We might ask residents of Boston, of central Philadelphia, of Washington DC, of Brooklyn, of Manhattan’s Upper West Side, Upper East Side, Greenwich Village, Chelsea, SoHo or Harlem whether they all live in highrise towers.

Doubtless most of the available urban lots in Seattle are of infill size. But is it really true that we almost never have any of generous dimension?

An I-5 lid… the Clise parcel… the Goodwill site… Yesler Terrace… light-rail excavations… Qwest parking… demolitions of earthquake-susceptible URM structures… International District parking lots… waterfront re-development…

Perhaps we should consider embracing the legitimate needs and desires of people who would live in cities, were they but given a palatable and affordable option. No doubt, highrise can be thrilling; but what about families, and all the people forced to live on the lower floors, with no view to compensate them for the traffic noise they have to sleep through?

Energy Watchdog Warns Of Oil-Production Crunch
IEA Official Says Supplies May Plateau Below Expected Demand
By NEIL KING JR. and PETER FRITSCH
May 22, 2008; Page A1

The world’s premier energy monitor is preparing a sharp downward revision of its oil-supply forecast, a shift that reflects deepening pessimism over whether oil companies can keep abreast of booming demand.

The Paris-based International Energy Agency is in the middle of its first attempt to comprehensively assess the condition of the world’s top 400 oil fields. Its findings won’t be released until November, but the bottom line is already clear: Future crude supplies could be far tighter than previously thought.

[...]

For several years, the IEA has predicted that supplies of crude and other liquid fuels will arc gently upward to keep pace with rising demand, topping 116 million barrels a day by 2030, up from around 87 million barrels a day currently. Now, the agency is worried that aging oil fields and diminished investment mean that companies could struggle to surpass 100 million barrels a day over the next two decades.

The decision to rigorously survey supply — instead of just demand, as in the past — reflects an increasing fear within the agency and elsewhere that oil-producing regions aren’t on track to meet future needs (link). [emphasis added]

Also, though oil might be “substitutable” as you say, keep in mind that oil is probably the most efficient form of energy. Think of it as solar energy crammed and condensed for thousands and thousands of years. Thus, even if there are substitutes they will ALWAYS be more expensive and less effecient in terms of effectiveness per calorie.

Rapidly falling out of favor macro totems aside, evidence please for the discrediting. Empirical evidence, not opinion pieces from, say, Globe and Mail.

Thank you in advance.

Thanks. I think that’s the guy.

Two things come to mind: (1) The province of BC recently raised the height for wood construction from four to six stories. There’s also an interesting video on a Berlin apartment building that recently went up all in wood — it’s 7 stories (since people here are questioning whether going to 6 stories in wood is safe, I blogged about this on May 13, if you’re interested in reading: http://tinyurl.com/693sdt).

IOW, it’s quite possible to build tall-ish midrises in wood, but if you go with concrete & steel, you have to go above 8 floors, otherwise the numbers don’t make sense.

(2) But there’s another factor: I’m not sure about the situation in Seattle, but here in Victoria BC, the typical downtown or inner core lot size is about 10,000 square feet — which is *nothing* much to build on. The only option really is to go high(er). If you want to build European-style mid-rises (with inner courtyards, as per the comment above — and which I agree are a real boon to tenants), then you need lots that are much larger — typically 3 or 4 “standard” city lots, and that practically never happens all at once in a built-out city.

We do have an office building underway here that has a footprint at least 3x what the average lot footprint is. It was partly an old gas station, partly a surface parking lot, and partly an old building that got demolished: very rare for all three things to come together and become available simultaneously like that. The building’s architect (Franc d’Ambrosio) is a fan of Euro-style midrise architecture, and has designed this office building at 7 stories. (It has its detractors, mainly because many people fear it’s going to look like a huge horizontal whale of a thing.)

But to have the option to spread out over such a large footprint is the exception — there are hardly ever any lots of that size available for building.

When a more standard surface parking lot or an infill project comes up, it’s typically 10K sq.ft. at most, and the developers can’t make a decent return on 4 to 6 stories. Plus, imagine the stubby stupid buildings you’d get: essentially, 70s-style stucco boxes of apartments, with hardly any architectural amenity — and you’d have to kiss the backside/ interior courtyard good-bye, as there’s no room for that.

Aside from that, I have to admit that I also appreciate the aesthetics of taller buildings, much as I think European-style cities are “charming.” But we haven’t really programmed ours like that, and we’re not going to get a Haussmann to flatten entire districts to make large lots capable of handling elegant, well-designed, amenity-packed (courtyards!) mid-rises feasible.

(Ooh, wish I could preview my comment — feels like I’ve rambled every which way in this tiny editing window! Sorry about that!)

Perhaps if we built these instead of crappy townhomes or view-specific towers then families would be more willing to give up their SFHs.

I’m thinking Yesler Terrace would be a good place to test this out. You could probably get llke 6,000 people in there if it was done right. Get a school in there and sprinkle a few diners, comic book shops, and toy stores and this could be one of the best family and low-income projects in years.