Hidden Density
Brent Toderian, the City of Vancouver’s Director of Planning, came up with a triptych that beautifully describes three kinds of density acceptable to residents of existing communities who would otherwise fight off any intervention that would seem to change the character of their community.
They are Invisible, Hidden, and Gentle Densities.
The first might be a secondary suite in an existing house. No change at all as seen from the street.
The second might be a lane cottage, tucked behind a house and barely seen from the front.
The third might be a few extra floors above the retail frontages along a commercial street or the introduction of rowhouses in a neighbourhood.
In a recent Planetizen blog post, Brent updates the progress the City is making in Hidden Density in the form of lane houses. You can read all about it here. Best of all, he includes images of recent examples.
Here are three examples of the Laneway Revolution – a sampling from the 200 approved in the City of Vancouver in the last year.
So if you can’t afford to buy a $750K plus fixer-upper in an existing community, you should resign yourself to being invisible (in a dark basement), hidden (out back in the laneway), or gentle (not sure what gentle is getting at)?
Gentle (context-sensitive?) is admittedly hard to argue with, but I sincerely take issue with the notion of pretending that density is only okay if we can pretend that it doesn’t exist and that the less fortunate remain in basements, backyards, or along arterials with heavy traffic.
What’s wrong with rowhouses, plexes, shotguns, etc…? Boston, Montréal, New York, San Francisco, Pittsburgh, and a host of other cities have beautiful and highly-sought-after multi-unit accommodation that in its design actually acknowledges the fact that not everybody can (or would like to) live in a monoculture of single-detached houses.
Suites and laneway houses are great and many are beautiful and dignified, but surely they shouldn’t be the only design solutions for multi-unit residential in existing communities. It’d be nice if other people could also have a front door, a small garden, etc. Surely there are ways of elegantly designing for higher densities that involve neither towers, podiums, or gentle, invisible hiding!
Some of these innovations are great ways to up the housing stock gradually, but the overwhelming emphasis on pretending that all is well in single-family land just reeks of ‘I’ve got mine’ elitism.
I sincerely hope that we see the introduction of more rowhouses and am glad to see that reference included in the above post; it’ll be interesting to see if Vancouver can do ‘tower without podium’ in its sleepier, out-of-downtown corners.
Don, I wholly share your opinion.
Many of these laneway house designs are pretty slick and are a Canadian analogue to the residential mews one sees in London in Belgravia. A nice residential option. Lance Berelowitz responded to Brent’s Planetizen post that the better model Vancouver should pursue for the “surburban” parts of the city is Mannhattan. Certainly building out Vancouver’s 45 square miles to the equivalent of West End residential densities would accommodate about another 2 million people, or about 60 years of forecast growth for the whole metro region. This assumes the other 20 plus municipalities park their aspirations for more population for that period, and that the majority of new reginoal residents aspire to an apartment lifestyle, whether the form model is New York or Paris or Coal Harbour. Another approach that I think is an entirely achievable direction for the next 30 – 50 years would be: 1) to develop the equivalent of Kerrisdale at every rapid transit stop along the Canada line south of False Creek, and along the Expo line, creating in effect a micro-West End for the square kilometer around each station; and, 2) permit freehold row houses as of right in all the remaining residential zones of the city. This last move on its own would has the potential to effectively double the theoretical unit yield of a standard block, in a form that avoids forcing people to join the often dysfunctional political community that is the strata council.
I agree with the comments on hiding density.
Although the laneway houses are a step up from hiding density in a basmeent suite, it’s still pretty low density.
WRT Mark’s comment about building a kerrisdale at each station.
I’ve always wondered why Kerridale – a historic transit-oriented development – is never used as an example.
Here is a link to a shot of Kerrisdale from the air with the Arbutus rail corridor at the top to give one a sense of the level of development that could cluster around a Canada line station, in a form entirely familiar to Vancouver residents.
http://flickr.com/photos/flyer_901/3380938049/