[BrennanW]

I visited the University of Colorado yesterday and loved it. I am an aspiring urban planner and I love Denver and the metro area, and Boulder is a fabulous and beautiful, transit-oriented city.

When I met with one of the administrators in the planning and design department, she mentioned Boulder's building height restriction (which I presume is for building/ neighborhood character preservation and possibly for water supply to higher points, though I doubt that would truly be an issue.) I took her up on it, as being in the planning department that calls itself "progressive" she ought to understand how density effects energy usage and sustainability. She brushed it off, arguing that it preserves the "small town charm" of Boulder.

Also, the University is exempt from the restriction and has built (and is building) above the height limit, leading to a quarrel with the city over it. Again, I'm not a resident and I don't know the details.

The only other major city I know of with a height restriction is Washington, D.C., and while I think taller buildings there would work well, I understand the desire to keep the capital high on the skyline.

My question is basically a straw poll, who thinks height and density restrictions are a good idea and why?

Thanks.

[Crawford]

So you're basically saying there should be no zoning?

A municipality cannot be progressive if it has any type of height, bulk or square foot regulations? If someone wants to build a 60-floor neon tower on Boulder's main drag, then that's fine?

Most loosely zoned or non-zoned areas are very sprawling. I don't think just letting developers do whatever they want will lead to some ultra-dense, transit-oriented place.

It will probably just result in Vegas Strip style blank walls, towering concrete blocks and massive roadway/parking infrastructure.

[BrennanW]

No, not necessarily. Boulder has a thriving, pedestrian downtown which seems like it would lend itself to higher density instead of sprawling suburbs like we see farther south in CU's other campus at Colorado Springs. This height limit has relatively little to do with zoning and land use as it is completely unilateral. Certainly a C-4 zoned district could use a 15-20 story building if there was demand for it (student housing, office space, etc.)

[WilliamTheArtist]

You don't need to have super high towers to have really great density. Plus I am sure many cities, like Tulsa, have multiple height limits depending on the area and its desired character. Some parts of town, like our Brookside, that want to keep a small town or "village" feel, keep the height limit to 3 stories, with the occasional exception. Other areas have a 5 and 6 story limit, then the downtown core as far as I know doesn't have a height limit at all. Our new Comprehensive Plan calls for multiple high density "cores" that would likely have no height limit, then numerous "Town Centers" that likely do have height limits, and "Urban Village" areas that might have anywhere from 3 to 6 story, limits. It all depends on what the people want each area to be like and how it meshes with the over all comprehensive plan and future plans for mass transit like rail. You dont want things developing willy nilly scattered all over the place, or, for instance, your higher density, pedestrian friendly, areas might have a hard (aka very expensive) time connecting to each other via any future mass transit/rail lines. Discouraging density in some areas can actually help concentrate it in the areas you want it.

[mhays]

Boulder has a serious problem in that its zoning precludes supply from meeting demand. And in terms of quality of life, it could use a some higher densities.

Seattle has room for growth, so supply keeps up with demand. But we do have fairly restrictive height limits. Many commercial district areas are 65' or 45'. The 65' zone works ok because it accommodates 5+1 construction (five levels of wood over one level of concrete, generally housing over commercial use). Woodframe is much more affordable than concrete, so going to 85' for example would result in higher prices even while allowing more supply. The 45' zone is often a missed opportunity to go to 65'. Our bigger problem is that highrises are completely disallowed in most of the city, and even the highrise zones require massive fees to get to reasonable heights. For example, some former 240' areas now allow 400' plus 40' architectural/mechanical, but going above 240' requires $19/sf in fees, and making the building narrower and more expensive per sf in construction costs as well. The result is that going to 440' is only feasible in a good or very good economy. In the center of the CBD there are unlimited height areas, but they have floor area ratio limits for commercial uses...many existing buildings wouldn't be possible with today's zoning.

[Spocket]

I would certainly agree that a supertall would look entirely out of place if plunked right down in the center of some "Valley Gardens" suburb . In that regard , yeah , height restrictions do keep character intact when they're effective .
Outside of flight paths though (and possibly some other practical concerns) I'm not so sure that height restrictions actually serve a purpose the way they've been applied in so many cases .

Often enough , core districts have height restrictions that , to me , seem rather arbitrary . Preserving views is one common argument in favour of height restrictions . This is often an argument that makes little sense to me since a twenty story building will be okay but a forty story building is too much . What difference does it make ? If you're close enough that you'd like a view of something (let's say mountains) then both cases are going to provide the same obstruction .

Anyway , it seems to be a matter of what the specific case is . In an historic city , sure , I can understand height caps but even if we look at Washington for example , well why not build a forty story tower somewhere ? There are plenty of areas where it's just not going to matter .

Anyway , as I said , it's really something that should done on a case-by-case basis which is why I personally don't approve of blanket height restrictions for the most part .

[Ch.G, Ch.G]

So you're basically saying there should be no zoning?

A municipality cannot be progressive if it has any type of height, bulk or square foot regulations? If someone wants to build a 60-floor neon tower on Boulder's main drag, then that's fine?

