Urban Land Magazine
Sustainability
ULI Member Perspective: Buffalo Bayou and Resilience in Houston (Video)
How can a park protect a city from extreme flooding? Houston’s 160-acre (65 ha) Buffalo Bayou Park demonstrated resilience during Hurricane Harvey, surviving the storm with minimal damage and providing critical green infrastructure to the city during the peak event. In this video, learn about the park’s design and development first hand from members of ULI’s Houston district council.
Read MoreRising Sea Levels Pose Risk to Institutional Real Estate Investment
Some $360 billion of U.S. institutional real estate is in the top 20 percent of locations vulnerable to sea-level rise. Given significant portfolio allocations to gateway markets, institutional real estate portfolios have considerable exposure to climate change. This raises the question as to whether investors have factored in the challenge of rising sea levels alongside the perceived positives of gateway markets.
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Healthier Office Space Paying Dividends in Boston
One of the most difficult challenges for those seeking to adopt emerging technologies in commercial real estate is justifying the cost of implementing such measures. A recent ULI event in Boston highlighted the benefits of the evolving standards on health and wellness by five industry practitioners.
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Helping Pollinators Thrive in a Greener Urban Ecosystem
Many vibrant urban green spaces, particularly plants with flower or fruit, can’t survive without pollinators. The Best Bees Company, based in Boston, is looking to help property owners find space to help create sustainable ecosystems for green roofs, street trees, and other urban greenery.
Read MoreRecent Articles
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New Energy Star Metrics Likely to Lower Buildings’ Scores
August 20, 2018New Energy Star building performance metrics being applied on August 27 by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency could lower the score of almost every building participating in the program, which encompasses over half of commercial real estate building floor space in the United States. This will cause some to fall below the 75-point level needed to achieve certification through the program.
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Adapting Building Design to the Effects of Climate Change
August 10, 2018Implementing strategies at the building, development, and community levels can preserve functionality despite extreme weather.
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Leveraging Landscape: Tools for Urban Resilience
July 31, 2018Landscape design can go beyond aesthetics to contribute to resilience in ways that save money and improve lives.
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Helping Building Owners and Cities Partner to Reach Efficiency Goals
July 30, 2018With buildings accounting for 75 percent of U.S. electricity consumption, achieving these commitments will require the active participation and cooperation of the real estate sector. However, many U.S. cities are still in the very early stages of developing new policies and incentive programs to support the real estate industry in transitioning to more energy-efficient building development and management.
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ULI Urban Open Space Award Finalist: Baxi River Forest Island
July 27, 2018Changsha is a bustling city of 7 million people in China’s central Hunan province. The Baxi River meanders through the city, carrying water flows that have created 15 scattered islands near the city. Seasonal flooding, rapid water flow, and constructed monocultures have caused escalating erosion, destabilization, and loss of habitat along the banks. Past approaches to managing the river have favored the creation of hard edges to protect land and property. With the two-mile-long (3.2 km), 156-acre (63 ha) Baxi River Forest Island, the local government tried a new approach. It embraced the river ecosystem, creating a new park that is helping both nature and people thrive.
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ULI Urban Open Space Awards, Special Community Impact Recipient: Ricardo Lara Linear Park
The Ricardo Lara Linear Park in Lynwood, California, demonstrates how underused land can be repurposed to benefit an entire community. Teamwork and creativity transformed a vacant five-acre (2 ha) stretch of land along Interstate 105 into a park that advances social equity, improves environmental health, and offers recreation spaces for all ages.