Francis 23

Village Homes: A Case Study In Community DesignMark Francis

Mark Francis, FASLA is professor oflandscape architecture at the Univer-sity of California, Davis. Trained inlandscape architecture and urban de-sign at Berkeley and Harvard, hiswork has focused on the use andmeaning of the built and naturallandscape. Much of this research hasutilized a case study approach. Hedeveloped the case study method forthe Landscape Architecture Founda-tion and serves on their Land andCommunity Design Case Study Initia-tive National Advisory Board.

Abstract: Village Homes is one of the most publicized built examples of sustainable com-munity design and landscape architecture in the United States. Designed and developed byMichael and Judy Corbett in the 1970s, Village Homes consists of 242 single- and multi-family residences on sixty acres. Houses are planned as energy-conserving buildings aroundcommon open spaces with play areas and shared gardens. A sizable part of the developmentis devoted to community open space, including orchards, vineyards, and play areas. Mostof the landscape is designed as an edible landscape and is owned and actively managed byits residents.Seen early on by local planners and bankers as a high-risk development, Village Homes to-day is one of the most desirable and economically successful developments in California. It offers many design and planning lessons useful for community design and landscapearchitecture. While widely studied and well documented, its impact has not been fullyreviewed. The purpose of this case study is to make this knowledge available to practitionersand researchers as well as to provide a critical review of the projects successes andlimitations.This case study follows a format developed for the Landscape Architecture Foundation(Francis 1999a, 2001a). This is one of three prototype case studies being developed forLAFs Land and Community Design Case Study Initiative (Francis 2001b,c; Francis2002). It is intended as a prototype place-based case study that will aid others in develop-ing cases of natural and built landscapes.

Davis, California may be turninginto one of the most innovativetowns in North America in its cur-rent search for new solutions tolow-energy community design.(Thayer 1977, p. 223)

So begins Rob Thayersaward-winning article onVillage Homes published over twentyyears ago when construction of Vil-lage Homes first began. Thayer sug-gested (1977), and many studies havesince confirmed, that Village Homeshas become one of the most innova-tive new neighborhoods built in theUnited States in the past twenty-fiveyears. It has also made the commu-nity of Davis, as Thayer suggested,one of the leading examples of sus-tainable design in the United States.1Village Homes may in fact be one ofthe most innovative examples of com-munity design since Radburn, NewJersey, was planned in 1928. VillageHomes is a model community designdistinct from most current new ur-banist proposals. It is especially use-ful as an example of sustainable land-scape architecture.

The Landscape ArchitectureFoundation selected Village Homesas the first place-based case studyfor its Land and Community DesignCase Study Initiative for several rea-sons. Most importantly, there is con-siderable case study material alreadyavailable on Village Homes. This in-cludes detailed case studies preparedby the Local Government Commis-sion, the National Association ofHome Builders, the U.S. Departmentof Energy Center of Excellence inSustainable Development, the RockyMountain Institute, and MITs De-partment of Urban Planning. In ad-dition, the project designers and de-velopers have published extensiveinformation on the goals and per-ceived outcomes of the project (Cor-bett 1981; Corbett and Corbett 1979,1983, 2000). Several studies, includ-ing some useful postoccupancy eval-uations, have been completed ofVillage Homes over the years by re-

searchers, students, and governmen-tal agencies interested in sustainabledevelopment.2 Much of this informa-tion is already available but is scat-tered in the literature on communitydesign, energy, and sustainable devel-opment and located in archival doc-uments, obscure web sites, graduatetheses, and local reports largely inac-cessible to people interested in theproject.

Past research on Village Homesmay be helpful to understand its sig-nificance as a model for sustainablecommunity development. For ex-ample, residents report having twiceas many friends and three timesmore social contacts than residentsin a nearby conventional neighbor-hood in Davis (Lenz 1990). Further-more, houses use one-third less en-ergy than other neighborhoods inDavis (Lenz 1990). When first pro-posed, the developers and designershad difficulty securing financing forthe project (Corbett and Corbett2000). Village Homes is now Davismost desirable subdivision, withhomes selling at $1025 per squarefoot premium in 30 percent less mar-

Landscape Journal 21:1-02 ISSN 0277-2426 2002 by the Board of Regents of the University of Wisconsin System

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ket time (Coldwell Banker Residen-tial, cited in Wilson, 1998).

Despite its success and fame,Village Homes has not been repli-cated as a whole. While many of its features, such as open channeldrainage and passive solar house de-sign, have become more standardpractice in community design, itsholistic approach has not beenadopted. This raises the question ofthe barriers that prevent innovativecommunity design from being morewidely implemented. In the case ofVillage Homes, an understanding ofits design and development processas well as impacts may help explainits significance and potential forlandscape architecture and commu-nity design (Figure 1).

The Case Study MethodThis case study utilized a

method prepared for the LandscapeArchitecture Foundation (Francis1999a, 2001a). The method was de-veloped as a template to provide auniform and comparable way to doc-ument and evaluate landscape archi-tecture projects and issues. Threetypes of case studies are being devel-oped by LAFplace-based, issue-based and hypothetical case studiesfor teaching. This is the first place-based case study developed by LAF,with several others to follow.3

The case study method involvesthe collection and analysis of differ-ent kinds of information, includingbaseline data, role of key project par-ticipants, financial aspects, projectgoals, and the design and decisionmaking process. In addition, this casedocuments use, perceptions, uniqueconstraints, project success, and limi-tations.

The methods used to developthis case study included archival re-search of key documents on VillageHomes, published reviews of past re-search and case studies on VillageHomes, internet searches, numerousvisits to the community over twentyyears, including behavioral observa-tions and a short time spent living inthe community, and studies of chil-dren in Village Homes (Francis 1981,1985, 1988). In addition, awards orspecial recognition descriptions, in-

terviews with the designers/develop-ers of the community, and interviewswith residents and users, non-residents, maintenance people/gardeners were used.

24 Landscape Journal

Village Homes Case Study: Summary Data 4

Project Name: Village HomesLocation: Davis, California located in Central Valley,

Putah/Cache Creek Bioregion, 60 miles north-east of San Francisco and 15 miles west ofSacramento

Date Designed/Planned: 19731975Construction Completed: Built in phases (50 units at a time) from

groundbreaking in 1975 to build out in 1982.Land Cost: $434,000 (in 1974)Development Costs: $2,329,241 (in 1974)Site Improvement Costs: $313,107 for swimming pool, bike paths, land-

scapingLender: Sacramento Savings BankHouses: 6003,000 Sq. Ft. Also a nine-bedroom co-op

house has about a dozen residentsHouse Construction Costs: $38 per square foot (1976 dollars)House Building: 60 percent built by developer and 40% by

small contractorsInitial Sale Price per Unit: $31,000$75,000Resale Price per Unit: $150,00$450,000 (2000)

Resale $1025 square foot higher than othersales in Davis (1995); sold in 3050% less time(Coldwell Banker)

Return on Investment: 23% per annum for 13 investment partnersSize: 60 acresDensity: 4 dwelling units/acre (7.7 dwelling units/acre

not counting common landscape); 6,933people per sq. miles Vicinity density: 35 dwelling units/acre Vicinity: 3,458 people per square mile

Open Space: 25% of site in public and community openspace

Land Use: 242 housing units (222 single family units, 22apartments); 650 residents; Commercial Officespace: 4,000 sq. ft. with 15 small businesses in-cluding consulting and professional firms;Agricultural uses: 12,000 sq. ft.; 12 acres ofgreenbelts and open space; 12 acres of com-mon agricultural land; two village greens;swimming pool; community center building;restaurant, dance studio, and day care center

Lot Size: Approximately 4,000 sq. ft.Land in Streets and Parking: 15 percent in Village Homes; 22 percent in

VicinityStreet Widths: 23 ft. in Village Homes; 44 ft. VicinityAverage Number of Cars: 1.8 in Village Homes, 2.1 in VicinityLandscape Architect(s): Michael Corbett, Town Planners, Davis, Cali-

forniaClient/Developer: Michael and Judy CorbettManaged By: Village Homeowners Association

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Precedents and Historical ContextThe design of Village Homes

was largely influenced by earlier con-cepts and long-standing principles ofcommunity design. Mike and JudyCorbett, the projects designers anddevelopers, give credit to earliergreenbelt communities in Britainand the United States (Howard 1965;Corbett and Corbett 2000) includingplanned communities such as Rad-burn, New Jersey and Greenbelt,Maryland. It was also inspired by cri-tiques of failed efforts at urban devel-opment and renewal in the 1960s (Jacobs 1961). Village Homes wasplanned well before the current in-terest in smart growth and new ur-banism. As a result, it serves as anoriginal and unique form of plannedcommunity than is currently popular(Duany et. al. 2000; Calthorpe et. al.2000) (Figure 2).

