Contributed photo
A draft rendering of the Living Village addition, at the top left of the map, as it fits into the Divinity School's existing structure.
The Yale Divinity School plans to build a dormitory that recycles its wastewater and generates all its own energy — aiming to create the first residential building to meet “Living Building Challenge” standards for sustainability.
University administrators presented these plans to the East Rock Community Management Team at mActivity on Monday evening, during the group’s first hybrid in-person and online meeting in months.
The Divinity School is planning to build the on-campus graduate student dormitory, which it’s calling a “Living Village,” where a parking lot currently sits beside the school’s main building, between Prospect, Division, St. Ronan, and Edwards Streets.
The university has contracted Bruner/Cott Architects and Höweler + Yoon to design the building according to the Living Building Challenge standards, which call for architecture to not only avoid environmental harm, but to contribute positively to the ecosystem. The standards require buildings to be carbon-neutral, constructed from sustainable materials, completely powered by built-in solar panels, self-reliant for water and waste management, and educational to the broader public.
Laura Glesby Photo
Div School's John Stachniewicz: student housing that's affordable and sustainable.
Designers of Yale’s Living Village envision a system that harvests and cleans rainwater and wastewater, using plants among other filtration devices, and recycles that fluid back into the building’s toilet system.
Current plans project that solar panels will produce 105 percent of the building’s energy, creating surplus that can be redirected to other energy recipients; the roof will slope at an angle that maximizes solar intake. The Village will build in sun-shading infrastructure to minimize the need for cooling resources.
The landscaping around the building will be “productive and resilient,” supportive to local bird and insect life, according John Stachniewicz, the Divinity School’s lead administrator.
Kristina Chmelar, Yale’s associate director of planning, described the Divinity School’s main academic building — the red-brick Sterling Divinity Quadrangle, structured around a courtyard — as “an inward-focusing building, almost like a monastery.” The new addition “will be a more inviting, welcoming landscape than it is today,” Chmelar said.
One of Yale’s aims for the Living Village is to “ease the burden” of obtaining a master’s degree by providing affordable student housing, Stachniewicz said. As budding ministers and religious leaders, “our students are not earning six figures.” He added that since part of the Divinity School students’ training involves community building, the dormitory will enable students to practice social leadership in their own lives.
East Rock resident Kevin McCarthy read aloud a question submitted in the chat by a virtual attendee of the meeting: “Will the buildings be tax exempt?”
“Yes,” since the dorm will be a new residential building, said Yale Community Affairs Liaison Karen King.
“How much will it cost?” asked John McFayden, a developer involved with the Corsair luxury building.
“It’s a moving target,” said Chmelar, noting that the project will be funded by a donation.
“I’m not sure the cost is public right now,” Chmelar said.
“Will you do tours while you’re building?” asked New Haven Academy science teacher Josh Glaab.
Chmelar said she imagined the university will offer virtual tours of the construction site.
After the meeting ended, Glaab recalled a class project this past spring in which his students modeled houses out of balsa wood. He would “definitely” want to take his students on a tour of the Living Village, he said.
It would be nice to see Yale construct a much higher-density building here, given that the demand for housing in New Haven keeps outpacing the supply.
It's likely that rent in New Haven is rising through the roof in part because Yale isn't building enough housing for its graduate students. Yale has added thousands of graduate students lately, and they mostly live off campus. In general, a few graduate students can afford to pay much more for a 2BR or 3BR apartment than a typical family can.
Would Yale consider a 20-story high "living village" instead of this underwhelming plan?