My Built Environment: Good, Bad, and Really Ugly

It seems like a short time between winter and spring this year. Not much more than a week ago we were still having frigid temperatures. The last of the snow finally melted in our yard this week, with most of it gone a week ago.

Now this week, we have tulip bulbs coming up, and crocuses too! Won’t be long before I am at it, cutting everything down and getting the yard ready for another showcase summer. Hopefully we will be on more of a normal moisture cycle this year. The past seven years we have been in this house have certainly been eratic from a weather and moisture standpoint. Not much to build or landscape in the garden this year, which is good, cuase this spring we are painting the exterior of the house. That will be a project.

I am also looking for large 20 inch or so hanging baskets for our porch. If anyone knows were to get some, please let me know!

It has been awhile since I blogged. I apologize to everyone, but to be honest I havn’t really been inspired for awhile, or perhaps I just had a serious case of writers block.

This has been a strange winter around here. The last postings I did were of our pre-Christmas blizzard. Oddly enough, a week after that storm, we had another pretty big one, and it seems a weekly storm of some sort. And it has been VERY COLD this winter! Usually we get an arctic blast for a week or so in the winter, then it is over. And we always have some very warm days during the winter when we can get out and enjoy life, go for a walk, play a round of golf, ride bikes, or even clean up the yard a little bit.

Not this year…we are in week 7 of cold snowy weather. The snow from the blizzard is STILL on the ground! and we have hardly had any days above 40, with most of them in the 20’s and 30’s, or colder. I am getting cabin fever big time. I have a burning desire to build something, but it is way too cold in the garage to fire up the woodshop. Even though the garage is fully insulated, it would cost a fortune to crank up the space heaters to get the temperature into the mid 40’s so I could work without gloves. Fortunately, I did figure out how to completely drain the trailer this year, so hopefully no broken pipes this time! I need a break from this weather…Calgon take me away!

On the bright side, business has picked up dramatically in the last couple of weeks! If this keeps up, it looks like this will be a good year, and my inspiration is starting to make a comeback!

Ok, so it isn’t quite Christmas, but close enough. Once again, we find ourselves under a blizzard, with about 2 feet of snow dumped on us. This doesn’t quite get up to the March 2003 blizzard when we had over 3 feet of snow, but with this storm, the snow will be with us for quite a while, as the cooler temperatures won’t melt it very fast.

It started snowing on us early Wednesday, and by noon at work, we called it a day. I went to fetch my daughter at school, and went home. by then we had about 4-6 inches. I drive a true 4 wheel drive SUV (and right now I am glad I do!), so I didn’t have any problems getting around, except for the other drivers on the road. The next morning, the snow had stopped, but the wind hadn’t! There were areas that were bone dry, and other places with 3-4 foot drifts! We had to keep our cars outside in the driveway, so we wound up with some major drifts around the cars. Thank goodness for my neighbor, who has a bobcat tractor. He used it to dig out the driveways of his neighbors! Course, I had to shovel out the drifts around the cars. I am also thankful now that we live on a collector that is a designated snow route…we get plowed! The first plow came through at 10 am following the end of the storm. While it was nice to get the street plowed, it did add an additional 2 feet of snow to the end of the driveway! Once again, thank goodness for my neighbor! He did make some major piles of snow in the street, that the kids have had a good time playing on!

Other than having closed the office for a couple of days, this storm has been nice in that it has rather put me in the Christmas spirit with a few days off, shoveling snow, and the like. It is very pretty out, and we are sure to have a white Christmas this year!

Merry Christmas everyone, and have a Happy New Year!

While helping to prepare some of the meal for Thanksgiving, I got out an electric hand mixer that I use a lot for small jobs. Using this hand mixer got me to thinking about a different aspect of sustainability, and that is how we have become a throw away society. These days, most of the everyday products we use are made of plastics or other similar materials, particularly the gears in the motors. These arn’t good plastics either, but cheap plastic designed to keep the end product costs low. But what usually happens? These products, particularly household kitchen appliances work well for a few months, maybe even a few years, then they break. Because they are so cheap, it is easier to buy a new one and throw the old one away…contributing to our landfill waste.

What is it that got me thinking about this? The hand mixer I mentioned above, is an old mixer. I got it from my mother when I settled in my own place 20 years ago. Now having a kitchen appliance for 20 years these days is really something, but this hand mixer is older than that. I remember using it as a kid, in fact I remember this particular mixer being around as long as I can remember….so that is pushing 40 years! And it is still going strong. Now it might not be the prettiest thing, it isn’t stainless steel, it isn’t shiny white, but a faded yellow…and it is made of metal. But in this case, it isn’t a beauty contest. It stays in the drawer and only comes out when needed, usually once a week or so.

Imagine what it would be like if common everyday items, be it kitchen appliances, toys, or whatever, where built to last. We wouldn’t have to throw everything away. Sure it might be more expensive initially, but it would sure be cheaper in the long run. Imagine having to shell out $100 or so for a good hand mixer that lasted 40+ years, instead of shelling out $30 every few years? Imagine how much less stuff would be trash, how much less resources we have consumed in making and transporting those products…now that is sustainability.

On November 15th, I was the proud recepient of the first every Urban Design award given out by the City of Fort Collins. We recieved the award for the Harvest Project that we designed a few years back, and which recently completed construction. The city gave out a total of 12 awards in 6 categories. The Harvest project was the only award given to a single family detached community, that was a greenfield development. It was an honor to recieve such an award.

Harvest was designed based on new urbanism principles. There are over 500 homes in the 105 acre community, with a mix of single family and townhomes. Within that is a broad mix of product types that where interwoven together. There were 4 single family product lines, with a variety of lot size needs. All these lot sizes where woven together within blocks to create a dynamic mix of homes and home prices. Also mixed in, where two townhome products. Again, these where interspersed throughout the community. Also included where 4 small pocket parks, a community recreation center that occupies an entire city block. This site is also surrounded by a public park, and a city natural area. The community was designed to be walkable with detached walks, street trees, and 95% of the garages are accessed by alleys. My client, Writer Homes (subsequently purchased by Standard Pacific Homes) designed an entirely new product line for this community. In addition, they used a variety of color schemes, to really create a vibrant streetscape. This is indeed a neighborhood and community to be proud of.