HOSACK BLOG INDEX 10.9 - 23.4

 I thought it might be helpful to publish a complete list of my blog essays to date as one complete document for ease of reference. The essays in italics were written after publication of the collection in “Symbiotic Architecture”. The italicized titles are only available on my blog and on Linked-In. Some, but not all, of the earlier titles are available on Linked-In. SEE 25.6 UPDATE

	Walter M. Hosack
Year/Mo/Order
10.9.1	Replacing Density
10.9.2	The City is a Farm
10.10.1	Examining Architecture Part 1
10.10.2	The Disorganized Zoning Ordinance
10.10.3	The Limits of Shelter Capacity
10.11.1	The Variance Contradiction
10.12.1	Land Use Plans & Ponzi Schemes
11.1.1	Hidden Implications of Design Decisions
11.1.1	Strategy is Missing from Economic Development
11.2.1	A Tool for Containing Sprawl
11.4.1	Design Specifications & Shelter Intensity
11.4.2	Parking Lot Design Implications
11.5.1	Dwelling Unit Design Implications
11.6.1	Measuring Design Excellence - Sullivan & Wright
11.7.1	The Symbiotic City
11.8.1	Symbiotic Architecture
11.9.1	City Design for Economic Stability
11.10.1	Citizen Participation is not Leadership
11.10.2	City Design with Space
11.10.3	Design for Survival
11.10.4	Education
11.10.5	Education Preamble
11.10.6	Pitch and Catch
11.10.7	Predict Shelter Options within Limited Built Domain
11.10.8	Protecting the Planet
11.10.9	Talent and Leadership
11.11.1	A New Language for Architecture & City Design
11.11.2	Strategic & Tactical Architecture
11.12.1	Improving Arguments for Architecture & City Design
11.12.2	A Tool for Containing Sprawl
11.12.3	An Overlooked Threat to the Family of Man
11.12.4	Conceptual Design & Architectural Scope
11.12.5	Land is a Critical Design Element
11.12.6	The Public Benefit of Architecture
12.1.1	City Design Synopsis
12.1.2	City Design-Urban Design-Architecture
12.1.3	Context, Capacity & Intensity
12.1.4	Examining Architecture Part 2
12.1.5	Form Follows Invention
12.1.6	Logic & Knowledge in Design
12.1.7	Parking Variances - A Glimpse into the Future
12.1.8	Population and Intensity
12.1.9	Questions About City Planning & Architecture
12.1.10	Recalling Michelangelo
12.1.11	Shelter, Survival and Design
12.1.12	Sustainability
12.1.13	Vitruvius Revisited
12.2.1	A Common Imperative
12.2.2	Intensity is Measurement for Survival
12.2.3	The Problem w City Planning
12.2.4	What is Architecture?
12.3.1	Introduction to Intensity
12.3.2	Recalling Linnaeus
12.3.3	The Symbiotic Goal
12.4.1	John Muir & Architecture
12.4.2	Response to the Problems with City Planning
12.4.3	Taking the Pulse of Architecture
12.5.1	First Prority of Architecture
12.6.1	Architectural Education Dialogue Part 1
12.6.2	Architectural Education Dialogue Part 2
12.6.3	Architectural Education Dialogue Part 3
12.6.4	Core Issues Parts 1-2 Szymanik Inquiry
12.6.5	Five Categories of Architecture
12.6.6	Harnessing Architectural Curriculum Pt 1-2-3
12.6.7	The Other Architectural Puzzle CG1B
12.7.1	Criticism, Questions & Ideas
12.7.2	Relevance
12.7.3	Replacing the Floor Area Ratio
12.7.4	Seriously
12.7.5	The Significance of Gross Building Area
12.8.1	Searching for Answers
12.8.2	Shelter, Space & Intensity
12.9.1	Plan with Architectural Intensity
12.10.1	The Influence of Design Decisions
12.10.2	Quantifying Intuition
12.11	The Built Domain
13.1.1	Problem Solvers
13.1.2	The Many Faces of Architecture
13.3.1	Free Enterprise & Architecture
13.4.1	Symbiotic Knowledge
13.5.1	Sound Bytes from Architecture
13.6.1	Commentary - Part 1
13.6.2	Leadership & Design
13.9.1	The Design Decisions That Matter
13.9.2	The Greatest Invention
13.10.1	Repositioning
13.11.1	Fundamental Questions
14.1.1	Sustainability & First Ring Suburbs
14.1.2	To the Philippines & Malaysia
14.1.3	Traffic Lights
14.2.1	Scoundrels in Law
