Brooks, that is correct. I'm not sure this credit was ever available outside of LEED for Homes, though. See the chart of credit availability here.

Tristan--As always, very helpful--thanks very much!

Tristan, for what it's worth, it was originally available at least for the new construction rating systems. We had registered for and completed the requirements for a CI 2009 project.

Nate, I think both of your questions are germane to the intent of the credit. The background info for the credit states, in part:

"This credit uses intersection density as a proxy for the level of community connectivity, transit accessibility and walkability. Intersection density corresponds closely to block size: ... Small blocks contribute to neighborhood walkability. In recent years, a growing body of research has confirmed that intersection density is one of the most important factors for encouraging pedestrian travel."

A cul-de-sac by definition is a dead-end and thus does not provide increased connectivity, which is why they don't count it.

As you note, proximity to open space is valuable and rewarded under LEED. However, it can easily be at odds with increased connectivity and resultant walkability, reduced VMTVehicle Miles Traveled (VMT): The number of miles traveled by motor vehicles in a specified period of time, such as a day or a year, by a number of motorists in absolute or per capita terms., etc. A large park is great for recreational walking, but may not be very conducive to "transportation" walking, plus it removes its area from potential sites for services. Put another way, if a neighborhood's density supports 10 services in a given 1/4-mile radius, then a home for which half of its 1/4-mile-radius circle overlaps a park will only have access to 5 services (or 6, counting the park).

Albert - we are completing the certification for a project which seems very similar to yours (over-the-cusp of Gold with this credit), just north of Center City in an older Northeastern City (Philly) with access to many amenities.
I did find a local anomaly within our 1/4 radius of the site which was, I believe a mid-20th Century development, that utilized cul-de-sacs. This significantly lowered the number of total intersections from what probably would have been close to 90 to closer to 70.
Most of Philadelphia probably wouldn't have a very hard time meeting the criteria for this point but, having seen the effects of the cul-de-sac design in this area, I can see how it would make this credit difficult. This small cul-de-sac development is still well situated for easy access to public transportation as well as other walkable amenities.
In my opinion, it's an easy credit for projects within an existing infrastructure of older cities but would obviously cause havoc trying to meet this in less dense, suburban town or development.

Our project is registered as a LEED-CI v2.0 and we are pursuing Pilot Credit 9.

Hi Terry. Thanks for this feedback. We've heard similar things from other project, particularly the issue with bodies of water and open spaces hurting the intersection count. For expressways (and also train tracks), i believe that their negative impact of the intersection count is intentional, because they make walkability and access to services by foot, bike, or even bus more difficult, making for a sort of walkability wasteland. This is discussed a bit more in the first few threads of this forum. .

Others with location & planning experience have opinions on this?

I had similar concerns on this point. Our project was lucky in that were were located downtown, but our radius also overlapped with a university that had an extensive system of walking paths. If our project site had been shifted to the west by 1/4 mile it ould have been right in the middle of downtown which is very pedestrian friendly, but not been able to achieve 60 intersections.

On 11/8/2010, we posted new versions of several pilot credits, and 30 brand new pilot credits in conjunction with the LEED Rating System Update, which is now available for public comment. In the public comment documents, this version of the open & connected community credit is only available to residential (LEED for Homes and Homes Mid-Rise) projects. To align with the public comment document, the applicable rating systems have been revised.

The new credit includes a blue box listing all of the changes made from the previous version: http://www.usgbc.org/ShowFile.aspx?DocumentID=8220.

While this credit was open to EBO&M projects, we received several comments from project teams stating that it should not be applicable to EBO&M projects, so we took that into consideration as well.

EBO&M, ID&C and BD&C projects that registered for the pilot credit prior to 11/08/2010 may continue using the pilot credit on their projects, but it is no longer open to new registrations under EBO&M, ID&C and BD&C.

One.

The LEED Neighborhood Development rating system has more information, including graphics.

The new version of Credit 9 http://www.usgbc.org/ShowFile.aspx?DocumentID=8220 now includes the LEED ND submittal example. Note that the credit is now only available to LEED for Homes & Homes Mid-Rise projects but the example can be used as guidance for all project that registered prior to 11/8.

This is a good question, relevant to all pilot credits.

Within a 1-2 days of completing the pilot credit survey, you will receive a confirmation email, which will include your responses to the survey questions. Submit this email confirmation as part of your LEED Online submittal.

