Streetlights - Neighborhood Planning

One of the most critical decisions in planning the Dos Ceibas neighborhood was the placement of the road. The undeveloped land was a 4 acre parcel with a ridge running down the center of the property -the only access to the site was along the southern border from road 413. With the exception of a few foot trails, most of the site was covered in thick vegetation and was difficult to navigate. Figuring out the ideal location of the access road was one of our first tasks in the design of the master plan.

After walking every inch of the site with machetes, we evaluated the possible options. The road would provide access to each of the lots, but would also be the service spine for utilities (water, electricity, cable and phone service) AND have to be lit by streetlights to comply with municipal codes. We constructed a 3d model of the site topography to test the extents of the light pollution from the anticipated streetlights. Below are the images from preliminary designs A and J.

Design A locates the road on the top of the ridge - roughly dividing the property in two. While this seemed like a straightforward solution to vehicular access, the downside was that half of the properties would lose their ocean view and all of the lots would experience nightime light interference.

Design J locates the road to the west, below the ridge - allowing all of the houses to occupy the ridge and taking advantage of the elevation for ocean views. This also located the streetlights in such a way that the natural topography of the site helped to contain the light pollution. We determined that Design J would be the basis of our master plan.