Why are you being so hyperbolical? First of all, there's nothing in the original post that allows you to conclude BrennanW opposes all zoning, which encompasses more than building heights and densities, i.e., the explicit topic. (See: title) Second, nowhere does BrennanW say that "a municipality cannot be progressive if it has any type of height, build or square foot regulations." You could just as easily infer from his post that he merely favors more prudent regulations. Third, building height and density have nothing to do with whether or not neon will be incorporated into the design, which is clearly outside the scope of this discussion.

It's not difficult to see how a city that eases certain restrictions (height, density) while enforcing others (for example, low parking ratios) would result in a much more "progressive" urbanism.

[M II A II R II K]

If a skyscraper has retail at street level it can be as tall as it wants without disrupting street life on the ground.

[hauntedheadnc]

If you're going to have height restrictions, you do best by spending a vast amount of time figuring out just what it is that the citizens of the community want, and then by working out a reasonable compromise between citizen interests and developer interests.

My city just passed height restrictions as part of its downtown master plan that also included stipulations that new construction mimic the massing, if not the design, of the city's older art deco buildings.

Our height restrictions are a nice compromise in my opinion, especially considering our terrain. With the passage of the restrictions, buildings in the downtown core can rise to a height of about 15 stories. New buildings at that height will tower over most of the other structures downtown, will be about the same height of a great many others, and will be shorter than a tiny handful of buildings. However, because the core of downtown is located at the top of a hill, buildings are allowed to build to taller heights as they descend the surrounding slopes. The maximum height beyond the downtown core is 25 stories. And, should intense, dense development have need to spring up in another area of town, there are no height restrictions beyond the downtown area.

The result is reasonable limit that preserves the existing character -- especially considering now that new buildings will have to taper as they grow taller and feature decorative spires, just like the historic art deco buildings everyone loves here -- while allowing dense growth in a new, more coherent and clarified pattern. Also, because of our terrain, which slopes up and down even in the heart of downtown, we'll avoid the "Sao Paulo Effect" of a sea of buildings of identical height, which makes for a godawfully ugly skyline overall.

In a nutshell, height restrictions can be done correctly, but it takes a hell of a lot of community input, plus you must take into account the existing built environment and terrain.

[Nouvellecosse]

Why are you being so hyperbolical? First of all, there's nothing in the original post that allows you to conclude BrennanW opposes all zoning, which encompasses more than building heights and densities, i.e., the explicit topic. (See: title) Second, nowhere does BrennanW say that "a municipality cannot be progressive if it has any type of height, build or square foot regulations." You could just as easily infer from his post that he merely favors more prudent regulations. Third, building height and density have nothing to do with whether or not neon will be incorporated into the design, which is clearly outside the scope of this discussion.

It's not difficult to see how a city that eases certain restrictions (height, density) while enforcing others (for example, low parking ratios) would result in a much more "progressive" urbanism.

LOL!

Hyperbole tends to be a very common (and very amusing) type of "argument" nowadays.

"I wish the city was cleaner" ----> "What? You think the only way a city can be a decent place to live is if the sidewalks are clean enough to perform surgery on?"

"Motorists should drive more slowly in bad weather" ----> "So you're saying the only way to be responsible when there's a few flurries is to creep down the freeway like a myopic 90 yr old?!?!"

"You shouldn't give the baby something small like marbles because he could choke" ----> "And what do you think would be better? Baby's first medicine ball?"

People sure are funny, aren't they? :haha:

[The Dirt]

When I met with one of the administrators in the planning and design department, she mentioned Boulder's building height restriction (which I presume is for building/ neighborhood character preservation and possibly for water supply to higher points, though I doubt that would truly be an issue.) I took her up on it, as being in the planning department that calls itself "progressive" she ought to understand how density effects energy usage and sustainability. She brushed it off, arguing that it preserves the "small town charm" of Boulder.

I'm not sure what the initial intention of the height restriction was, but she provided a pretty silly layman answer to a complex question.

In short, the answer is that height limits CAN promote density when density is low. In Boulder's case, this is exactly what happened.

Downtown, for a long time, had no shortages of parking lots and dirt lots, even along major streets like Canyon, Broadway, and Pearl (east of the mall). What height restrictions did was allow those lots to be filled rather quickly by high quality projects that didn't oversaturate the market. This is a completely separate issue from Boulder's reluctance for any residential growth. Contrary to popular belief, Boulder actually has been doing a lot better in that regard as well, by filling in low density or dilapidated neighborhoods with higher density urban mixed use developments (see North Broadway).

Once the remaining parking lots are filled in (probably within 10+ years), all that's left is pop-top renovations, replacing old under-zoned buildings, and the city pushing the urban boundary to connect to other centers like 29th Street and the transit neighborhood along Pearl Parkway & 30th. I'm sure Boulder could keep this up for 100+ years and continue to grow just fine with a 50 ft limit.

