UNSTABLE LAND USE ALLOCATION

Gross building area can be occupied by any land use activity. A combination of gross building area per acre and occupant activity per square foot sets the stage for municipal income per taxable acre. When this primary source of revenue is added to other investment income, it must equal a city’s total annual expense per acre. It is a fairly simple relationship complicated by our inability to accurately and rapidly predict shelter capacity options per buildable acre and the revenue per sq. ft. that can be expected from occupant activity alternatives. This has made it impossible to correlate urban pattern with urban form and occupant activity to produce yield that supports a desired quality of life within geographic limits. Our inability to correlate has led us to repeatedly consume our source of life with annexation in a vain search for economic stability. Few are aware and fewer have paid attention to this unwitting Ponzi scheme. It requires new money from increasing amounts of land consumption to compensate for the increasing cost of past land use allocation mistakes. The problem appears over generations of budget reductions, slow decline, tax resistance, and community complaint; and the mathematical correlation required to correct the condition is just emerging to face its political opposition. 


Annexation for more shelter capacity and activity with less than the average yield per acre appears to solve immediate budget problems with new money until its expense exceeds the revenue provided over time. At this point annexation again appears in vain pursuit of stability with hope as a strategy and Ponzi as its companion - when additional land is available. “First ring” suburbs have no room to expand and have been the first to confront this problem without the knowledge, commitment, and equipment that is equal to the threat. 


The shelter capacity of land is a function of a building design category choice and the values assigned to its design specification topics. These values are correlated by an architectural algorithm and processed by a category master equation to produce gross building area options that are a function of the floor quantity alternatives entered. A change to one or more specification values produces a new forecast of gross building area options that can be occupied by any desired activity. Prior to this, the number of options that could be considered in a reasonable time frame was severely limited by time-consuming graphic evaluation. The introduction of mathematical analysis makes it possible to evaluate hundreds of options and economic forecasts before graphic analysis focuses on the most promising. These cellular content solutions represent design decisions at their most fundamental level. They aggregate to produce shelter form that is served by a pattern of movement, open space, and life support within the Built Domain.


Municipal financial stability will remain an elusive goal stimulating random annexation until we understand the current productivity of each acre within a city’s corporate limits. At this point, we can accurately predict the adjustments needed to equate average yield with the expense required per acre for a desired quality of life within city limits. The effort will require relational databases of acquired knowledge combined with evaluation models and treatment decisions at the cellular level of city formation. Keep in mind, however, that excessive capacity options produce intensity, intrusion, and domination that detract from our quality of life. Fortunately, they can be measured and evaluated to build the knowledge needed to lead future city design decisions.

SHELTER SPRAWL

Sprawl is a disease consuming the Natural Domain with building mass, pavement, and open space in both the Urban and Rural Phyla of the Built Domain. When sprawl is seen as a cancer expanding with population growth, there will be a search for a cure to treat this threat to our source and quality of life. The cure will begin at the cellular level of sprawl formation called a lot. A primary building providing shelter for human activity is its nucleus. A cell and its aggregation is where architecture can help by focusing on the building categories, cell content, design specification values, and master equations that produce gross building area options within each cell of currently sprawling urban form.


Gross building area can be occupied by any activity. These area and activity options combine with pavement and social open space to produce levels of shelter capacity, intensity, intrusion, and domination in each cell of the Shelter Division of the Urban and Rural Phyla of the Built Domain; but capacity and intensity have not been measured or compared with occupant activity. This combination has municipal revenue and expense per acre implications that affect its physical, social, psychological, environmental, and economic quality of life; but this lack of correlation means that the relationship of building mass, intensity, and activity to economic stability and quality of life cannot be predicted at the present time. This, however, is the key to a cure for sprawl vainly seeking financial stability and shelter for growing populations.


Shelter capacity is gross building area per acre. It produces a level of intensity, intrusion, and domination in a cell based on the building design category chosen and the values entered in its design specification template. These values have had partial recognition and conflicting specifications in zoning ordinances. This has led to uncorrelated, unsuccessful attempts to consistently lead the emergence of urban form to physical, social, and economic success that protects our health, safety, welfare, and source of life.


