new urbanism
cadman009
finding many of the concepts quite appealing. i am just getting into
planning myself and see some opportunities to put some of the
principles of new urbanism into practice. one of the things that
really intrigues me is the idea that traffic congestion can be
aleviated through planning smaller retail and commercial centers
closer to residences. this makes total sense to me.
how i see it being applicable to larger metropolitan areas is that we
should break up the large homogenous residential and commercial zones
that we have tended to assign under conventional planning into
smaller, self-contained towns and villages. it seems to me that this
could potentially eliminate a lot of cross-town driving that occurs
under the average conventional city plan.
one potential problem that i see would be that if we make the mistake
of planning retail uses in an area surrounded by residences, and don't
create enough drive-by traffic the businesses will not thrive and the
whole thing falls apart. i would think that a huge key for the
success of a plan would be to create the perfect balance between the
retail businesses' proximity to residences and their exposure to
vehicle traffic within the surrounding community.
Jack May
"cadman009" <cadm...@lycos.com> wrote in message
news:ed63b9d2.04101...@posting.google.com...
> i've been introduced recently to "new urbanist" planning and am
> finding many of the concepts quite appealing. i am just getting into
> planning myself and see some opportunities to put some of the
> principles of new urbanism into practice. one of the things that
> really intrigues me is the idea that traffic congestion can be
> aleviated through planning smaller retail and commercial centers
> closer to residences. this makes total sense to me.
Where is the proof of that statement?
You are basically believing that people will not shop at big box stores for
the lowest prices and largest selection of products. You believe people
want to pay higher prices for much lower selections of products. Does not
make a lot of sense.
We also know that people travel about one hour per day in all cultures and
town sizes all over the world. Your theory of traveling less with smaller
centers near houses seems not to be true anywhere in the world.
Just because is sounds good to you does not make it true. Any design must
be based on reality, not good sounding cliché's
George Conklin
> finding many of the concepts quite appealing. i am just getting into
> planning myself and see some opportunities to put some of the
> principles of new urbanism into practice. one of the things that
> really intrigues me is the idea that traffic congestion can be
> aleviated through planning smaller retail and commercial centers
> closer to residences. this makes total sense to me.
>
> how i see it being applicable to larger metropolitan areas is that we
> should break up the large homogenous residential and commercial zones
> that we have tended to assign under conventional planning into
> smaller, self-contained towns and villages. it seems to me that this
> could potentially eliminate a lot of cross-town driving that occurs
> under the average conventional city plan.
>
Mixing commercial and residential together boosts crime greatly.
Further, people are not happy going to the assigned restaurant and new
urbanist stores often fail because new people cannot be attracted.
> one potential problem that i see would be that if we make the mistake
> of planning retail uses in an area surrounded by residences, and don't
> create enough drive-by traffic the businesses will not thrive and the
> whole thing falls apart.
Correct.
i would think that a huge key for the
> success of a plan would be to create the perfect balance between the
> retail businesses' proximity to residences and their exposure to
> vehicle traffic within the surrounding community.
People do not accept buying things in expensive, small stores either.
Further, if husband and wife do not work at the same place, there is travel
involved. Travel for buying things is not during rush hours so there is
little demand on the roads.
New Urbanism is like any utopian dream. It promises what it cannot
deliver, and harms people.
Baxter
2040 Regional Growth Plan (
http://www.metro-region.org/article.cfm?articleID=231 ). If you look at the
maps, you'll see lots of regional centers scattered throughout the greater
Portland metro area.
--
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
Free software - Baxter Codeworks www.baxcode.com
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
"cadman009" <cadm...@lycos.com> wrote in message
news:ed63b9d2.04101...@posting.google.com...
Baxter
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
Free software - Baxter Codeworks www.baxcode.com
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
"George Conklin" <nil...@earthlink.net> wrote in message
news:N5Ocd.252$5i...@newsread2.news.atl.earthlink.net...
>
> "cadman009" <cadm...@lycos.com> wrote in message
> news:ed63b9d2.04101...@posting.google.com...
> > i've been introduced recently to "new urbanist" planning and am
> > finding many of the concepts quite appealing. i am just getting into
> > planning myself and see some opportunities to put some of the
> > principles of new urbanism into practice. one of the things that
> > really intrigues me is the idea that traffic congestion can be
> > aleviated through planning smaller retail and commercial centers
> > closer to residences. this makes total sense to me.
> >
> > how i see it being applicable to larger metropolitan areas is that we
> > should break up the large homogenous residential and commercial zones
> > that we have tended to assign under conventional planning into
> > smaller, self-contained towns and villages. it seems to me that this
> > could potentially eliminate a lot of cross-town driving that occurs
> > under the average conventional city plan.
> >
>
> Mixing commercial and residential together boosts crime greatly.
> Further, people are not happy going to the assigned restaurant and new
> urbanist stores often fail because new people cannot be attracted.
Conk ignores the facts. New urbanist developments are doing better in
Portland than Big Box stores. Conk also ignores the findings of Jane Jacobs
concerning the impact of mixed-use on crime.
Baxter
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
Free software - Baxter Codeworks www.baxcode.com
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
"Jack May" <jack...@comcast.net> wrote in message
news:EHHcd.267225$D%.20870@attbi_s51...
>
> "cadman009" <cadm...@lycos.com> wrote in message
> news:ed63b9d2.04101...@posting.google.com...
> > i've been introduced recently to "new urbanist" planning and am
> > finding many of the concepts quite appealing. i am just getting into
> > planning myself and see some opportunities to put some of the
> > principles of new urbanism into practice. one of the things that
> > really intrigues me is the idea that traffic congestion can be
> > aleviated through planning smaller retail and commercial centers
> > closer to residences. this makes total sense to me.
>
> Where is the proof of that statement?
>
> You are basically believing that people will not shop at big box stores
for
> the lowest prices and largest selection of products. You believe people
> want to pay higher prices for much lower selections of products. Does not
> make a lot of sense.
People really do NOT want to make every trip to a big-box store. Portland
demonstrates this -fact- quite decisively. Portland has both WalMart and
Wild Oats stores. Wild Oats is growing faster in the region than WalMart.
Yes, people do want Big Box stores, but they also want the smaller stores.
greg byshenk
[re "new urbanism"...]
> one potential problem that i see would be that if we make the mistake
> of planning retail uses in an area surrounded by residences, and don't
> create enough drive-by traffic the businesses will not thrive and the
> whole thing falls apart. i would think that a huge key for the
> success of a plan would be to create the perfect balance between the
> retail businesses' proximity to residences and their exposure to
> vehicle traffic within the surrounding community.
First, there is nothing at all "new" about this particular idea; it is
the way urbanized areas have been organized pretty much as long as they
have existed -- with the exception of the post WWII (American, usually)
"bedroom community".
One thing to bear in mind is that there are different types (or perhaps
something of a continuum) of commercial enterprises, depending on
frequency or regularity of use, and the relevance of convenience. For
example, most people will not be terribly interested in going far out
of their way to pick up a carton of milk or a loaf of bread, to return
a video, or to pick up a pizza or chinese food. For these sorts of
regular daily/weekly errands, proximity and ease of access are primary
factors, in a way that they are not for infrequent major things such as
buying a new car or refridgerator.
And in traditional urban areas (including both cities and suburban
towns) you see this continuum instantiated. The "catchment areas" for
supermarkets, bakers, donut shops, pharmacies, newsstands, etc. are
relatively _small_ and local (with the exception of some limited
number of specialized retailers), as most people aren't willing to
expend a lot of time, effort, and money travelling around every day
just to save a few cents (as in the old joke about spending two hours
and two dollars worth of gas in order to save one dollar, it doesn't
make sense).
Unless they really have no other choice. One of the reasons that
Wal-Mart (for example) originally limited itself to rural areas is
that a significant part of the custom of rural "downtown" merchants
were those who were driving in from some distance outside of town.
And if it is the same 20-minute drive to A or B, then it makes
(economic) sense to choose the one that is slightly cheaper. And
the same seems to hold true for other "big box" retailing in newer
suburban areas: if one must get into one's car and drive for 15
minutes to buy something, then there is minimal cost in driving 15
minutes (or even slightly more) in the other direction, if one can
save even a small amount.
On the other hand, if it is a question of a 15-20 minute drive vs
a five minute walk down to the corner, or a quick stop on the way
home from work, then there is no payoff. Mini-marts and cornershops
succeed on just this sort of trade, even with their generally higher
prices and more limited selection.
Here in the Netherlands, pretty much every neighborhood (even new-
built ones) seems to include space for neighborhood shops. They
will vary with the neighborhood, of course. For a small
neighborhood of family homes, this may mean a butcher, baker,
greengrocer, and newsstand. For a more populous neighborhood
including a number of apartment blocks, this may mean two
supermarkets, a couple of cafes, a pet shop, a wine and liquor
merchant, and a druggist, as well. (These are two actual examples
close to me.)
And the same sort of thing (though perhaps not in as throughgoing
a manner) holds true in the more traditional urban areas of the
US in which I have lived. And here, just as in the US, there are
many other things that aren't really "neighborhood" items. For
clothing, electronics, bedroom and bath furnishings, etc., one
will likely head into the city center or to a larger shopping area,
and for major items, such as furniture, home appliances, building
materials, etc., one may head out of town entirely
But -- to conclude this now overly long message -- the point is
that many types of businesses don't really need any "drive-by
traffic" from outside the neighborhood in order to succeed, nor
are they likely to get any significant level of custom from those
outside the neighborhood even if they try.
--
greg byshenk - gbys...@byshenk.net - Leiden, NL
George Conklin
"greg byshenk" <gbys...@byshenk.net> wrote in message
news:slrncn846i....@byshenk.demon.nl...
> cadman009 <cadm...@lycos.com> wrote:
>
> [re "new urbanism"...]
>
>> one potential problem that i see would be that if we make the mistake
>> of planning retail uses in an area surrounded by residences, and don't
>> create enough drive-by traffic the businesses will not thrive and the
>> whole thing falls apart. i would think that a huge key for the
>> success of a plan would be to create the perfect balance between the
>> retail businesses' proximity to residences and their exposure to
>> vehicle traffic within the surrounding community.
>
> First, there is nothing at all "new" about this particular idea; it is
> the way urbanized areas have been organized pretty much as long as they
> have existed -- with the exception of the post WWII (American, usually)
> "bedroom community".
>
Wrong again. This is one of the big lies. New urbanism is NEW, and
never before seen in any city except the pre-industrial city. It was NOT a
feature of the industrial city of the USA. New Urbanism can never bring the
factory back to downtown, nor its limiting fixed-rail transit systems.
The so-called downtowns decimated community shopping.
> One thing to bear in mind is that there are different types (or perhaps
> something of a continuum) of commercial enterprises, depending on
> frequency or regularity of use, and the relevance of convenience. For
> example, most people will not be terribly interested in going far out
> of their way to pick up a carton of milk or a loaf of bread, to return
> a video, or to pick up a pizza or chinese food.
Except they do. People are NOT going to go to a small video store which
does not have what they want. Nor are they going to use one brand of pizza
allowed by planners for a specific area. People pick up milk and other
things on their weekly shopping trips to cost-effective stores.
