July 10 – Urban Design & Preservation Division – EcoDistricts – Performance Based Urban Design – Speakers: Otto Condon, Elizabeth Miller, Jill Sherman, and Adam Beck

An Ecodistrict strategy is an emerging planning process which incorporates environmental performance metrics to guide neighborhood growth with a social, environmental and economic priority. This panel session will present, in detail, two ecodistrict efforts: the Brewery Blocks in Portland, OR – a private sector driven redevelopment of a historic brewery district, and the SW Ecodistrict in Washington, DC – a federal agency driven redevelopment of a single use office district into a sustainable, mixed-use neighborhood. The Brewery Blocks will illustrate how private sector efforts on a sustainable adaptive reuse of multiple industrial properties laid the foundation for ecodistrict strategies. By contract, the SW Ecodistrict – A Vision Plan for a More Sustainable Future is the first public agency approved ecodistrict plan in the United States (accepted by the National Capital Planning Commission in January 2013). The SW Ecodistrict, which is currently a federal employment precinct south of the National Mall is being planned as a national model of mixed use sustainability with a goal of being net zero energy, as measured in carbon, by 2030. The presentation will highlight how goals for energy, waste and water reduction guided recommendations for preservation and rehabilitation, infill or redevelopment of mid-century modern buildings; how recommendations for energy and stormwater management guided the urban design of the public realm; and how urban design guidelines for building massing and height and the street network were developed within the context of the Monumental Core, adjacent Smithsonian institutions and the historic L’Enfant Plan. The presentation will also provide an overview of the EcoDistricts framework and Target Cities, a new two-year partnership with ten development projects across eight North American cities, including Atlanta, Austin, Boston, Cambridge, Denver, Los Angeles, Ottawa, Ontario and Washington, D.C. Target Cities is utilizing public-private-civic partnerships to accelerate district-scale community regeneration representing more than 1,300 acres of existing neighborhoods, downtown areas, business districts, historic precincts, neighborhoods rich in culture, brownfield sites, and university campuses.