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Pressure is on to scale-down and build 'small'
It has been 30 years since E. F. Schumacher promoted his theories of "Buddhist economics" in what was summed up in the title of his world best seller: "Small Is Beautiful". But a series of planning decisions, primarily in the US, have demonstrated what could be a trend against "building big" and support for Schumacher ideas for a more compact, low-impact lifestyle.
The US decisions advocating "smallness" have been primarily a result of local economics and landscape considerations.
At the same time in Australia the Royal Australian Institute of Architects has been promoting the benefits of more compact habitat for environmental reasons. In fact the institute has urged State governments to promote the construction of smaller, "greener" project homes as an effective way to minimise the future economic cost of climate change.
In America the Brookings Institution in a paper, "Investing in a better future", has taken the economic arguments for smaller habitats to present new evidence to support compact development and "smart growth" planning.
But it is also apparent that in some places there is a growing social rejection towards large-scale homes. For example in Pasadena the local Planning Commission has become the centre of a heated dispute after it responded to local opinion and ruled against overly large homes being built on the city's steep hillside lots. Supporters of the ruling argue that they do not want the city littered with "monster" eyesores. Opponents claimed property owners and architects were being forced into straightjackets. Similarly at Lake Tahoe near Los Angeles local planning authorities have imposed size limits on residential constructions to stem ostentatious homes being built by the lake side.
A court challenge to the ruling was dismissed in April. The Tahoe Regional Planning Agency says it has been trying to preserve the area's scenic beauty by using an ordinance that penalises any design for a new home, if that home does not "blend" with its surroundings.
Similar disputes are also occurring in towns on the US east coast where long-term local residents have started to object strongly to investors who knock down "historic" cottages and replace them with "McMansions" that dwarf all other homes in the neighbourhood.
Like many holiday homes being built on Western Australia's coast, the new dwellings are often "mini-hotels" designed for holiday rentals. While developers in the US contend there is nothing new in replacing old houses, people like Donald Beck, the mayor of South Bethany in Delaware contends the coastal towns have a right to "protect their character" and prevent constructions that "overtax sewer and drinking water systems".
But the arguments against size do not stop with housing. In the US residents of Inglewood, a suburb of Los Angeles, have just voted in a local referendum to stop the construction of a "mega" retail development in their district. Normally such local politics does not make national news but the fight was against American retail giant Wal-Mart and the decision made headlines across the US.
Wal-Mart had wanted to construct a "big-box store" - a buy-anything shop that would have covered an area equivalent to 17 football fields. In the referendum residents were simply asked whether Wal-Mart should be allowed to go ahead without public hearings or traffic and environmental studies. But the referendum campaign included all the arguments for and against any construction at all.
On the pro side was the fact that a "big-box store" would bring in many new local jobs and big price cuts for shoppers. Against the store was the argument that it would introduce "low pay", crippling competition for existing businesses, and ultimately a low price structure that would push manufacturing jobs overseas. Inglewood residents voted "No".
Meanwhile Royal Australian Institute of Architects believes unless Australia starts designing houses that respond to climate and minimise the needed for artificial systems of heating and cooling, a legacy of greenhouse gas emissions will be created that will last generations.
"It's totally inappropriate that in 2004 we are continuing to design and build large-scale energy-inefficient Cape Cod and Tuscan villas, in a climate far removed from their country of origin," says David Parken, the RAIA's national president. He was putting the case for change as part of a commentary on Australia's Year of the Built Environment.
"Well designed houses appropriate for Australian conditions are not totally reliant on reverse cycle air conditioning," he said.