For these sorts of
> regular daily/weekly errands, proximity and ease of access are primary
> factors, in a way that they are not for infrequent major things such as
> buying a new car or refridgerator.
>
Ditto for pizza. Do you want only the local planner-approved brand?
> And in traditional urban areas (including both cities and suburban
> towns) you see this continuum instantiated. The "catchment areas" for
> supermarkets, bakers, donut shops, pharmacies, newsstands, etc. are
> relatively _small_ and local
Wrong again. People do NOT want to shop at a high-cost local pharmacy
especially for drugs costing what they do today. They want Wal-Mart prices
for drugs. Newspapers are DELIVERED in case you did not notice.
Supermarkets have LARGE catchment areas in case you did not notice.
(with the exception of some limited
> number of specialized retailers), as most people aren't willing to
> expend a lot of time, effort, and money travelling around every day
> just to save a few cents
Except they do just that which annoys planners for some reason.
(as in the old joke about spending two hours
> and two dollars worth of gas in order to save one dollar, it doesn't
> make sense).
>
Only to a planner.
> Unless they really have no other choice.
Choice? hang on to your tax money.
One of the reasons that
> Wal-Mart (for example) originally limited itself to rural areas is
> that a significant part of the custom of rural "downtown" merchants
> were those who were driving in from some distance outside of town.
> And if it is the same 20-minute drive to A or B, then it makes
> (economic) sense to choose the one that is slightly cheaper. And
> the same seems to hold true for other "big box" retailing in newer
> suburban areas: if one must get into one's car and drive for 15
> minutes to buy something, then there is minimal cost in driving 15
> minutes (or even slightly more) in the other direction, if one can
> save even a small amount.
>
> On the other hand, if it is a question of a 15-20 minute drive vs
> a five minute walk down to the corner, or a quick stop on the way
> home from work, then there is no payoff.
Sure there is. Selection, price and get it, choice? Your own choice,
not that made for you by planners.
Mini-marts and cornershops
> succeed on just this sort of trade, even with their generally higher
> prices and more limited selection.
>
Right now only the poor have to shop in such places. Raising costs for
the middle class is what New Urbanism is all about.
> Here in the Netherlands,
Here we go again. Only people in Europe know how to live and those of us
in the USA are fools for not living like they do somewhere else.
pretty much every neighborhood (even new-
> built ones) seems to include space for neighborhood shops. They
> will vary with the neighborhood, of course. For a small
> neighborhood of family homes, this may mean a butcher, baker,
> greengrocer, and newsstand.
And why would anyone want to pay convenience store prices? Maybe YOU
do.
For a more populous neighborhood
> including a number of apartment blocks, this may mean two
> supermarkets, a couple of cafes, a pet shop, a wine and liquor
> merchant, and a druggist, as well. (These are two actual examples
> close to me.)
>
> And the same sort of thing (though perhaps not in as throughgoing
> a manner) holds true in the more traditional urban areas of the
> US in which I have lived. And here, just as in the US, there are
> many other things that aren't really "neighborhood" items. For
> clothing, electronics, bedroom and bath furnishings, etc., one
> will likely head into the city center or to a larger shopping area,
> and for major items, such as furniture, home appliances, building
> materials, etc., one may head out of town entirely
>
City center for eletronics and furniture? Are you kidding? You would
pay through the nose to shop in such stores. You need big box stores for
that kind of thing. On the other hand, my house is furnished almost
entirely with used furniture and some of it does come from out-of-business
department stores with the sign Antiques hanging over the door. Those
stores are re-selling what they originally sold but about 50 years later.
> But -- to conclude this now overly long message -- the point is
> that many types of businesses don't really need any "drive-by
> traffic" from outside the neighborhood in order to succeed,
Even restaurants trying out the New Urbanism jive in the USA find they go
bankrupt. Why? People get tired of the local restaurant after a few tries
and then drive to new areas. But since parking is limited by the anti-car
lobby, the restaurants cannot complete for new customers to replace the lost
ones. They go broke.
nor
> are they likely to get any significant level of custom from those
> outside the neighborhood even if they try.
>
Wrong. They have found the opposite. They MUST appeal to those outside
the neighborhood.
I have had the chance to talk with a nice British couple who told me they
drove only 3,000 miles a year. They take mass transit to go to work and for
many other trips. But for shopping, they always use the car. Why? prices,
selection and all the other usual things. They can put a lot in the car.
Otherwise, they waste time shopping. When the women stayed home all day and
walked every day to the market to talk to farmers, maybe you were right. We
no longer live in 1830.
Baxter
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
Free software - Baxter Codeworks www.baxcode.com
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
"George Conklin" <nil...@earthlink.net> wrote in message
news:9YWcd.637$5i5...@newsread2.news.atl.earthlink.net...
>
>
> Except they do. People are NOT going to go to a small video store
which
> does not have what they want.
Nope. I'm not going to drive across town to some mega-video store. I'm
going to get the new releases from the video store in the neighborhood or
else from the cable company.
>Nor are they going to use one brand of pizza
> allowed by planners for a specific area.
No city is planning to that extent - nor does New Urbanism advocate any such
level of planning.
>People pick up milk and other
> things on their weekly shopping trips to cost-effective stores.
>
Not everything is bought on a weekly basis. Few Costco members shop there
every week.
cadman009
> news:ed63b9d2.04101...@posting.google.com...
> > i've been introduced recently to "new urbanist" planning and am
> > finding many of the concepts quite appealing. i am just getting into
> > planning myself and see some opportunities to put some of the
> > principles of new urbanism into practice. one of the things that
> > really intrigues me is the idea that traffic congestion can be
> > aleviated through planning smaller retail and commercial centers
> > closer to residences. this makes total sense to me.
>
> Where is the proof of that statement?
>
one of the realities i face daily is unbelievably horrible traffic
which is way out of control in my city. i live in orlando, florida,
and from what i've seen and read we're one of the prime examples of
how conventional, post-ww2, automobile-centric planning is failing
miserably. i have only lived in about 4 different cities in my
lifetime so far. 3 of them were small towns, and now i live in
orlando. i'm looking around me and making lots of observations as to
why living in a small town was so much more pleasant for me. i'm also
wondering what can be done to fix some of the ills of bigger cities
like orlando, and possibly designing something liveable for future
generations. the theory that i'm coming up with so far is that
breaking up the homogenity of suburbia is probably part of the
solution. forming small towns with centers and edges could in theory
do at least something to alleviate traffic by lessening the need for
cross-town trips. (i said *alleviating traffic and *lessening
cross-town trips, not eliminating them.) i'd love to see the reality
of my statements substantiated with scientific, quantitative evidence.
i will be pursuing that, of course, but for now the experience of
living in the various environments that i've already lived in has
given me lots of reality-based knowledge to go on.
> You are basically believing that people will not shop at big box stores for
> the lowest prices and largest selection of products. You believe people
> want to pay higher prices for much lower selections of products. Does not
> make a lot of sense.
no, i'm not believing that at all. my experience tells me that
driving to my nearest wal-mart sucks big-time. i've tried it many
times. i'm sure i will once in a while do it, thinking that i'm going
to save some money, but the reality is the last time my wife and i
drove into the parking lot of wal-mart and saw the crowds of people
trying to get a space and clogging the in and out doors of the store
with their shopping carts we said, "forget this," turned around and
left and drove as fast as we could to the target a mile down the road.
shopping at the target is still a hassle, it's still pretty crowded,
but lately i find myself deciding more and more that the slightly
higher prices at target are worth paying in exchange for the
advantages of going to a store where i can get in and out just a
little bit easier. i'm not being unrealistic and saying everyone's
going to do all their shopping at the corner small-town stores if they
exist near their neighborhood. i, for one, wouldn't mind having the
option.
>
> We also know that people travel about one hour per day in all cultures and
> town sizes all over the world. Your theory of traveling less with smaller
> centers near houses seems not to be true anywhere in the world.
not sure the facts would really back you up on that one. life in an
old-fashioned town in the us or in europe is much different than the
modern suburban experience in many of our bigger american cities.
modern suburbia is replacing the traditional small town. my question
is, is it really better to live in? it may be that miles of strip
malls in front of 6-lane highways makes sense for somebody, but do the
majority really say that's a pleasant or desirable environment to live
in? why have american cities evolved that way? is it really the best
way to continue to plan our communities?
>
> Just because is sounds good to you does not make it true. Any design must
> be based on reality, not good sounding cliché's
i agree. i also think we need to consider the possibilities that new
urbanism proposes. i don't buy the philosophy wholesale, but a lot of
what the new urbanists are saying rings true and verifies what i've
believed for a number of years. sure, i'm investigating the pros and
cons as i think we all should with any design ideas with which we are
presented - new or old.
cadman009
> news:slrncn846i....@byshenk.demon.nl...
> > cadman009 <cadm...@lycos.com> wrote:
> >
> > [re "new urbanism"...]
> >
> >> one potential problem that i see would be that if we make the mistake
> >> of planning retail uses in an area surrounded by residences, and don't
> >> create enough drive-by traffic the businesses will not thrive and the
> >> whole thing falls apart. i would think that a huge key for the
> >> success of a plan would be to create the perfect balance between the
> >> retail businesses' proximity to residences and their exposure to
> >> vehicle traffic within the surrounding community.
> >
> > First, there is nothing at all "new" about this particular idea; it is
> > the way urbanized areas have been organized pretty much as long as they
> > have existed -- with the exception of the post WWII (American, usually)
> > "bedroom community".
> >
>
> Wrong again. This is one of the big lies. New urbanism is NEW, and
> never before seen in any city except the pre-industrial city. It was NOT a
> feature of the industrial city of the USA.
new urbanism is new in the sense that it is a new direction for
american planners. many of the ideas however are a return to older
principles that were lost to a degree for many years. from what i
see, one of the big thrusts in new urbanism is to elevate planning
back to an art form rather than the blind enforcement of zoning
ordinances that produce ugly, bland streetscapes.
> New Urbanism can never bring the
> factory back to downtown, nor its limiting fixed-rail transit systems.
> The so-called downtowns decimated community shopping.
?
>
>
>
> > One thing to bear in mind is that there are different types (or perhaps
> > something of a continuum) of commercial enterprises, depending on
> > frequency or regularity of use, and the relevance of convenience. For
> > example, most people will not be terribly interested in going far out
> > of their way to pick up a carton of milk or a loaf of bread, to return
> > a video, or to pick up a pizza or chinese food.
>
> Except they do. People are NOT going to go to a small video store which
> does not have what they want. Nor are they going to use one brand of pizza
> allowed by planners for a specific area. People pick up milk and other
> things on their weekly shopping trips to cost-effective stores.
>
>
> For these sorts of
> > regular daily/weekly errands, proximity and ease of access are primary
> > factors, in a way that they are not for infrequent major things such as
> > buying a new car or refridgerator.
> >
> Ditto for pizza. Do you want only the local planner-approved brand?
>
that's just way out there, man. planning smaller centers doesn't
limit people's choices, it increases them. conventional planning
segregates uses to the extreme so that travel by car becomes the only
practical way to get to shopping from your home. allowing retail
closer to your home doesn't limit your ability to drive further if you
so desire. how can allowing you to travel a shorter distance be
limiting your choice?
