My thought process for how this relates to architecture, and specifically the American suburban house is the following:
It's possible that we architects never specifically offered a transitional model.
Of course, you could say that the contemporary American home does offer a lot of technology to facilitate certain amenities. Eg. central and artificial heating/cooling, smart security, and triple glazed windows for a start.
However, I'd posit that the wide spread aesthetic model of the Georgian Colonial [or Spanish Villa, or whatever you might choose] is encumbered by it's rigid adherence to formal typologies.
Whereas, the most fundamental ways to address energy lay in siting and massing, which may, of course, boggle the traditional typology.
So, the question ends up being: What did we miss? Where is that transition that allows, provides, facilitates, coordinates, the building of the single family house in a smart, contemporary manner for not only one-off prototypes, but for mass consumption?
Oct 4, 12 2:17 am
Huh? Who, exactly, is living in non-contemporary housing?
there are many "traditional" housing types that do not really adhere to rigid formal decoration and directly address energy and comfort in specific climates - for example - salt box:
form, orientation, fenestration, cladding, etc... are very specific to new england winters.
People will continue to want the horribly outdated, inappropriate faux traditional things....garages, basically have not moved beyond the original use as a stable for your horse, Carports never really caught on. Entertainment centers, cutting edge technology, hidden away in traditional wood cabinetry like a pie safe. etc.., etc...
“When we have to create infrastructure for ourselves — installing charging stations at our houses, for instance — we make the invisible visible. It becomes an overwhelming task, like having to remake the world. Most people just want a car."
I think that sums it up nicely, especially this part, "It becomes an overwhelming task, like having to remake the world." If you think about it, modern suburban-to-exurban tract housing and automobiles have one thing in common— the tank.
If you want to open up a gas station, all you need is a cement tank in the ground to store gasoline. Likewise, if you want to build a modern house in the middle of nowhere, all you need is a septic tank or a cesspit.
Ironically, most people make the assumption that, no matter where they live, the government or a private utility is almost obligated to supply them with water and electricity. And sometimes, there's an expectation of telephone services. But the number of "standard" modern utilities keeps growing from piped-in refrigerants to steam to gas to alcohol to fiber optics to cable.
The main issue with these is cost— they either require less people paying more money (in low-density developments) or more people paying less money (in high-density developments).
But, perhaps, the most important change needed is the conversion of residential electrical to polyphase or three-phase power. And any mass adoption of electric cars will require it as well. At the cost polyphase power, there's a legitimate discussion, outside of aesthetics or neighborhood image, of whether to go above ground or below ground.
Electric cars won't be widely accepted until their charges times are similar to cellphones and laptops— polyphase power can deliver than less-than-an-hour charge time. And the increasing number of high-voltage, high-power electronics already require the wiring anyways.
One particular technology of the future for cooking, water-heating and air-heating will be induction. But a single induction cooktop already overwhelms the entire power supply capacity of most houses. Adding multiple induction devices plus the demand of electric car charging-stations, the increase in power failures and rolling brownouts will become common place.
And this really comes down to cost as the limiting factor: can you rewire a small 10,000 person town with three-phase power directly into the house? Yes. But the lengthy multi-decade bonds a city or county would have to float would be a long-term budget killer. If there were ever a crisis — natural or fiscal — that kind of long-term debt would be difficult to juggle.
The move to higher densities, if only by a thousand or two per square mile, would alleviate the cost significantly that these massive infrastructural changes could be compressed into a decade or two. And, now that you've increased density, the number of options from mixed-use-and-walkable communities to multi-mode transportation are also now available.
And that, of course, increases the number and variety of housing and building types appropriate to a given area.
Oct 4, 12 1:37 pm ·
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Why the public will want electric cars before they want contemporary housing
I just read an interesting article in the NYTimes about why the electric car did not take off back at the turn of the 20th century, when it was invented. You can find the full article here: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/07/magazine/why-your-car-isnt-electric.html?pagewanted=1&_r=0&ref=magazine
My thought process for how this relates to architecture, and specifically the American suburban house is the following:
It's possible that we architects never specifically offered a transitional model.
Of course, you could say that the contemporary American home does offer a lot of technology to facilitate certain amenities. Eg. central and artificial heating/cooling, smart security, and triple glazed windows for a start.
However, I'd posit that the wide spread aesthetic model of the Georgian Colonial [or Spanish Villa, or whatever you might choose] is encumbered by it's rigid adherence to formal typologies.
Whereas, the most fundamental ways to address energy lay in siting and massing, which may, of course, boggle the traditional typology.
So, the question ends up being: What did we miss? Where is that transition that allows, provides, facilitates, coordinates, the building of the single family house in a smart, contemporary manner for not only one-off prototypes, but for mass consumption?
Huh? Who, exactly, is living in non-contemporary housing?
Yo!
there are many "traditional" housing types that do not really adhere to rigid formal decoration and directly address energy and comfort in specific climates - for example - salt box:
form, orientation, fenestration, cladding, etc... are very specific to new england winters.
People will continue to want the horribly outdated, inappropriate faux traditional things....garages, basically have not moved beyond the original use as a stable for your horse, Carports never really caught on. Entertainment centers, cutting edge technology, hidden away in traditional wood cabinetry like a pie safe. etc.., etc...
“When we have to create infrastructure for ourselves — installing charging stations at our houses, for instance — we make the invisible visible. It becomes an overwhelming task, like having to remake the world. Most people just want a car."
I think that sums it up nicely, especially this part, "It becomes an overwhelming task, like having to remake the world." If you think about it, modern suburban-to-exurban tract housing and automobiles have one thing in common— the tank.
If you want to open up a gas station, all you need is a cement tank in the ground to store gasoline. Likewise, if you want to build a modern house in the middle of nowhere, all you need is a septic tank or a cesspit.
Ironically, most people make the assumption that, no matter where they live, the government or a private utility is almost obligated to supply them with water and electricity. And sometimes, there's an expectation of telephone services. But the number of "standard" modern utilities keeps growing from piped-in refrigerants to steam to gas to alcohol to fiber optics to cable.
The main issue with these is cost— they either require less people paying more money (in low-density developments) or more people paying less money (in high-density developments).
But, perhaps, the most important change needed is the conversion of residential electrical to polyphase or three-phase power. And any mass adoption of electric cars will require it as well. At the cost polyphase power, there's a legitimate discussion, outside of aesthetics or neighborhood image, of whether to go above ground or below ground.
Electric cars won't be widely accepted until their charges times are similar to cellphones and laptops— polyphase power can deliver than less-than-an-hour charge time. And the increasing number of high-voltage, high-power electronics already require the wiring anyways.
One particular technology of the future for cooking, water-heating and air-heating will be induction. But a single induction cooktop already overwhelms the entire power supply capacity of most houses. Adding multiple induction devices plus the demand of electric car charging-stations, the increase in power failures and rolling brownouts will become common place.
And this really comes down to cost as the limiting factor: can you rewire a small 10,000 person town with three-phase power directly into the house? Yes. But the lengthy multi-decade bonds a city or county would have to float would be a long-term budget killer. If there were ever a crisis — natural or fiscal — that kind of long-term debt would be difficult to juggle.
The move to higher densities, if only by a thousand or two per square mile, would alleviate the cost significantly that these massive infrastructural changes could be compressed into a decade or two. And, now that you've increased density, the number of options from mixed-use-and-walkable communities to multi-mode transportation are also now available.
And that, of course, increases the number and variety of housing and building types appropriate to a given area.
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