Project Developers and PlannersThe developers background in

architecture, town planning, ecology,and environmental psychology helpsto explain their goals in designingthe project. Michael Corbett is prin-cipal in the consulting firm TownPlanners and author of A Better Placeto Live (Rodale 1981). He served asmayor of Davis in the late 1980s. In1999, he was named, along with JudyCorbett, as a Hero of the Planet byTime magazine. Judy Corbett is thefounder and for the past twenty yearshas served as Executive Director ofthe Local Government Commission,a nonprofit membership organiza-tion made up of almost one thou-sand mayors, city council members,county supervisors and local govern-ment staff from throughout Califor-

nia and the Western States. She hasco-authored several books and guidesfor policymakers on implementingmore livable land use patterns. A1974 graduate of the Ecology Gradu-ate Group at the University of Cali-fornia at Davis, Judy Corbett hasserved as a board member of theCongress for the New Urbanismsince 1995.

Project Background and HistoryMike Corbett describes their

early experience developing the Vil-lage Homes project. When I firstpresented the concept plan for Vil-lage Homes to the then City Plan-ning Director for the City of Davis,she sat back in her chair and startedto laugh. This goes against every-thing I learned in planning school.Change all of it and come back andthen we can talk, she responded.What is remarkable, I was able to getabout 90 percent of what was on thatoriginal plan.5 Judy Corbett hasstated, we basically had to break al-most every code in the city to get Vil-lage Homes approved (Owens 1993,p. 19) (Figure 3).

And so begins the story of Vil-lage Homes in Davis, California.What started out as a visionary plancombining healthy doses of ecologyand sociology eventually became aninternationally recognized built ex-ample of community design. Re-garded by some as a one-of-a-kindcommunity and by others as a modelfor sustainable community develop-ment, Village Homes is now well

known as an experiment of commu-nity planning in the ranks of Rad-burn, New Jersey; Reston, Virginia;Greenbelt, Maryland; Sunnyside Gar-dens, New York; and Milton Keynesin Britain (Howard 1965; Lang 1994;Stein 1989).

Interviewed some twenty yearslater, Senior Planner Doris Michaelof the City of Davis commented, Ithink the strengths of the design arethe sense of community and the feel-ing of belonging to a neighborhood.I like the fact that theres a sense ofrecognition and that people careabout who you are. People in thiscommunity know each other (Fitch1999, p. 15). The fact that city plan-ners have done a complete reversalof attitude toward the project reflectsboth its significance in the local com-munity and the changing culture ofdevelopment today.

Genesis of ProjectVillage Homes began as the de-

velopers vision in making what theycall a better place to live. Born outof social and environmental con-cerns of the 1960s and 1970s, VillageHomes was intended as a reflectionof the values of these timesenvi-ronmental sensitivity and social re-sponsibility. It began, according todeveloper Judy Corbett, with a smallgroup of families meeting for a yearto try to create their own community.The Corbetts later set up a booth atthe first Whole Earth Festival held onthe University of California Daviscampus with sign-up sheets for any-one interested in joining them. Morethan thirty families met for about ayear, but the group eventually fellapart. People decided we couldntget enough money, Mike Corbett re-called (Fitch 1999, p. 2).

Writing in their book on VillageHomes some twenty-five years later,the Corbetts describe their early ex-perience developing Village Homes:

When we set out to design andbuild Village Homes in 1972, itseemed unlikely that we would besuccessful. We had no financial as-sets and no track record in devel-opment. We were embarking on alarge-scale project that incorpo-rated numerous untried and inno-vative features. The most likely out-

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Figure 1. Panoramic view of Village Homes. Photograph by Tom Lamb.

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come, and the one we expected,was that we would not succeed butwould be able to publish a bookabout our experiences and de-scribe how a forward-looking com-munity could be designed. Ourplanning concepts and designideas might then be useful to oth-ers. Luck was on our side. It took a

great deal of tenacity and persever-ance, but in the end we were ableto overcome multiple obstacles andbuild Village Homes. (Corbett andCorbett 2000, p. xiii)

The developers describe theirtwo interrelated goals for the com-munity of designing a neighbor-

hood which would reduce theamount of energy required to carryout the familys daily activities, andestablishing a sense of community(Corbett and Corbett 1983, p. 1).These goals are based on a numberof philosophical ideals, many com-bining human and natural ecology(Corbett and Corbett 2000) (seeTable 1).

In the early phases of VillageHomes there was a strong pioneeringsense. Judy Corbett observes, Wedid a lot with community work par-ties, building paths and foot bridges.There was a real strong spirit of thepioneers; we were doing somethingdifferent, for ourselves. The rest ofDavis thought we were a bunch ofnutty hippies. The process was veryunifying socially (Owens 1993 p.20). She says, We put everythinginto the vision and making it work(personal communication, 2000).

Design, Development and Decision-Making Process

Design Process. The designersand developers used a participatoryapproach to develop the initial plan-ning concepts for the community.They brought together a group offriends and interested families to dis-cuss how the project should be de-signed. The goals of this originalgroup, who called themselves theVillage, were visionary:

The discussion centered on ashared sense of dislocation, discon-nection, and powerlessness and ona concern for the environment. Wewondered whether it would be pos-sible to recover some of the homieraspects of village life within the con-text of a modern neighborhood.We believed it should be possibleto design a community so that onemight live more lightly on the land.(Corbett and Corbett 2000, p. 23)

Yet the group disbanded after ayear, frustrated by the lack of a siteand funds to realize their dream. TheCorbetts retreated to develop theirown plan and find willing investors.The final plan was their own vision, ablend of Judy Corbetts backgroundin environmental psychology andMike Corbetts interests in architec-ture and ecology. The plan was oneof the first to combine natural ecol-

26 Landscape Journal

Figure 2. Aerial view of Village Homes in the mid 1980s.

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ogy and social ecology into an inte-grated vision of people, nature, econ-omy, and community.

Decision-Making Process. Whenthe Corbetts submitted their plan tocity officials in the early 1970s, it metwith considerable resistance and hos-tility. As Judy Corbett describes theprocess, Everyone had a problem.The police department did not like

the dead-end cul-de-sacs. The fire de-partment did not like the narrowstreets. The public works departmentdid not like agriculture mixing withresidential. And the planning depart-ment picked it apart endlessly (Jack-son 1999, p. 78).

Even the federal governmentfound cause to question the merits ofthe project. While this office is most

sympathetic with your objective con-cerning energy conservation and en-vironmental concerns, we feel theproposal requires further study, saidRichard D. Chamberlain, area direc-tor for the U.S. Department of Hous-ing and Urban Development at thetime, in a letter to Mike Corbett.Chamberlain questioned havingapartments in the midst of single-family housing, providing parkingbays instead of on-street parking, andthe orientation of lots. He said thecommon areas seemed ill conceived,provisions for runoff of storm waterinadequate, and the idea of having ahomeowner association growing agri-cultural products questionable. Itcould well be that the same objectivecan be obtained by enlarging individ-ual lots and substantially eliminatingmuch of the common area, he said,noting such a change would provideindividual homeowners with spacefor garden plots (Fitch 1999, p. 2).