14.4.1	Tacit Knowledge
14.5.1	Reply to Tacit Knowledge Comment
14.11.1	A Plan Review
15.1.1	Lesson from the Duomo
15.1.2	Reconsidering Architecture
15.1.3	Two Questions with Follow-up
15.2.1	A Fork in the Road
15.2.2	Architectural Practice and Profession
15.2.3	Comments Worth Pondering
15.2.4	Survival
15.3.1	Design Leadership
15.3.2	Two Question Follow-up
16.7.1	Advertise The Science of City Design
16.7.2	Excerpts from The Science of City Design
16.7.3	The Science of City Design
16.8.1	City Planning & Design Basics
16.8.2	Repeating Success
16.9.1	Pop-up Urban Projects
16.9.2	Shaping the Future With Opinion
16.9.3	Urban Renewal
16.10.1	Removing the Blindfold from Economic Development
16.10.2	The Human Scale
16.11.1	Land Use & Urban Form
16.11.2	Power, Policy & Planning
16.12.1	Architecture, Agriculture & Planning
16.12.2	Graduating from The Floor Area Ratio
17.1.1	Restoring the Health of Cities
17.2.1	Arguing for a Science of City Design
17.2.2	Strategic Architecture
17.2.3	Surface Parking Limits on Shelter Capacity
17.2.4	The Concept
17.2.5	Updating a Comprehensive Plan
17.3.1	Adapting Our Cities to Reality
17.3.2	Improving the Influence City Planning & Design
17.4.1	Addendum to What is Architecture
17.4.2	Townhouse & Apartment Density Exposed
17.5.1	A Cautionary Comment
17.6.1	A Debate Over Architectural Beauty & Taste
17.7.1	Grenfell Tower
17.7.2	Replacing Density - Updated
17.7.3	Zoning Conflict & Opportunity
17.8.1	Competing to Consume
17.8.2	Core Area Restrictions on Shelter Capacity
17.8.3	The Future of Cities
17.8.4	Understanding a Building Footprint
17.9.1	Leading Shelter Capacity, Intensity and Context Results
17.9.2	The Future of Shelter
17.10.1	Comparing Shelter Des Decisions 11.4rev
17.10.2	G1.R1 Single-family Detached Home Dilemma
17.12.1	Reply to Architectural Criticism
18.1.1	An Expanded Role for Architecture
18.1.2	Architectural Capacity & Shelter Intensity within a Limited Built Domain
18.2.1	The Least a Smart City Should Know
18.3.1	Elected & Appointed City Planning & Design Decisions
18.3.2	Facing Reality on a Finite Planet
18.3.3	Open Space Metric
18.6.1	Learning to Lead the Formation of Cities
18.7.1	Visualizing the City
19.1.1	Correlating Economic & Real Estate Development
19.3.1	A Question from Kabul
19.3.2	Back Cover
19.4.1	Planning Our Presence
19.4.2	Response to Bill Gates re Land Consumption
19.5.1	Shelter Design Basics
19.6.1	A Collision of Architectural Opinion
19.6.2	Shelter Sprawl
19.8.1	Unstable Land Use Allocation
19.9.1	Larry Discussion
19.10.1	Benefit of Land Use-Urban Form Correlation
20.3.1	A Farmer Knows More
20.4.1	Density and Covid-19
20.4.2	Planning with Economic Development Homework
20.8.1	Zoning Design Specifications
20.10.1	Contributing Knowledge
20.12.1	Measuring the Intensity of Place
21.2.1	Design Decisions that Determine Apartment Density
21.3.1	Design Decisions that Determine Single-Family Detached Housing Density
21.3.2	Design Decisions that Determine Townhouse Density
21.4.1	Design Decisions that Determine Single-Family Subdivision Density
21.7.1	Land Use & Development Capacity Correlation
21.8.1	Shelter, Sprawl, and Survival
21.10.1	The Equations of Urban Design
21.12.1	Not Published - Architecture - Fine Art
22.2.1	Concerning Our Presence on the Planet
22.3.1	The Consequences of City Design Decisions
22.7.1	Urban Design
22.8.1	A Scientific Approach to Zoning Plan Review
22.9.1	Shelter Capacity
22.12.1	The Land We Take for Granted
22.12.2	Confronting Sprawl with an Adequate Language
23.1.1	Interpreting the Planet's Law of Limits
23.1.2	Zoning Plan Review
23.2.1	Annexation
23.2.2	The Public Policy - City Design Disconnect
23.2.3	The Implications of Shelter Capacity Design Decisions
23.4.1	The Decisions Needed
23.4.2	The Pattern of a Master Plan

