In my opinion, cities only know where they are. They have a limited
concept of where they want to be. They know the annual revenue they receive and
if next year’s budget must be reduced, but they do not understand the granular
level of their revenue engine and the comprehensive physical adjustments that
annexation, economic development, zoning, and redevelopment must produce to
comprehensively improve their financial condition – and few things improve without the money required to undertake the effort.
Improvement will begin when the gross building area
potential of land can be accurately predicted based on the six building design
categories available, since gross building area can be occupied by any
permitted activity, and the combination has significant shelter capacity,
intensity, intrusion, context, and revenue implications. I have discussed this
in many essays. The following is my attempt to summarize.
GROSS BUILDING AREA OPTIONS
Gross Building Area Options (GBA) are a function of the
building design category chosen and the values, including floor quantity alternatives,
entered in its design specification template. For instance, the G1 Building
Design Category equation for gross building area potential uses the values
entered in its template to derive the values needed for its equation. (GBA =
((af) / (a+(fs))) * CORE). My point is that shelter capacity and intensity have
mathematical definitions that can become part of an improved leadership
language. The following are a few points that I’d like to emphasize.
SHELTER CAPACITY
Shelter Capacity (SFAC) is equal to the gross building area
present or predicted (GBA) divided by the buildable acres occupied (BAC),
excluding future expansion area. It can be used to calculate many implications
including, but not limited to, intensity, intrusion, context, and revenue potential.
INTENSITY
Increasing shelter capacity indicates increasing physical
intensity. A city has been concerned with the health, safety, and welfare of
adjacent activity but it has not been able to accurately measure intensity. It
has continued to be a problem without adequate definition. This has led to
sprawl seeking to reduce intensity on one hand and excessive intensity seeking
to increase revenue on the other. Many cities, if not all, have a limited
ability to lead the intensity of shelter construction toward measurable goals
capable of consistently repeating success, in my opinion.
Inadequate density and floor area ratio calculations will
continue to consume our source of life in a vain search for financial stability
until intensity definition and leadership improves. In other words, we have not
been able to measure where we’ve been with a leadership language that can be
used to chart an accurate course into the future.
BUILDING REVENUE POTENTIAL
The annual municipal revenue produced by each taxable parcel
or block within its jurisdiction is a function of the gross building area
present, the occupant activity present, and the revenue produced per square
foot. A city may know the gross building area present per parcel. It could
record the activity present, but it does not record the revenue produced per
square foot of activity on a given buildable land area, and cannot accurately
predict gross building area options for a given buildable land area. This means
that a city vaguely understands the productivity potential of land under its
jurisdiction and cannot accurately evaluate shelter capacity options that can
improve its productivity on a comprehensive basis.
Occupant Revenue per square foot is
equal to total occupant revenue divided by the gross square feet occupied.
Building Revenue per square foot is
equal to the sum of its occupant revenue receipts per square foot divided by
the number of occupants.
Building Revenue Potential per acre of buildable land area is equal to its shelter capacity in square feet times the average revenue potential present or planned per square foot.
Revenue potential is related to shelter intensity and
activity. A city has been concerned with the health, safety, and welfare of
adjacent activity but it has not been able to accurately measure intensity.
This has led to sprawl seeking to reduce intensity on one hand and excessive
intensity seeking to increase revenue on the other. Both have been pursued by
government without an accurate ability to correlate the shelter capacity,
intensity, intrusion, context, and revenue implications capable of consistently
repeating success in my opinion, because cities have had limited information
sharing, data management, mapping, and shelter capacity evaluation available.
This has significantly limited their ability to comprehensively calculate the
shelter capacity and revenue potential of land use decisions in their
jurisdictions.
Inadequate density and floor area ratio calculations will
continue to consume our source of life in a vain search for financial stability
until this leadership improves. In other words, we have not been able to
measure where we’ve been with a leadership language that can be used to chart
an accurate course into the future.
If a city knows its total average annual cost per taxable
acre, it could compare this cost to the annual revenue produced per taxable
acre by each of its parcels, blocks, or zones if it had the required data. It
is an evaluation that could indicate the leadership decisions needed; but
information sharing, data management, mapping, and shelter capacity evaluation
are a few of the tools needed to pursue the knowledge required for more
informed leadership decisions.
SHELTER CAPACITY EVALUATION
Tegimenics, or shelter capacity evaluation, begins with a
series of forecast models meant to measure and predict the gross building area
capacity of buildable land based on a building design category choice, a
template of design specification decisions, and a column of variable of floor
quantity options. Since shelter capacity can be occupied by any permitted
activity, the allocation of capacity over an entire city has significant physical,
social, psychological, environmental, and economic implications that precede
more detailed definition.
TEGIMENICS
The method of calculating shelter capacity and its
implications, or Tegimenics, represents a leadership language based on
mathematics. It can improve our ability to chart a course for shelter that
protects the activities of growing populations on limited land areas defined to
protect their source of life, the Natural Domain.
I’ve written about facets of shelter capacity evaluation on
many occasions. For the interested reader, these essays are located on my blog
at www.wmhosack.blogspot.com.
The more recent are also on LinkedIn. The entire concept is collected in my
book, “The Equations of Urban Design”. It is available on Amazon.com. In
hindsight, I wish I had titled the book, “Tegimenics, the Science of Shelter
Capacity Evaluation”, but this has been a journey of incremental discovery seeking
an intuitive destination. It has led to leadership language capable of measuring,
evaluating, and defining shelter capacity options that can be part of any sustainable, symbiotic
solution to the puzzle of our presence on the planet.
CONCLUSION
I am suggesting that shelter capacity design begins with the
measurement, prediction, evaluation, and selection of desirable site plan quantities.
These quantity decisions establish the foundation for the shelter pattern,
form, function, and appearance that is molded from its recipe. The result is
context of place. This combination of strategic and tactical leadership can be
used to protect our physical, social, psychological, environmental, and
economic quality of life within geographic limits, but it will depend on a
commitment to funding and improving the information sharing, data management,
mapping, and shelter capacity evaluation needed to expand the knowledge available.
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