Home, again

See the house in the picture? Take a careful look. Can you see that it’s obviously green? I bet you can. Does that make it a green home? Not by a long shot. Built in 1907, the house you see spent more than 100 years serving as home for one family or another. Grand parents grew old; children grew up in this house. It was a home, not just a house. It was alive with people who lived, loved and laughed in it. That’s one of the big differences between a house and a home. Then, as part of the “great recession,” it became a foreclosure, uninhabited, like too many other houses that were once homes. It may look green, but to be a dynamic green home it will need to be healthier for people, healthier for the environment, and have a family living in it.

929 Edmund Street

Greater Frogtown Community Development Corporation [GFCDC] and the Minnesota Chapter of the U. S. Green Building Council [USGBC-MN] plus collaborators, sponsors and volunteers are going to transform 929 Edmond Street into a healthier dynamic green home for another generation or two. It will be green, not just look green. 

To begin with, you remember the old real estate saying about “location, location and location,” don’t you? 929 Edmund is a fairly green location, 4 blocks from the new University Avenue Green Line, it has a Walk Score of 63, a Transit Score of 59 (before the Green Line is operating), and a Bike Score of 58. This means that the family that eventually lives here won’t have to depend solely on their car(s) to run errands or get to work or school. Transit-oriented locations help improve air quality, a small step toward restorative development. The site is also in the Capitol Region Watershed District, tributary to the Mississippi River and Como Lake, Crosby Lake and Loeb Lake in Saint Paul and Lake McCarrons in Roseville. The rain garden in the landscaping plan helps provides another small step for restorative development—for water quality this time.

During the next few months, the USGBC-MN team will lead three major renovation strategies (landscaping, interior painting and flooring), plus organize and lead community education sessions for each strategy. Inside painting will use paints that look good, clean nicely and meet green building criteria. Yard landscaping will include the already mentioned rain garden, planted with non-invasive native plant species. Flooring will work on finishing the hardwood floors with indoor air-quality friendly finishes and installing linoleum. These green building strategies, provided at minimal or no cost to GFCDC will make the house healthier for people and the environment (and more affordable) by improving indoor air quality; improving water quality and enhancing aesthetics.

GFCDC is responsible for demolition, including lead paint abatement, managing much of the construction and coordination with USGBC-MN. The renovation will fulfill the requirements of St. Paul’s building code report and the St. Paul Housing and Redevelopment Authority’s construction specifications, including many related to green building. In the end, GFCDC will sell the healthier, affordable, renovated house to a low or moderate-income family that will move into, enjoy and be comfortable in their renovated home, making their lives and the community greener, healthier and more sustainable.