The Pattern of a Master Plan

 A plan is a pattern. Building mass emerges from

a plan and produces perceptible physical intensity on the land occupied. Mass is gross building area in square feet for occupant activity. I’ve referred to the square foot quantity of gross building area introduced per acre of buildable land as shelter capacity and intensity that can be measured and predicted. Capacity and intensity combine with activity to produce public revenue per buildable acre. In other words, the majority of municipal revenue produced in most cases is a function of the shelter capacity, intensity, and land use activity allocation options chosen for every acre of buildable land within the shelter division of a master plan.

THE SHELTER DIVISION

A city plan that does not convey the shelter capacity, activity, and intensity correlation required to provide adequate average revenue per buildable acre within its municipal boundaries will manage its budget over time through a rear view mirror as a consequence. At some point in time this guesswork faces one of two options: (1) annexation of undeveloped land and sprawl for new revenue that again becomes inadequate over time -- when land is available. This option leads a city to slowly consume its source of life in pursuit of the correlation it cannot calculate and monitor; or (2) redevelopment of land within a fully developed, encircled city with no annexation potential. This unpopular alternative remains its only method of revising existing shelter capacity, intensity, and activity allocation to increase the revenue needed to reverse decline and improve its quality of life.

It is not difficult to understand that shelter capacity in square feet of gross building area per buildable acre times the revenue potential of occupant activity per square foot will yield revenue potential per acre for a given activity. Unfortunately, land use allocation for activity has not been correlated with the shelter capacity and intensity potential of land to produce revenue per acre ratios equal to a city’s total annual expense per acre. The inevitable result involves public service reduction.

The building category classification, design specification templates, and master equations needed to measure and predict these options now exist, but the information gathering and evaluation procedures needed to support this effort with an increasing foundation of knowledge remains unassembled.

I’m not aware of any city with the correlated information management systems, relational databases, measurement protocols, shelter classifications, forecast models, predictive equations, and assessment program needed to undertake the knowledge accumulation required to support the level of city design suggested, but I am no scholar.

The effort hasn’t been that important because land has been considered a commodity “without end” that can be purchased, granted, or converted with few restrictions prior to the 20^th century. We are slowly beginning to realize that land is actually a source of life that can be consumed. This has made preservation a greater concern, but we have not begun to accurately predict the land use, massing, and intensity correlation needed for economic stability within a limited Built Domain designed to protect our quality and source of life.

This has led me to argue that we must improve our understanding of the shelter capacity of land; the occupant activity ratios required for economic stability; and the intensity options needed to serve growing populations within limited land areas that do not threaten their quality of life; since every acre we consume for shelter to survive is an acre we remove from our source of life.

In other words, the square feet of gross building area per acre and the revenue it produces per square foot of occupant activity determines the contribution of the acre to the total annual cost of city services per acre. To be successful, city design must accurately provide ratios of shelter capacity, intensity, and activity that combine to produce average revenue per buildable acre equal to a city’s average cost per acre to provide a desirable quality of life -- without the physical handicaps associated with excessive intensity, intrusion, physical dominance, and sprawl.

In summary, the building design categories and equations of city design produce shelter capacity / intensity options defined by the values entered in their design specification templates. The gross building area options produced have been generically referred to as building mass options.  The massing ratios of shelter capacity, intensity, and activity adopted for every buildable acre in a city represent its recipe for economic stability. I have mentioned these in my previous essay and will avoid repetition here.

The organization of massing ratios has been variously referred to as urban design, place-making, urban texture, urban composition, landscape architecture, site planning, architecture, and so on. For the most part, these terms have been land owner focused, project-oriented, and concerned with initial construction cost and profit potential. Public revenue has been a remote or nonexistent consideration.

THE MOVEMENT DIVISION

I’ve referred to movement in all its forms as a division of the Rural and Urban phyla of the Built Domain. It serves the Shelter Division. I am not referring to movement systems that connect these domains and cannot help traversing the Natural Domain.