However, I would prefer to modify the hight limits to allow developers to build higher if they meet a certain set of criteria. First floor retail means +1 floor, LEED Silver/Gold/Platinum +1/2/3 floors, adjacent to transit +whatever floors, decorative spire +a million floors, etc. If condo projects provide an x% of affordable units, then they are allowed x more floors.

[Cirrus]

Boulder has a thriving, pedestrian downtown And the height limit is a big reason why.

The key advantage of height limits has nothing to do with preserving character or keeping mountain views open. The key advantage of height limits is that they cause downtown land to be too valuable to leave unused.

Every property owner wants to maximize the development they put on their land, because more square footage means more profit. That means that if you don't have a height limit then two bad things happen: Property owners know that they will make much much more money building a 50 story tower than a 5 story building, so they hold out and don't build anything until they have enough backing to build a 50 story tower.
When one 50 story tower gets built, that eats up all the demand for new square footage in the area for many years, reducing the demand to develop other blocks.
When these two things happen, which they almost always do, the result is that you get a handful of very tall buildings surrounded by parking lots. It is not conducive to good urbanism. For proof of this, go stand at the corner of Broadway and 19th Street in downtown Denver.

Now, on the other hand, this is what happens when you have a height limit: 1. Property owners know that they will only ever be able to build up to the limit, so there is no incentive to hold out and wait for a bigger pay day. Rather, they will make more money if they build a short building up to the limit as quickly as possible.
2. The only way to meet the demand for new development in the community is for just about every lot to be developed.
So the effect of a good height limit is that every property gets developed with a nice urban building.

Think about downtown Boulder versus downtown Denver. Downtown Denver is much larger and has much greater demand for new development, so theoretically there should be much greater demand to use land in downtown Denver efficiently. But guess what! Downtown Denver is full of pedestrian-hostile surface parking lots and underused land, while downtown Boulder is full of pedestrian-friendly buildings on almost every property. Boulder's strict height limit is why.

[SDfan]

I have to agree with Cirrus and Dirt on this one, especially since it reflects San Diego's growth so very well.

Downtown SD has a height allowance of 750' (based on FAR), but the FAA has imposed a height limit of 500' for an emergency turn out path for SD International.

I would say the height limit has definitely helped create a lot more density then might otherwise would have been developed. The Gaslamp Quarter has a height limit of 12 stories, and now virtually every block along 5th Ave is built up because there wasn't an over-saturation of the market.

Does it suck not having anything taller than 500'? Yes.

Is it nice having a healthy downtown population and and a dense urban core? Yes.

Give and take.

[mhays]

If Boulder has filled up most of its developable lots and still has excess demand, then what's the danger of adding some height to address than demand? Not 50 stories but maybe a few more than currently?

[Cirrus]

^
Boulder's not quite there yet. Another decade and it might be.

But you're right: Eventually you have to raise the limit or you max out and stop developing. But even then you'd want to raise the limit, not eliminate it.

[mhays]

The concept of "eliminate" rarely enters my head. Too foreign a concept for a Seattle resident.

I'd argue that the point when limits should be raised is when scarcity causes prices to rise substantially. Since many property owners will be holdouts regardless, with very slow turnover, that point is generally when there's still a fair amount of developable property left. In other words, realistic growth potential vs. theoretical potential. I have no idea where Boulder falls in that dynamic.

[BrennanW]

Think about downtown Boulder versus downtown Denver. Downtown Denver is much larger and has much greater demand for new development, so theoretically there should be much greater demand to use land in downtown Denver efficiently. But guess what! Downtown Denver is full of pedestrian-hostile surface parking lots and underused land, while downtown Boulder is full of pedestrian-friendly buildings on almost every property. Boulder's strict height limit is why.

Not really. After reading the post entitled "CBD Sprawl" (http://denverinfill.com/blog/2010/11/cbd-sprawl.html) at the DenverInfill Blog, Downtown Denver doesn't have as much of a problem with filling lots. Its like sprawl all over again, because prices are too high in the CBD, businesses are moving to near-downtown because of lower prices. The parking lots sticking around downtown are more a consequence of bad landowners.

* The corner of 17th and Welton (Block 174), where the old Kenmark Hotel once stood, that has been sitting vacant since the mid-1990s. Owned by Gary Cook, infamous for his refusal to do anything with his properties, ever, the weedy gravel lot sits smack-dab in the middle of the “Wall Street of the Rockies”.
* Block 176 (the “Shelby’s block”) located one block from a light rail station. Nothing.
* 16th and Lincoln (Block 029-B) located one block north of the state capitol, owned by the Dikeou family (the other infamous family known for their unwillingness to do anything with their properties). Zilch.
* The depressing Block 207, owned by a half dozen different property owners, across the street from the Webb Building. Nada.
* Block 159, also a block from the 20th & Welton light rail station. TOD anyone?

[cabotp]

One thing I've started to see in the last 10-15 years with new buildings in Downtown Vancouver. If a builder wants to build a building that is above the height limit for that zoned area. They can sometimes gain a few extra feet here and there by adding other amenities to the area. A prime example in this is when they built Yaletown in downtown Vancouver. When the builder decided to build the elementary school and park. The city allowed them to gain a few feet on some of the buildings.