The Corbetts responded withthe persistence of missionaries ratherthan the pragmatism of developers.Not taking no for an answer, they setup traffic cones in an empty parkinglot to show the fire department thatemergency equipment could easilynavigate the narrow streets, even pastparked cars. They convinced the po-lice department that putting side-walks behind the houses rather thanin front and eliminating throughwayswould make residents feel safer, andVillage Homes low crime rate hasproved this point (Jackson 1999,p. 78) (Figure 4).

While city staff fought virtuallyevery design concept, it was the polit-ical process that rescued the project

Francis 27

Figure 3. Site Plan of Village Homes. Courtesy of Mike Corbett.

Figure 4. Judy and Mike Corbett usedlarge-scale maps and models to developthe plan for Village Homes. Courtesy ofJudy Corbett.

Table 1. Assumptions of Sustainable Development. Source: Corbett and Corbett 2000,pp. 5360.

1. Every living thing survives by numerous and subtle relationships with all living thingsand with the inanimate environment.

2. Ecosystems and parts of ecosystems composed of a wide variety of species tend to adaptbetter to environmental changes or human tampering than do those composed offewer species.

3. Part of the ecosystem is a complex system of energy transfers that depends, ultimately,on energy input.

4. In the long run, every one of the humanitys physical needs must be satisfied eitherwithout the use of nonrenewable resources or through recovery and reuse of thoseresources.

5. Although humans seem to be the most adaptable of living things, we still have certaininherent physical and psychological needs that must be met by the ecosystem, thehuman-made physical environment, and the social environment.

6. Humans are for the most part genetically adapted to the environment that existedabout 200 to 20,000 years ago. This adaptation involves not just the physical makeupbut also the modes of perception and behavior and relates to the social environmentas well as the physical environment.

7. The relationship between people and the environment goes both ways: humanityshapes and is shaped by its environment.

8. Humans can adapt to a wide range of environmental conditions, but the results of theadaptation to inhospitable conditions is temporary or chronic stress.

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and allowed it to be built. Judy Cor-bett says, We essentially had to ap-peal all staff decisions to the CityCouncil, and fortunately, the CityCouncil was very liberal and support-ive of what we were attempting(Owens 1993, p. 19). After almostthree years of delays and negotia-tions, they were allowed to begin con-struction of the first houses in 1975.

Financing. While the plan wasanything but conventional, conven-tional financing was needed to buildthe project. Judy Corbett remem-bered there was a lot of resistance to the project from local banks. Wewent to 30 different banks before wegot a loan (Owens 1993 p. 21). Rea-sons they were turned down includedtheir lack of past experience as devel-opers and the unusual aspects of theplan. Eventually they convinced abank to finance the project afterdownplaying its unique features.

Role of Participation. While theoverall plan came solely from the de-velopers, they built in numerous op-portunities for residents to partici-pate in the design of open spaces andongoing management of the commu-nity. One of the main ways residentshave been involved is through workparties. Much of the communallandscape and buildings were con-structed through this community-built process. Funds were set aside bythe Homeowners Association to allowresidents to design and build land-scape areas and buildings such as theCommunity Center and Pool. For ex-ample, each group of eight home-owners living around a common areareceived about $600 from the Home-owners Association to landscape thecommon areas as they wished. Thisforced residents to work togetherand get to know each other almostimmediately after moving in.

An important benefit of resi-dent participation is creating a senseof symbolic ownership. Surveys haveshown that this participation has ledto a stronger sense of attachment tothe neighborhood and greater satis-faction (Lenz 1990).

Design and Planning Concepts.Village Homes combines older de-sign and planning principles withnewer more innovative ideas. Manyof its basic concepts, as the develop-

ers admit, are drawn directly fromearlier greenbelt communities. Theidea of a residential area organizedaround open space (as compared tothe street) is a long-standing andpopular planning concept. It alsogoes against most new urbanist think-ing that maintains the street as thecentral focus of public space (Brill2002; Calthorpe et al., 2000; Duanyet al., 2000) (Figure 5).

The physical planning prin-ciples grow directly from the largermission of the community. The NewHomeowners Guide, published by theVillage Homeowners Association(1995), summarizes the major plan-ning concepts and spells out the so-cial and environmental goals of the plan.

A number of design features helpVillage Homes residents live in anenergy-efficient and aestheticallypleasing community. All streets areoriented east-west and all lots areoriented north-south. The orienta-tion helps the houses with passivesolar designs and makes full use ofthe suns energy. Street widths areall narrow with curving cul-de-sacsless than 25 feet wide minimizingthe amount of pavement exposedto the sun in the long, hot sum-mers. The curving lines of theroads also give them the look of vil-

lage lanes, and the few cars thatventure into the cul-de-sacs usuallytravel slowly.6 The common areasalso contain Village Homes inno-vative natural drainage system, anetwork of creek beds, swales, andpond areas that allow rainwater to be absorbed into the groundrather than carried away throughstorm drains. Besides helping tostore moisture in the soil, this sys-tem provides a visually interestingbackdrop for landscape design.(Village Homeowners Association1995, p. 1)

Site Planning. The Corbettsidentify six elements as the main site planning innovations of VillageHomes (Corbett and Corbett 1983,pp. 2747). They include commu-nity, energy conservation and use ofsolar energy, walking and bicycling, adesign closer to nature, neigh-borhood agriculture and naturaldrainage (Figure 6).

Open Space. Several types of openspace are provided in Village Homes,including private gardens, commonareas, agricultural lands, turf areasfor sports, and landscaped areas (seeTable 2). These spaces are describedin the official publications of VillageHomes as household commons,greenbelt commons, and agricul-

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Figure 5. Village Homes house solar design. Courtesy of Mike Corbett.

Figure 6. Panoramic of central open space. Photograph by Tom Lamb.

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tural lands (Village Homeowners As-sociation 1995, p. 11). Residents holdcommon interest in all three types ofland. Common lands are specified bythe Homeowners Board to be usedfor three purposesenjoyment, flow-ers and food, and profit, such as thealmond orchard of 300 trees thatgenerates income for the homeown-ers association.

These traffic-protected open ar-eas form safe play areas for children(Francis 1998). Residents have builtplay areas for their children in someof these open spaces and modifiedthem as the kids grew older. Theyhave also experienced some problemswith nonresidents using the openspaces and picking fruit (Figure 7).

Vegetation and Edible Landscape.Much of the plant material in VillageHomes is either edible or native. Vil-lage Homes residents can pick fruitright outside their houses in mostcommon areas. The edible landscapeincludes oranges, almonds, apricots,pears, grapes, persimmons, peaches,cherries, and plums. Community gar-dens located on the west side of theneighborhood provide organic pro-duce, some of which is sold to localrestaurants and markets. Annual har-vest festivals bring residents together.This edible landscape has created adiverse and somewhat overgrowncharacter to the neighborhood. Somenonresidents have commented thatthe overall landscape is an eyesoreand needs a great amount of mainte-nance. On the other hand, residents

get pleasure in seeing the seasonalcycles of nature expressed in the Vil-lages vegetation and open spaces(Figure 8).

Circulation. Pedestrian and bi-cycle paths were laid out before thestreets and given greater emphasis inthe overall plan. This makes it easierto walk or bike from one part of thecommunity to another than to drive.Greatest travel time within the neigh-

borhood is five minutes, typicallywithout ever crossing a road. TheCommunity center with swimmingpool, day care center, the PlumshireInn restaurant, and a dance studioare no more than a five-minute walkfrom any house. No other servicesare provided in the community. Gro-cery stores and other services are a short bicycle ride away, althoughmost residents use cars to shop in

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Table 2. Typology of Open Spaces foundin Village Houses.

