Green Building Law Blog : Green Building Lawyer & Attorney : Shari Shapiro: Calliope Communications, LLC

Last week, the world was a-twitter about the New York Times Freakonomics blog concluding that green buildings in an unsustainable infrastructure are not really green.  Imagine my amusement when the EPA releases a list of the cities with the most Energy Star buildings, with Los Angeles at the top, declaring:

These cities see the importance of taking action on climate change," said Gina McCarthy, assistant administrator for EPA’s Office of Air and Radiation. “Communities from Los Angeles to Louisville are reducing greenhouse gases and cutting energy bills with buildings that have earned EPA's Energy Star."

Coincidentally, Los Angeles is also among the top 10 cities with the longest commutes. It would be higher than 9th due to the traffic, but the suburban-style office parks and lack of a compact central downtown allow for shorter commute times. According to Forbes:

But what serves L.A. well is that a surprisingly high percentage of drivers get to their destinations in under 20 minutes (34%), which is only the 13th worst rate in the country. The reason? All those office parks and strip malls dotting the basin make it easy for people to commute between suburbs as opposed to a central downtown location, and that makes commutes shorter in mileage terms.

Green buildings are just one component of what cities need to do to combat climate change.  A comprehensive approach which incorporates regional planning, transit, infrastructure, zoning, and the buildings themselves is what will move us truly forward in the fight against climate change, and the EPA should be stressing the need for cities to move in this direction.  

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I have posted on many occasions about the importance of place in green building--green buildings on unsustainable sites are simply not green.  But it is never really true until the Grey Lady--The New York Times--says it is.  Today, on the Times' Freakonomics blog, James McWilliams had a nice little piece on the fundamental issue of building LEED buildings in an unsustainable, car-based infrastructure. 

Take the long view. From the moment of European settlement onward, American faith in Manifest Destiny has inspired aggressive development driven by land acquisition and individual choice. Sprawl started to become ingrained in the American character over two centuries ago and, as a result, middle America has inherited cities that value expansion over intensification.  To an extent, this vexed inheritance turns our cork floors and compost bins into empty expressions akin to the sun-starved solar panels adorning the Merritt Center.

What McWilliams does not acknowledge is the role that regulation and tax policy has had in developing the infrastructure the way it is. Two give just three examples--the mortgage interest tax credit encourages homeownership outside of the urban core. For many years, urban neighborhoods, the most sustainable, were red-lined--you simply couldn't get a mortgage.  Funding highways over mass transit means that more highways are built, making it possible to move further from the urban nodes.  Finally, funding schools through property tax assessments mean that inner cities with multi-family housing and greater rental concentrations will have less money to provide excellent education, driving families with children to the suburbs.

McWilliams uses the passive voice--" Sprawl started to become ingrained in the American character over two centuries ago "--as if sprawl simply appeared, like a cancer on the landscape.  Not so.  Regulatory and monetary policy implemented by elected representatives caused the unsustainable circumstance Americans now find ourselves in.  

 We have seen the sprawl, and it is us.

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