>
> > And in traditional urban areas (including both cities and suburban
> > towns) you see this continuum instantiated. The "catchment areas" for
> > supermarkets, bakers, donut shops, pharmacies, newsstands, etc. are
> > relatively _small_ and local
>
>
> Wrong again. People do NOT want to shop at a high-cost local pharmacy
> especially for drugs costing what they do today. They want Wal-Mart prices
> for drugs. Newspapers are DELIVERED in case you did not notice.
> Supermarkets have LARGE catchment areas in case you did not notice.
you're making big assumptions here. why are walgreen's and cvs still
in business? they're small corner drug stores. i go to walgreen's
because it's quick and easy. the prices aren't exhorbitant, just a
little higher than wal-mart. if i want to go further to go to
wal-mart i can. surely, you're not advocating that no provision
should be made for walgreen's or cvs to exist are you?
>
>
> (with the exception of some limited
> > number of specialized retailers), as most people aren't willing to
> > expend a lot of time, effort, and money travelling around every day
> > just to save a few cents
>
> Except they do just that which annoys planners for some reason.
>
>
> (as in the old joke about spending two hours
> > and two dollars worth of gas in order to save one dollar, it doesn't
> > make sense).
> >
>
> Only to a planner.
you don't get out much, it sounds like.
>
>
> > Unless they really have no other choice.
>
> Choice? hang on to your tax money.
>
> One of the reasons that
> > Wal-Mart (for example) originally limited itself to rural areas is
> > that a significant part of the custom of rural "downtown" merchants
> > were those who were driving in from some distance outside of town.
> > And if it is the same 20-minute drive to A or B, then it makes
> > (economic) sense to choose the one that is slightly cheaper. And
> > the same seems to hold true for other "big box" retailing in newer
> > suburban areas: if one must get into one's car and drive for 15
> > minutes to buy something, then there is minimal cost in driving 15
> > minutes (or even slightly more) in the other direction, if one can
> > save even a small amount.
> >
> > On the other hand, if it is a question of a 15-20 minute drive vs
> > a five minute walk down to the corner, or a quick stop on the way
> > home from work, then there is no payoff.
>
> Sure there is. Selection, price and get it, choice? Your own choice,
> not that made for you by planners.
>
>
> Mini-marts and cornershops
> > succeed on just this sort of trade, even with their generally higher
> > prices and more limited selection.
> >
>
> Right now only the poor have to shop in such places. Raising costs for
> the middle class is what New Urbanism is all about.
i used to enjoy shopping at a smaller hardware store in the town i
used to live in rather than go to the local home depot because the
people at the smaller store knew how to service customers. i paid a
little bit more at the smaller store. i ordered a storm door from
home depot, and they botched the order 3 times. i finally tried the
smaller hardware store and they arranged it promptly and efficiently.
they installed it for me, and it was all completely hassle-free. the
owners of the small store acted like they cared. that to me is
something of what new urbanism is about reviving in our communities.
i think we are due in america to see a swing back toward better
customer service, and i'd say most common every-day people would
certainly welcome that. what does my small-town hardware store have
to do with planning? i think our planning should reflect good values.
if good values includes the kind of service a small-town hardware
store can give people, then why shouldn't we plan our communities with
that in mind? should we make all home depots illegal? no, i don't
think so, but planning communities around the pattern of a small town
creates a better atmosphere in my opinion. will a community plan
suddenly make small-town businesses automatically flourish? i'm not
saying that. what i am trying to say (in a really round-about way) is
that the small-town pattern is something worth looking at as we
consider how to plan communities. i believe planning can certainly
set a tone for a community. we can make it small-scale and personal,
or we can make it large-scale and cold. i think there's a place for
both small- and big-scale stuff in a community. i think new urbanism
helps us revive the small-scale as a viable pattern.
Jack May
>> We also know that people travel about one hour per day in all cultures
>> and
>> town sizes all over the world. Your theory of traveling less with
>> smaller
>> centers near houses seems not to be true anywhere in the world.
>
> not sure the facts would really back you up on that one.
It was in the Scientific American special issue on transportation in the mid
90's
> my question is, is it really better to live in?
You define best which is not possible because of the wide variety of needs,
goals, and attitudes of people.
I visited my niece who lived in a small town for a couple of years. A lot
of the men went out and got drunk most nights because they were bored. The
kids could hardly wait until they grew up and could leave. Most people
worked for the one company in town. If that company had problems, there
was no where to go for another job. They had to drive two hours to get to a
shopping center for many things.
What you are doing is idealizing small towns that have their own problems.
You are demonizing larger cities that have a advantages that a lot of people
like.
If you like small towns, then why are you living in a big city. If you
think there are too many problems with small towns for you to move back to
one, then you don't have a point.
I personally would not like to live in a small town because it would be too
boring for me personally. That was the complaint of my small town nieces
husband . He said he felt life was just passing him by. I certainly don't
feel that way.
I assume there are a lot of people that like small towns, but that is not a
general attitude of everyone as you seem to imply. I am an engineer in
Silicon Valley and enjoy my work a lot. I don't think Silicon Valley is
possible in a small isolated town.
George Conklin
"cadman009" <cadm...@lycos.com> wrote in message
news:ed63b9d2.04101...@posting.google.com...
> "Jack May" <jack...@comcast.net> wrote in message
> news:<EHHcd.267225$D%.20870@attbi_s51>...
>> "cadman009" <cadm...@lycos.com> wrote in message
>> news:ed63b9d2.04101...@posting.google.com...
>> > i've been introduced recently to "new urbanist" planning and am
>> > finding many of the concepts quite appealing. i am just getting into
>> > planning myself and see some opportunities to put some of the
>> > principles of new urbanism into practice. one of the things that
>> > really intrigues me is the idea that traffic congestion can be
>> > aleviated through planning smaller retail and commercial centers
>> > closer to residences. this makes total sense to me.
>>
>> Where is the proof of that statement?
>>
>
> one of the realities i face daily is unbelievably horrible traffic
> which is way out of control in my city. i live in orlando, florida,
> and from what i've seen and read we're one of the prime examples of
> how conventional, post-ww2, automobile-centric planning is failing
> miserably.
My parents live in Orlando for years, and it was a nice place. If you
think it is hard to get around Orlando, just try Brooklyn for congestion and
bad living conditions for the middle class. They traded an apartment for a
small house which pleased them greatly. They made great friends on the
street the lived on for the first time. In the big city, you don't even
know your neighbor.
Calthorpe and others who push New Urbanism go bankrupt.
George Conklin
>
> "cadman009" <cadm...@lycos.com> wrote in message
> news:ed63b9d2.04101...@posting.google.com...
>
>
>>> We also know that people travel about one hour per day in all cultures
>>> and
>>> town sizes all over the world. Your theory of traveling less with
>>> smaller
>>> centers near houses seems not to be true anywhere in the world.
>>
>> not sure the facts would really back you up on that one.
>
> It was in the Scientific American special issue on transportation in the
> mid 90's
>
>> my question is, is it really better to live in?
>
> You define best which is not possible because of the wide variety of
> needs, goals, and attitudes of people.
>
> I visited my niece who lived in a small town for a couple of years. A
> lot of the men went out and got drunk most nights because they were bored.
In Philadelphia there is a bar on every corner.
cadman009
> "cadman009" <cadm...@lycos.com> wrote in message
> news:ed63b9d2.04101...@posting.google.com...
>
>
> >> We also know that people travel about one hour per day in all cultures
> >> and
> >> town sizes all over the world. Your theory of traveling less with
> >> smaller
> >> centers near houses seems not to be true anywhere in the world.
> >
> > not sure the facts would really back you up on that one.
>
> It was in the Scientific American special issue on transportation in the mid
> 90's
i think i might have misinterpreted what you meant. i believe i've
heard similar statistics. still, the thing you don't seem to be
taking into account is that in pedestrian- and mass-transit-oriented
communities, many of the trips that would go to make up that one hour
of travel can be made on foot or via mass-transit and not in
automobiles. retail and commercial centers being closer to residences
would help to transfer some trips away from the automobile. i'm also
pretty sure the statistics you're refering to are talking about the
time people are willing to commute and not the actual average time
they spend traveling. logic tells me that if more opportunities to
travel shorter distances are available more people will tend to
shorten their time traveling for daily activities. i know i would.
>
> > my question is, is it really better to live in?
>
> You define best which is not possible because of the wide variety of needs,
> goals, and attitudes of people.
>
> I visited my niece who lived in a small town for a couple of years. A lot
> of the men went out and got drunk most nights because they were bored. The
> kids could hardly wait until they grew up and could leave. Most people
> worked for the one company in town. If that company had problems, there
> was no where to go for another job. They had to drive two hours to get to a
> shopping center for many things.
>
> What you are doing is idealizing small towns that have their own problems.
> You are demonizing larger cities that have a advantages that a lot of people
> like.
>
> If you like small towns, then why are you living in a big city. If you
> think there are too many problems with small towns for you to move back to
> one, then you don't have a point.
i hear what you're saying, but the points you are bringing out about
boredom and lack of job choices in small towns don't really apply to
the subject i brought up. i'm talking about how bigger metro areas
can take the good things about the small town and incorporate them
into their city plans. the disadvantages you bring up are only
applicable to isolated small towns. i'm also not actually demonizing
larger cities, just trying to be a good planner and think about ways
to improve them.
why do i live in orlando? mainly, it's to be close to my extended
family. it doesn't really have anything to do with me not liking to
live in a small town. i loved living in a small town. i grew up in a
really small town called rockledge, florida. it's small, but not
really isolated. there are plenty of good jobs within a half hour's
drive. if not in rockledge, they can be found in neighboring towns.
rockledge is a peaceful, but growing community. nearby merritt island
and cocoa beach have plenty of nightlife and shopping for those who
get bored easily, and if someone really gets bored they can drive
about an hour to orlando where there's plenty more to do. i'm
following you on the problems with really isolated towns. i've never
lived in that situation exactly.
the last place we lived before moving to orlando was lititz,
pennsylvania. it's an even better example of a great small town.
it's in lancaster county, which is a thriving, growing area and has
enough population so that good jobs and decent shopping are readily
available. lititz has a beautiful main street well known in the area
for being a great place to walk around and shop. it has a real nice
park right across from main street with picnic and playground
facilities and has a spring and a stream flowing through it which
makes for a nice stroll. it's in a growing region, but the residents
have managed to maintain lititz' small-town character by keeping most
of the main roads 2-lane with parking behind the historic buildings
rather than plowing them down to create conventional parking lots.
residences are mixed in with businesses all around that little
downtown area, and i never heard any complaints that this exposed them
to crime. the library was within walking distance from our home, and
my family and i used to walk there all the time. i just felt much
healthier in that environment than i do living in orlando. there's
nothing that says orlando has to be designed the way it is. it's just
the result of modern planning practices which destroy the quality of
life that used to consciously be built into our older communities.
speaking of building a quality of life in our communities, i've
noticed that modern conventional communities, at least in orlando,
don't seem to hardly ever set aside land for parks. the communities
are jammed with houses on every square inch of land. the
neighborhoods are lined up one after another along thoroughfares that
contain zero shopping. this monotonous pattern goes on mile after
mile till you finally get to an extremely congested major road with
miles of nothing but strip malls and bumper to bumper traffic. is
this smart planning? does it make for a pleasant, liveable
environment? i don't think so. the idea of isolating neighborhoods
from traffic might make seem to make sense on the surface, but i think
orlando has done this to an extreme, and the practice has produced
extreme traffic congestion along those commercial strips
unnecessarily.
