Albemarle County and Greene County are adjacent and usually friendly neighbors.
But when Albemarle decided to declare a bordering area by Greene County a historical preservation zone - prohibiting any development to take place in the area - and Greene County subsequently decided to build a shopping mall across the border to revive its stagnant economy, some problems ensued.
This is one of the problems that the Architecture School's Institute for Sustainable Design wants to help resolve.
ISD was founded in 1996, a project that Architecture Dean William McDonough supported.
"He was already a well-established and nationally recognized architect with emphasis on environmental design," ISD Director Diane Dale said.
Not a firm
The ISD offices are located in the basement of Madison House on Rugby Road, across from the Architecture School. Walking in, visitors are not greeted with what they may expect - instead of a busy architecture firm, ISD maintains a relatively quiet office with diagrams, brochures and pictures pinned up all along the walls denoting the various projects the Institute has taken up in its short existence.
"We are not an architectural firm," Dale said.
She explained ISD is a non-profit organization that acts more as a forum, providing the dialogue and resources on sustainability.
Sustainability is a complex topic, she added. It is a study of the various workings of a system - such as a factory or a town and its ability to self-sustain or support itself in an effective and appropriate manner.
Dale said Williamsburg, Va., is an example of a city that now is facing sustainability issues.
Last year, ISD assisted in facilitating the Williamsburg Crossroads Community Workshop, a series of planning discussions focused on various problems related to growth in that area.
"Williamsburg is concerned about preserving their culture, their resources, their economy and heritage," Dale said.
With a growing tourism industry and the inevitable shifts in terms of increased traffic, pollution and strip malls, the town must consider what it can do to combat these issues, she said.
The considerations of sustainability and architecture of design hark to a three-prong approach - of ecology, equity and economy, she added. These issues are all factors that must be considered in designing any system. What is most important, however, is the need to find some sort of balance to those three elements.
Ecology refers to the environment's role as a resource provider and also as the world we live in - the pollution and such in the Williamsburg problem would have to be examined in the increased traffic.
Equity touches on social equality of access. Benefits to any system must benefit all in a fair manner, Dale said. Thus, good roads and neighborhoods may not be designed exclusively for wealthy areas, but for all.
Economy is the issue of cost-effectiveness. With the added revenue from tourism in Williamsburg, the city needs to decide how to allocate its money, so that it can meet all its goals of preservation.
Seeing a solution
The function of ISD is to "render visible" the available solutions that can provide for sustainable architectures, Dale said.
"There are many more solutions than the one-size-fits-all approach," she said.
For instance, a road that is congested may be a problem to which some offer an easy solution - just widen the roads. But this creates a host of potential problems - pollution or growth of strip malls along the road, for example.
Also, the lack of communication between different areas is symbolic of the inward-looking nature of the counties in Virginia. This makes it difficult for the region leaders to fully understand the ideas around regional sustainability.
One project the Institute is assisting in is the Regional Renaissance.
"It's a two-year program where we're looking at Lynchburg, Bedford and the four surrounding counties in helping them" with their sustainability issues, said Katie Khawaja, a graduate Architecture student who is working on the project with ISD.
Regionalism, or the study of sustainability, is a trend that is growing across the country, Dale said. Various states like Oregon, California and Florida have entire state agencies who examine these issues. But Virginia's tendency towards insularity prevents it from confronting these issues appropriately, Khawaja said.
The Regional Renaissance still has a year and a half to go and will proceed on to voting on the suggested plans of action and then more discussion, she added.
The program "will make an impact," Khawaja said.
A sustainable future
Sustainability is the future, according to architects like McDonough, Dale said.
"Look at nature - there's no waste there at all," she said. "Something's that's given off as a product is cycled back into the system. We too can look at how this system works and mimic it. Waste is a human" construction.
This, along with commercial issues and respect for the diversity of all groups of people, will uphold the "three prongs" of sustainability, Dale said.
ISD hopes to continue in its goals to assist groups and also to facilitate ideas of sustainability, Dale said.
"We are always looking for topics to grow on," she said.
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