[Cirrus]

Not really. After reading the post entitled "CBD Sprawl" at the DenverInfill Blog, Downtown Denver doesn't have as much of a problem with filling lots. Its like sprawl all over again, because prices are too high in the CBD, businesses are moving to near-downtown because of lower prices. The parking lots sticking around downtown are more a consequence of bad landowners.Bad landowners who won't redevelop because they're waiting to cash in on a 50 story building! Ken's post about CBD sprawl completely supports my point. Development is skipping the central downtown parcels where there's not much of a height limit and instead happening on the fringes of downtown where there is a more strict limit.

Here are some blurbs from the DenverInfill CBD sprawl post that are pertinent:

I argue that the development taking place in Lower Downtown and Union Station represents the expansion of the CBD into these areas. The fact that LoDo/Union Station is the new hotspot for traditional 17th Street-type firms in general, is evidence of this trend.

Meanwhile, our existing Central Business District has no shortage of development opportunities. Because of the parkinglotification of Downtown that occurred during the last half of the 20th Century, by my count, there are 40-60 sites within Denver’s CBD that are vacant and suitable for high-rise development.

With the exception of the half-block-long Cheyenne Place, there is not a single named or numbered street in Downtown Denver that doesn’t have at least one vacant lot fronting it.

On our current trajectory, 30 years from now we will end up with a Central Business District twice the area of the one we have today, but it will still be a fragmented checkerboard of buildings and parking lots.

It just doesn’t make sense for parcels at prime locations in our historic CBD to sit fallow for decades and hinder the fulfillment of Downtown’s promise while billions of dollars are spent to create what are essentially new extensions to the CBD.

For goodness sake, his post repeats my point almost exactly: That lots of properties in central downtown Denver are dramatically underdeveloped despite massive demand for new supply, and that instead development is flowing to a place (LoDo) with a much more strict height limit.

Indeed, if you read the comments of that post, the author of it (Ken) says:

if we lower the height limit in downtown it will do two things: it reduces the expectations of property owners for what their property is worth (you can’t ask as much for your land if the highest you can build on it is 15 stories instead of 50 stories), and it forces consumption of the land at a faster rate. If there’s the demand for, say, 2 million SF in new commercial construction in Downtown per decade, it would be better to put that square footage in ten 200,000 SF buildings (removing ten parking lots in the process) than to put that square footage in two or three skyscrapers.

[MonkeyRonin]

Uniform city-wide height restrictions, bad; varying height restrictions based on specific areas, good.

[PragmaticIdealist]

Height restrictions should vary by Transect Zone. And, the Transect should be regulated so that a minimum of three zones exist in each pedestrian-shed.

Every couple of decades each zone should advance one notch, unless the citizens want stasis because they believe the area has reached climax and, as such, is now deserving of preservation.

[Ch.G, Ch.G]

Every property owner wants to maximize the development they put on their land, because more square footage means more profit. That means that if you don't have a height limit then two bad things happen: Property owners know that they will make much much more money building a 50 story tower than a 5 story building, so they hold out and don't build anything until they have enough backing to build a 50 story tower.
When one 50 story tower gets built, that eats up all the demand for new square footage in the area for many years, reducing the demand to develop other blocks.
When these two things happen, which they almost always do, the result is that you get a handful of very tall buildings surrounded by parking lots. It is not conducive to good urbanism. For proof of this, go stand at the corner of Broadway and 19th Street in downtown Denver.

Developers are attuned to markets. They won't build 50 stories just because they can, and, as long as land is taxed, they won't wait indefinitely for demand to sufficiently increase. Developers routinely build shorter than what's allowed or scale down projects when the market cools.

I think you assume that it's better to have a thousand people spread out in low-rise buildings over several square blocks than it is to have that same number of people concentrated in a couple of high-rises in one square block. Is that really the case though? "Good urbanism" isn't characterized by homogenous zones of residential or office space. You need restaurants, bars, supermarkets, pharmacies, retail, etc. mixed in. Demand for those services is the same in either scenario; the number of restaurants, bars, etc. constructed will be the same. The crucial difference is that in a less dense, low-rise neighborhood those services will necessarily be less proximate/accessible to the average resident. Clearly, this is far from "good urbanism."

Now, on the other hand, this is what happens when you have a height limit: 1. Property owners know that they will only ever be able to build up to the limit, so there is no incentive to hold out and wait for a bigger pay day. Rather, they will make more money if they build a short building up to the limit as quickly as possible.
2. The only way to meet the demand for new development in the community is for just about every lot to be developed.
So the effect of a good height limit is that every property gets developed with a nice urban building.

What actually happens is that, by restricting supply, the government artificially inflates the cost to live in these areas, thereby pricing out people who could otherwise afford it. In addition to being unjust, height restrictions thus indirectly decrease socioeconomic diversity (and racial/ethnic diversity, inasmuch as race/ethnicity is correlated with economic status). I don't know enough about Boulder or Denver to make the following claim with certainty, but I suspect these kinds of policies contribute to the home price/demographic discrepancies between the two cities. (Boulder is whiter and its home prices higher.)

