From the Archives: "Break new ground in old ways"
This second opinion piece appeared in The (Hilton Head) Island Packet on February 26, 1996. Below is a full transcription. The first part of this series can be read here.
Yesterday this column discussed the conventional approach to planning that reached its zenith in Charles Fraser's Sea Pines and has been copied by other plantation style developments in Beaufort County for the past 35 years.
This approach involves segregated land uses in zones of low density sprawl that is heavily dependent on the automobile to get around. This may be an appropriate option for an affluent clientele who desires privacy and exclusivity and can afford to pay for it.
However, the column examined environmental, economic, and social reasons why it would not be a good idea to use such a conventional approach in the comprehensive planning process that is going on now in Beaufort County.
Historic planning
An alternate vision involves planning so that growth can take the form of traditional towns and villages. We have some of the best examples in the country of this type of planning right here in the Lowcountry. The historic district of Beaufort, the Charleston peninsula, the Old Village of Mt. Pleasant, Rockville, the Isle of Hope, old Bluffton, Port Royal, and the historic district of Savannah offer wonderful models that have endured for hundreds of years. Encouraging growth to take the form of traditional towns has several advantages.
Environmentally, traditional development patterns are less consumptive of land allowing more rural and green spaces to be preserved. Also, mixing uses and having them closer together enables the choice of walking to meet some daily needs, rather than having to get in the car for everything.
Economically, because of their compact nature, traditional development patterns are much more efficient to build and maintain over the long run. Parenthetically, this is the principal reason why towns and cities were built this way from colonial times until the big government era began in the 1930s. Planning communities in this manner has been done for thousands of years in Europe and throughout the rest of the world.
Mix of residents
Socially, this form of planning has many advantages. In traditional communities, it is your address and not a gate out front that represents your social standing. Haven't we all heard and due respect for such place names as Bay Street, South of Broad, the Point, the Old Village, and the Battery? And yet, such neighborhoods are inclusive allowing less affluent neighbors and visitors to walk their sidewalks and streets. In fact, the small apartments and carriage houses within these neighborhoods enable people of lesser means to live in a community and enjoy what their more affluent neighbors get to experience.
In such neighborhoods, individuals and families from different socioeconomic levels come to know each other rather than fear each other.
In contrast to development methods that promote privacy and exclusivity, traditional planning promotes community and neighborhood. Therefore, instead of each additional home taking away from what was originally offered (privacy and exclusivity), each new home adds to what is being offered (community and neighborhood.) Under this planning scenario the attitude toward growth is less suspicious and more welcoming.
Charleston comparison
To put the different approaches to planning in perspective, compare Hilton Head Island with the Charleston peninsula. Hilton Head has a population of 25,000 people; the peninsula, 40,000. Hilton Head has had sustained development for 35 years; the Charleston peninsula, 315. Hilton Head has annual tourism of 1.5 million people; the peninsula, 5.5 million. Hilton Head encompasses 25,000 acres; the peninsula, only 2,500.
Frank Chapman, the former Democratic mayor of Hilton Head appeared on national TV shunning growth and urging visitors to stay away. Joe Riley, the popular Democratic mayor of Charleston, welcomes growth and is proud for visitors to see his city. Think about this the next time you hear someone say Hilton Head is overbuilt. Then ask yourself which place is the more sustainable model of growth.
The conventional planning methods regulating development for the past 50 years were established by Modernist architects and their followers in a period from the 1920s to the 1960s. Unfortunately, the Modernists not only succeeded in popularizing these concepts, but also their vaguely socialist theories appealed to New Deal liberals and were adopted as government policy. Over the years, these theories were written into local development and zoning ordinances across the country so that the type of development they promoted is essentially the only option allowed.
Imagination outlawed
Today, if Bull's plan for Charleston, or Nicholson's plan for Annapolis, or Washington's plan for Alexandria, or Oglethorpe's plan for Savannah, or for that matter, Fraser's plan for Harbour Town were brought into a local planning department, it would be met with so many variance requirements it would be all but impossible to implement. Each would be forced through a fiercely emotional and political gauntlet to rezone the property to a PUD (planned unit development) so the project could be built with graceful elegance. You would have to have a screw loose to want to go through such a process.
No form of development is perfect. Perfection is not one of the options. However, encouraging development to take the form of compact, mixed-use patterns would enable those who have it to keep their exclusivity, while better preserving undeveloped rural and green spaces, and still allowing growth to occur.
Change is difficult. Changing from the conventional approach will be even more difficult because most of the voting age population grew up in an era that codified the theories of modernist planners. Let us keep our minds open to fresh ideas, and recognize we are planning for a time beyond the next election.
Let's aspire to something more than conventional sprawl. Let's rearrange the discussion to talk about a civic sense of shared purpose, not simply four units per acre as far as the eye can see.
Preceding generations left us with celebrated places that endure. With few exceptions, the past 50 years have left us with places we would rather forget.
We can and must do better. We owe it to the land, to ourselves, and to our children.
VINCE GRAHAM
Vince Graham is the founder of Newpoint, a traditional walking neighborhood on Lady’s Island, and a partner in the Graham Co., which is pursuing approval to develop I’On in Mount Pleasant.