Architecture intuitively understands the correlation required but has never classified building design categories, comprehensively listed their design specification topics, or written algorithms to correlate design specification values for use by master equations that accurately predict shelter capacity and intensity options for any given land area. This leadership language was not needed by anyone when the planet was “a world without end” and we were encouraged to be “fruitful and multiply”. These exhortations have led to promiscuous consumption of land vainly searching for economic stability with hopeful annexation. Public participation has kept everyone busy within the city, but its focus on detail has failed to recognize sprawl and the knowledge needed for correction. 


The cure is city design of urban form for growing populations that contains shelter capacity, intensity, intrusion, and dominance decisions balanced for economic stability and quality of life within sustainable limits. New relational databases are needed to produce knowledge that can defend the decisions required. Decisions in turn must be expressed in a language that can lead. It must correlate the mathematical design specification decisions that are the hidden foundation of shelter formation. This is the language needed to repeat success and avoid failure on a very finite world in a universe without end.


A city design recipe for urban form is not a replacement for traditional architectural priorities. It is a massing prelude that requires further architectural refinement to produce shelter composition, context, and appearance. These results will symbolize the logical foundation needed to achieve sustainable cities and symbiotic survival on a planet that does not compromise with ignorance. 



If you have read my books you should have a thorough understanding of what I mean by the mathematical language of city design, building design categories, design specifications, gross building area, shelter capacity, intensity, intrusion, dominance and urban form correlation. The first two contained forecast models based on the incremental approach to calculation historically used by architects. The third translated this approach into architectural algorithms that correlated comprehensive sets of design specification values to serve a building design category master equation. The equation predicted gross building area options based on these design specification decisions and floor quantity alternatives. A change to any specification value or floor quantity alternative produced a new set of options, but a forecasting CD was not included because of previous copyright infringement. This book has been replaced by an unpublished fourth that simplifies the third and contains far better organization. All final forecast models will be placed in the cloud if someone takes up the baton.

A Collision of Architectural Opinion

The first two paragraphs are excerpts from comments that have prompted my response.


Mark Wigley: “…If you could say what the problem is you wouldn’t hire an architect…You call an architect in when you have a very complex situation in which you have a lot of information that doesn’t really connect, and the architect just goes in there and sees or projects or imagines a possible form of organization that allows that complexity to continue…naiveté is crucial…because to know that you don’t know, to have a sense that you don’t know and therefore to be in awe of what you are experiencing and full of love and respect for complexity, this I think is the genius of architects and why I think they have an enormously important role in society.”

Ujjval Vyas, Ph.D., J.D. Strategic Advisor | Attorney | Entrepreneur | Scholar | Principal of Alberti Group | Founder, FDI-AEC

“Are you kidding me? This is the clarion call of obfuscatory mumbo jumbo. The endless excuse-making about a serious lack of thinking, deep respect for learning and knowledge, and the final recourse of the scammer. The idea that ignorance is a qualification … is bizarre... No wonder the idea that architects have some special design thinking to contribute is only of interest to those trying to bail water out of this Titannic (sp). Architecture is too great a discipline to be permanently held down, but the jury is still out if this recovery is just over the horizon or only where there be dragon’s (sp).

Walter Hosack:


Architecture records complex owner requirements and desires in a document it calls a program. It solves the puzzle defined by the program with logic it calls schematic design. In the military the program would be called a policy and schematic design would be called strategic planning. Architecture has made the mistake of calling its entire effort fine art.


Mr. Vyas talks about seeing over the horizon to reach a remote destination, but the skill required an abstract ability to calculate latitude and longitude. Unfortunately, architecture earns a living from its project orientation and has no incentive to consider a horizon beyond the cell it calls a lot, or the cells that are combined to form a larger project area. It will take a different form of calculation to pursue an attempt to cure metastasizing sprawl that is consuming our source of life.


A building is the shelter nucleus of a cell we call a lot. Cells collect to create a Built Domain that is expanding through annexation of the Natural Domain. The form created is called sprawl to shelter the activities of growing populations, and there is no correlated mathematical language or political priority that can lead to healthy, symbiotic urban form within geographic limits.


Zoning is a collection of uncorrelated, conflicting design specifications that cannot predict the shelter capacity of cells and their aggregations. As a result, it cannot lead to the formation of healthy urban anatomies that avoid excessive intensity with correlated shelter capacity and economic activity. At the present time, zoning contradictions combine with activity misallocation to abet sprawl searching in vain for elusive economic stability through annexation. 