[urbanlife]

Developers are attuned to markets. They won't build 50 stories just because they can, and, as long as land is taxed, they won't wait indefinitely for demand to sufficiently increase. Developers routinely build shorter than what's allowed or scale down projects when the market cools.


But they have and will wait indefinitely if the profit of the surface parking lot is higher than the cost of tax on the land. I know of land owners in Spokane, Seattle, and Portland that are basically doing this...cause one day there land might be worth more than it is now and/or someone will be willing to pay top dollar to build a tower on their lot.


I think you assume that it's better to have a thousand people spread out in low-rise buildings over several square blocks than it is to have that same number of people concentrated in a couple of high-rises in one square block. Is that really the case though? "Good urbanism" isn't characterized by homogenous zones of residential or office space. You need restaurants, bars, supermarkets, pharmacies, retail, etc. mixed in. Demand for those services is the same in either scenario; the number of restaurants, bars, etc. constructed will be the same. The crucial difference is that in a less dense, low-rise neighborhood those services will necessarily be less proximate/accessible to the average resident. Clearly, this is far from "good urbanism."

Actually you are kind of describing Barcelona, which is mostly an entire city that is built to a specific height restriction and is a very culturally diverse city. Towers do not necessarily mean "good urbanism" and often times they are symbols of bad urban development. You can easily develop a healthy city that has nothing over 15 stories.

[Cirrus]

Developers are attuned to markets. They won't build 50 stories just because they can, and, as long as land is taxed, they won't wait indefinitely for demand to sufficiently increase.The experience of almost every medium to medium-large city in America suggests otherwise. You cannot simply brush off the land banking in most American downtowns. It happens. It is a big problem.

I think you assume that it's better to have a thousand people spread out in low-rise buildings over several square blocks than it is to have that same number of people concentrated in a couple of high-rises in one square block. Is that really the case though? "Good urbanism" isn't characterized by homogenous zones of residential or office space. You need restaurants, bars, supermarkets, pharmacies, retail, etc. mixed in.You are assuming that if you concentrate the people into 1 or 2 blocks then other stuff fills in the rest. Experience indicates that when we're talking about downtowns (as opposed to neighborhoods), this does not happen. What actually happens is that the rest of the land is banked as parking lot.

by restricting supply, the government artificially inflates the cost to live in these areasWrong. As long as there are ample empty lots then you are not restricting supply, and I already said that you have to increase the height limit once your building envelope gets close to maxing out. Height limits do not affect the production of supply as long as there is room to expand somewhere in the district, especially considering that "height" and "density" are not in any way synonyms (as just about every European city proves).

Density restrictions affect supply. Height restrictions do not, provided they are modified from time to time as the older building envelope fills in.

[Strange Meat]

Preserving views is one common argument in favour of height restrictions . This is often an argument that makes little sense to me since a twenty story building will be okay but a forty story building is too much . What difference does it make ? If you're close enough that you'd like a view of something (let's say mountains) then both cases are going to provide the same obstruction.

That 40 story building will, at more of a distance, block the view for more people than the 20 story would. It's not about up close, it has more to do with a larger area. Hence the term view planes.

[mhays]

Several factors people have discussed here are basically all true at the same time.

[BevoLJ]

I have mixed feeling on this one. Like Paris recently got rid of many of its rules. I love Paris. I am very worried about what this will do for that city, but I am sure they will prevent it screwing up particular areas.

Here in Austin there has always been strict rules about protecting the view of the State Capitol Building. It is a set of corridors. In the past two years the skyline has completely changed. Austin is really an entirely different skyline than it was just a few years ago. Back in 2000 the capitol building and the UT tower were still somewhat noticeable features in our skyline. That just really isn't the case anymore. Yes there are still parts of the city that you can get good views of the Capitol but looking at Austin that is no longer what you see. Everything is now down on Town Lake with all of the big high rises and condos.

I don't know about London. There aren't any hight restrictions that I know of, but I'm probably wrong. Our second biggest building is right downtown. But on the whole most of the big buildings are on down on Canary Wharf, and the Shard is right across the river which I think is great.

[mhays]

In London, it's a good rule of thumb that the life is where the skyscrapers ain't.

[dchan]

In my generalized opinion, unlike what some may claim on this thread, skyscrapers don't necessarily make neighborhoods denser - that is, they don't necessarily bring in residents. The way I see it, when a developer is looking to build a skyscraper, he obviously wants top dollar rents for his investment. Why else would he go through the risk expense of building something that would otherwise be impractical and uneconomical?

So who will likely be renting the space in skyscrapers? Mostly likely corporations and other businesses, for a couple of reasons. First, they can consistently afford to pay the high rent the developers are asking for. Second, they will likely buy large swaths of office space, meaning there's less chance for unrented vacant spaces within the building, which is more likely in tall residential buildings. Overall, large businesses provide for as more steady and lucrative tenants to developers than do residents do. Apartment renters may love having good views of their city, but most are unwilling to pay top dollar for that relatively unimportant amenity.