The LEED Online ID credit will be update in the next month or so to include clearer language. There is no pilot credit documentation form. To earn pilot credit, you should submit the following pieces of documentation:

- confirmation email from registration
- confirmation email from survey completion
- credit specific documentation (as outlined in the pilot credit file)

participation in LEEDuser is also required.

Thanks.

It would also be helpful if there was a way to indicate in the pilot credit application / survey / etc. if someone other than the project administrator is documenting the pilot credit, participating in LEEDUser, etc. (I'm handling the pilot credit, but the Project Administrator receives all the emails.) I made a note in the survey that LEEDUser participation was under my name, not the Project Administrator's. Hopefully that will get tracked through by a reviewer.

In reviewing the survey confirmation email, I see that my longer responses got cut off at 256 characters. Will the reviewer have access to the actual survey response? Or is my feedback gone? (There was nothing on the survey form to suggest that there is a length limit.)

Thanks for this feedback. The reviewer will have access to your complete survey information, the cut off is only in the confirmation email, not in the actual survey.

We will add an additional field for "primary contact email address". Thanks for the input.

I agree with Michael that additional clarity on the actual submittal process would be extremely helpful. Per Batya's earlier response, the process is to "submit the following pieces of documentation:
- confirmation email from registration
- confirmation email from survey completion
- credit specific documentation (as outlined in the pilot credit file)
Participation in LEEDuser is also required."

I have completed the survey and am waiting for my confirmation email. But then what - where do I send the registration and survey completion confirmation emails and my maps demonstrating compliance? I haven't used LEED Online because everything so far (for all of the "regular" credits) has been submitted by my LEED for Homes provider, Steven Winter Associates. Is LEED Online the only way to submit documentation for Pilot credits?

This is an important issue for Homes projects. For LEED for Homes projects, the submittals are the same, but they should go through your standard LEED for Homes process (through the Green Rater to your LEED for Homes Provider). The pilot credit submittal will then be reviewed just as other project documentation and Innovation credit are currently, between the Provider and a reviewer, rather than in LEED Online..

Thanks for the clarification and your rapid response, Batya! This helps a lot.

Word of warning on the submittal. I recently submitted two Pilot Credits with the survey confirmation email, which was mostly blank due to the 256 character limit. My review came back indicating I did not provide answers to the additional questions associated with the Pilot Credits. Thus, I am not sure if the reviewers do actually have access to the complete survey information.

At this point, I've typed out the entire survey into word and will submit that and the explaination about the survey confirmation email. Hopefully, this works because I'm not sure what else I could do.

Yes, this is the link to register:

http://www.usgbc.org/leed/pilot/PilotLibraryProjectReg.aspx

Hi Tristan,

is there a deadline for the registration of project on pilot credit?

There is not a deadline currently posted.

This credit was based on language from LEED-ND. To determine the intent we check with LJ Aurbach from the Location and Planning Technical Advisory Group:

"The largest benefits of small blocks and well-connected street layouts appear when pedestrian routes are public and at ground level. This allows pedestrian traffic to contribute to the liveliness, civic activity, and commercial success of streets, alleys, passages, etc. Pedestrian routes that are grade separated from the street tend to suck the life away from streets, and also tend to enforce social class segregation in the daily life of an urban place. Overhead pedestrian bridges, tubes, etc. are often suboptimal responses to high-speed, high-volume traffic arterials, and can also be eyesores that block views and sunshine.

For these reasons, the LEED-ND definition of streets specifies that they must be publicly accessible at all times, and they must be "addressable." Publicly accessible means that streets are not gated and are not located within gated areas. "Addressable" means that streets are (or can be) lined by lots with postal addresses -- i.e., no parking lots, driveways, access ramps, and so on."

So the answer is, the partially gated pathways would not count towards your intersection count, though this is not clear from the current pilot credit. When you submit for the pilot credit, please provide feedback on how to improve the credit language, and perhaps more information on how these building to building connections improve the openness of the community in Prague (in order to meet the intent of the credit). This information will help us to improve the credit language for the future.

OK, well this brings up another question.

Our site is also adjacent to several metro stations. These stations provide below grade links (in addition to those on the surface) to allow more direct, traffic-free, and weather-protected pedestrian movement across the area.