Land use planning is a two dimensional exercise that cannot correlate the shelter capacity, intensity, and activity of urban form. This is critical because shelter capacity measures the gross building area per acre present or planned. Shelter is occupied by activity and the combination determines revenue yield per acre of land area consumed. When thought of collectively, average economic yield per acre consumed must equal a city’s average expense per acre to avoid budget cuts and a declining quality of life.


Since shelter capacity can be occupied by any activity, the ability to predict shelter capacity per acre and the economic yield per square foot from occupant activity is crucial to economic stability. At the present time, a city cannot balance the shelter capacity of its land with occupant activity to meet the average yield per acre it needs for operations, maintenance, improvement, and debt service.

This is a problem that begins with architectural inability to comprehensively and accurately predict and compare shelter capacity, intensity, intrusion, and dominance options at the cellular level of urban aggregation, but it is not a problem that can be assigned to architecture as we know it. It is a problem for city design leadership with a new version of latitude and longitude prediction.

The goal is shelter capacity, intensity, and activity in proportions that will protect a growing population’s economic stability and quality of life within geographic limits that protect their source of life. This is our new destination over the horizon. It will require the ability to calculate another version of latitude and longitude and the power of a captain sailing in a universe without end.

Pete Pointer

Science is good but principles, values applied in process locally is more important.

Like "Pete" Pointer FAICP, ALA, ITE’S comment

Walter Hosack

A strategic plan to correlate shelter capacity, intensity, and activity for economic stability throughout a city begins at the cellular level of building mass, pavement, and open space. Conversion of this cellular recipe to composition, context, and appearance is a more detailed, tactical level of physical design that you refer to as "local". I would not prioritize the effort. It is all needed to contribute to our quality of life within sustainable cities that are capable of contributing to our symbiotic survival.

Drake Waters

The world needs good architecture more than ever by a factor of 100. So much is changing and has to change and the brilliance and creativity good architecture brings is priceless. Good architecture is not wasteful useless and comatose through aesthetics alone. It is a way of thinking that encompasses everything to support society. We are done for if current trends in architecture continue. We must enable AI to force multiply our impact and integration of disciplines has to be the norm. None of that is possible in gate keeper lock down, our status quo. Sink or swim? We are sinking fast.

A Symbiotic Pre-requisite

A primary building is the nucleus of a cell we call a lot. We inhabit the shelter provided and bring the cell to life as part of the Shelter Division of the urban anatomy. Each cell contains contents that combine in various quantities to serve a given activity. These quantity decisions form building, pavement, and unpaved open space elements that equal 100% of a cell’s site plan area. The plan defines two-dimensional quantity relationships. Floor quantity decisions convert building footprint areas to gross building area quantities often referred to as building mass. Gross building area divided by the buildable acres consumed is shelter capacity.


Massing composition within a cell is served by pavement for service and social activity. The combination of building mass and pavement produces shelter capacity that is offset by unpaved open space to produce measurable levels of intensity, intrusion, and dominance. The combination of composition and context design molds intensity, intrusion, and dominance into the places we traverse to reach shelter. The final form and appearance of shelter within composition and context reflects the preferences of the time. The style chosen symbolizes the complex effort to provide shelter for human activity at the cellular level of the Shelter Division in the Urban and Rural Phyla of the Built Domain. 


Shelter capacity options produce levels of intensity that are equal to shelter capacity per acre multiplied by the impervious cover percentage planned or present. Intrusion is floor quantity divided by five. When more than one primary building is located in a cell, intrusion is a floor quantity average adjusted by the percentage of total gross building area related to each. Dominance is equal to the sum of intensity and intrusion. These three measurements of dominance summarize the impact of design specification decisions on our quality of life within a single cell. These cells aggregate to form the Shelter Division of the Built Domain.

Design specification topics are related to a building design category. Seven categories exist when buildings are classified by the parking system planned or present. The seven building categories of the Shelter Division combine with Movement, Open Space, and Life Support Divisions to form the Urban and Rural Phyla of the Built Domain. Each building design category is defined by a list of design specification topics that vary by category. The values assigned to these topics are correlated by an architectural algorithm that serves a category master equation. The equation predicts shelter capacity, intensity, intrusion, and dominance results based on the floor quantity options and specification values entered. A number of secondary equations predict the design detail implied by these floor quantity options and specification value decisions. This detail includes, but is not limited to: gross building area, building footprint, parking quantity, and parking area related to the floor quantity under consideration. A change to one or more design specification values produces a new forecast.