Streets

Central Green

Vineyards

Orchards

Common areas

Playgrounds

Drainage swales

Community Gardens

Bicycle and pedestrian paths

Private courtyards

Figure 7. Community designed, built and common area. Photograph by Tom Lamb.

Figure 8. Much of Village Homes is an agricultural landscape owned by residents.Photograph by Tom Lamb.

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neighborhood centers or in down-town Davis. Large purchases gener-ally take place in Woodland, tenmiles to the north, or in Sacramento,fifteen miles east of Davis (Figure 9).

Open Channel Drainage. Thedrainage system creates a network ofsmall, creek-like channels that holdrainwater and allow runoff to perco-late back into the water table, theCity of Davis source of drinking wa-ter. During the dry summers theybecome landscaped play areas. The system accomplishes multiplegoals. This creates a low-technologydrainage system, saves infrastructurecosts, and creates pleasant natural ar-eas with visual and play value (Boothand Leavitt 1999; Girling and Help-hand 1994). As a result, conventionalstorm sewers were not required, sav-ing nearly $200,000 in developmentcosts (Corbett and Corbett 2000).Open channel drainage instead ofcatch basins and pipes undergroundreportedly saved enough money topay for most landscape improve-ments in the development, includingwalkways, gardens, and other land-scape amenities (Figure 10).

Open channel drainage notonly recharges the water table and re-duces infrastructure costs for utilitiesbut also creates a diverse landscapewell suited for naturalistic play (Hart1978; Moore 1993). These principleshave been adopted and have begunto be widely implemented (see, forexample, Ferguson 1998; Richman &Associates 1997). Several Davis devel-opments have adopted open channeldrainage in the design of a numberof residential and commercial proj-ects, including the Aspen and Wil-lowcreek developments.

Energy Use and Conservation. Nat-ural heating and cooling is accom-plished through both passive and ac-tive systems. While residents were notrequired to have active solar water-heating systems, the design reviewcommittee strongly encouragedthem, and Mike Corbett put them onall the homes he built. Almost everyresident complied. Houses are ori-ented north/south, accommodatingthe use of solar panels. The designalso allows south-facing windows tobe shaded in the summer by over-hangs and deciduous vegetation.

Houses incorporate passive heatingand cooling, are well insulated, andincorporate thermal mass. Solar hotwater systems are required and typi-cally meet up to one hundred per-cent of a homes hot water needs inthe summer and above fifty percentin the winter. Street trees shade roadsand reduce ambient air temperaturesby as much as ten degrees, a signifi-cant amount on hot summer days.

A well-publicized aspect of Vil-lage Homes is its reported lower useof energy. Lenz (1990) found one-third less household energy use thanin other parts of Davis. This is a resultof a combination of its passive solarhouse designs, south-facing site ori-entation, and south and west sideshading. A dissertation at UC Davisin 1978 found that Village Homesresidents consume fifty percent lessenergy than other residents in Davis(Hamrin 1978).

Water Conservation. The neigh-borhood is designed to conserve wa-ter through drought-tolerant land-scaping and reduced use of turfareas. It employs a hydrozoningconcept where irrigation is applied

most heavily to areas of human use(Thayer and Richman 1984). For ex-ample, larger commons have lawnfor soccer practice, games, and infor-mal gatherings, while areas alongpaths use native or edible vegetation.This has proved to be quite effective(Corbett and Corbett 2000).

Management. An office managerhired by the Homeowners Associa-tion performs daily management. Allresidents are dues paying membersof the Village Homeowners Associa-tion (VHA). The Homeowners Asso-ciation Board and its various commit-tees (which include both a DesignReview Board and an AgriculturalBoard) is a strong body that ensureslocal control and participation. TheBoard is involved in everything fromresolving disputes among neighborsto controlling use of pesticides to re-viewing additions and remodeling ofexisting structures. Committees andregulations are numerous. For ex-ample, three pages of guidelines gov-ern the community gardens and gar-den coordinators are appointed tooversee different areas.

When residents move in, theyreceive a Welcome to Village Homesbrochure (Village Homeowners Asso-ciation 1995). More than a welcomewagon, this document lays out the

30 Landscape Journal

Figure 9. Bikepaths in use. Photograph by Tom Lamb.

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history and philosophy of the neigh-borhood and its unique features andrules. It provides instructions for pay-ment of homeowners dues, notingthat a reduction in fees is availablefor residents who maintain their por-tion of the common area. The Boardof Directors makes semiannual weedwalks to ensure that residents dotheir jobs. The nonprofit Board alsois the sole stockholder of Plumshire,

Inc., a for-profit corporation set up toplan and manage nonagriculturalprofit-making ventures of the Associ-ation. This includes the Plumshirebuildings with offices, some apart-ments, and a small and popularrestaurant, the Plumshire Inn.

Community Economics. The Cor-betts original vision was to develop,as much as possible, an economicallyself-sufficient community. Money-making ventures were envisionedthrough different types of agricul-ture, office developments, and aninn. Only some of this has been real-ized. Office space owned by theHomeowners Association is rented,as is the Community Center, withrates ranging from $25 an hour forresidents to $250 a day for nonresi-dents. The Community Center is verypopular for weddings and family re-unions and is often booked. Board-sponsored events as well as freeclasses, parties, and meetings are ex-empt from fees.

Most residents are employed by the University of California or inSacramento, the state capital. Thereare a few employment opportunitiesin the village. Those that exist are inthe Plumshire office complex, at therestaurant, in the day care center, orwith the Homeowners Association.Some residents have used the com-munity gardens to grow and sell pro-duce.

Food Production. Residents arethe primary beneficiaries of theneighborhoods edible landscape.Lenz (1990) found that residentsproduce about twenty five percent oftheir household fruit and vegetableconsumption. Some residents alsoproduce their own nuts, honey, andgrain. The community gardens areproductive and add to the agricul-tural character of the neighborhood.There are almond orchards that areharvested in the early autumn. Thecommunity is invited to participate inthis work party, and if they do, theyhave the opportunity to buy the al-monds at a fifty percent discount.Remaining almonds are sold to otherresidents, and any excess is sold tocommercial almond processors (Fig-ure 11).

Community Organizations andSpecial Events. A number of specialevents and special interest groups areactive in Village Homes. These in-clude a Performance Circle ofacoustical musicians, a Secret Gar-den Tour, Yoga and Tai Chi classes,an Easter Egg Hunt, and a regularPotluck Brunch. Noteworthy is the

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Figure 10. Open channel drainage. Photograph by Mark Francis.

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annual Overhill-Westernesse Back-to-School Party. Residents of theOverhill-Westernesse common areasbuilt a neighborhood play area intheir commons and hold a back-to-school party to share it with the restof the community.

Safety and Traffic Calming. Theuse of narrow and cul-de-sac streetsin Village Homes appear to result intraffic-calming benefits. The need forslow streets to encourage child playand residential satisfaction has beenwell documented (Southworth andBen-Joseph 1997). The long and nar-row streets in Village Homes accom-plish this but lead to other problems,such as lack of visitor parking (Fig-ure 12).

Role of Landscape Architect(s)Village Homes is the result of a

strong vision on the part of the de-signers. Its success is also due to thedesigners ability to implement theirvision over time. In many ways, theproject has been a long-term labor oflove for the Corbetts. They put fortha vision and fought for it againstgreat odds for more than a decade.They have also lived in the commu-nity since its inception, investedcountless hours into the manage-ment and publicizing of the commu-nity, and invested in neighborhoodbusinesses. Mike Corbett runs hisplanning firm from the communityand has built and operates PlumshireInn, a small and excellent restaurantopened in 1999.

