Reduce, Reuse, Recycle - Being Green in Old Town

In the 1980s, a slogan caught on that we still use today: Reduce, Reuse, Recycle. If the order of the words indicates the order of importance, then reducing is one of the most important things we can do to help the environment. We like to focus on recycling because it allows us to live life as we please while turning the result of our over consumption into an environmentally lauded end goal. But having a lot to recycle shouldn't be a reason to pat ourselves on the back. Rather, reducing our initial consumption and reusing what we already have can go a lot further in making significant environmental change.

Living in a historic Old Town house can be an ascetically beautiful way to support sustainability. There are many ways to downsize or to live simply. Often the first type of housing that pops to mind when people think "small" is mobile homes. While there are some beautiful mobile homes on the market, for the most part, they tend to be boxy and the lots they sit on are often quite small. Some people choose to live in a condo when starting out or when downsizing after retirement. Most of the condominium spaces in buildings such as the Park Lane Towers on Howes Street, the Cottonwood Condos on Matthews Street, and the Pine Street Lofts in the heart of downtown offer living spaces under 1,000 square feet, so they're a good option when choosing to live simply. But most (if not all) of the condominium options in town (whether in Old Town or elsewhere) were built after World War II and lack some of the beautiful "ginger bread" designs, built ins, and other features that typify many of our older houses. And for those that value both privacy and community, Old Town neighborhoods are often the top choice offering detached buildings (providing privacy) with front porches (enabling neighborhood community).

This house offers just over 1,000 square feet of living space on a 7,000 square foot lot,
which is ideal for the environmentalist who values gardening over dusting.

Choosing an older home is also a great way to reuse. Scraping an old house and building something brand new creates waste and requires the consumption of wood, PVCs, metal, and other materials, many of which are chemical laden. Choosing to live in an older house creates no, or little, additional waste and requires fewer materials to renew a building than to build something entirely from scratch.

There's a misconception that all older houses are drafty and poorly built, but for most older houses, this is not at all the case. Building with lathe and plaster offers not only sound dampening between rooms, but also acts as insulation. Houses built after World War II, with particle board and plywood, often lack either insulation or lathe and plaster and truly are less energy efficient. But construction before the post-war boom was generally carefully crafted and solidly built. With proper maintenance, these older houses can be just as energy efficient as new buildings. Older houses also include passive heating and cooling systems (deep front porches, for example) that enable sun to enter the house in winter but keep it out in the summer months. Old Town is also well known for its beautiful, mature trees which likewise allow the sun in during the winter months and shade houses in the summer.

The well constructed, beautiful old houses of Fort Collins area a silent tribute to sustainability in a world consumed with the idea that bigger and newer are always better. Our older houses contradict this mentality with style, beauty and lower energy bills.

For more on the sustainability of historic Old Town houses, see Sustainability and Simple Living in Old Town.