Solea “Zero Commute” Lifestlye
22 05 2008The building pictured below is the Solea in Colombia Heights and the big thing that the developers have been playing up is the zero-commute” lifestyle. The idea is that residents will use their units to live and to work with a variety of floor-plans designed to accommodate various businesses which could fit into this type of arrangement from clothing designers to telecommuters.
It’s unclear if the sales team will discriminate against non-work-at-homers but to establish a community like this there will have to be some type of restrictions.
We’ve been watching this building go up over the last few months, and we couldn’t help notice that the majority of the structural support is wood. Now we know that not all mid-rise residential projects are built with all concrete shells, but we can’t get over it whenever we see a building going up stick style. It’s not that we’re questioning the structural integrity of the building, it just reminds us of the big bad wolf, and we know how that ended.
In all honesty though, projects like this have such thin walls that in general you can hear everything going on with your neighbors which, for all but the most nosey, is a negative. Maybe the developers can spin this as a positive though… thin walls make it easy to collaborate with fellow entrepreneurs?
[Photo: DCMetrocentric]
Wood frame construction is cheaper than concrete and I believe that this project contains a sizeable low to moderate income housing set aside, so they’re probably trying to contain costs to keep it affordable.
I really feel this “zero commute” archeticture theory isn’t grounded in lifestyle reality.
DC residents, perhaps more than any other city residents, need a seperation between work life and real life. Sure I’d like to keep my commute to a minimum (hey, I travel from Cap Hill to Tyson’s every day - I feel the commuter pain) but I’d much rather leave work at work. Living in the same building as my office means living in the shadow of a professional to-do list. Suddenly lines become blurred - are you more likely to go to work when sick because your desk is only an elevator ride away? How many Sunday evenings will be stolen by a quick trip upstairs for an impromptu meeting?
I’m a little skeptical of this as well. The whole live-work concept seems to be just that, a concept, nothing to back it up when you consider the economics of it. Holladay Corp. is having a hell of a time trying to sell live work units at 1800 Wilson in Arlington. The few people buying them are using the downstairs as an office and then renting out the upstairs (there is a separate door allowing for this), which kind of defeats the purpose. If the developers decided this was best then good luck to them, but if the gov’t was encouraging it they’re just taking away value.
That building looks like a fire waiting ot happen, if you ask me!