing and occupancy evaluation.

Versions of the Natural House have been built at Britain's Ideal Home Show for the last two years, employing the same principles, and visited by over a quarter of a million people each year, to show people that being green can be a positive choice.

It is being licensed to house builders complete with urban and siting guidelines.

Detached houses: 3.7 units/acre

Terraced houses with integrated

parking: 19.4 units/acre

Mid-rise mansion / perimeter

block flats: 170 units/acre

Location Efficiency and Density

3. Increased urban population demands mega densities.

DESIGNING WALKABLE SUBURBIA Updating the Terraced house for C21

Addressing the demand side of the equation

CONSERVING RESOURCEWALKABILITYLaying out our neighbourhoods so that people can walk to access their daily needs FABRIC FIRST Creating a high performing building shell reduces the amount of energy to heat or cool it THERMAL MASS OR SOLAR SHADING The ability of the building to stay cool or w a r m w i t h m i n i m a l t e c h n o l o g i c a l interventions PASSIVE VENTILATION Fresh air is key to well being and passive ventilation allows this to happen without mechanical means

ADAPTABLE HOUSES

A N I M P O R T A N T P A R T O F A N Y S U S T A I N A B L E C O M M U N I T Y I S M A K I N G S U R E THERE IS A GOOD MIX OF AGES AND INCOME BRACKETS

Upton Urban extension, 2005-9