George Conklin
"cadman009" <cadm...@lycos.com> wrote in message
news:ed63b9d2.04101...@posting.google.com...
> "Jack May" <jack...@comcast.net> wrote in message
> news:<Dy0dd.282606$3l3.188361@attbi_s03>...
>> "cadman009" <cadm...@lycos.com> wrote in message
>> news:ed63b9d2.04101...@posting.google.com...
>>
>>
>> >> We also know that people travel about one hour per day in all cultures
>> >> and
>> >> town sizes all over the world. Your theory of traveling less with
>> >> smaller
>> >> centers near houses seems not to be true anywhere in the world.
>> >
>> > not sure the facts would really back you up on that one.
>>
>> It was in the Scientific American special issue on transportation in the
>> mid
>> 90's
>
> i think i might have misinterpreted what you meant. i believe i've
> heard similar statistics. still, the thing you don't seem to be
> taking into account is that in pedestrian- and mass-transit-oriented
> communities, many of the trips that would go to make up that one hour
> of travel can be made on foot or via mass-transit and not in
> automobiles.
One hour on foot? I doubt there are enough New Yorkers walking 1 hour on
foot to measure. Maybe 2? As far as travel by transit goes, it does not
save fuel. So what are you out to prove? The cost? Unaffordable housing.
Higher crime rates. More alienation.
retail and commercial centers being closer to residences
> would help to transfer some trips away from the automobile.
But it is shopping that people WANT to use a car for. Prices, selection
and convenience are just some of the reasons.
i'm also
> pretty sure the statistics you're refering to are talking about the
> time people are willing to commute and not the actual average time
> they spend traveling. logic tells me that if more opportunities to
> travel shorter distances are available more people will tend to
> shorten their time traveling for daily activities. i know i would.
>
But commutes are the one thing people will use transit for. Not for
anything else really, if they can avoid it. You still need a car in the
city.
This is confused thinking. It is density and size which make large
cities bad news.
> why do i live in orlando? mainly, it's to be close to my extended
> family. it doesn't really have anything to do with me not liking to
> live in a small town. i loved living in a small town. i grew up in a
> really small town called rockledge, florida. it's small, but not
> really isolated. there are plenty of good jobs within a half hour's
> drive. if not in rockledge, they can be found in neighboring towns.
> rockledge is a peaceful, but growing community. nearby merritt island
> and cocoa beach have plenty of nightlife and shopping for those who
> get bored easily, and if someone really gets bored they can drive
> about an hour to orlando where there's plenty more to do. i'm
> following you on the problems with really isolated towns. i've never
> lived in that situation exactly.
>
> the last place we lived before moving to orlando was lititz,
> pennsylvania. it's an even better example of a great small town.
Lititz is turning artsy-fartsy. Is that what appeals to you? Its main
street is also a through highway, and begs to be bypassed. It is noise,
noise and noise if you live on the main streets.
> it's in lancaster county, which is a thriving, growing area and has
> enough population so that good jobs and decent shopping are readily
> available. lititz has a beautiful main street well known in the area
> for being a great place to walk around and shop. it has a real nice
> park right across from main street with picnic and playground
> facilities and has a spring and a stream flowing through it which
> makes for a nice stroll. it's in a growing region, but the residents
> have managed to maintain lititz' small-town character by keeping most
> of the main roads 2-lane with parking behind the historic buildings
> rather than plowing them down to create conventional parking lots.
> residences are mixed in with businesses all around that little
> downtown area,
My wife is Pennsylvainia Dutch and is a native of Lancaster County. You
know what? They used to farm the areas which are now developed into
housing. She can point out the barns surrounded by houses where they had
cows. And you know what? No one in that family wants to go back to the
past. It was a hard life.
and i never heard any complaints that this exposed them
> to crime. the library was within walking distance from our home, and
> my family and i used to walk there all the time. i just felt much
> healthier in that environment than i do living in orlando
Then why not move back? My parents were the most happy in Orlando they
ever were in their entire life. Are you sure you are not turning your
personal troubles into a city-wide issue?
. there's
> nothing that says orlando has to be designed the way it is. it's just
> the result of modern planning practices which destroy the quality of
> life that used to consciously be built into our older communities.
>
Thank goodness the people in Orlando have NOT been subject to what you
want. Litiz was not either. It was built long before planners had anything
to say.
> speaking of building a quality of life in our communities, i've
> noticed that modern conventional communities, at least in orlando,
> don't seem to hardly ever set aside land for parks. the communities
> are jammed with houses on every square inch of land.
Children play in their own yards. My wife always wanted it that way too.
We had common ground. She kept our girls out of there and made sure they
played in our own yard. Private space is better than unpolicied public
space.
the
> neighborhoods are lined up one after another along thoroughfares that
> contain zero shopping. this monotonous pattern goes on mile after
> mile till you finally get to an extremely congested major road with
> miles of nothing but strip malls and bumper to bumper traffic.
Shopping should be clustered in one place on commercial roads. It does
not belong in residential areas. And Lititz? It has all kinds of shopping
along the highways leading to it and from it.
is
> this smart planning? does it make for a pleasant, liveable
> environment? i don't think so.
Actually about 98% of the population thinks it does.
Joey Jolley
size? Are there any city planners that agree with your view? So all of our
cities and towns are going to shrink, Mr. Cadman?
"Baxter" <lbax01.s...@baxcode.com> wrote in message
news:10n7pis...@corp.supernews.com...
Joey Jolley
should break up everything? are there planners that agree with you?
Baxter
to grow at a high rate. The "regional centers" are being established within
the metro boundaries.
--
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
Free software - Baxter Codeworks www.baxcode.com
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
"Joey Jolley" <john...@qwest.net> wrote in message
news:_nidd.1001$PJ1....@news.uswest.net...
> So you're saying we should shrink our cities and towns to pre-WWII
> size? Are there any city planners that agree with your view? So all of our
> cities and towns are going to shrink, Mr. Cadman?
>
>
> "Baxter" <lbax01.s...@baxcode.com> wrote in message
> news:10n7pis...@corp.supernews.com...
> > Check out Portland - http://www.metro-region.org/ Look particularly at
> > the
> > 2040 Regional Growth Plan (
> > http://www.metro-region.org/article.cfm?articleID=231 ). If you look at
> > the
> > maps, you'll see lots of regional centers scattered throughout the
greater
> > Portland metro area.
> >
Baxter
--
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
Free software - Baxter Codeworks www.baxcode.com
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
"Joey Jolley" <john...@qwest.net> wrote in message
news:8xidd.1004$PJ1....@news.uswest.net...
cadman009
> So you're saying we should shrink our cities and towns to pre-WWII
> size? Are there any city planners that agree with your view? So all of our
> cities and towns are going to shrink, Mr. Cadman?
yeah, it's called "new urbanism". you can look it up on google. i
don't necessarily buy everything the new urbanists are saying, but
most of it sounds pretty good to me. i am new to planning, so my
personal theories most likely aren't really worth that much. one
reason i'm posting here is to get feedback, pro and con. my
understanding of new urbanist planning includes the breaking up of
large, single-use metro areas into smaller towns and villages with
multiple uses in close proximity. most americans list traffic
congestion as the number one political concern in their own cities. i
think new urbanism has a real possibility of being at least a partial
answer.
another thing new urbanist design allows besides helping ease traffic
congestion is to create a sense of place within each village and town.
this is accomplished by designing neighborhoods, villages, and towns
with recognizable centers and edges. this is part of what makes
traditional towns more attractive to the average person than the
places our conventional modern suburban zoning laws have created. why
do vacationers flock to places like lancaster county, pennsylvania or
st. augustine, florida or walt disney world's main street usa? many
american's seem to think that small towns (or disney's stage set of a
small town) are enjoyable places to hang out on vacation. wouldn't we
like the cities we live in to be just as enjoyable?
George Conklin
If you want ugly, just try New York City, the model for mixed land use.
Just because people have to live over stores does NOT mean beauty.
No, it limits you to those few stores you can walk to. And then they go
out of business, just like Calthrope's dreams do.
conventional planning
> segregates uses to the extreme so that travel by car becomes the only
> practical way to get to shopping from your home. allowing retail
> closer to your home doesn't limit your ability to drive further if you
> so desire. how can allowing you to travel a shorter distance be
> limiting your choice?
>
The whole idea of planning is to limit big box stores and all
alterntives.
> >
> > > And in traditional urban areas (including both cities and suburban
> > > towns) you see this continuum instantiated. The "catchment areas" for
> > > supermarkets, bakers, donut shops, pharmacies, newsstands, etc. are
> > > relatively _small_ and local
> >
> >
> > Wrong again. People do NOT want to shop at a high-cost local
pharmacy
> > especially for drugs costing what they do today. They want Wal-Mart
prices
> > for drugs. Newspapers are DELIVERED in case you did not notice.
> > Supermarkets have LARGE catchment areas in case you did not notice.
>
> you're making big assumptions here. why are walgreen's and cvs still
> in business? they're small corner drug stores.
We just heard a case where Walgreen's wanted to take one corner over for
a big box store. We turned it down. Neighborhood? Are you kidding? It
needed a huge catchment area.
i go to walgreen's
> because it's quick and easy. the prices aren't exhorbitant, just a
> little higher than wal-mart.
They want to locate within a short distance of Wal-Mart here.
if i want to go further to go to
> wal-mart i can. surely, you're not advocating that no provision
> should be made for walgreen's or cvs to exist are you?
>
They do not want neighborhood stores in Durham. They want a big box
outlet in a place zoned for something else.
> >
> >
> > (with the exception of some limited
> > > number of specialized retailers), as most people aren't willing to
> > > expend a lot of time, effort, and money travelling around every day
> > > just to save a few cents
> >
> > Except they do just that which annoys planners for some reason.
> >
> >
> > (as in the old joke about spending two hours
> > > and two dollars worth of gas in order to save one dollar, it doesn't
> > > make sense).
> > >
> >
> > Only to a planner.
>
> you don't get out much, it sounds like.
>
I thought you said I get out too much and need to walk? I was thrilled
when a Super Wal-Mart opened a mile or so away. Such stores open in
well-to-do areas around here because only the poor have to buy at local
stores with high prices. Segregated food it used to be called.
Fine. And I just purchased a lot of stuff at an old-fashioned hardware
store in Elk Park, NC. Guess what: they are about 50% higher in price on
many items.
> they installed it for me, and it was all completely hassle-free. the
> owners of the small store acted like they cared. that to me is
> something of what new urbanism is about reviving in our communities.
Since when is business support the same as a 'community'? Small
businessmen are community? Are you serious?