Movement systems have served as a framework for the color identification of land use categories in master plans. I’ll have to admit that I have always wondered about the justification for the land use quantities and intensities proposed for these activities, since inadequate economic contribution over time can often prompt requests for annexation and/or redevelopment as city expenses and populations increase.

A master plan often focuses on its movement pattern. The pattern serves as a guide for the land use allocation of shelter capacity, intensity, and activity based on concepts of compatibility, but these are concepts that have often contributed to budget deficiencies and sprawl.

Movement systems have been encouraged to penetrate agriculture and the Natural Domain to serve growing populations. This has had to occur before the land use quantities required for shelter capacity, activity, intensity, economic stability, and quality of life within a limited Built Domain could be accurately predicted. Sprawl has been an inevitable symbol of the lag between civil engineering and city design leadership.

The mathematical foundation for measurement, evaluation, prediction, knowledge accumulation, and leadership of the Shelter Division has had to depend on instinct, intuition, talent, and opinion. The result has been an attempt to respond to market demand without an adequate frame of reference. The result has often been sprawl. Redevelopment has rarely been accepted as a reasonable alternative when agriculture and the Natural Domain are not available for annexation. In this case, decline becomes a greater possibility.

THE OPEN SPACE DIVISION

I’ve referred to public and institutional open space in all its forms as a division of the Rural and Urban Phyla of the Built Domain, and as another essential artery supporting life in this abstract world. Unfortunately, it has often become pockets of relief and an expression of charity. Its role as a vital artery providing life support to the populations of both the Natural and Built Domains at all levels of scale remains to be acknowledged with a scope that can make the difference.

THE LIFE SUPPORT DIVISION

I will continue to refer to this division as an artery. It includes all above and below ground services required to serve the power and utility demands of the other divisions in the Built Domain. I am not referring to the methods of acquisition and production of energy currently under great scrutiny in the Natural Domain. I am only including it as an essential division of the Built Domain that has great significance and deserves adequate correlation within the urban pattern, texture, and composition being considered within a limited Built Domain.

CONCLUSION

Private sector special interest cannot be expected to plan or predict the public interest in adequate revenue and quality of life within limited areas; or the extent of the Natural Domain that must be protected as our source of life. The health, safety and welfare of a population remains an issue, however. The dimensions of concern have simply expanded and the leadership language required must improve in response.

The Decisions Needed to Shelter the Activities of Growing Populations Within a Limited Built Domain

 

If you agree that we need shelter to survive on an unstable planet, and that the Natural Domain is a source of life that must be protected, then the remaining question concerns the land area that must be devoted to the Natural Domain; and the Built Domain area that remains to accommodate shelter for the activities of a growing populations seeking a desirable quality of life. I will leave this question to others far more qualified to answer.

My objective is to explain the tools needed to measure and predict shelter capacity and intensity options for any limited land area, given the assumption that the Built Domain cannot continue to expand and consume its agricultural land and the land of the Natural Domain indefinitely. This is the knowledge we will need to more accurately consider the shelter potential of any land area in any designated Built Domain.

Shelter begins as building mass we call gross building area. Gross building area produces shelter capacity, intensity, intrusion, and dominance that can be measured and predicted. Gross building area may be occupied by any activity and molded to achieve any appearance. The more fundamental point is that gross building area per buildable acre, or shelter capacity, combines with occupant activity to determine the scope of revenue potential per buildable acre; but excessive intensity can undermine the quality of life desired. Different activities produce different revenue quantities per square foot. This means that revenue per buildable acre is a function of the gross building area, shelter capacity, intensity, and activity introduced. The combinations combine to form neighborhoods, districts, cities, regions, and so on; but cities have not had the information management systems, predictive algorithms, and development control needed to reconcile the productive capacity of municipal land per acre with the annual expense per acre required to deliver all desired services. At this point, the debate over “essential” services begins in every city hall facing budget cuts.

The gross building area introduced per acre of buildable land area occupied is referred to as shelter capacity. The shelter capacity of a cell, or land area, is a function of the building design category chosen and the design specification values entered in its forecast model. Shelter capacity decisions have intensity, intrusion, and dominance implications that can be calculated, evaluated, and predicted at the cellular level of shelter formation.

