New Urbanism seen as green answer

By Jennifer Hiller

Express News

September 4, 2008

Is New Urbanism a real estate fad to be discarded next year like a bad fashion blooper?

Scott Polikov, a town planner and principal with the Fort Worth-based Gateway Planning Group, doesn't think so.

“We need to figure out how to take advantage of the new rules of the game,” Polikov told more than 200 business and government officials at a luncheon Wednesday at the Doubletree Hotel San Antonio Airport.

Global warming and higher gas prices are pushing both public policy and the marketplace toward the type of development that New Urbanism champions: pedestrian-friendly neighborhoods that integrate single- and multi-family homes, schools and retail, as well as cities with transportation networks that include toll roads, cars, light rail, buses and bikes.

And Polikov, who spoke at a gathering of the real estate organization the Urban Land Institute, said it's not just a downtown-verses-the-suburbs debate.

“It can't just be about downtown,” Polikov said. “A lot of people like to live in the suburbs.”

The country likely is headed for carbon limits, which means that federal transportation dollars may start to favor both urban and suburban communities with projects that promise to help lower carbon footprints by making people less car dependent, Polikov said.

Cities that try to integrate New Urbanism in both downtown and suburban areas will have a better chance of attracting new businesses and residents, he said.

New Urbanist neighborhoods are infrastructure-intensive and expensive, but they create a higher dollar value for both the developer and the tax base over time, Polikov said.

Communities that don't encourage such development risk being left behind, he said.

Smaller Texas cities and suburbs, including Duncanville and Leander, are working to bring in rail lines and a mix of housing and retail projects, while larger cities such as Houston are trying to figure out how to make their skyscraper-lined downtown streets less intimidating for pedestrians and residents.

Even Plano, the stereotypical Texas suburb, has re-created its downtown area with a rail line and mixed-use developments.

“If they can do it in Plano, Texas, they can do it anywhere,” Polikov said.

And local governments have to take a lead in planning, he said.

Traditional planning and zoning focuses only on segregating land use for things such as homes, industrial space or retail. But form-based codes, which deal with the character of a development rather than the specific use of a property, have helped create New Urbanist neighborhoods across the country. Form-based codes consider things such a building height, setbacks and landscaping in medians.

Mike Fulton, chairman of the San Antonio chapter of the ULI and vice president of development with Embry Partners, introduced Polikov. In his remarks, he said form-based development had been nonexistent in San Antonio, but is being tried in and around the new Texas A&M campus on the South Side.

“The market dictates the highest and best use, but planning and zoning facilitate a great place,” Fulton said. “You know what it's going to feel like. But you don't know exactly what will be there.”