Evaluation of Successes and LimitationsThe literature on Village

Homes is almost unanimous in itspraise of the community. Yet much ofthis literature is anecdotal or basedprimarily on qualitative assessments.The few quantitative studies of VillageHomes tend to support the commu-nitys successes. To date, no longitu-dinal research has been done on theproject which limits understandingthe projects long-term benefits.7

The most systematic and com-

prehensive evaluation of VillageHomes was done as a postoccupancyevaluation (POE) by Thomas Lenz aspart of his masters degree in socialand urban geography from the Tech-nical University of Munich (Lenz1990). According to Lenz, his re-search goals were to find out how Vil-lage Homes functioned as a neigh-borhood, whether the design goals asstated by the developers were met,and whether residents were satisfiedwith their neighborhood. The data

32 Landscape Journal

Figure 11. Much of the public and private landscape is edible. Photograph by Tom Lamb.

Figure 12. Streets were designed to be narrow and heavily shaded with no on streetparking provided. Photograph by Mark Francis.

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were collected between October1988 and March 1989 and involvedcomparison of Village Homes to acontrol neighborhood in Davis.8 Healso compared factors such as recy-cling behavior, car and bicycle trips,and household energy use betweenthe two neighborhoods. His findingsare particularly useful in understand-ing the successes and limitations ofVillage Homes as a better place tolive.

In general Lenz found thatresidents of Village Homes are moresatisfied with their houses and muchmore satisfied with their neighbor-hood than their counterparts in the

conventional neighborhood (1990).Major complaints from Village Homesresidents had to do with problemswith solar equipment, quality ofbuilding materials, and lack of light-ing in the common areas. Other con-cerns included the lack of parking,garages, and storage. Most appreci-ated was the unique social life of theneighborhood, including its commu-nal open spaces, appropriateness forchildren, and opportunity for socialcontacts. Lenz found that residentsof Village Homes socialized moreand knew their neighbors better thanresidents in the traditional neighbor-hood (see Table 3).

Lenzs study raises the questionof whether increased social contactsare a result of the physical design ofthe community or the unique kindsof people who choose to live there.Lenz found that Village Homes wascomprised of a greater number ofyoung families and what he calledspecial interest groups such as stu-dents and senior citizens. He alsofound that the people who ratedtheir social lives the highest tendedto be Food Co-op members and com-munity gardeners, while people whowere not part of these groups social-ized, recycled, and gardened less andrated the neighborhood lower on

Francis 33

Table 3. Comparison of Village Homes and Conventional Neighborhood. Source: Lenz 1990.

Village Homes Control Neighborhood

DemographicsNumber of households 242 54Cars per household 1.8 2.1Bikes per household 3.5 3.6Family households 71.9% 93.3%Mean household income $51,600 $65,300Mean house square footage 1500 1820Percentage of homeowners 86.5% 93.3%

Evaluation of Houses (0 = completely dissatisfied; 10 = completely satisfied)Average of all evaluated items 7.3 6.8Overall design evaluation by respondents 7.9 7.0

Evaluation of NeighborhoodsAverage of all evaluated items 8.2 7.7Overall design evaluation by respondents 8.6 7.1

Evaluation of Friends and SocializingNumber of best friends within neighborhood 4 .4Number of friends 16 8Number of persons known 42 17Time spent with friends from within the neighborhood (hours per week) 3.5 .9Time spent with friends from outside the neighborhood (hours per week) 8.7 3.7

AgricultureAverage number of fruit and vegetables grown 10 8Average contribution to totalannual consumption 24% 18%

TransportationAverage annual miles per car 11,300 13,400Average miles per household 210 270Average gas mileage of vehicles 27 mpg 23.5 mpgGasoline consumption per car per year 422 gallons 577 gallonsGasoline consumption per household per year 753 gallons 1171 gallons

Energy ConsumptionTotal yearly energy consumption per household (kW/h) 44,900 67,700

Recycling (0 = do not recycle; 10 = always recycle)Glass 7.5 6.4Paper 4.3 1.7Organic Waste 3.4 2.0

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most dimensions. Lenz concludesthat it is a combination of the uniquevalues of the residents and the provi-sion of places that bring people to-gether that make the communitymore social.9

UC Davis landscape architec-ture professor Patsy Owens and herstudents conducted a follow-up post-occupancy evaluation (POE) a fewyears later (Owens 1993).10 Theyfound similar high levels of satisfac-tion among residents. The threehighest ranked design elements werethe common areas, the bicycle andpedestrian paths, and the attractive-ness of the community (Owens 1993,p. 29). Close behind were auto circu-lation, closeness of houses, privacy,solar design, and open channeldrainage (all above eighty percentsatisfaction) (Owens 1993, p. 29).Lowest ranked was the satisfactionwith parking, which may be due tothe rise in teenagers bringing a thirdcar into the household. When askedhow much longer residents plannedto live in Village Homes, half an-swered forever. This mirrors thestrong sense of attachment to placefelt by residents.

Even studies by the City of Davisnow confirm its success. The overallimpression of the neighborhood ishow the homes and streets recedeinto the lush landscape and green-belts: a non-manicured landscapeconsisting of many edible plants anddominated by common areas, ex-plained then Community Develop-ment Director Jeff Loux and Associ-ate Planner Robert Wolcott (Louxand Wolcott 1994).

Maintenance and Management.A key feature of Village Homes is theunique management system that in-volves residents in decision-making.The Corbetts believed that a parti-cipatory management organizationwas needed for the community to be successful (2000). They chose ahomeowners association model as itprovided the greatest degree of localcontrol and participation. Over theyears they may have regretted this to some degree as the homeownerboard has gone against some of theirproposals. For example, it took sev-eral years of discussion before theBoard agreed to develop the small

restaurant complex completed in1999. Yet the Corbetts continue to in-clude participation as one of their es-sential ingredients in making sustain-able communities (Corbett andCorbett 2000).

Social/Community Factors. Whatis unique about Village Homes is how it works as a social place. Thephysical form of the neighborhoodhas created a cohesive and dynamiccommunity life. For example, Lenz(1990) found that people living inVillage Homes had twice as manyfriends and three times as many social contacts as people living inother parts of Davis.

Another good indicator of acommunity is how it works for chil-dren. In my interviews with Judy Cor-bett, she emphasized this as one ofthe most successful aspects of thecommunity. It is a great place toraise kids. It offers children a sense offreedom and security. This is one ofthe communitys greatest successes(personal communication, 2000).

In the early 1980s, we did a se-ries of observations and interviews toassess childrens use of open space inVillage Homes (Francis 1985, 1988).We found in general that it providedan accessible and rich landscape thatoffered kids numerous opportunitiesfor naturalistic play. One of the find-ings was somewhat surprising andcounter to one of the core principlesof Village Homes. The street was asheavily used and valued a part of thechildhood landscape as the commonareas. What is unique about VillageHomes from a childs perspective isthe diversity of places provided, fromstreets to play areas to natural areas,and the almost seamless access pro-vided to these places (Figure 13).

Critical Reviews. Village Homeshas been widely discussed and re-viewed in both the professional andpopular press. Publications as diverseas Landscape Architecture, The ChristianScience Monitor, Time, and Newsweekhave featured the community in ar-ticles on sustainable development.Village Homes is well known abroaddue to numerous documentaries

aired on European and Asian televi-sion. It has also received several na-tional design awards.

Another form of peer review ispublished reports by its residents onthe experience of living in VillageHomes. Some of the case studiespublished on Village Homes illus-trate its unique social life. For ex-ample, Paul Tarzi, a resident of Vil-lage Homes since 1979, commentsthe open spaces and play areas arewell used and provide casual meet-ing opportunities. Youre just moreaccessible to your neighbors. Hisneighborhood group has had weeklypotlucks for years. Its somethingthat people look forward to, he says.Everyone has an orange flag theyput out that day if they intend tocome. Tarzi goes on to state, Acommunity is more than a physicallocation. Its a feeling of kinship. Liv-ing at Village Homes has enhancedour lives in many ways. I guess I couldsay Im looking forward to growingold here (Browning and Hamilton1993, p. 33).