It helps to recognize that gross building area is a universal measurement; that gross building area divided by the buildable acres occupied is a measure of shelter capacity; that shelter capacity can be occupied by any activity; that shelter capacity can be used to measure or calculate the physical intensity, intrusion, and dominance present or planned; that physical intensity produces a host of social, psychological, environmental, and economic implications; and that the intensity planned for activity within the Built Domain contributes to the physical, social, and economic relationships established.

Built Domain Classification

Built Domain classification begins with its urban and rural phyla. It continues with the shelter, movement, open space, and life support divisions within each phylum. The shelter division contains the building design categories listed in Table 1. This relatively limited list can be occupied by any activity group we currently refer to as a land use category. The separation of building design category and capacity from land use activity serves to explain a relationship that can be correlated to produce a desired economic yield per acre when shelter capacity forecasting is available.

The specification topics related to each building design category represent the initial language of shelter capacity design. I will introduce Table 2 as an example in a moment. The values assigned to the shaded values in a forecast model represent the parameters being considered to lead all ensuing design decisions. These values define the gross building area options under consideration. The intensity, intrusion, and dominance implications of these decisions are also calculated in each forecast model to permit the evaluation required to build knowledge and establish leadership direction.

Building Design Categories in the Shelter Division

Building design category classification begins with the parking system under consideration. The parking decision, including a “no parking” option, defines the building design category under consideration, since the parking system is directly related to the gross building area that can be created on a given land area. There are a number of variables involved in addition to parking as you will soon see, but the principal determinants of shelter capacity prediction are the core buildable area available, the building design category, parking requirement , floor quantity, and unpaved project open space percentage being considered.

Design Specification Values

When building classification is based on the parking system involved, the number of potential building design categories is limited. This makes measurement and mathematical prediction of gross building area and shelter capacity options for all categories feasible in a short period of time – when using design specification values in the spreadsheet format of a forecast model. It is, after all, shelter capacity, intensity, and activity that must be economically correlated on every acre within municipal boundaries to protect its quality and source of life. The social, psychological, environmental, and economic implications of these predictions will remain unknown until evaluated by many related but currently independent professions. This means that independent professional observations can be correlated with the design specification values involved. Sprawl has failed to achieve this correlated goal, even though it may produce immediate economic benefit that proves temporary over time.

Forecast Model Example

I’ve introduced Table 2 is an example of a forecast model I’ve introduced many times. It pertains to the G1.L1 predictive model. This is shorthand for a forecast model that applies to all buildings served by a surface parking lot around, but not under, the building (G1) when gross land area is given (L1).

Table 2 is an example of the design specification vocabulary used to measure and/or predict the shelter capacity of a given land area. The shaded areas indicate decision locations for optional value entries that are correlated by the model’s algorithm to produce the gross building area, shelter capacity, intensity, and activity implied. A change to one or more of these value decisions produces a revised template calculation. These shaded value decisions control the formation of cellular capacity for shelter activity, intensity, and revenue within cities.

Core Land Area

I’ve referred to the buildable land area remaining for building cover (footprint) and parking cover on a given gross land area as the core area. It is found through a process of subtraction that begins with the value entered in cell F3. The shaded values entered from cell F4 to F29 are subtracted to find the core area remaining (CORE) in cell F33 and G33. This is a key variable in the master equation noted in cell B39.

The master equation also depends on the parking variables (s & a) entered in shaded cells A35 and A36 and the floor quantity variable (f) entered in shaded cells A44-A53.

Planning Forecast Panel

The Land Module and Core Module variables entered in the shaded cells noted are used to calculate the gross building area options in cells B44-B53 of the Planning Forecast Panel. Additional design information in the panel can be calculated using the gross building area values predicted.

Implications Module

The shelter capacity, intensity, intrusion, and dominance implications of the design specification values entered in the shaded cells of Table 2 are calculated in its Implications Module based on the gross building area options predicted in its Planning Forecast Panel. The implication equations involved are noted on line 43 of the Implications Module.

Conclusion

Table 2 has been included to generally illustrate the predictive format used for all forecast models listed in Table 1. They have all been created to both measure existing design specification values for evaluation of existing conditions and to predict the correlated implications of contemplated design specification values. The concept is similar to our first blood pressure measurements. In the beginning, these measurements were just an idea. The identification, collection, evaluation, correlation, and sharing of measurement and observation began to improve the diagnostic ability of medicine. The measurement and prediction of shelter capacity makes this possible for all the disciplines associated with the evaluation and planning of a Built Domain that must become capable of coexisting with its source of life while ensuring its quality of life within geographic limits.