Architect: Rethink city development
Done well, more dense development can lessen the environmental impact of development and enrich people’s lives, says Terry Shook, who spoke on urban design issues here Wednesday night.
He is an architect and a principal at Shook Kelley, a Charlotte-based urban design and marketing firm. He speaks frequently on urban design issues, and several new urbanist developments the firm has designed have won national and regional awards.
City government sponsored Shook’s public lecture at Diana Wortham Theatre.
Shook suggests that the growing scarcity of oil makes it more important to create development patterns that lessen reliance on the automobile and that development can be done to create a sense of place.
Here are excerpts from Shook’s conversation with the Citizen-Times on Wednesday afternoon.
Question: You’ve been described as an advocate of more dense development and mixed-use development. … Why do you think those are things that we need?
Answer: We’re going to be transitioning from a carbon economy to at least a low-carbon economy, if we’re lucky, and it’s going to drastically impact the pattern of living and land development that we see all across America. … Everything that touches contemporary life is going to be affected by the parallel depletion of oil.
… The other part of it is the spiritual side. Man really is a convivial animal and we have over 50, 60 years of suburban development. We’ve developed a land pattern that’s really against our very basic nature. For many reasons (building) places that are at their very core convivial, that convene people, is an important societal thing.
Q: Are there common characteristics of more dense development and maybe mixed-use developments that you think work?
A: A legitimate public realm. A very public space where people are empowered to be citizens and you guys (in Asheville) can check that one off … with the fact that you have had a Pack Square for all these years. …
The second one, I think, is recognizing that street-level retail that surrounds it … is a very important part of activating that public realm. Then you get into design issues in terms of how that is done. There are good ways, from an urban design perspective, where retail meets the street and there are also some abysmal ones. Quite frankly my profession, architecture, over the past 50 years, has a pretty poor record on its own in delivering that. The best models, for better or worse, really are the ones that predate World War II.
Q: We’ve had some support in this area in theory for more dense development, new urbanism, smart growth, call it what you will, but it’s not unusual when a project is actually proposed for there to be a good bit of opposition. … Any thoughts on how you deal with that and why that might be?
A: Density is a relative term, and it’s a lightning-rod thing for a lot of people. … We have delivered in our time and place and still are. There are some examples of tall buildings that are rather impoverished, and I think the average person reacts to that and they have a right to. It’s not something that’s just vested with professionals; it’s something that lay people know and can sense.
The best thing that I find dealing with groups of people is taking places that everyone generally knows and loves … places people hop into a car, get on a plane to see, show them from a visual standpoint, ‘Don’t you like this place?’ And then give them the hard facts of how dense it is. Usually people are shocked.
Q: There’s some discussion about a (building) height limit downtown. I’d be interested in your thoughts on height in general and anything in particular we ought to be thinking about here in Asheville.
A: Height should be an issue that should be debated and be part of a planning session in Asheville. You have two buildings that anchor the skyline between the great neoclassical courthouse and the art deco City Hall. They are symbols of this city. People know them, they’re used on postcards, ads what have you. The question when it comes to height is not height per se but height where. Height means different things at different places. It requires a very sensitive urban design study to decide where height goes. … Even then, I think it’s as important to build well.
ON THE NET: www.shookkelley.com