> i think we are due in america to see a swing back toward better
> customer service, and i'd say most common every-day people would
> certainly welcome that.
Except they don't. They want lower prices and have proven that many
times. You are not supporting what people want but some dream of what YOU
want.
what does my small-town hardware store have
> to do with planning? i think our planning should reflect good values.
Planning values are not those of the average person. Why do you think
that your values are best? Just curious.
> if good values includes the kind of service a small-town hardware
> store can give people, then why shouldn't we plan our communities with
> that in mind? should we make all home depots illegal? no, i don't
> think so, but planning communities around the pattern of a small town
> creates a better atmosphere in my opinion.
Except the majority shop where the prices are best. Are you aware that
what you post was also used against establishment of Parcel Post? Are you
against that too?
will a community plan
> suddenly make small-town businesses automatically flourish? i'm not
> saying that. what i am trying to say (in a really round-about way) is
> that the small-town pattern is something worth looking at as we
> consider how to plan communities.
Big cities are not small towns. Planning is for big cities. The small
towns you seem to like grew up long before planning.
i believe planning can certainly
> set a tone for a community.
What modern planning does is increase crime. Is that your goal?
George Conklin
"the wonderer" <thewond...@lycos.com> wrote in message
news:5b4cddc8.04101...@posting.google.com...
> "George Conklin" <nil...@earthlink.net> wrote in message
news:<9YWcd.637$5i5...@newsread2.news.atl.earthlink.net>...
> >
> > Here we go again. Only people in Europe know how to live and those of
us
> > in the USA are fools for not living like they do somewhere else.
> >
>
> that'll win you a lot of credibility with intelligent people!
>
The old academic rant that Europe is the home of culture is bankrupt.
Give it up.
> um, george, you really missed this one. i'm pretty sure he is talking
> about big box stores being in the city centers.
>
Mostly they are NOT in city centers. And for good reasons too.
> > On the other hand, my house is furnished almost
> > entirely with used furniture and some of it does come from
out-of-business
> > department stores with the sign Antiques hanging over the door. Those
> > stores are re-selling what they originally sold but about 50 years
later.
> >
> >
> >
> > > But -- to conclude this now overly long message -- the point is
> > > that many types of businesses don't really need any "drive-by
> > > traffic" from outside the neighborhood in order to succeed,
> >
> > Even restaurants trying out the New Urbanism jive in the USA find
they go
> > bankrupt. Why? People get tired of the local restaurant after a few
tries
> > and then drive to new areas. But since parking is limited by the
anti-car
> > lobby, the restaurants cannot complete for new customers to replace the
lost
> > ones. They go broke.
>
> this is the kind of thing i'm addressing when i say that planners must
> not allow this situation to occur. the retail and commercial stuff
> near the neighborhoods must be designed so that they have plenty of
> potential customers.
You are not going to 'allow' stores to go broke? My my.
it might take some analysis along with some
> common sense to ensure that retail and commercial uses aren't too
> isolated in the quest for close proximity to homes.
And you must guarantee that people who live nearby must shop at the store
you choose for them? I have news for you. They all go bankrupt.
a good plan will
> avoid burying the businesses too far away from drive-by traffic. well
> designed village and town centers will either draw people in from the
> outside or catch them as they drive by.
>
That is why big box stores succeed and the New Urbanism bankrupts
business. It is nice to think of everyone buying at small stores, but I
know I cannot afford it.
> i would also say that having a couple of local restaurants
> strategically located in a village or town center if done properly can
> potentially get lots of business from within and without the local
> community.
Until they get tired of it and then they go bankrupt. That is
well-documented.
George Conklin
The city was a different place when it held only 25% of the total
population and people were spread out into the rural areas. Now that cities
are holding most people, they cannot return to the past.
George Conklin
> "Joey Jolley" <john...@qwest.net> wrote in message
news:<_nidd.1001$PJ1....@news.uswest.net>...
> > So you're saying we should shrink our cities and towns to pre-WWII
> > size? Are there any city planners that agree with your view? So all of
our
> > cities and towns are going to shrink, Mr. Cadman?
>
> yeah, it's called "new urbanism". you can look it up on google. i
> don't necessarily buy everything the new urbanists are saying, but
> most of it sounds pretty good to me.
Like many utopian dreams, peace and brotherhood sound good in the
abstract. But New Urbanism is a harshly critical system of thought which
increases crime, decreases choice and is simply wrong.
If you want a refereed source on how mixed land use increases crime, see:
http://www.ncsociology.org/sociationtoday/raleigh.htm
For how city size decreases voting and other good behavior, see the review
at
http://www.ncsociology.org/sociationtoday/review1.htm
or the original article if you have access to a university library.
For how increased density INCREASES costs to a city, see the review at
http://www.ncsociology.org/sociationtoday/v21/review2.htm
or look up the original article.
The New Urbanism is a fraud.
Baxter
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
Free software - Baxter Codeworks www.baxcode.com
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
"George Conklin" <georgec...@earthlink.net> wrote in message
news:Tizdd.2461$KJ6...@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net...
>
> "cadman009" <cadm...@lycos.com> wrote in message
> >
> > that's just way out there, man. planning smaller centers doesn't
> > limit people's choices, it increases them.
>
> No, it limits you to those few stores you can walk to. And then they
go
> out of business, just like Calthrope's dreams do.
No it doesn't georgie porgie. Nobody is holding gun to your head. Nobody
said you could only walk and never drive.
cadman009
you have hardly proven that new urbanism is a fraud with this scanty,
mostly unrelated "evidence". give me a break! the raleigh study is
way too limited in scope to make broad-sweeping conclusions from it.
review 1 says high-density big city living causes people to withdraw
and suggests that small town living tends to be more sociologically
healthy for humans. common sense along with personal observations
lead me to agree with you on this. the new urbanist emphasis on
higher densities is one of the areas where i tend to disagree with
them to an extent and take a more balanced view. i think good city
planning should accomodate a wide variety of choices with regard to
density. i think many of the higher-density models used in new
urbanism work well for many people and for many situations, but i
think new urbanism has a lot more good things to say beyond just the
promotion of high densities.
review 2 didn't interest me all that much. i think planning for a
variety of densities helps to provide people with better choices. let
each citizen decide what density they prefer to live in. opinions run
the gamut. the increased cost of very high densities is something
that has to be considered, of course, but to me the less tangible cost
of sitting in traffic jams as the result of poor planning is something
that is more important. it's not a matter of simple economics.
to me we must weigh the intangible rewards of good design into our
equation when making design and zoning decisions. basing decisions on
purely economic grounds without regard to what kind of livability
we're producing is a big part of the current problem as far as i'm
concerned. we need more libraries, museums, and parks to make our
cities more pleasant to live and work in, but it seems government
agencies are more concerned with saving public money than to invest in
the arts or just to add some green space once in awhile to break up
the monotony. i think it's a sign that something is going terribly
wrong when public officials don't think we need libraries or museums
any more. do we really think it's best if mcdonald's and best buy
become the only cultural centers left in our communities in the
future?
i think that increasing densities is really a very small part of what
new urbanism is actually all about. you're barking up the wrong tree
with me with these articles, that's for sure. what i'm liking about
new urbanism is 1) the idea of reducing the need to drive for miles to
get to shopping and work from home, and 2) reviving the art of
creating a beautiful, liveable outdoor environment that will make
people look around and say, "wow, this is an awesome place!"
bumper to bumper traffic everywhere i turn is something i am disliking
more and more. i've got this nagging need to come up with ways to
help fix this problem. i guess i'm an optimist. i think it might
actually be fixable.
cadman009
> "cadman009" <cadm...@lycos.com> wrote in message
> news:ed63b9d2.04101...@posting.google.com...
> > "Jack May" <jack...@comcast.net> wrote in message
> > news:<Dy0dd.282606$3l3.188361@attbi_s03>...
> >> "cadman009" <cadm...@lycos.com> wrote in message
> >> news:ed63b9d2.04101...@posting.google.com...
> >>
> >>
> >> >> We also know that people travel about one hour per day in all cultures
> >> >> and
> >> >> town sizes all over the world. Your theory of traveling less with
> >> >> smaller
> >> >> centers near houses seems not to be true anywhere in the world.
> >> >
> >> > not sure the facts would really back you up on that one.
> >>
> >> It was in the Scientific American special issue on transportation in the
> >> mid
> >> 90's
> >
> > i think i might have misinterpreted what you meant. i believe i've
> > heard similar statistics. still, the thing you don't seem to be
> > taking into account is that in pedestrian- and mass-transit-oriented
> > communities, many of the trips that would go to make up that one hour
> > of travel can be made on foot or via mass-transit and not in
> > automobiles.
>
> One hour on foot? I doubt there are enough New Yorkers walking 1 hour on
> foot to measure. Maybe 2?
my point here was in answer to the claim that people travel 1 hour a
day in all cultures and in all town sizes all around the world. i
believe the actual statistic is that people are willing to work about
half an hour one way away from their home, whether it's on foot (in
3rd world countries mostly), mass transit, or by automobile. this
statistic does not cover the additional daily trips people are forced
to take as a result of segregated zoning and how that number would be
decreased by mixing uses. maybe there are studies that cover this.
i'll let you know if i hear of any.
> As far as travel by transit goes, it does not
> save fuel. So what are you out to prove? The cost? Unaffordable housing.
> Higher crime rates. More alienation.
most of your comments here are the opposite of the truth. affordable
housing in a nice community is one of the goals of new urbanist
planning. so far, the prices in well-designed communities are indeed
high, but that's because the demand is so high and the supply so
limited. once these communities start becoming more common the prices
will come down. ghettos produce crime. mixing homes for various
income levels in new communities allows more people to escape the
ghetto and get away from crime. liveable communities have beautiful
public spaces and pedestrian-oriented shopping areas. this will
result in less alienation than that found in conventional auto-centric
communities.
now, i'm really confused. just what are you trying to say here? i'm
talking about managing growth, not encouraging or eliminating it.
growth causes problems. maybe we agree on that. i think we disagree
greatly on the proper solutions for managing growth.
>
>
>
> > why do i live in orlando? mainly, it's to be close to my extended
> > family. it doesn't really have anything to do with me not liking to
> > live in a small town. i loved living in a small town. i grew up in a
> > really small town called rockledge, florida. it's small, but not
> > really isolated. there are plenty of good jobs within a half hour's
> > drive. if not in rockledge, they can be found in neighboring towns.
> > rockledge is a peaceful, but growing community. nearby merritt island
> > and cocoa beach have plenty of nightlife and shopping for those who
> > get bored easily, and if someone really gets bored they can drive
> > about an hour to orlando where there's plenty more to do. i'm
> > following you on the problems with really isolated towns. i've never
> > lived in that situation exactly.
> >
> > the last place we lived before moving to orlando was lititz,
> > pennsylvania. it's an even better example of a great small town.
