Market Analysis & Available Sites

Better Books Market Analysis, San Francisco

Marin City Center - Part 3

This was a very interesting project that would have been amazing with some field work or some more data.  We first analyzed the land cover within the Marin City by trees, grass and impervious features using orthophotographs.  Carbon storage and sequestration was also analyzed based on some specific census block neighborhoods. 

The final portion of the project provided a conceptual plan of the city center.  We attempted to justify the expenditure for the new city center in conjuction with a tree planting project.  The goal was to create a plan that would offset the annual utilities of the city center complex by at least 50% with the energy savings of trees.  There was not nearly enough space within the less than 8 acre city center complex to plant enough trees to offset the utuility costs, so the remainder of trees would need to be planted around the city or on an additional piece of property purchased by the city. 


Marin City Center Final Report

Marin City Tree Study

The intent of the project was to convince the City of Marin to support the planting and maintenance of trees in areas that would benefit economically and environmentally to qualify for a federal grant under the Small Business Environment Stewardship Assistance Act of 2010.  The city would have to commit to a 25% match of the grant.

In this project I analyzed the land cover for selected neighborhoods within Marin City.  An 1 meter othorographic image was manually classified into 50 different classes of trees, grasses, and impermeable surfaces (buildings, pavement, etc).  The land use layer was then reclassified into 3 classes (trees, grass, impermeable). 

I determined the acreage of each class and the percent of trees for each of 5 neighborhoods.  Using the CITYgreen average mulipliers, I calculated the carbon storage and carbon sequestration rate.