[mhays]

Not really. The office market considers 10% vacancy "equilibrium," while the apartment market considers 5% to be equilibrium.

Offices also fluctuate more in downturns. Plenty of metros have office vacancy rates above 20%, but I doubt many metros have apartment vacancies more than 10-12%. Apartments tend to recover more quickly too.

[BevoLJ]

I can kinda agree that big building don't necessarily bring or keep more people in a downtown. I mean look at the buildings here in Austin that bring in the most people. First there is 6th street. It is just a ton of 150 year old 2 story buildings and it brings in so many people we have to close the street off at night. Then after that the next big draws is the Whole Foods HQ and a bookstore and small local music store that is across the street there.

What big buildings can do that has been required or pushed here in Austin to draw more people in is to make sure the streets of those buildings are all retail. Like second street in Austin is a big shopping district with lots of new big buildings that have lots of shopping. The hight and 'largeness' of the new skyscrapers in Austin I don't think has really drawn that many more people to downtown. There might be a few more that live there now, but it is still the small 150 year old 2 story buildings and the parks and lake that is where everyone goes.

I remember walking around Boston and there being TONS of huge buildings and no one on those streets. All the people are in other parts. Same with like was mentioned about London. My flat is in Camden and I spend most of my time in west end. Not anywhere near the big buildings.

[McBane]

I live in Philadelphia. We have lots of tall buildings and also, as Circus correctly pointed out, lots of surface parking lots. I'm amazed every time I go to DC. As much as I love tall buildings, I prefer street-level vitality - and that lends itself to mid-rise development.

For example, Philadelphia has approximately 15 skyscrapers ranging in size from 500 - 975 feet. Now if there was a floor limit of say 15 floors, the same office space (only one of these 500+ is residential) would be spread over maybe 50 buildings. It should be noted that the 5 tallest all take up a full city block - something that a 15 story building doesn't typically do; however, I'd still rather have 40 15 story buildings than 15 50 story buildings and 25 surface lots.

I'd also like to stress how height restrictions can go wrong. Philadelphia is an example. First, the restriction was on height, so developers built buildings that maximized office space and floors, resulting in a skyline that was full of boxy, flat top buildings. Second, the height restriction, in practice, was 500 feet, which is pretty high. A 500 foot restriction isn't going to get you a city that looks like Paris or DC. The height restriction was to preserve views of City Hall, not to recreate Paris.

If I could enact a height restriction, it would be by floor. I would also add a generous max height. For example, 15 floors, and no taller than 250 feet. 250 feet for only 15 floors gives architects the flexibility to be very creative and avoids a skyline of boxy towers. In fact, I would imagine architects would take full advantage of the generous height restriction to distinguish their buildings as much as possible.

[Spocket]

In my generalized opinion, unlike what some may claim on this thread, skyscrapers don't necessarily make neighborhoods denser - that is, they don't necessarily bring in residents. The way I see it, when a developer is looking to build a skyscraper, he obviously wants top dollar rents for his investment. Why else would he go through the risk expense of building something that would otherwise be impractical and uneconomical?

So who will likely be renting the space in skyscrapers? Mostly likely corporations and other businesses, for a couple of reasons. First, they can consistently afford to pay the high rent the developers are asking for. Second, they will likely buy large swaths of office space, meaning there's less chance for unrented vacant spaces within the building, which is more likely in tall residential buildings. Overall, large businesses provide for as more steady and lucrative tenants to developers than do residents do. Apartment renters may love having good views of their city, but most are unwilling to pay top dollar for that relatively unimportant amenity.
I'm not really following your argument here . Taller buildings mean more people on the same footprint of land . How can that not make for higher density ?
What you seem to be suggesting is that only businesses are leasing space in high-rises because developers can only make a dollar by constructing office space .
Well that's quite simply wrong . The vast majority of high-rises are apartments and condominiums . Developers seem to make all kinds of money off of them and they actually present less of a risk . As well , unlike the office market , rental rates per square foot/meter are much more stable even in boom/bust markets. That's to say that rents never seem to go down depending on the market conditions whereas with office space the effects of an economic downturn are quite acute .

So , sure , if people were building office towers in any given neighbourhood then no , the density would not increase . That's not what happens though .

[Infernal_Elf]

id say height restriction is pure bullshit as long as the city dont have a world famous city centre like London Paris or st petersburg just to name a few

generally in most cities height restriction causes the city to just float out and become ridiculously big and hard to get through.

And u cant really find all you need in a small area like u can in cities with tall buildings. And the space for parks and farmland is also very often consumed by the low city buildings.

it also tend to happen that all the big malls and such are built outside of the city center because there isent space in the city centre and that removes much trade and such from the city centre.

[Ch.G, Ch.G]

You are assuming that if you concentrate the people into 1 or 2 blocks then other stuff fills in the rest. Experience indicates that when we're talking about downtowns (as opposed to neighborhoods), this does not happen. What actually happens is that the rest of the land is banked as parking lot.