The objective is to create a classification system and precise mathematical language to correlate and lead decisions that combine to create the shelter capacity, intensity, intrusion, and dominance of activity within cells that aggregate to form the Shelter Division of The Built Domain. An inability to lead produces sprawling shelter that is a metastasizing, parasitic physical disease. It can only be treated with a language capable of leading the formation of shelter for growing populations within a geographically limited Built Domain that protects both our quality and source of life – the Natural Domain.


The combination of shelter capacity, activity, location, and condition determines a cell’s financial yield per acre to both private and public enterprise. All cellular revenue per acre is not equal to a city’s average expense per acre, however, and excess revenue per acre from the shelter capacity and activity in some must be used to subsidize others to maintain a balanced municipal budget. When the number of subsidized cells becomes too great, budget cuts ensue and a city’s ability to operate, maintain, improve, and serve its debt becomes increasingly difficult. At this point a city will sprawl seeking new revenue to repeat past mistakes because it cannot adequately diagnose the cellular performance of its anatomy. The problem becomes acute when an encircled city has no more room to sprawl, limited ability to diagnose, and less ability to treat.

A sprawling city will continue to consume its source of life in a vain search for economic stability until it learns to diagnose and correlate shelter capacity, social activity, and economic performance at the cellular level of its growth. The goal is sustainable urban form and social activity that produces adequate average municipal revenue per acre within limited geographic areas. It is an obvious prerequisite for symbiotic survival.

Planning the Future of Shelter on a Finite Planet

Shelter means survival for Homo sapiens until sprawl becomes a threat to its source of life. Shelter site plan composition is defined by topics that may be unfamiliar. The values assigned to the topics and items listed in a building category template represent quantities . These quantities define a shelter capacity, intensity, intrusion, and dominance option illustrated by the site plan. (Shelter capacity is gross building area in sq. ft. divided by the buildable land area in acres.) The choice of values entered in a category template has quality of life implications within the property cell, or lot, and in the surrounding area. The accumulation of quantity decisions produced by property cell aggregation creates the Shelter Division of the Built Domain. This domain is organically alive and growing because we live in the nucleus of each cell.

I’ve covered this in two editions of my book, Land Development Calculations, 2001 and 2010, but the forecasting math in the attached CD’s was based on my first attempts to organize the empirical thought process and topic arithmetic related to the very beginning of the architectural design process. This site plan arithmetic sets the stage for all that follows, but site plan topics have not been consistently listed and values correlated to mathematically predict the shelter capacity, intensity, intrusion, and dominance implied. Site planning has also been upstaged by a focus on final building style and appearance. This may produce a signature building on an isolated lot, but isolated sculpture does not ensure desirable quality of life on the site and among buildings in surrouding neighborhoods, districts, cities and regions.

A focus on isolated shelter projects will continue to produce random sprawl until a new language is created with the power to correlate shelter capacity, intensity, intrusion, and dominance on every lot present and planned. The aggregation of these cellular decisions sets the stage for the physical, social, psychological, environmental, and economic quality of life in projects, neighborhoods, districts, cities, and regions.

The goal is shelter for the activities of growing populations within geographic limits that protect their quality and source of life. A new language of shelter planning is needed to achieve the goal. The goal will only be successful, however, when associated with a global policy of symbiotic survival.

A correlated mathematical language for shelter capacity measurement, forecasting, evaluation, and planning has been my objective, and I am writing this because the effort is complete. It has been based on the realization that there are now two worlds on a single planet – The Built Domain and The Natural Domain. The Built Domain contains Urban and Rural Phyla. Each phylum contains four divisions: Shelter, Movement, Open Space, and Life Support. The Shelter Division in each phylum is served by arteries of movement and life support. Open space arteries in the Urban Phylum are rarely present but badly needed. Their inclusion has been discredited by the concept of “highest and best use”. The benefit from this slogan has been limited to a few when the scope of shelter capacity, intensity, intrusion, and dominance imposed on our presence is considered in addition to the sprawl it produces when the concept is a world without end.

