REthink Development is an innovative real estate development and consulting company focused on leveraging green building practices and high performance building technologies to build higher value, healthier, and more environmentally sound communities and workplaces for the future. Like Toyota’s design of the Prius, REthink Development advances real estate development by mixing the right technology, design, innovation, and market positioning to deliver a product that smartly differentiates itself in the marketplace. As a result, the popularity, market recognition and perception, and economics of such a differentiated product ultimately drive profitability upwards while increasing the economic, social, and environmental bottom line (“triple bottom line”) for all immediate and extended stakeholders.
Greg Reitz Honored with Earth Month Award
April 30th, 2008
In honor of Earth Month, The City of Los Angeles honored 15 environmental leaders and organizations for their efforts to promote environmental conservation in the city over the last year. Greg Reitz of REthink Development was the only developer and green builder to be among the honorees. “As a developer, it is an especially great honor to be recognized among dedicated environmentalists,” said Reitz. “I am more used to being greeted in public meetings with boos than applause,” he joked. Greg was honored for his work supporting the creation of the City of Los Angeles’ green building program (up for vote before Council April 22nd) and for REthink’s efforts on their LEED Gold (or better) mixed use project, Cherokee Lofts, now under construction on Fairfax Ave.
In the Cherokee Lofts project, REthink worked with Councilmember Jack Weiss’ office to win approval for a plan to build a bioswale in the sidewalk for collecting and infiltrating the project’s stormwater runoff. The project will capture 100% of the water from normal storm events preventing it from carrying pollutants to Santa Monica Bay. The project met Councilmember Weiss’ goals for cleaning up Santa Monica Bay while REthink was able to meet its goals for environmental stewardship, LEED certification, and SUSMP requirements. REthink hopes the project will not only be a demonstration for how we treat our stormwater in the future but also as an example of how public agencies and private enterprises can cooperate to meet environmental goals.
January 24th, 2008
REthink Speaks at Dwell on Design
REthink Speaks at Westside Cities Council of Governments
REthink Principal Wins Award
REthink Speaks at Real Estate 08
Cherokee Lofts
Cherokee Lofts will be the most advanced and distinctive building of its kind in Los Angeles. It will be the first “green” LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) Gold Certified building in Hollywood per the U.S. Green Building Council certification system and it will pay homage to the significant musical and Hollywood history of Cherokee Recording Studios, MGM Studios before it, and all the artists who recorded music on the site from Frank Sinatra to David Bowie to Dave Mathews.
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Cherokee Goes Up Instead of Down
June 16th, 2008
Once we finished removing and prepping (see Going Green as It Goes Deeper post) it was time to start putting something back into the project and building. Furthermore, if we are going to put material back in the ground to build this project it better be as green as possible. For some this is nothing new, but for others rebar and concrete can and in our case do have a high amount of recycled content. Our steel rebar, 38 tons of it contains at least 95% recycled content. Our concrete has 15% fly-ash content, which is a waste byproduct of coal plants. So, instead of 2 tons of fly-ash going to landfills it goes into our concrete and actually makes it stronger. Plus, both materials came from local plants, the rebar plant is 53 miles away and the concrete plant is 58 miles away. The proximity of the plants reduces the impact of vehicle miles traveled by the materials.
Video of Basement Concrete Pour