I never make that assumption. I do, however, question your assumption that diffuse land use is better than concentrated land use because it has fewer surface lots. (IMO, it's not, and, in fact, leads to greater problems in the long-run by establishing a "norm" for lower heights/densities that is ultimately very difficult to change.)

Wrong. As long as there are ample empty lots then you are not restricting supply, and I already said that you have to increase the height limit once your building envelope gets close to maxing out. Height limits do not affect the production of supply as long as there is room to expand somewhere in the district, especially considering that "height" and "density" are not in any way synonyms (as just about every European city proves).

In European cities, height may not necessarily correlate with density as much as it does in US cities because their buildings more efficiently utilize space. Aside from Manhattan and select neighborhoods in older cities, how often do you see the kind of (literally) wall-to-wall construction where adjacent buildings create a seamless surface that typifies the European urban experience? The ratio of units to square foot is much higher. As a result, European cities can achieve the kind of density with five story buildings we in the US can only dream of from our new construction.

Moreover, demand is not uniform over a given area: just because there are "ample empty lots" does not mean the demand for those lots will be the same.

Density restrictions affect supply. Height restrictions do not, provided they are modified from time to time as the older building envelope fills in.

Practically speaking, the idea of "modifying" height restrictions from time to time is totally unrealistic, especially in neighborhoods where the need is greatest (that is, where the demand to live is highest). Residents of those neighborhoods have a vested interest in preserving its exclusivity and fight tooth-and-nail against any kind of zoning changes. This is the main type of NIMBYism we all decry and it is, unfortunately, much too successful in forcing back developers' plans. The result is an artificially low supply and greater socioeconomic segregation (and, of course, less density).

Look, to get a sense of where I'm coming from check out the Chicago General Development or High-rise Construction threads. What you will see is a long, documented history of much-needed development stifled or scaled back because residents claim it will lead to crowding. (Would that such a thing were a legitimate "problem" in the US!) It happens in low-rise neighborhoods like Wrigleyville and even in high-rise neighborhoods (or those that abut them) like Lincoln Park, the West Loop-- even along soaring Michigan Avenue.

The result, again, is that the most desirable neighborhoods (those with the best amenities or greatest access to certain resources) become the most exclusive and segregated, and not by virtue of the market but because of its distortion. (Again, to say nothing of the other downsides to lower densities.)

[Cirrus]

Taller buildings mean more people on the same footprint of land . How can that not make for higher density ? There are two reasons tall buildings are frequently not as dense as short ones:

1. Tall buildings almost always end up wasting vast amounts of space to oversized plazas, setbacks, and underused adjacent parcels. If one compares aerial images of say, Ballston (http://maps.google.com/?ie=UTF8&ll=38.880489,-77.109856&spn=0.003107,0.004812&t=k&z=18) and Dupont Circle (http://maps.google.com/?ie=UTF8&ll=38.914102,-77.041647&spn=0.003105,0.004812&t=k&z=18), it is easy to see that even though Ballston is fully urban and “built out” in its center, there are massive gaps in the urban fabric as compared with Dupont. This effect doesn’t stop at plazas; taken to an unfortunately frequent extreme it often results in cities where land owners think nothing of achieving the same density by building twice as tall and leaving half their land for parking. When land isn’t at a premium, there’s no reason to conserve it.

2. Tall buildings are difficult to modify. Over time, small buildings are often subdivided into smaller apartments and share-houses because subdividing them increases the number of units and therefore increases density. That sort of thing is much more difficult and rare at the elevator building scale than at the rowhouse scale, which means that elevator buildings are more likely to keep their original number of units over time rather than increase them. Since large new buildings almost always have to be “luxurious” in order to justify their construction costs, they’re almost always built with a lower number of expansive interior units rather than a higher number of small units. This means that generally speaking, tall buildings have fewer units on a per-square-foot basis than short buildings, and that over time this difference becomes exaggerated even more.

Examples of the non-synonym-ness of dense and tall abound. Ballston versus Dupont is one, but the quintessential may be Paris and its 11th arrondissement (http://maps.google.com/maps?q=11th+arrondissement+of+Paris&oe=UTF-8&ie=UTF8&split=0&gl=us&ei=o41CSoWcJ4Ontgea3rnTCQ&ll=48.858588,2.377617&spn=0.005252,0.01369&t=k&z=17) neighborhood. The 11th is the densest neighborhood in Europe and is comparable to the densest neighborhoods in New York. The vast majority of its buildings are shorter than those in downtown Washington. Very few are as short as two or three stories, but virtually all fall squarely in the category of midrises rather than highrises. Paris as a whole, for the record, is the densest city in the world outside of Asia, and except for La Défense (which doesn't actually have all that much square footage) is almost entirely a midrise city.

This is not a European phenomenon, either. If you go to San Francisco, Boston, Philadelphia, or just about any large city with intact historic urban neighborhoods, the densest neighborhood in the city will almost uniformly be one without many tall buildings.