The Shelter Division contains six primary building design categories. Each category may be occupied by any activity, assuming zoning and building code compliance. A category is defined by at least two design specification templates that list topics in response to the information given. The values assigned to each topic and item in a template represent a design option that is produced by an architectural algorithm serving a master equation. The equation in one template produces gross building area options and implications based on floor quantity alternatives, and many options can be evaluated in the time it takes to produce one sketch. The equation in the other produces buildable land area options for a given gross building area objective. The palette of template values chosen represents a mathematical foundation for the vast list of architectural design decisions that are built upon this base.

Shelter cells, or lots, are presently growing with negligible, random restraint across the face of our planet in a parasitic pattern we refer to as “sprawl”. This is happening because there is no reliable leadership language for city design. A cure for sprawl will depend on its formation and the decisions we define as urban DNA with its vocabulary. The challenge I've mentioned is a symbiotic urban anatomy containing shelter for growing populations within limited geographic areas that are defined to protect their source and quality of life. The birth of this anatomy will replace the parasitic, carcinogenic pattern of land consumption that we currently refer to as “sprawl” when not admiring it as “growth”.

Response to Bill Gates Regarding Land Consumption

The conversion of arable land to shelter population growth is currently a random function of market forces because these forces lack the mathematical ability to quickly, accurately and comprehensively forecast shelter capacity options. The result has been arbitrary consumption we call “sprawl” based on the concept of a “world without end” and the mandate to be “fruitful and multiply”. The” unlimited” concept no longer applies and the “fruitful” mandate is no longer needed to protect Homo sapiens from other predatory species. Homo sapiens’ parasitic, life threatening sprawl across the face of the planet however, will only be cured when we adopt a policy of symbiotic survival that includes the goal of shelter planning within sustainable geographic limits.

The classification system and mathematical tools required to accurately budget land for shelter is the subject of my fourth book, which is nearing completion. The choice of optional design specification values within the system will be up to you. These choices will determine our ability to shelter growing populations within geographic limits that protect their quality and source of life.

A QUESTION from KABUL

A QUESTION FROM KABUL

Originally addressed to the AIAKnowledgeNet

I am working as an Urban Planner in developing a City bus plan for Kabul city in Afghanistan, which includes both operational plan as well as a plan for necessary infrastructure (e.g. stations, terminals, depots, etc.).

I tried to search a specific standard for developing a land use plan for all these stations, but could not find any.

Can someone please recommend me a specific manual/ standard which could help me in identifying percent of green area, built-up area and paved area (for bus maneuver and parking).

I’ve condensed the question above. The complete text mentioned the following:

“Unfortunately the sites geometry are not specified yet, so we want to purpose a typical package with specified requirements and facilities.”

ANSWER

I'm glad you're searching for site plan ratios that relate to building design categories occupied by specific activity groups. These ratios define the shelter capacity, intensity, intrusion, and dominance planned or present. They also determine the amount of land we remove as a source of life.

If you enter values in the shaded boxes of Table 2.3, including the gross building area objective in cell A34, the embedded architectural algorithm and master equation will predict buildable land area options related to the floor quantity options entered in cells A44-A53. Examples of predictions are located in its Planning Forecast Panel and Implications Module. The values shown are examples. They do not apply to your particular Activity Group (Bus Terminals). The table relates to the G1 Building Design Category, which includes all buildings served by surface parking and loading adjacent to, but not under, the building. You would have to tailor the values entered to your particular Activity Group. The result would be a forecast of buildable land area options. The problem is that the knowledge to accurately fill in the values is missing. This is where research and knowledge is required. If you send me the values you wish to enter in the shaded boxes, including floor quantity options, I will be happy to send you an Adobe copy of the forecast. This may help define your “typical package”. (This offer was only made, and is limited to, the unnamed source of this inquiry.)

If you know land area and wish to forecast development capacity, send me the values in the shaded boxes of Table 2.1. The embedded architectural algorithm and master equation will predict gross building area options for a given gross land area. The results are a function of the values entered, including floor quantity options. The accuracy of the forecast would again be a function of the acquired value knowledge you have regarding the topics addressed by the shaded boxes of Table 2.1. This is why I suggested that you measure existing project values and evaluate the results produced before you decide on the values you wish to enter.

