Green neighborhood offers 'community' feel

By: Lindsey Pruitt

Posted: 4/30/08

The UA Community Design Center has developed a new vision of neighborhood for the Washington County chapter of Habitat for Humanity: no sidewalks, no curbs, no gutters and no flooding, even after torrential rain, according to a press release.

Porchscapes: An Affordable LEED-Neighborhood Development, the official name for the project, was awarded a 2008 ASLA professional award in planning and analysis from the American Society of Landscape Architects, according to the ASLA Web site.

The project was developed by the UA design center in partnership with Professor Marty Matlock of the Ecological Engineering Group in the UA Division of Agriculture, the Department of Biological and Agricultural Engineering, the city of Fayetteville and McClelland Consulting Engineers, according to the press release.

The project also was given a $23,000 grant by the UA Women's Giving Circle and a $464,000 grant by the Arkansas Natural Resources Commission to support the design phase, according to the press release.

"I am very proud of the project," said Kendall Curlee, director of communications for the UA School of Architecture. "The community design center has won so much for sustainable development that it raises our national awareness for the school.

"The planet is growing, and we need to find a way to live light on the land," she said. "This kind of development is very important."

The Porchscapes plan means residents will benefit from a "shared street" - on track to be the first of its kind in the U.S. - that promotes community, slows down cars and soaks up stormwater like a sponge, according to the press release.

There are four overreaching principles of the project: density and compactness, walkable streets, street network and access to public space, and solar orientation, according to the ASLA Web site.

"The University of Arkansas is taking a leadership role with this low-impact development project," said Bobby Hernandez, community planner for the Environmental Protection Agency's Region 6, which includes Texas, Arkansas, Oklahoma, Louisiana and New Mexico, according to the press release.

"I don't know of any other project that we've funded in our region that comes close to what the university has done in demonstrating low-impact development's role in decreasing stormwater runoff," he said in the press release. "This is a great example to other communities."

A wet meadow, rainwater gardens, bioswales, and pervious parking and street surfaces will absorb and treat stormwater on site, a key goal in low-impact development.

With no curbs, gutters and pipes needed, infrastructure costs are cut by half, said Stephen Luoni, director of the Community Design Center, in the press release.

Architecture students Keith Wheeler and Russell Worley were charged with designing homes for the neighborhood, and focused on the porch to meet Habitat for Humanity's request for low-cost, one-story homes, according to the press release.

The students' spacious screened porches extend housing square footage at one-quarter the cost of conditioned space and provide variety to the streetscape, according to a press release.

Streets become part of the runoff treatment train, and eliminates expensive curbs, gutters, pipes and catch basins found in conventional systems, which can cut costs by 40 percent, according to the ASLA Web site.

"What began as a strong idea became a visionary statement for a community," said the 2008 Professional Awards Jury, according to the ASLA Web site.

"The landscape architect took a fresh approach to a simple issue and solved it with leading edge sustainable strategies."