>
> Lititz is turning artsy-fartsy. Is that what appeals to you? Its main
> street is also a through highway, and begs to be bypassed. It is noise,
> noise and noise if you live on the main streets.
lititz is artsy. yes, it does appeal to me. the 2-lane roads that go
through it's downtown aren't anywhere near as noisy as the 4-lane
roads running near my office in downtown orlando. wider roads produce
more noise and make crossing them difficult for pedestrians. keeping
the scale smaller is what lititz has done, and i for one really like
it. lots of other people apparantly like it too. the businesses
along main street are very busy on the weekends with pedestrian
traffic, but the volume of people walking along the street stays at a
very comfortable level. driving in the conventional strip mall zone
east of lancaster is another story, and forget trying to walk across
the highway on the east side of town. it'd be something akin to
suicide.
>
>
>
>
> > it's in lancaster county, which is a thriving, growing area and has
> > enough population so that good jobs and decent shopping are readily
> > available. lititz has a beautiful main street well known in the area
> > for being a great place to walk around and shop. it has a real nice
> > park right across from main street with picnic and playground
> > facilities and has a spring and a stream flowing through it which
> > makes for a nice stroll. it's in a growing region, but the residents
> > have managed to maintain lititz' small-town character by keeping most
> > of the main roads 2-lane with parking behind the historic buildings
> > rather than plowing them down to create conventional parking lots.
> > residences are mixed in with businesses all around that little
> > downtown area,
>
> My wife is Pennsylvainia Dutch and is a native of Lancaster County. You
> know what? They used to farm the areas which are now developed into
> housing. She can point out the barns surrounded by houses where they had
> cows. And you know what? No one in that family wants to go back to the
> past. It was a hard life.
there's still lots of farming around the area. it makes for some very
pleasant views while driving from one place to another. lancaster
county really is a great place. why do you think so many people
vacation there from new jersey? the biggest attraction there is the
amish. why do people idealize their simpler way of life? i'm not
advocating that we all should become amish. i agree with you, that
would be a hard life, and i wouldn't choose it. but i do think
there's something very attractive about keeping just a little closer
to nature than the endless parking lot created by common suburban
sprawl zoning practices.
>
>
>
> and i never heard any complaints that this exposed them
> > to crime. the library was within walking distance from our home, and
> > my family and i used to walk there all the time. i just felt much
> > healthier in that environment than i do living in orlando
>
> Then why not move back? My parents were the most happy in Orlando they
> ever were in their entire life. Are you sure you are not turning your
> personal troubles into a city-wide issue?
you mean my personal troubles sitting in traffic with about 5 million
other people? the agressive driving of many of the people around me
on the roads around here is an obvious clue as to the stress and
frustration that this environment produces in people.
>
>
>
> . there's
> > nothing that says orlando has to be designed the way it is. it's just
> > the result of modern planning practices which destroy the quality of
> > life that used to consciously be built into our older communities.
> >
>
> Thank goodness the people in Orlando have NOT been subject to what you
> want. Litiz was not either. It was built long before planners had anything
> to say.
actually, modern planning isn't real planning in any architectural or
artistic sense. old-fashioned towns were always planned with beauty
and livability as the main goal, not around how many cars can be
crammed into an area. lititz was planned very well. i saw some old
master plans from the founding of the city in the museum there.
lititz is the result of old-fashioned careful planning around a
pedestrian scale, and the results speak for themselves to any
reasonable person. oh, we used to complain about the "traffic" on
501, the 2-lane thoroughfare that main street tee's into. looking
back, it really wasn't bad at all. as the area grows they will
probably need to establish a good alternative parallel to 501, but
this issue pales in comparison to other areas where congestion is an
actual problem.
>
>
> > speaking of building a quality of life in our communities, i've
> > noticed that modern conventional communities, at least in orlando,
> > don't seem to hardly ever set aside land for parks. the communities
> > are jammed with houses on every square inch of land.
>
> Children play in their own yards. My wife always wanted it that way too.
> We had common ground. She kept our girls out of there and made sure they
> played in our own yard. Private space is better than unpolicied public
> space.
talk about isolating people. i guess you're saying, "we don't need no
stinking parks." talk about putting your personal opinion above
everyone else's. jeez. i guess you probably enjoy riding around with
your car windows shut tight with the ac running too so you never have
to come in contact with the outside world. you saying we don't need
public parks because you personally would never use one is pretty
selfish, i think. how about the people who don't have big yards and
who's kids might want to throw a frisbee or football somewhere besides
in the middle of the street?
>
>
> the
> > neighborhoods are lined up one after another along thoroughfares that
> > contain zero shopping. this monotonous pattern goes on mile after
> > mile till you finally get to an extremely congested major road with
> > miles of nothing but strip malls and bumper to bumper traffic.
>
> Shopping should be clustered in one place on commercial roads. It does
> not belong in residential areas. And Lititz? It has all kinds of shopping
> along the highways leading to it and from it.
i believe, like the new urbanists, that shopping should be clustered
mostly in centers, but easily accessible from neighborhoods. if your
preference is to live in a standard conventional neighborhood farther
from shopping, then have at it. you have plenty of choices and you
always will. i would advocate that a variety of environments should
be allowed within a community plan to accomodate all kinds of
preferences.
>
>
>
> is
> > this smart planning? does it make for a pleasant, liveable
> > environment? i don't think so.
>
> Actually about 98% of the population thinks it does.
*bzzzzt*! wrong! here's a good link for you. this survey says,
among other interesting things, that 61% of people who think they'll
buy a home in the next 3 years are more likely to look for real estate
in a smart growth (new urbanist) community rather than a sprawling
(conventional) community. your 98% number is slightly off.
George Conklin
George Conklin
Amos Hawley came up with the 1-hour rule, now maybe a half hour. The
average commute in the USA is about 20 minutes, hardly a great problem. It
is LONGEST in NYC, the home of mass transit. Mass transit is slow and
expensive.
Zoning is by definion the effort to exclude uses which do not fit well
together, like retail and residential or residential and factory work. Why
not just do away with zoning seems to be your statement. Then everything
will be mixed together and people will be happy, you tell us. Wrong, but
then planners would have nothing to complain about. Does a happy planner
exist?
> > As far as travel by transit goes, it does not
> > save fuel. So what are you out to prove? The cost? Unaffordable
housing.
> > Higher crime rates. More alienation.
>
> most of your comments here are the opposite of the truth.
Those comments are completely correct. You are just ignorant of the
facts of human behavior.
affordable
> housing in a nice community is one of the goals of new urbanist
> planning. so far, the prices in well-designed communities are indeed
> high,
They are high because of the cost of building. Density RAISES costs.
but that's because the demand is so high and the supply so
> limited.
Unaffordable housing is the RESULT of planning fads.
once these communities start becoming more common the prices
> will come down.
More high costs = more high costs.
ghettos produce crime. mixing homes for various
> income levels in new communities allows more people to escape the
> ghetto and get away from crime.
The arrangement of cities makes crime more common in all cultures.
liveable communities have beautiful
> public spaces and pedestrian-oriented shopping areas. this will
> result in less alienation than that found in conventional auto-centric
> communities.
>
The so-called auto-centric areas of cities have LESS crime.
Management of growth? In 63 nations the populations are not reproducing
themselves. But they are also no longer farmers and move to cities. We are
dealing with over-concentration of populations. It is not growth. It is
anti-growth.
> >
> >
> >
> > > why do i live in orlando? mainly, it's to be close to my extended
> > > family. it doesn't really have anything to do with me not liking to
> > > live in a small town. i loved living in a small town. i grew up in a
> > > really small town called rockledge, florida. it's small, but not
> > > really isolated. there are plenty of good jobs within a half hour's
> > > drive. if not in rockledge, they can be found in neighboring towns.
> > > rockledge is a peaceful, but growing community. nearby merritt island
> > > and cocoa beach have plenty of nightlife and shopping for those who
> > > get bored easily, and if someone really gets bored they can drive
> > > about an hour to orlando where there's plenty more to do. i'm
> > > following you on the problems with really isolated towns. i've never
> > > lived in that situation exactly.
> > >
> > > the last place we lived before moving to orlando was lititz,
> > > pennsylvania. it's an even better example of a great small town.
> >
> > Lititz is turning artsy-fartsy. Is that what appeals to you? Its
main
> > street is also a through highway, and begs to be bypassed. It is noise,
> > noise and noise if you live on the main streets.
>
> lititz is artsy. yes, it does appeal to me. the 2-lane roads that go
> through it's downtown aren't anywhere near as noisy as the 4-lane
> roads running near my office in downtown orlando.
Then why are you in Orlando? You obviously hate the place. Why
transfer your personal hatreds to the whole world?
wider roads produce
> more noise and make crossing them difficult for pedestrians. keeping
> the scale smaller is what lititz has done,
You ignore the fact that Lititz is surrounded by other areas which carry
out the economic needs of the region. Further, planners never would have
come up with Lititz. It is massively pre-urban planner.
and i for one really like
> it. lots of other people apparantly like it too. the businesses
> along main street are very busy on the weekends
For tourists. For shopping, you have to go out along the highway.
Did you ever stop to think that those farmers you make fun of lived what
you call isolated lives. Do you ever see the Amish in an artsy-fartsy park?
Do you ever see real farmers using parks? Those are for city people with no
choices.
George Conklin
Such as what? Mixing residential and commercial? More crime. And you
did not bother with the Creating Defensive Space reference. That showed
that cul-de-sacs lower crime in the 50-65% range with the same people.
Urban design is what makes crime rise. Raleigh showed that existing design
causes crime. The other study showed the same thing on an experimental
basis. Crime data show higher urban crime rates for the country as a whole.
You cannot deny 75 years of FBI data.
>
> review 2 didn't interest me all that much. i think planning for a
> variety of densities helps to provide people with better choices.
People have had choices. They voted with their feet against what you
want. You are against choice. You want to forbid choice and then call that
choice.
> to me we must weigh the intangible rewards of good design into our
> equation when making design and zoning decisions. basing decisions on
> purely economic grounds without regard to what kind of livability
> we're producing is a big part of the current problem as far as i'm
> concerned.
You have that backwards. You want to introduce dangerous design. The
people are smarter than you. They have voted. You don't like what they
voted for.
we need more libraries, museums, and parks to make our
> cities more pleasant to live and work in,
The internet is an international library. Museums? That is what Smart
Growth is: production of obsolete living patterns.
but it seems government
> agencies are more concerned with saving public money than to invest in
> the arts or just to add some green space once in awhile to break up
> the monotony.
Wrong again. Private housing is not the production boring landscapes.
You just hate the middle class. If you want to live over Wal-Mart, I feel
sorry for you.
i think it's a sign that something is going terribly
> wrong when public officials don't think we need libraries or museums
> any more.
Irrelevant comment. Turning every bankrupt downtown building into an art
museum is a waste also. It seems to be all that city councils want to do.
do > i think that increasing densities is really a very small part of what
> new urbanism is actually all about. you're barking up the wrong tree
> with me with these articles, that's for sure. what i'm liking about
> new urbanism is 1) the idea of reducing the need to drive for miles to
> get to shopping and work from home,
20 minutes to get to work, the current norm, is reasonable. It does not
need to be changed, except in NYC which wastes people's time with mass
transit. As for shopping, strip malls are very near most places of
residence, but then strip malls are out of fashion with people like you.