These underground links are vestibules of the metro stations, so they are publicly accessible 24hrs a day and outside of the paid zone of the metro. They also provide "addressable" space that is leased to tenants for commercial space. The vestibule closest to our project for example, includes a full service grocery, a bakery, a cafe, a sports betting office, a newsstand or two, and a public transit office, among other things. This subterranean space is quite busy all year long, but especially during bad weather and throughout our cold winters. Not only transit users utilize this highly trafficked 'short-cut' space, which is quite well used even in the late night hours.

Also due to the highly urban nature of the area, these spaces appear not to diminish traffic on the surface, nor segregate users.

Consequently, based on these assumptions, I would include these public metro vestibule connections in our intersection totals.

I would recommend differentiating between the intersections on these various levels (above, below and street level) when you submit your credit documentation, so that reviewers are able to see how the different systems impact the connectivity of the site. I know similar underground systems exist in other cities, so they should be evaluated and more clearly addressed in the credit language during the next revision.

I've done some searching, but can't find a definition of "All Weather Pathways". A project I'm working on is adjacent to a campus with numerous meandering and crossing walking paths (open to the public, not gated). They are not covered, but the project is in a very temperate climate. Do these count as all weather?

Yes, you can apply for both credits.

See Batya's comment above.

At the moment, this credit is seen as being in addition to SSc2, rather than an alternative compliance path. A project team may earn SSc2 and still earn an ID point for this pilot credit.

What we're really looking to test is whether the intersection count (which is a relatively simple submittal) can serve as a good stand-in for more complex credit requirements, while meeting a similar connectivity intent.

We have started to see that geographic barriers like railroad tracks, bodies of water, and designated open spaces can be a barrier to achievement, and your suggestion of offering various radius options sounds like a good solution, though some of these features really do hamper the connectivity of a site to its surroundings (especially in the case of railroad tracks). What do others think?

On a related note for all participating projects, please do submit your your findings even if you do not meet the threshold to earn this credit. Because it is a pilot credit, your feedback on improving the credit is even more valuable than meeting the threshold. Perhaps include some examples of how your project would fare if the radius were expanded to 1/2 mile (with a corresponding increase in number of intersections) or even 1 mile to offset the inaccessible areas.

Our project site is in a dense urban location in San Diego but there are some parks and cul-de-sacs that made it a little tricky. However, we did end up meeting the minimum requirements. While I can see extending the radius to a 1/2 mile, I think a mile seems pretty extensive.

Along the lines that Batya suggested, I would agree that any expansion of the radius should be accompanied by an increas in the number of intersections -- and potentially a proportionally larger increase, so that it's about a secondary compliance path, not just an easier threshold.

In my feedback survey on the pilot credit, I suggested a few other 'Option 2' compliance paths, such as:
1. Being allowed to count any intersection that can be reached in +/- 1750' walk (which is based on an estimated distance to a compliant intersection w/in the 1/4-mile radius, but at the diagonal on a square grid).
2. Being allowed to shift the center of the circle a small distance (250'? 300'?) to correct for projects that are slightly too close to barriers, but otherwise well-connected.
3. Being allowed to center the 1/4-mile radius anywhere that includes the entire project site within the circle, but requiring an increased threshold (70 or 75?) to attain one point.

Being able to shift the center of the 1/4-mile circle some limited distance, while maintaining the number of required intersections at 60, seems like it would be a good method of getting a "clean" representative sample of a community's connectivity when there are pedestrian obstacles (highways, railroad tracks, open spaces/parks) present. Increasing the radius much beyond 1/4 mile starts to get outside the limit of walkability, at least in a suburban context (unfortunately!).

My project is in a dense, highly-connected suburb of Boston (Newton, MA). We meet the requirements to achieve 3 points for LL5.3 - Outstanding Community Resources / Transit, so the neighborhood should certainly be considered highly connected. With the 1/4-mile circle centered on the site, however, we just barely meet the 60-interesection requirement for PC9. Shifting the circle 500' north to avoid railroad tracks and a large park yields an intersection count of 67. The neighborhood has quite a few cul-de-sacs, which limits our total - and, in this case, is a good proxy for connectivity.

Where can I find more information on the definition of all weather pathways? Thanks.

Peter, are there any particular situations you're wondering about?

I think that in terms of documenting this as a pilot credit, you can make your own assumptions, to some extent.

Project is in San Diego and is very near two large public campuses. They have concrete and brick pathways allowing pedestrian access crisscrossing the large campus blocks. For this project, I'd need those intersections to count to get the 60. It seems appropriate to me to count them, as they do contribute greatly to connectivity and community access.