In summer 2000, a 25th anniver-sary party was held for Village Homesand was attended by 350 people, in-cluding some alumni who hadmoved away and come back to cele-brate. There were speeches, music,and a slide show of the early days ofthe Village. For the first time, thecommunity honored the Corbetts sfor their vision in founding VillageHomes with a bronze plaque to bemounted on a large rock near thecommunity center (Davis Enterprise2000.

Criticism. Most of the publicitysurrounding Village Homes haspointed to its successes as a develop-ment and praised its importance forother communities. Little of what hasbeen written has been sharply criti-cal. Village Homes does raise somefundamental issues surrounding thecreation of community through phys-ical design.

The National Association ofHome Builders (NAB) has critiquedthe unrealized aspects of the VillageHomes plan. They state not all ofthe original design premises and ex-pectations of Village Homes havebeen realized. The Davis Departmentof Health rejected a plan to recycle

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gray water for irrigating orchards. Acooperative store idea fell by the way-side, as did a central cooperative ele-mentary school. And when federaltax credits for alternative powersources were terminated by the Rea-gan Administration in the 1980s,continued solar development on theVillage Homes model experienced amajor setback (National Associationof Homebuilders 2000)

The following criticisms11 havebeen offered of Village Homes andits approach to community design:

Shared Values or Design Determin-ism. Is the success of Village Homesits unique community design or thekind of people who have chosen tolive there? Several observers of Vil-lage Homes have raised this question.For example, landscape architectEllen Jouret-Epstein (2000) asks ina letter to the editor to Landscape Ar-chitecture, Is Village Homes a sharingcommunity because of its indisput-ably great features? Or because it hasattracted and concentrated a popu-lation with certain shared values?Clearly some residents decide to livethere due to its physical and symbolicreflections of their environmentaland social values. In the early daysmany residents chose to settle there

due to its unique ideology and thepioneering spirit of living in a newexperimental solar community.Since then, there has been a largeturnover of residents and today onlyabout 25 percent of the early resi-dents remain, a figure that is stillmuch higher than it is for most com-munities. Many people now chooseto live there due to its strong prop-erty values and high quality of living.This reportedly creates some conflictbetween old and new residents, whichsometimes need to be mediated bythe Homeowners Association (Jouret-Epstein 2000, p. 11).

Conflict with New Urbanist Prin-ciples. Village Homes goes againstmany of the principles currentlypopular in new urbanist and smartgrowth planning (Fulton 1996;Duany et. al. 2000; Calthorpe et. al.2000). For example, the develop-ment is open space-oriented as op-posed to more formal geometries ofcommunity design (Francis 1995).Clare Cooper Marcus provides a criti-cal review of Village Homes transfor-mation from an early hippie com-

munity to now one of the most desir-able places to live in Davis (CooperMarcus 2000). Comparing VillageHomes to new urbanist planning, shestates, The design of this highly suc-cessful community breaks many ofthe rules popularized by the propo-nents of New Urbanism. First of all, iteschews the grid and provides accessto houses via long, narrow cul-de-sacsthose lollipops of 1950s sub-urbia much hated by proponents ofNew Urbanism. The green-shaded,narrow, dead-end streets save moneyon infrastructure, use less land, re-duce urban runoff, keep the neigh-borhood cooler in summer, andcreate a quiet and safe public areawhere neighbors meet and childrenplay (Cooper Marcus 2000, p. 128).

Hierarchy of Open Space. CooperMarcus goes on to critique the openspace design of Village Homes andcompare it to the more formal,street-oriented layouts proposed bynew urbanists. She finds, based onobservations, that the shared pedes-trian commons or green spaces pro-vided between houses work well forchildrens play, natural areas, andcommunal events. This attractiveenvironmentthough accessible to outsiders riding or walkingthroughis definitely not a publicpark. She suggests that these com-mon areas provide a green heart tothe neighborhood. Cooper Marcusgoes on to suggest that between thedesignations of private yard andpublic park lies a critical category ofoutdoor space that might be calledcommunal or shared (Cooper Mar-cus 2000, p. 128).

What would you do differently?Some of the criticism of VillageHomes comes from the developersthemselves. Mike Corbett suggeststhat the development could be threetimes denser while providing thesame amount of green space. JudyCorbett observes that the communitymay be too big with some 800 resi-dents. She states, We would havehad a much stronger sense of com-munity if there were about 500 of us(Owens 1993, p. 20). The Corbettsdisagree between themselves regard-ing the size of the central green areanear the Community Center. JudyCorbett says, I tend to think it would

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Figure 13. The open drainage areas provide numerous opportunities for childrens play.Photograph by Mark Francis.

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be better smaller, though Mikethinks it should stay that size. Itsgood for soccer practices and morespread-out activities, and it is used onweekends. Its just too big for thekind of intimacy that other openspaces seem to have fostered(Owens 1993, p. 20).

Where is the front door? The siteplan, which emphasizes the backyardcommon areas over the street, led to a dilemma in deciding where toput the front door. With the houseturned away from the street, the frontdoor was deliberately not placed onthe street side. With the commonarea being the major focus, the frontdoor could go here, but there wereconcerns about visitors being able tofind it. The Corbetts were ambivalentabout this and ultimately settled onputting the door on the side of thehouse. They admit that the frontdoor is often impossible to find(personal interview, 2000).

Lack of Open Space Use. Duringinformal observations over a periodof several years, and more systematicobservations done for this case study,I was struck by how underused someof the landscape of Village Homes is (Francis 1985, 1988). While usepicked up in evenings and weekends,weekdays tended to find few people

using the common landscape. Thelow use may be partially due to theharsh summers in Davis where it isnot comfortable to be outdoors, es-pecially during the day. An addedfactor may be the busy lives of its resi-dents, whose lives are as highly struc-tured and over-programmed as thoseof their suburban counterparts inother developments. This is also trueof Village Homes children whoselives are filled up with school, sports,music lessons, computers and TV(Figure 14).

Whose Fruit? One limitationwith the design of Village Homes isthe blurred boundary between pub-lic and private realms. While this isresponsible for much of its distinctcharacter, with no fences betweenprivate yards and more public com-mon areas, it has created some prob-lems. For example, it is unclear towhom the bountiful fruit in the com-mon areas belongs. Is it the privateresidents? The collection of housesaround it? The entire community?The public? Visitors and even someresidents are often confused by this.Common fruit trees are especially

hard to identify, since they are gener-ally near household common areas.

While the landscape is ambigu-ous about this, the Homeowners As-sociation rules are not. They specifyonly residents of Village Homes areallowed to pick produce from thecommon areas. Youre encouraged tointroduce yourself and anyone yousee picking if she or he is a resident...and you should politely explain tononresidents that Village Homes isprivate property. Even residents are discouraged from picking fruit in other peoples common areas:Please do not pick fruit from house-hold commons unless you see a signinviting you to pick, and alwayshonor signs requesting you not topick (Village Homeowners Associa-tion 1995, p. 13) (Figure 15).

Vegetation and Pest Management.With plentiful and diverse vegetationcomes a diversity of insects. In VillageHomes this includes spiders (includ-ing black widows), slugs, and ants.Residents report having these inlarge quantities and some attribute itto the profusion of vegetation andthe lack of chemical pest control.Some have called for more inte-grated pest management (IPM) edu-cation among gardeners and resi-dents. As one Village Homes residentsums it up, Im all for integrating na-ture into my home, but this is ridicu-lous!!

Security. Village Homes hasproved to be a safe neighborhoodcomparable to other neighborhoodsin Davis. Yet it is not without its crit-ics. A Davis police officer with the

36 Landscape Journal

Figure 15. Who owns the fruit andvegetables has been a point of conflict inthe community as seen in this PrivateOrchard Sign. Photograph by TomLamb.

Figure 14. While well designed, some open spaces in Village Homes are not heavily used.Photograph by Tom Lamb.