The percentage of unpaved open space entered in cell F11 of Table 2.1 and in cell F10 of Table 2.3 is often overlooked but of particular importance. When it is subtracted from 100%, the remainder is the total impervious cover permitted on the site. Impervious cover should not exceed the storm sewer capacity that is, or will be, available. Sacrificing open space for the sake of shelter capacity on a given land area increases impervious cover. Flooding can result when the decision is repeated along the branch line of a storm sewer with limited capacity. Protecting storm sewer capacity is one justification for the presence of unpaved open space. Improving our quality of life within the urban pattern is another, but our present knowledge regarding the relationship of unpaved open space to our physical, social, psychological, environmental, and economic quality of life is minimal at best and often subjective. Unpaved open space, however, is the missing artery in an urban anatomy of shelter capacity that is served by arteries of movement and life support. A sprinkling of isolated parks has attempted to substitute for the deficiency. 

The Language of Shelter Capacity

"The Conversation", Arnold Lahovsky c.1935

There are now two worlds on a single planet – the Built Domain and the Natural Domain. The challenge is to prevent the Built Domain from consuming its source of life with annexation and sprawl that provides shelter for population growth. This means that we need a language that can accurately predict gross building area options per acre. I say this because gross building area is shelter capacity per acre that may be occupied by any activity; and the proportional presence of activity within a limited municipal land area determines its economic stability, social benefit, and potential for symbiotic correlation with the Natural Domain.

There are only six habitable building design categories on the planet when classification is not based on building appearance and internal occupant activity. This limited number makes gross building area and shelter capacity prediction feasible for every acre of land based on the building design category chosen. The shelter capacity of each category is determined by design specification value decisions. These topics are listed in a category’s design specification template. These values are correlated with an architectural algorithm and used by a category master equation to produce gross building area and shelter capacity options per acre. Changing one or more values in the category template produces a new set of predictions. This becomes significant when we realize that the ability to accurately predict gross building area alternatives and shelter capacity options per acre for any activity will determine our ability to correlate a growing presence with a planet that is no longer a world without end.

I have completed my work and will be publishing my fourth and final book on this subject. The first two included a CD that contained spreadsheet forecasting models, but the category classification system and internal mathematics are now outdated. My fourth book will not contain a CD because the previous versions were extensively copied. I now hope to place these improved models in the cloud for access on a subscription basis. These models can predict hundreds of options in the time it would take to sketch one. The mathematical correlation involved can eliminate regulatory contradiction papered over with arbitrary variance approvals. This has the potential to improve evaluation, focus decisions, and eliminate the promiscuous, arbitrary consumption of our Natural Domain when accurate correlation is missing.

Excessive shelter intensity is an internal urban threat that compromises our health, safety, and quality of life. The external threat is sprawl. It continues to consume our source of life. Both can be addressed with the language of shelter capacity, but there is a more fundamental policy issue. It is symbiotic survival. Excessive shelter will threaten our quality of life with excessive intensity and the natural balance that we instinctively know is required. Shelter capacity, intensity, intrusion, and dominance can now be measured with the language of shelter capacity. This is the language needed to accurately assess the shelter options available to Homo sapiens and the decisions needed to protect a human presence that depends on symbiotic solutions for sustainability.

Correlating Economic & Real Estate Development

Note: The forecast models mentioned are at the end of this text.

There are only six primary building design categories on the planet. The fact that buildings have been classified by appearance and internal activity (such as a Greek Revival bank) has concealed a more fundamental classification that makes the efficient use of land mathematically predictable.

A building category may be occupied by any activity when they both comply with local zoning and building codes. The categories themselves just have greater and lesser shelter capacity potential based on their design specification topics and assigned values. (“Shelter capacity” is gross building area per buildable acre.)

The most common building design category is G1. It includes all buildings served by a surface parking lot around, but not under, the building. I’m including a G1 model and two versions of its design specification template to explain the concept of consistent development capacity prediction and regulation.

The entire software package is based on a single concept. A user can accurately predict gross building area options for any given land area based on the values entered in a design specification template. The template is related to the building design category under consideration. When gross building area options can be forecast, the user can predict anything that is a function of a building square foot such as: construction cost, profit potential, revenue potential, financing expense, population, traffic generation, and so on. This is a great boost to project economic development, but there is another macro consideration.

A city has a total expense per acre that is offset by its total revenue per acre. Revenue potential is a function of the gross building area present and the activity sheltered within. The combination of shelter capacity and activity produces real estate tax, income tax, and other miscellaneous income to offset total municipal expense per acre. The challenge is to correlate land use allocation with shelter capacity to produce revenue per acre that will be equal to a city’s expense per acre as it ages.