Here's a link to the graphic:
http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/w4xRA8792fvF7aiBc_4jDks04y_YNIQzvnD...

Thanks!

Peter,

It will be interesting to see how USGBC treats campus sidewalks/pathways. In many cases they clearly function as pedestrian streets, but they sometimes also serve as redundant shortcuts that don't really indicate increased connectivity. Also, when are or are they not 'addressable' (per LEED ND -- see Batya Metalitz's 09.28.10 post below)?

More generally, looking at your graphic and google maps of the area, it looks like you have marked some intersections that appear to be only sidewalks to access a building whose entrance is set back from the street (e.g. the two red-roofed buildings at the bend in Park Blvd; the diagonal driveway at the condo at 7th & Ash), rather than ROW intersections. Also, it looks like you've marked at least one that is two freeway ramps merging.

So I guess I'm not clear. We get the ID point for attempting the credit and providing feedback? or getting to 60 intersections? I agree some of the ones I've marked probably don't meet the intent of the credit. If the campus pathways count, we could probably pick up a few more there, or shift the radius around the rectangular site to maximize intersection count. I'm also limited by what I can see on Google Earth, there may be alleyways that are not counted.

Thanks for the immediate and direct feedback!

I am working on a campus condition as well and have found it very difficult to document side walk connections based on google maps do to the tree canopy. In some ways, I have found this credit to be a little counter to the Open Space credit, because a great open space is something will not have street intersections cutting through it.

Hi Patrick

Thanks for the comments. You're not bound to using google maps, so if none of the view types work (satellite or map view maybe?), you can use some other type of map or drawing of the area. Please let us know how this goes.

The "counter to open space" comment is one we've received several times now, see the conversation below. It seems the best approach is to essentially dilute the impact of a nearby open space by expanding the radius and increasing the number of required intersections somewhat. This doesn't solve the issue of the conflicting intents, but it does help to manage the problem. Other alternative recommendations?

The new pilot guidance helped our project significantly. Under the new language, the radius can be drawn from the site boundary, rather than just one circle from the middle. Here's our revised diagram, submitted for USGBC review last week.

http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/Zh6CzZJBcGGn7mjzzX_jR0s04y_YNIQzvnD...

Comments welcome! Thanks.

The Pilot credit 29 will help my project get the extra points we need for certification. The LEED certification process should use more emphasis on the location of the project as it pertains to the commercial areas near the project.

I have several projects that are pursuing PC 9 and will easily qualify. In reviewing their submittals however, I've noticed one idiosyncrasy that I'm hoping folks here can either identify as a flaw in the current credit wording, or a misunderstanding on my part: "Intersections with culs-de-sac are not counted." would seem to indicate that any intersection where one option is a cul-de-sac does not count. Wouldn't a four (or more) way intersection that includes a cul-de-sac as one option be equally advantageous to a three way intersection with no cul-de-sac? If I"m correct, I suggest the above quote be changed to "Three way intersections with culs-de-sac are not counted." Thanks

Jon, I would agree with your interpretation, but I don't have any specific experience to suggest how USGBC would respond. Perhaps a suggested language change would be something like "streets that lead only to a cul-de-sac or other dead-end shall not be considered in determining intersections to be counted.

I think to combat the "counter to open space" issue, there could be a percentage reduction in the requirement. Something like if the area surrounding the project is 40% water, the number of intersections could be reduced 30-40%.

Two responses to the Jons:

Jon Jensen - that's a great suggestion. It currently is assumed that this is the case, but we can be more clear. We updated the language to clarify that it's 'intersections leading only to a dead end or cul-de-sac'.

Jon Texter - the credit language allows project teams to ignore parks and water bodies, so project team's aren't penalized by being near them. We look at intersection density, rather than total number of intersections. So yes, the total number of intersections needed will be reduced by the same percentage as the percentage of park area within 1/4 mile of the project boundary. This will be made abundantly clear by the use of examples in the Reference Guide.

I think that the "intersection" requirement should be amended to include BOTH streets for cars, buses and bicycles and sidewalks.

I feel there should be a correlation between the intersection count and available community resources. Lots of intersections doesn't necessarily reflect on its connection to the community. Suburban and rural areas won't easily qualify for this credit, yet these areas might actually be connected better to community resources then some urban areas.