Pull up census tract density maps of American cities and you will see that with the exception of New York (and maybe Chicago), the densest neighborhoods are not where the tall buildings are.

[Cirrus]

I do, however, question your assumption that diffuse land use is better than concentrated land use because it has fewer surface lots. (IMO, it's not, and, in fact, leads to greater problems in the long-run by establishing a "norm" for lower heights/densities that is ultimately very difficult to change.
"Diffuse" land use is not better than concentrated land use. But tall buildings do not equate to concentration, as experience shows.

What you will see is a long, documented history of much-needed development stifled or scaled back because residents claim it will lead to crowding.The fact that sometimes people have bad reasons for wanting a good thing doesn't make the good thing bad. Height limits have virtually nothing to do with density, therefore virtually nothing to do with crowding. People who argue against them on those grounds are misguided both in their goal and their presumed means of achieving it.

[Trantor]

If a skyscraper has retail at street level it can be as tall as it wants without disrupting street life on the ground.

gee, thats quite the nonsense eh Mark. You need plenty of infrastructure in public transport and urban planning for the place where the skyscraper is located to be able to support in the streets around it the intense movement of thousands of people going to work on it and leaving it.

[Trantor]

And u cant really find all you need in a small area like u can in cities with tall buildings. And the space for parks and farmland is also very often consumed by the low city buildings.

if you need to find all the stuff you want in a small area, that area will need a VAST infrastructure so all the people in the city can go to that area...

that is NOT possible in many cities. Maybe in american cities, where cities are cut by highways with 12 dozen lanes in each direction, passing right next to downtown... but not elsewhere.


Porto Alegre has severe height restrictions all over the city. The downtown is already too dense, even though the highest building there is 33 floors... its incredibly jammed with cars and people. The narrow streets dont support more cars. There are no place for parking lots in or around the downtown. Can it support skyscrapers? Hardly.

[LSyd]

if the FAA says height restrictions are needed due to flight paths, like in downtown Birmingham, i guess it's a good idea because planes and skyscrapers don't mix.

-

[M II A II R II K]

Skyline may climb as Vancouver mulls building heights


http://www.vancouversun.com/Skyline+climb+Vancouver+mulls+building+heights/3966721/story.html

Vancouver is considering raising the maximum height for high towers in the downtown core, as long as they aren’t within several protected view corridors. But the proponents of a $500-million, three-tower proposal for Burrard Street are already trying to convince the city to exceed the new proposed height restrictions even before they’ve been adopted by council.

On Thursday, council will consider a staff recommendation to raise the maximum building height in the central business district outside of view corridors to 700 feet from 600. They’re also suggesting the city raise to 500 feet from 375 feet the maximum height along the Burrard Street corridor, which affects the Davie/Burrard area.

In October, Reliance Properties and Jim Pattison Developments unveiled a proposal to build a 48-storey, 466-foot tower on Pattison’s Toyota dealership as part of its Burrard Gateway project. The height limit is 375 feet. But in the report to Thursday’s planning and environment committee, staff say the developers have since submitted a new application for a building 550 feet tall — higher even than the new contemplated limits.

Staff told them they didn’t support the proposal but that it was up to council to decide. The city is also proposing to raise the maximum heights of signature buildings that can be seen from the approaches of Granville and Burrard bridges, including 300 feet at the foot of Burrard and 425 feet at the foot of Granville.

And it recommends creating a new “shoulder” area in the central business district south of Alberni Street to add to the existing Melville Street shoulder. It suggests raising the heights in those shoulder areas to 550 feet from 400.





http://www.vancouversun.com/3966722.bin?size=620x400

[M II A II R II K]

View corridors are protected, city planner says


http://www.vancouversun.com/news/story.html?id=4001818

Vancouver city's plan to consider allowing extra-tall buildings in the downtown core affects only seven specific sites and would not allow any intrusions into long-protected view corridors, the city's director of planning said Thursday.

Facing public anger over the possibility that Vancouver's iconic mountain views would be obscured by increasingly higher office and residential towers, Brent Toderian tried to dampen concerns, saying any developers who want their buildings to hit or exceed the city's proposed height limits would have to go through a rigorous public hearing process.

But even then, he said, the likelihood that most of those seven identified sites will be built on in the near or mid-future is unlikely. And the one site in the downtown identified as having a potential 700-foot tower on it -- at the corner of Burrard and Georgia Streets -- already has a 19-storey office tower.

Toderian also insisted that the proposed new heights of up to 500 feet on some locations and 700 feet on the Georgia and Burrard site could only be reached if developers offer concessions or through density bonusing. He said that "500 feet doesn't mean 700 feet." The city has received an application for a 500-foot tower on the Jim Pattison Toyota site, and expects another for a second site very soon, Toderian said. But the rest are likely to remain undeveloped in the near future, he said.

City council commissioned the report earlier this year after rejecting staff queries about possibly allowing new developments to puncture the 25-year-old view corridors. Instead, they said they would be willing to consider extra-tall buildings in areas outside the view corridors.