What you do NOT need is to have shopping in residential areas.
and 2) reviving the art of
> creating a beautiful, liveable outdoor environment that will make
> people look around and say, "wow, this is an awesome place!"
>
Most developments are nice places. Why do you so hate the American way
of life?
> bumper to bumper traffic everywhere i turn is something i am disliking
> more and more.
Crowded city streets are bumpter to bumper.
i've got this nagging need to come up with ways to
> help fix this problem. i guess i'm an optimist. i think it might
> actually be fixable.
There is no problem to fix.
Baxter
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
Free software - Baxter Codeworks www.baxcode.com
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
"George Conklin" <georgec...@earthlink.net> wrote in message
news:WgNdd.3090$%h1....@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net...
>
>
> Did you ever stop to think that those farmers you make fun of lived
what
> you call isolated lives. Do you ever see the Amish in an artsy-fartsy
park?
> Do you ever see real farmers using parks?
Actually, I have. Around here, the Amish and the Old Believer Russians use
the parks all the time. Both city parks and State/County parks. Family
gatherings and such.
>Those are for city people with no
> choices.
>
You're wrong again.
cadman009
> There is no problem to fix.
that's your contribution in a nutshell, isn't it? i think you're
projecting your happiness with your situation on everyone else in
america. the truth is, growing communities need solutions, and fast.
and what is it with your attitude that planning and planners are
somehow the only problem that exists in america? why do you keep
insisting that there ever was a time that communities weren't planned
by someone? they always have been, and they always will be, unless we
revert to anarchy where all you will have time to plan for is to try
to keep your gun loaded in your bunker. i'm guessing maybe you have a
different definition of city or community planning than i do.
conventional suburban communities are planned by planners, and new
urbanist communities are planned by planners. to say building a
community is practical without any planning or planners is pretty far
fetched. where do you get this idea?
Joey Jolley
towns to pre-WWII size? I disagree with you on that.
George Conklin
> news:<3rNdd.3191$KJ6...@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>...
>
>> There is no problem to fix.
>
> that's your contribution in a nutshell, isn't it? i think you're
> projecting your happiness with your situation on everyone else in
> america. the truth is, growing communities need solutions, and fast.
People are still moving to the more remote areas. That is their solution
to urban problems. You just want to force them to live where you have
decided to put them.
>
> and what is it with your attitude that planning and planners are
> somehow the only problem that exists in america?
Planners hate the average person. If Bush wins the election, it will be
because Democrats are now associated with the elites---as are planners.
why do you keep
> insisting that there ever was a time that communities weren't planned
> by someone? they always have been, and they always will be, unless we
> revert to anarchy where all you will have time to plan for is to try
> to keep your gun loaded in your bunker.
Planning commissions are new. If you want to go back far enough, look
at Philadelphia, where Wm. Penn laid out the city with one-acre lots. That
was the ideal-type then as now. It is just that now planners no longer
believe in the city.
George Conklin
> You didn't answer my question, Mr. Cadman. Should we shrink our cities and
> towns to pre-WWII size? I disagree with you on that.
> "cadman009" <cadm...@lycos.com> wrote in message
Cities were compact when over 50 % of the public lived in rural sprawl.
When the population started to compact itself into cities, they had to grow.
Joey Jolley
Jack May
> Amos Hawley came up with the 1-hour rule, now maybe a half hour. The
> average commute in the USA is about 20 minutes, hardly a great problem.
> It
> is LONGEST in NYC, the home of mass transit. Mass transit is slow and
> expensive
What I remember is the one hour was for all travel during the day, not for
just one leg of a commute. It included shopping etc. Its been a long time
since I read the article so I may be wrong.
In the Scientific American article there was a great graph showing what I
think was travel time vs. income with points labeled with each country.
Baxter
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
Free software - Baxter Codeworks www.baxcode.com
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
"George Conklin" <nil...@earthlink.net> wrote in message
news:6ZWdd.3891$5i5...@newsread2.news.atl.earthlink.net...
>
> "cadman009" <cadm...@lycos.com> wrote in message
> news:ed63b9d2.04102...@posting.google.com...
> > "George Conklin" <georgec...@earthlink.net> wrote in message
> > news:<3rNdd.3191$KJ6...@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>...
> >
> >> There is no problem to fix.
> >
> > that's your contribution in a nutshell, isn't it? i think you're
> > projecting your happiness with your situation on everyone else in
> > america. the truth is, growing communities need solutions, and fast.
>
> People are still moving to the more remote areas. That is their
solution
> to urban problems. You just want to force them to live where you have
> decided to put them.
Changing your tune? Wasn't that long ago you were claiming that people were
leaving the remote interior for the coasts.
cadman009
> You didn't answer my question, Mr. Cadman. Should we shrink our cities and
> towns to pre-WWII size? I disagree with you on that.
i guess i'm not really sure what you're asking. post-ww2 planning was
mentioned a couple of times in this thread. this is generally
considered roughly the time when automobile-centered planning really
began to take off in the US. before this time traditional towns and
cities were planned with the pedestrian as a priority. i'm not of the
extreme school that says we should attempt to do away with the
automobile, but i do agree that pedestrian-friendliness is a desirable
thing. there are many who don't have the luxury of being able to
drive, mostly the elderly. a few years ago i was helping my
mother-in-law find an apartment in suburban lancaster, pa. she
doesn't drive, so we were attempting to find her a place that was
within walking distance of shopping. even in lancaster, which i think
is a great town, pedestrian-friendly apartments don't really exist
unless you live right downtown.
cadman009
> Well, you're not a planner, are you?
no, i'm not a planner. i've been working as a cad tech for a planning
firm in orlando for a couple of years and am now starting to take on
some actual design as a part of my job. i think i'll probably
eventually go back to school and get a degree in planning, but for
now, i'm loving what i'm learning and doing in my current position.
George Conklin
> "Joey Jolley" <john...@qwest.net> wrote in message
> news:<bHWdd.10$eR2....@news.uswest.net>...
>> You didn't answer my question, Mr. Cadman. Should we shrink our cities
>> and
>> towns to pre-WWII size? I disagree with you on that.
>
> i guess i'm not really sure what you're asking. post-ww2 planning was
> mentioned a couple of times in this thread. this is generally
> considered roughly the time when automobile-centered planning really
> began to take off in the US. before this time traditional towns and
> cities were planned with the pedestrian as a priority.
No they were NOT. The entire industrial city was totally dependent on
fixed rail transportation. People moved around on mechanized
transportation. Cities could not grow bigger than about 3.2 miles in radius
when walking was the main way of getting around. Chicago is a classic
example. When it was dependent on walking, half of the population was
within 1 hour of walking of the center. When trolleys came in, the radius
expanded to 12 (TWELVE) miles. At that point, the city was NOT dependent on
walking.
George Conklin
>
> "George Conklin" <georgec...@earthlink.net> wrote in message
> news:WgNdd.3090$%h1....@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net...
>> Amos Hawley came up with the 1-hour rule, now maybe a half hour. The
>> average commute in the USA is about 20 minutes, hardly a great problem.
>> It
>> is LONGEST in NYC, the home of mass transit. Mass transit is slow and
>> expensive
>
> What I remember is the one hour was for all travel during the day, not for
> just one leg of a commute.
No, it was for going to work.
Jack May
"Scott en Aztlán" <sloth...@NOyahooSPAM.com> wrote in message
news:ss9ln0l2q6g8qe2f9...@4ax.com...
> Don't forget the transit stops located in the heart of the pod so
> people at least have the option not to drive ALL the time.
Yes lets give them stage coaches, horses, helicopters, boat, everything they
desire since choice doesn't cost anything does it.
While we are at it lets give them apartments, farms, mansions, caves, tents,
and anything else they want so they don't have to choose one type of life
style all the time. After all Government has unlimited amounts of money to
pay taxes for all possible choices.
To pay for those choices, let make the minimum wage more than a million
dollars since money and cost are irrelevant in your view of the world. The
Government will just pay for it all.
George Conklin
Choice=high taxes.
George Conklin
"Scott en Aztlán" <sloth...@NOyahooSPAM.com> wrote in message
> On Mon, 18 Oct 2004 11:50:05 GMT, "George Conklin"
> <nil...@earthlink.net> wrote:
>
>> Mixing commercial and residential together boosts crime greatly.
>
> Typical luddite NIMBY thinking
If such use were desirable, everyone would want it and then there would
be NIMBY.
The simple FAct is that mixed land use development is crime-centric and a
direct cause of increased crime rates in cities.
George Conklin
"Scott en Aztlán" <sloth...@NOyahooSPAM.com> wrote in message
> On Wed, 20 Oct 2004 19:59:24 GMT, "George Conklin"
> <georgec...@earthlink.net> wrote:
>
>
>>For how increased density INCREASES costs to a city, see the review at
>>
>>http://www.ncsociology.org/sociationtoday/v21/review2.htm
>>
>>or look up the original article.
>>
>>The New Urbanism is a fraud.
>
>
> Where does anyone claim that density higher than 250 persons per mile
> (the optimal density level according to the article quoted above) is a
> requirement for New Urbanism?
>
New urbanism is all about increasing densities to that of old cities,
about 10,000 per square mile. So, remote rural and modern urbanism both are
high-cost options.
George Conklin
"Scott en Aztlán" <sloth...@NOyahooSPAM.com> wrote in message
> On Wed, 20 Oct 2004 19:53:41 GMT, "George Conklin"
> <georgec...@earthlink.net> wrote:
>
>> The city was a different place when it held only 25% of the total
>>population and people were spread out into the rural areas. Now that
>>cities
>>are holding most people, they cannot return to the past.
>
> OK, so what's your solution? What are the tenets of the "Conklin
> Urbanism?"
>
The United Nations also shows that anywhere in the world when the
population becomes less than half urban, we get about the same pressures the
USA has had since 1940.
Baxter
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
Free software - Baxter Codeworks www.baxcode.com
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
"Scott en Aztlán" <sloth...@NOyahooSPAM.com> wrote in message
news:pocln0d42fvi4of6i...@4ax.com...
> On Wed, 20 Oct 2004 19:59:24 GMT, "George Conklin"
> <georgec...@earthlink.net> wrote:
>
>
> >For how increased density INCREASES costs to a city, see the review at
> >
> >http://www.ncsociology.org/sociationtoday/v21/review2.htm
> >
> >or look up the original article.
> >
> >The New Urbanism is a fraud.
>
> Interesting article.
>
> Where does anyone claim that density higher than 250 persons per mile
> (the optimal density level according to the article quoted above) is a
> requirement for New Urbanism?
>
Do note that 250/sq mi is about 10 acres per Dwelling Unit. You're not
talking an urban environment.
Baxter
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
Free software - Baxter Codeworks www.baxcode.com
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
"George Conklin" <nil...@earthlink.net> wrote in message
news:ktzed.5743$5i5....@newsread2.news.atl.earthlink.net...
>
> "Scott en Aztlán" <sloth...@NOyahooSPAM.com> wrote in message
> news:pcaln0hv714g98cna...@4ax.com...
> > On Mon, 18 Oct 2004 11:50:05 GMT, "George Conklin"
> > <nil...@earthlink.net> wrote:
> >
> >> Mixing commercial and residential together boosts crime greatly.
