Counting diverse use categories.

Your interpretation is right. I'm looking at an awarded credit on a university project that counted several Civic/Community uses to reach 10 uses.

Yes, the reported uses must represent at least three of the five categories, exclusive of the building's primary uses. If the building's primary use is Civic and community facilities, the project team can include Community serving retail, Services, and Civic and community facilities categories, along with that, the project must include at least one use type from an additional category (Food retail or Community anchor uses). FYI: No more than  two uses in each use type may be counted. Hope it helps!

Hi Bipin Karki, About for the requirement "no more than 2 uses in each type may be counted". If we had 2 pharmacies, 2 convenience stores in the same category - Community-serving retail, would we only choose either 2 pharmacies with 1 store or 1 pharmacy with 2 stores? Thank you.

Hello Hieu: 

You can count 2 pharmacies and 2 convenient stores in the same category - Community Serving retail. "No more than 2 uses in each type may be counted" - means if there were 3,4, or more pharmacies only 2 would be counted, and similar to convenient stores. And make sure the counted uses must represent at least three of the five categories, exclusive of the building's primary use. For example if your project is school building which primary use falls in "Civic and Community Facilities" category, you must include uses from at least three other categories: services, food retail, community-serving retail, community anchor uses. 

Hope it helps. Thank you!

Hi Bipin et al,

I am having the same problem as Keith reported. My reviewer is saying that since my project is a YMCA and falls in the Civic and Community Facilities category, I can't count any other uses in that entire category to make up the three categories that I need. This makes no sense to me.

If the project is being counted as a "service" itself then the category it belongs to should count already as one of the three we need. If not, we should be able to count other uses within that category that fall into different service types. The Civic and Community category has by far the most service types of all the categories. If this one is disallowed due to the project type, it places an unreasonable constraint on what specific services need to be adjacent to the project to comply.

I also don't understand why restaurants and diners are in the Services category and are separate from Food Retail. Again, these distinctions when you make a category specific requirement can result in unreasonable requirements.

Do I understand this correctly? That I have to find services in three categories that are not Civic and Community adjacent to my suburban YMCA to comply with this credit?

Right, you would need to find services in three categories that are not Civic/Community. However, once you find those three, additional Civic/Community uses would count toward your total count of uses to reach the points threshold.

I agree that category is quite broad and I would hope a reviewer in that case would look more holistically at the intent of the credit versus strictly the letter of the law, and allow uses that technically fall in that category but don't overlap with the YMCA. I know though that approach can vary and cause this kind of frustration...

Michelle,

We had the same reviewer ruling with our project (public-serving community building).  I agree with you about the burden it places on such a broad category of building types.  It's especially challenging in a suburban context where the development is more spread out.

In our case we ended up finding something that fits the description of Food Retail "Grocery with produce section". Focus on the "produce section".

Good luck!

Wow, that's disappointing (and, again, inconsistent with a review I received where we included "civic and community facilities" for 6 of the 10 listed services). It does not seem consistent with the credit intent to disallow totally unrelated services. Have you emailed LEED Coach or GBCI customer service about this? I wonder if the inconsistency is due to a new policy, or different interpretations by different reviewers. 

Thanks for the follow through Keith. I was unsuccessful at fighting this also, but it doesn't seem fair.

I'm documenting this one now for a university building that has classrooms and offices pretty evenly split. We're putting services from both of those use categories in our list. We should be submitting pretty soon, so I'll let y'all know what the results are. I was tempted to ask for reasoning from LEED Coach / GBCI prior to submission, but I want to see what they come back with first.

We are having the same issue with a school project.  

The LEED reference manual states, "The counted uses must represent at least three of the five categories, exclusive of the building’s primary use."  The requirements are not clear.  We interpret this to read we cannot count the school as one of the uses. The reviewer is interpreting it to read we cannot use Civic and Community Services as one of those three categories (because our school falls in that category).

It doesnt make sense that we would be denied to use that category at all.  We have several other different uses in that category, fire station, churches, parks, another school and more. I can understand that we would not count our middle school, and can understand why we could not count the other (elementary) school (as same primary use type - school).  The others are different types of uses. If we could use the fire station and a church the project would appear to meet the criteria. But the reviewer is stating we can't use that category at all as one of the three minimum cateories. It just does not seem practical as the Civic and Community Facilities group has a large variety of uses.

The middle school is in a mostly residential area with no grocery stores or supermarkets, or large apartment complexes (100 or more units) or large office buildings (100 or more offices) withn a half-mile walking distance. That excludes those 2 categories leaving only three of five available.  But if we cant use the Civic and Community Facilities group that excludes a great deal. 

I wonder if this could be a work around.  Count the 103 unit sr citizens housing in the Community Anchor category as housing with more than 103 units, instead of counting it in the Civic and Community services category?  Does that seem legitimate?

After all that, two short questions are:

1. Can we count an an assisted living center with more than 100 apartments in the Community Anchor category instead as an "adult or Sr. Care (licensed)" facility in the "Civic and Community Uses" category?

2. Can we count single family houses that total more than 100 within a half mile walking distance in the Community Anchor category, or do the 100 plus units have to be in 1 (apartment) complex?  If in 1 apartment complex is there a limit to how many buildings they must be in; quadplexes, duplexes, freestanding, etc.? I see no mention of requirements for maximum "number of buildings" or that the buildings have to be in 1 complex, subdivision or other unit.

Thank you for your reply, Keith. In the Community Uses Category under LEED v4, Appendix 1A lists both Commercial Office (100 or more full-time equivalent jobs) and Housing (100 or more dwelling units) as the allowed use types. But I have not been able to find a description of what kinds of housing units can be used to make up the 100 dwelling units.  For instance could that be a neighborhood of 100 or more single family homes? Then also could a 103 unit assisted living center (103 apartments including bedrooms but group kitchen/dining) be counted as housing with 100 or more dwelling units rather than an "adult or Sr. Care cemter" in the civic and community uses group?

I think the 103 unit assisted living center (103 apartments including bedrooms but group kitchen/dining) should count as Housing (100 or more dwelling units) under Community anchor uses. Adult or senior care (licensed) is more of a special facility to provide care for adult or senior, and may not necessarily include housing/kitchen/dining, this is more similar to Child care (licensed) which falls under civic and community use. Additionally, providing a clear description stating how the 103 unit assisted living center (103 apartments including bedrooms but group kitchen/dining) meets the Housing (100 or more dwelling units) under Community anchor uses and this credit intent may add a strong point to your case. 

I have no idea about the neighborhood of 100 or more single-family homes. We have documented multiple buildings of an apartment complex, as a 1 use to meet Housing (100 or more dwelling units) under Community anchor uses, but not a neighborhood of residential building.