The best municipal economic development combines project emphasis with a correlated, comprehensive land use and shelter capacity plan for economic stability throughout the city. This means that a city must understand the productivity of each acre. Productivity is primarily produced by a combination of shelter capacity and activity per acre. The challenge is to balance shelter capacity with occupant activity throughout a city to reach its revenue target. Unfortunately, a city has not been able to measure or accurately predict the shelter capacity of each acre in its portfolio. This has prevented an accurate assessment of the revenue potential of each acre when occupied by gross building area and activity options.

An economic plan grows one project at a time, but it will continue to be a haphazard benefit to its community until the physical growth of shelter capacity can be correlated with the social and economic implications of occupant activity per square foot of gross building area potential. At this point the final physical composition, context, and appearance added will symbolize the development decisions behind the health, safety, and quality of life provided.

The following are two examples of design specification decisions that lead to gross building area and shelter capacity options for a given gross land area. The design specification template lists the G1 cell content that must be managed with optional value decisions to produce intended physical, social, psychological, environmental, and economic results on a consistent basis.

Non-Residential Shelter Capacity

A G1.L1 forecast model is attached and applies when gross land area (GLA) is given and gross building area options (GBA) are to be found. (A G1.B1 forecast model applies when a gross building area objective is given and buildable land area options for the gross building area objective are to be found.) When values are entered in all shaded boxes of the G1.L1 forecast model, the algorithm and master equation in the model calculate gross building area options for the land specified in cell F3 based on the floor quantity options entered in cells A44-A53. (Note that 30% open space has been entered in cell F11. This value produces an impervious cover limit of 70% in cell F12. The storm sewer capacity present or planned should equal this impervious cover percentage unless storm detention and/or retention are introduced.)

Based on all specification values entered, the gross building area options forecast are contained in cells B44-B53 of the Planning Forecast Panel and are a function of the floor quantity options entered in cells A44-A53. (Please note that the GBA options increase at a decreasing rate per floor, and that building footprint options (BCA) decline at an increasing rate per floor until the footprint eventually becomes too small to be realistic. This is a G1 Design Category characteristic that I won’t stop to explain.)

A change to one of more of the values entered in the shaded boxes of the design specification template produces a new forecast of development capacity options in the Planning Forecast Panel of the G1.L1 model. The building footprint area (BCA), gross parking area (GPA), and parking quantity options (NPS) predicted in Columns C-E are a few of the many that can be calculated once gross building area alternatives (GBA) can be forecast.

The Implications Module measures the shelter capacity (SFAC), intensity (INT), intrusion (INTR), and dominance (DOM) implied by the design specification values entered and the gross building area options (GBA) calculated in cells B44-B53.

Residential Apartment Shelter Capacity

The G1.L1 forecast model predicted gross building area options when occupied by non-residential activities. The results in the Planning Forecast Panel (PFP) and Implications Module (IMP) were a function of the values entered in its 27 shaded design specification boxes.

A G1.L1.R3 forecast model is included to illustrate an R3 apartment specification module. It must be added to the G1.L1 specification template when R3 apartment occupancy is planned. This module is presented in cells A34-J45.

The 52 values entered in the shaded boxes of the G1.L1.R3 design specification are again used by an architectural algorithm and master equation to predict gross building area potential in cells B56-B65.

The values entered in the R3 Apartment Module are used to convert the gross building area and building footprint options predicted in columns B and C of the Planning Forecast Panel. The number of dwelling units implied is forecast in Column D of the Planning Forecast Panel. Additional parking and garage predictions are included in Columns E-H based on the specification values entered. A breakdown of dwelling unit quantities by bedroom type is included on lines 70 and 71.

The Implications Module of the G1.L1.R3 forecast model is located in cells J56-M65. It translates gross building area options into the following implication categories: (1) shelter capacity per acre, (2) intensity, (3) intrusion, (4) domination, and (5) dwelling unit density per shelter acre (dSHAC).

Conclusion

A forecast model permits all interested public and private parties to discuss a common set of correlated design specification topics and values with predictable outcomes and implications. This removes surprises, builds trust, and produces consensus by using a common mathematical language with the capacity to repeat success and avoid failure.