Sustainable Buildings Handbook

Creating a guide for homeowners and developers on how they can benefit from sustainable construction methods is the first step in increasing awareness of the city's dedication to sustainable development. It will help buildings in the city become more efficient, increase long-term savings for building owners, and reduce adverse environmental impacts on water and air quality, among other aspects.

Idea

Presenting potential developers with a suite of architecture, engineering, and site layout solutions that can reduce the negative impacts of a development is an easy tool that could increase the sustainability of new developments in Whitehall. Creating a handbook that contains potential solutions, environmental benefits, and short and long-range costs and benefits.

Goal

Create a sustainable development handbook that focuses on solutions for commercial and residential developments.

Objectives

1. Create an internal committee of employees that work in engineering, building, and planning departments to author the handbook.
2. Assess existing city codes that can be updated or improved to increase sustainability while having a negligible increase of financial hardship to property developers and owners.
3. Research and create a document that can be presented to potential developers that incorporates sustainable design guidelines.

Examples

There are many cities that have green building requirements. For example, all new commercial buildings in the City of Upper Arlington are required to be at least LEED-Silver eligible. This means that each building would qualify for LEED-Silver rating, but do not have to go through a costly and time-consuming certification process. Below are links to some cities’ green design standards and guidelines that can be used for reference: Boise, Idaho Santa Monica, California Yonkers, New York

Connection to Other Plans

This idea potentially addresses the following elements of the MORPC Regional Sustainability Agenda:

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