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Crime Prevention Unit commentedin a 1993 interview If Village Homeswere to be built today, it would notmeet the current Davis SecurityCode, so many changes would needto be made. In general, the streetsare too narrow for emergency ve-hicles to turn around, house num-bers are not easily visible from thestreet, and lighting is poor through-out the site. Because the shrubbery s not kept pruned back from walls,there are too many places for prowl-ers to hide (Owens 1993, p. 23).

These are several of the samecriticisms that almost prevented Vil-lage Homes from being built. Evenwith this criticism, it is one of thesafer areas in Davis. Police depart-ment records show that VillageHomes crime rates are ninety per-cent below the rest of Davis (Corbettand Corbett 1983, p. 9).

Role as a Symbolic Community.The farm-like landscape serves as apowerful symbol for the community.Without the vineyards, orchards, andcommunity gardens, Village Homeswould appear much more like a con-ventional development. It demon-strates that there is a value to zoningsmall scale agricultural uses withinexisting cities, rather than the cur-rent thinking that farms must existapart from where people live.

Aesthetics. Village Homes has itsown unique look that has been char-acterized as ecological aesthetics(Thayer 1994). The landscape clearlyreflects the ecological practices thatguide its creation and management.While some value the rural feelingof the development, not all appreci-ate its often wild and unkempt char-acter. The developers concede thatthe aesthetic of Village Homes is notfor everyone (personal communica-tion, 2000). The regular weed pa-trols of the Homeowners Board isevidence of the continuing struggleto find a healthy balance betweenwildness and order.12

Environmental Impacts. Much ofthe planning and site design was in-tended to be sustainableto reduceenergy use, conserve water, reduceautomobile use, and create food sys-tems. Clearly this has occurred withVillage Homes. Most new urbanistplanning has similar environmental

goals. Yet it is questionable if thesetypes of development yield the sameenvironmental benefits as VillageHomes.

In a study at the University ofOregon funded by the National Ur-ban and Community Forestry Advi-sory Council, researchers comparedthe effects of three types of neighbor-hood development on air, water, andurban forest quality (Girling et al.,2000). They did extensive modelingof a traditional suburban develop-ment, a typical gridded, new urbanistdevelopment, and an open space-oriented development modeledlargely after Village Homes. The re-searchers found that the traditionaland new urbanist developments hadvery similar environmental impacts,including amount of impervious sur-face, runoff, and energy use. The Vil-lage Homes style development wasthe only one that produced signifi-cant improvements in air, water, andforest quality. This study points outthe need for more comparative stud-ies that look across cases.

Replication. The most commonand troubling criticism of the projectis that it has not been replicated.Even the developers acknowledgethere is nothing like it anywhere(personal communication, 2000).Village Homes has even spawned de-velopers among its residents whohave chosen not to replicate its suc-cesses. When asked why, the responseis that it would be too risky. JohnWhitcombe, one of Davis leadingresidential developers, is not sur-prised no one has built a project asrevolutionary as Village Homes. Hesuggests that the main reason therearent more Village Homes is theresonly one Mike Corbett (Fitch 1999)(Figure 16).

Former City of Davis plannerDoris Michael suggests that it is dueto the fact that it is too expensive(Owens 1993, p. 17). She attributesthe lack of replication to not allpeople feeling comfortable living soclose to others. Fears of expenseand density are common fears of de-velopers. Yet the reality of develop-ment has proved that these are moremyth than fact.

Planners Loux and Wolcott(1994) have observed, Many citizens

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Figure 16. Innovations such as open channel drainage have been used in later Davisprojects such as the design of this play beach in the Aspen development. Design byCoDesign; photograph by Mark Francis.

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throughout the city look with prideto Village Homes and question whyno similar model has been built inthe past 20 years. The two plannerssuggest that the reasons for this areincreases in land prices and changesin home styles and tastes. City stan-dards in Davis and elsewhere remaina substantial barrier for a developerwanting to build a similar project.

Mike Corbett offers an assess-ment of why the project has not beenreproduced. The problem is notthat the public does not want it. Theycome here and see what we havedone and say, Why isnt everybodydoing this? But developers are soclosed-minded. They continue tobuild thousands of places where youcant get around without a car (Jack-son 1999, p. 79).

Even replicating the project inDavis has been difficult. Judy Corbettpoints out, the present City Councildoes not hesitate to brag to othercountries about how wonderful theirVillage Homes is, but they do notseem to do much to enable anythinglike it to be built here again (Owens1993, p. 19). Some of the ideas, suchas open channel drainage and natu-ral landscape, have been used in laterdevelopments in Davis, but no onehas attempted to replicate the com-

munity in whole. For now, it is a one-of-a-kind project.13

Significance and Uniqueness ofProject. Why does Village Homeswork? Factors commonly cited in theliterature include that people like liv-ing there, they perceive the commu-nity as safe, it is seen as a good placeto raise children, and that the de-signers and developers actually livethere.14 Some point out that thehouses have a higher resale valuethat makes them a good investment.It also encourages and fosters theparticipation of its residents. Alsomentioned is that it exists in a townthat is socially and environmentallyaware and that it provides a neededalternative to suburban living. Per-haps most importantly, VillageHomes has meaning for residentswho have a strong attachment to it asa place (Figure 17).

Limitations and Problems. With itsmany successes and pioneering de-sign and planning features, VillageHomes has not been without its prob-lems. Many of these are minor designflaws, yet several raise significant is-sues for designing similar sustainablecommunities. One limitation is thatmany residents living in VillageHomes often have strong environ-mental and social values, although

not everyone shares the same politi-cal views. Another problem is that in-adequate storage space has createdvisual clutter. Judy Corbett for ex-ample has commented, I wouldhave no carports. Those seem to havejust gotten messy, and people com-plain about lack of storage. Garageswould work much better (Owens1993, p. 20). The developers andmost observers agree that the samesuccess could have been achievedwith a higher density.

Despite great efforts on thepart of developers to provide afford-able housing opportunities, social di-versity has been limited in VillageHomes. As home values have esca-lated, so too has the number of pro-fessional residents. While rentalapartments, the co-op house, andsmall houses create a sense of diver-sity, social diversity is limited in thecommunity as it is in the larger cityof Davis. As the community has ma-tured it has also been difficult to sus-tain the level of involvement of theearly days. For example, the VillageHomeowners Association (VHA) inits newsletter (March 1999) com-plained about the shortage of votesto conduct Board elections.

Generalizable Features andLessons. Most, if not all, of the designand planning principles discussedearlier are directly applicable toother projects. Especially transfer-able is the projects emphasis onparticipation, open channel drain-age, the diversity of open space types,shared communal space, the child-oriented landscape, and hydrozon-ing. Also generalizable is the mixed-use Village Center concept andplacing emphasis on pedestrians andbikes first, and cars second.

There are some comparable de-velopments to Village Homes worthnoting. Perhaps the closest philo-sophically is The Woodlands inTexas, also designed in the early1970s (WMRT 1974). Most similar toVillage Homes is the more recentPrairie Crossing, a 667-acre develop-ment in Grayslake, Illinois, north ofChicago. Prairie Crossing puts simi-lar emphasis on agriculture and openspace, with 150 acres set aside forfarmland among its 317 home sites.It also uses a natural drainage system.

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Figure 17. Community participation, such as used in the design and construction of thecommunity pool, is one reason for the success of the community. Photograph by TomLamb.

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Other recent examples that sharesimilarities to Village Homes are Cof-fee Creek in Indiana (being designedby architect William McDonough),Haymount in Virginia , and Civanoin Arizona. One also cannot helpcomparing Village Homes to twoother well-known planned communi-ties Sea Ranch, also in California,and Seaside in Florida.15 While theseprojects differ in that they are prima-rily second home communities, theydo share Village Homes ingenuityand design experimentation.

Future Issues and Plans. If VillageHomes were being designed today,some thirty years later, how should itbe different? Given its great success,one could argue that it should be de-signed exactly the same as there areso many things that work well aboutthis place. Yet there have been manyadvances in the basic design prin-ciples pioneered in this project. Forexample, we know more about howto design natural drainage systemsand make them larger, more visibleparts of communities (Richman &Associates 1997).

