Condo terraces provide private gardens for New York City residents.
Our big cities have always been more “urban” than “jungles” when it comes to integrating nature into the buildings where their residents live. Except for a lucky few, the average New Yorker, Chicagoan, or Angeleno must leave home to enjoy a garden oasis in the city. This has slowly changed in recent years – especially since Covid-19 highlighted the benefits of natural outdoor spaces so painfully.
Architects, builders and developers are responding by creating more gardens in their condominium and apartment projects, but this is not easy to achieve, given the high cost of land in many cities and the competing demands for more housing. Each unit under construction should have its own plantable outdoor space, or at least access to a shared on-site garden, as one of the lessons of the pandemic has demonstrated, but that doesn’t always happen. It is a social benefit that we see this trend growing, given all the competing challenges.
Mandates
Open spaces are required by some local governments. Architect based in Los Angeles Dean Larkin incorporates this fact into his latest project in West Hollywood. Each unit built in the dense, compact city on the west side of sprawling Los Angeles County must have a minimum of 120 square feet of private open space — and a third of it must be open to the sky, a- he explained in an email. .
There are also requirements for common open space, depending on the size of the project, the architect added. “For our seven-unit buildings, we needed 500 square feet. » In addition to balconies with space for residents’ plants, Larkin created courtyards along the project’s shared property lines, added tree wells to parking areas and created a “pocket park” for stopping and having a conversation on what would normally just be a sidewalk. in front of the buildings.
It’s not just West Hollywood with these open space requirements, Larkin commented. Beverly Hills, Santa Monica, and the City of Los Angeles all have minimum outdoor space requirements. It’s something he’s all for, he shared: “A connection to outdoor living is the very soul of the Southern California living experience and multifamily living should not no exception! »
Growing demand
Stephen Glascock, president of the New York-based developer Anbau, would probably agree, even if the Big Apple doesn’t offer a year-round outdoor living climate like Larkin’s in Los Angeles. Glascock observed that “post-COVID-19, there is a greater desire to connect with nature” and an “awareness that the outdoors presents a safe space for human connection, in addition to happiness and oxygen byproducts of life with plants.” Private outdoor space is a commonly requested feature in housing searches, he added in his emailed observations.
Natural benefits
“Incorporating greenery, especially in a dense urban city, not only has an impact on the individual, but also a lasting impact on the environment,” Glascock wrote. There is plenty of evidence for the benefits of nature on physical and mental health (from improving air quality for respiratory health to reducing stress, for example), but the developer cited another : “One of the most widespread factors that can help mitigate climate change is the reduction of the heat island effect (according to EPA), a phenomenon in which the temperature in cities is higher than it should be because things like cladding or cement absorb heat in dense areas. One of the best ways to reduce this effect is to add vegetation. Courtyard, roof, balcony and terrace gardens are all useful. And they live in buildings that make them healthier and more pleasant.
In its latest condo project, Flatiron House, Anbau created gardens with balconies for the majority of the building’s residents. “We wanted to make sure residents could feel a connection to the outdoors within their own home,” Glascock explained. “People love being able to grow their own herbs and even some fruit right next to their kitchen. » Units without a garden balcony can still access a garden courtyard common to the building and planted loggias.
Post-pandemic
Home gardens are a specialty of New York-based horticulturists Marc Davies. He creates them on balconies, terraces, rooftops and in hidden courtyards of the city’s high-end condos and co-ops. Some are intended for individual units. Some are shared by all residents. “These buildings want to have common rooftop terraces as an amenity for their tenants,” he noted in an email.
Demand fell at the height of the pandemic, as New Yorkers fled to their second homes away from the city, but demand is up 25% to 30% compared to previous years, Davies said. “Now that we seem to be “post-pandemic”, we want to have more outdoor spaces and move towards individual individual space. As it is safer for people to gather outdoors, it becomes more desirable,” he stressed. (Part of the increase in activity is because people are renovating rather than moving or responding to Covid, he theorized.)
One decidedly pandemic-related real estate trend the New York-based horticulturist is seeing is the impact of remote work on the Manhattan office market. “The Adams administration has worked to change zoning to allow vacant office buildings to be converted into housing. Added to this is the need for exterior developments,” he commented. When buildings complete this and other updates driven by local policies, buildings that did not have outdoor space would consider adding it, Davies said. This is a benefit to their residents and the rest of the city.
Does your local government require outdoor space for your residential buildings? It’s worth talking to your city or county officials if this isn’t the case. Your future living space could be the beneficiary.