When asked what she would dodifferently, Judy Corbett commented,build the commercial area firstrather than wait until the end (per-sonal communication, 2000). She ob-serves that NIMBYism (not in myback yard) does set in, and residentsbecome resistant to change and newideas. Just as the city of Davis was abarrier to implementing the Cor-betts ideas, residents were reluctantto approve their plans for comple-tion of the Village Center (Figure18).

Conclusions/ImplicationsThe Corbetts summarize what

they consider to be the importanceof their labor of love in this way. Wedo not view Village Homes as anideal. We see it as a practical step inthe right direction. Just as the housesand the quality of life within VillageHomes have been improved as wehave gained experience, we hopethat future developments will beimproved to become largely self-sufficient neighborhoods. Most ofthe necessary techniques, equipmentand knowledge are now available todo this. The challenge is to combine

these many simple, practical and eco-nomical steps so they work together(Corbett and Corbett 1983, p. 9).

The ideas and principles em-bodied in Village Homes can be uti-lized in many other situations. It al-ready has influenced many otherdesigners and developers. VillageHomes has also inspired develop-ment of important theory and builtpractices of sustainable communitydesign.

With the current interest in for-mal approaches to community de-sign as evidenced by new urbanists,Village Homes provides an alterna-tive and refreshing model of neigh-borhood design. Most importantly, itdemonstrates an approach to sustain-able community design quite differ-ent than most current models. Per-haps the most important differenceis the projects heavy emphasis onopen space as the organizing frame-work for the community. Unlike newurbanist proposals that begin withformal layouts of gridded streets andprecise formulas for street designand provision of public space, VillageHomes emphasizes more informaland naturalistic open space to fostercommunity participation and senseof place. It also shows how important

the designed and natural landscapeis to creating a strong communityidentify and resident satisfaction.

Writing in his award-winning ar-ticle in 1977 that first introduced Vil-lage Homes to design professionals,Thayer suggested that it might not beappropriate to make Village Homes amodel for all community design. Itmay be unwise to suggest that VillageHomes is a generalizable case study.A large percentage of homeownerslive there as an experiment. He goeson to conclude Village Homes willmake a significant contribution toprogress in community design,whether it stabilizes as a neighbor-hood and true product of environ-mental awareness or serves as a con-tinually evolving laboratory forconservation and community in envi-ronmental design. As BuckministerFuller might say, Village Homes isperhaps less a noun and more averb. It is clear that the experimen-tal period of the project is now pastand it has become a more establishedand even institutionalized model ofcommunity design. Village Homestoday serves as a living model of sus-tainable community design and anongoing laboratory for research andreplication.

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Figure 18. Many home gardens are designed as sustainable landscapes emphasizingnative plants, water conservation, and habitat. Photograph by Tom Lamb.

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AcknowledgmentsI would like to thank Frederick Steiner andSusan Everett who first encouraged me to dothis study and to the Landscape ArchitectureFoundation who commissioned this work. Thepreparation of this case study was funded by aJJR Research Grant, the Landscape Architec-ture Foundation, and the University of Califor-nia Agricultural Experiment Station. I wouldalso like to thank the designers and developersof Village Homes, Judy and Mike Corbett,whose openness, self-criticism, and enthusiasmaided preparation of this case study. I wouldalso like to acknowledge Rob Thayer, my col-league at UC Davis and longtime VillageHomes resident, for his important researchand insight over the years regarding VillageHomes and its significance for landscape ar-chitecture. My students at UC Davis have alsobeen important observers of Village Homesand have greatly informed my own views ofthe place. Mary Bedard, Judy Corbett, SusanEverett, Randall Fleming, and Rob Thayer pro-vided useful comments on an earlier draft ofthis article. I also thank Tom Lamb for his per-mission to reproduce his original photos com-missioned by LAF for this study.

Notes1. Innovations that have made Davis recog-nized as an ecological community have oftenbeen initiated outside the university. A fewdays before President Francois Mitterands1984 visit to Village Homes, designer and de-veloper Mike Corbett was on his bike to visitthen UC Davis Chancellor Jim Meyer toexplain that the French President did not havetime to visit the campus and to invite theChancellor to come out to Village Homes togreet the French dignitaries. Residents of Vil-lage Homes, including graduate students, pro-fessionals and UCD faculty members, havemade notable environmental and design con-tributions to the neighborhood and largercommunity. Residents Rob Thayer, JimZanetto, Bruce Maeda, Virginia Thigpen, BobSchneider, and Marshall Hunt are notable ex-amples.2. My purpose is not to collect substantial newdata on Village Homes but to synthesize andmake available existing information in a usefuland accessible case study format. A secondarygoal is to show the projects significance forlandscape architecture and urban design sothat it can be more easily replicated in the fu-ture. An additional goal is to provide a criticalreview of the project so that future researcherscan learn from both the projects success andits failures.3. For more information on LAFs Land andCommunity Design Case Study Initiative seetheir web site at www.lafoundation.org. For anexample of an issue-based case study see Fran-cis 2001c.4. This article presents selected parts of theVillage Homes Case Study. For the full case seeFrancis 2001b. Most of this baseline data istaken from the Local Government Commis-

sion case study on Village Homes. While manysources list information on Village Homes, Ihave used this data as Judy Corbett is Execu-tive Director of the LGC. This data was alsochecked against the Corbetts Designing Sus-tainable Communities book (2000) and in inter-views with the developers.5. Lecture by Mike Corbett on Village Homesat UC Davis in 1988. The fact that he was ableto get the plan approved is a testament to histenacity and persuasion.6. The cul-de-sacs in Village Homes distinguishit from the new urbanist communities that en-courage gridded streets and do not allow cul-de-sacs. A 1997 survey done by the UrbanLand Institute shows that a majority of U.S. homebuyers would prefer to live on acul-de-sac. 7. It would be useful to repeat Lenzs survey orsomething similar every three to five years.8. The control neighborhood was a more con-ventional suburban neighborhood built aboutthe same time as Village Homes. Houses wereabout 20 percent larger and lots 60 percentlarger than Village Homes and lacked commu-nal open space. Lenzs study involved 89 ques-tionnaires returned from Village Homes resi-dents (a 37 percent return rate) and 15 fromthe control neighborhood residents (28 per-cent return).9. A useful study would be to examine the ef-fect of environmental values on attachment toplace. Are these values shaped by the place ordo values create the sense of place? In the caseof Village Homes, it is the interaction of thesetwo that form neighborhood attitudes and asense of belonging.10. Unlike Lenz, Owens utilized a multi-method approach to the POE involving inter-views along with observations, archival re-search, and recording of behavior traces.While the sample size was smaller (25 total in-terviews compared to Lenzs 89), Owens re-port offers a more holistic and comprehensiveview of the neighborhood.11. Some of these observations are based onpapers written by my students at UC Davis, in-cluding Landscape Architecture 220PublicSpace and Public Life, Winter, 2000.12. A Canadian developer visiting VillageHomes noted that it looked like a slum in re-action to the somewhat unkempt landscape.Most developed communities adopt a mani-cured approach to their landscape and rein-force this through strict regulations requiringconformity and a high level of maintenance.Village Homes took a different approachwhere natural aesthetic is more highly valued.But it does raise the issue of the aesthetics ofecological design. Thayer (1994) has provideda useful theory that suggests that the publicvalues making sustainability visible. Clearly, thehigh satisfaction of Village Homes by its resi-dents proves this true.13. There may be nothing wrong with this. Just as other great planned communities likeReston and Columbia are unique, so too isVillage Homes. Perhaps what is more impor-

tant than total replication is that the successesof Village Homes be reproduced elsewhere.14. Not all of these factors were true in the be-ginning but have since become important. 15. See A Case Study Method for Landscape Archi-tecture (Francis 1999a), which presents SeaRanch as a case study.

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