> >
> > Typical luddite NIMBY thinking
>
> If such use were desirable, everyone would want it and then there would
> be NIMBY.
Nope. Different strokes for different folks. This demonstrates one of the
fallicies that you're operating from.
>
> The simple FAct is that mixed land use development is crime-centric and
a
> direct cause of increased crime rates in cities.
>
"FAct" = propaganda. The real fact is mixed land use development is no more
crime-centric than any other model.
Baxter
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
Free software - Baxter Codeworks www.baxcode.com
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
"George Conklin" <nil...@earthlink.net> wrote in message
news:Luzed.5745$5i5....@newsread2.news.atl.earthlink.net...
>
> New urbanism is all about increasing densities to that of old cities,
> about 10,000 per square mile.
Conk routinely ignores the fact that densities are not uniform. NW
Portland, for instance, is more than 20,000 per square mile, while other
parts of the city are far, far less.
Jack May
> Oh yes. As soon as you hear 'choice,' hold onto your wallet.
> Choice=high taxes.
Yes, in the SF Bay area, "choice" has put transportation agencies in serious
financial trouble and scrambling to raise taxes and bridge tolls.
Such a nice word; "Choice". Such a financial hell hole created by the nice
word.
George Conklin
Choice also implies that we have been the silent victim of evil
developers. I am perfectly willing to vote against bad development and do
so every month. But some of the WORST development is supported by planners,
making it very hard to deal with. Planners also discourage single-family
houses. As I have gotten to know developers better, I am told a lot of what
goes on with planning staff, who of course, deny it all, but some of us know
things from many sources including elected officials who will talk privately
about the same things they face.
Joey Jolley
Okay, Cadman. I'll ask you point-blank. Do you think we should
shrink communities that have already been built (post-World War II)
back down to pre-World War II size, do away with existing
single-family neighborhoods, and force everybody to live in the city
when that kind of a life is clearly not for everybody? And what do you
think our metropolitan areas such as Los Angeles and Salt Lake City
will look like in twenty years and what the primary form of
transportation will be?
Also what will happen to our existing roads and what if people if
single-family home subdivisions and drive to their destinations?
Joey Jolley
George Conklin
That would have to include forced migration of people to remote rural
areas, from which they came.
Baxter
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
Free software - Baxter Codeworks www.baxcode.com
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
"Joey Jolley" <john...@qwest.net> wrote in message
news:fcf7d88f.04102...@posting.google.com...
> Okay, Baxter. But what about existing city land-area sizes?
What about them?
Portland continues to grow in land-area - slowly, as provided by State
Land-Use laws -- the growth is in keeping with or lower than the population
growth.
cadman009
well, no. i'm not sure i'd necessarily go along with anything quite
as radical as what you're describing. personally, i think there is
probably going to continue to be plenty of call for conventional
suburban neighborhoods. i don't think anybody should outlaw them
altogether, i just think we need more alternatives available that
allow people some choices as to whether they want to live in traffic
jams or not.
off the top of my head i think projecting out 20 years isn't going to
see a whole lot of changes. even if communities start now making
changes in their planning and zoning and allowing more new
urbanist-esque design, it would take many years for a whole lot of
existing communities to start seeing much improvement. that's just
off the top of my head, of course, i'm not experienced enough and
haven't read enough to tell you what the experts would say about this.
i think it'll happen gradually, and that lack of choice will not be a
problem. if there continues to be the demand in the market for
isolated suburbs they will continue to be built. i think the demand
is definitely very high for new urbanist-type alternatives, though.
hopefully, one thing you will probably see in the next 20 years in
places like los angeles and salt lake city is for smaller centers and
edges to begin to take form within the existing sprawling communities.
it happens project by project. infill upgrades are going to happen
as older properties start falling apart and losing their appeal. the
smaller town centers and edges will have to be planned properly ahead
of time so that as new development is done over time it will begin to
take on the new shape and heal the present suburban monotony.
one thing i'm seeing in many of the new designs that are being done
out there now, is that a variety of living conditions are created on
purpose because of the fact that people really do want choices. there
are many hybrid communities for instance being designed all the time
by the firm i work for, because that's what the developers have
determined will sell. residential areas close to mixed use and
commercial centers tend to be higher density with lower density more
standard suburban design being done further away from the center. i
think this approach is probably what you'll continue to see for the
foreseeable future. just my non-expert opinion, of course.
what do you think about all this?
cadman009
> And what do you
> think our metropolitan areas such as Los Angeles and Salt Lake City
> will look like in twenty years and what the primary form of
> transportation will be?
i'm sure that in 20 years the primary form of transportation in metro
areas like la and slc will still be cars. i'm a realist in this
regard. it seems that the only time most americans will give up
driving and move to alternate modes of transportation is when they
simply can't afford to own 1 or 2 cars, can't get a driver's license
(too many dui's, for example) or when the hassles of driving outweigh
the benefits by a wide margin. the latter only seems to happen in big
downtowns where parking is outlandishly expensive and extremely
scarce.
>
> Also what will happen to our existing roads
existing roads will be redone when they need major repairs and/or when
enough changes are being made to nearby buildings to warrant major
overhauls.
> and what if people if
> single-family home subdivisions and drive to their destinations?
? not sure what you're trying to say here.
Joey Jolley
I think you've answered my question. If you want to discuss this
further, we can do it in private. Contact me at pica...@yahoo.com.
cadman009
> >
> >> There is no problem to fix.
> >
> > that's your contribution in a nutshell, isn't it? i think you're
> > projecting your happiness with your situation on everyone else in
> > america. the truth is, growing communities need solutions, and fast.
>
> People are still moving to the more remote areas. That is their solution
> to urban problems. You just want to force them to live where you have
> decided to put them.
>
>
> >
> > and what is it with your attitude that planning and planners are
> > somehow the only problem that exists in america?
>
> Planners hate the average person. If Bush wins the election, it will be
> because Democrats are now associated with the elites---as are planners.
>
i work for a planner, and i don't hate the average person. neither do
any of the people in my company that i know of. we are pretty average
people. i for one, am excited about the potential for my planning
work to effect average people in a very positive way. why wouldn't
most planners do their planning with average people in mind? average
people buy and/or use the properties that the developers hire us to
design. they'd be crazy not to accomodate them the best they can.
> why do you keep
> > insisting that there ever was a time that communities weren't planned
> > by someone? they always have been, and they always will be, unless we
> > revert to anarchy where all you will have time to plan for is to try
> > to keep your gun loaded in your bunker.
>
> Planning commissions are new. If you want to go back far enough, look
> at Philadelphia, where Wm. Penn laid out the city with one-acre lots. That
> was the ideal-type then as now. It is just that now planners no longer
> believe in the city.
william penn laid out the city, eh? sounds like planning to me.
planning commissions aren't new. community's have always been
planned. the question is what is good planning and what is poor
planning? that survey link i sent you earlier shows that more and
more people are getting fed up with traffic, just like me. if you
live in a community where traffic isn't that big of an issue, i'm
happy for you. it seems there are lots of people across the US who
don't.
i don't hate orlando, i love it. that's why i want to help it to be
the best it can be. having input into plans at the firm i work for is
one way i can do that. planning can be a good thing. what's so crazy
about the idea that maybe there are better ways to plan so that
traffic doesn't become a nightmare?
i think we're approaching agreement on at least one thing. i'm
concerned about the viability of businesses when they're too isolated
and surrounded by residences. i think a moderate approach is probably
best. i think we can bring commercial uses closer to residences
without taking it to an unhealthy extreme and causing the problems you
keep bringing up about businesses going bankrupt. i'm also not
completely buying the idea that many americans are going to switch to
using mass transit anytime in the near future. good planning will
continue to accomodate cars, though providing more alternatives does
have the potential of at least easing some traffic congestion.
George Conklin
High prices and crowded living in small dwelling units is postive hatred
of what the average person wants.
I am concerned with the homeowners in mixed land use areas who are
subject to crime due to a business being located next to and in housing
areas.
i think a moderate approach is probably
> best. i think we can bring commercial uses closer
Why bother? What is closer? They are close enough right now. We now
have in Durham oil change operations in neighborhood commercial. How often
do people walk to get their oil changed?
to residences
> without taking it to an unhealthy extreme and causing the problems you
> keep bringing up about businesses going bankrupt. i'm also not
> completely buying the idea that many americans are going to switch to
> using mass transit anytime in the near future. good planning will
> continue to accomodate cars, though providing more alternatives does
> have the potential of at least easing some traffic congestion.
According to the NYT this week, the true cost of a fare in NYC is $4.00,
with the fare at $1.75. The taxpayer who does not use the system pays for
the rest. Is that a good choice?
Baxter
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
Free software - Baxter Codeworks www.baxcode.com
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
"George Conklin" <georgec...@earthlink.net> wrote in message
news:x9Cfd.8117$KJ6....@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net...
>
>
> High prices and crowded living in small dwelling units is postive
hatred
> of what the average person wants.
>
The waiting lists for units in the Pearl District say you're a liar George.
cadman009
> "cadman009" <cadm...@lycos.com> wrote in message
> news:ed63b9d2.04102...@posting.google.com...
> > "George Conklin" <nil...@earthlink.net> wrote in message
> news:<6ZWdd.3891$5i5...@newsread2.news.atl.earthlink.net>...
> > > "cadman009" <cadm...@lycos.com> wrote in message
> > > news:ed63b9d2.04102...@posting.google.com...
> > > > "George Conklin" <georgec...@earthlink.net> wrote in message
> > > > news:<3rNdd.3191$KJ6...@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>...
> > > >
> > > >> There is no problem to fix.
> > > >
> > > > that's your contribution in a nutshell, isn't it? i think you're
> > > > projecting your happiness with your situation on everyone else in
> > > > america. the truth is, growing communities need solutions, and fast.
> > >
> > > People are still moving to the more remote areas. That is their
> solution
> > > to urban problems. You just want to force them to live where you have
> > > decided to put them.
uh-huh...(?) again, you're making no sense. good planning creates
better communities, but i don't think it forces anyone to live in
them.
> > >
> > >
> > > >
> > > > and what is it with your attitude that planning and planners are
> > > > somehow the only problem that exists in america?
> > >
> > > Planners hate the average person. If Bush wins the election, it will
> be
> > > because Democrats are now associated with the elites---as are planners.
> > >
> >
> > i work for a planner, and i don't hate the average person. neither do
> > any of the people in my company that i know of. we are pretty average
> > people. i for one, am excited about the potential for my planning
> > work to effect average people in a very positive way.
>
> High prices and crowded living in small dwelling units is postive hatred
> of what the average person wants.
>
so, all planners advocate what you are describing here? i don't think
so.
>
> why wouldn't
> > most planners do their planning with average people in mind? average
> > people buy and/or use the properties that the developers hire us to
> > design. they'd be crazy not to accomodate them the best they can.
> >
> > > why do you keep
> > > > insisting that there ever was a time that communities weren't planned
> > > > by someone? they always have been, and they always will be, unless we
> > > > revert to anarchy where all you will have time to plan for is to try
> > > > to keep your gun loaded in your bunker.
> > >
> > > Planning commissions are new. If you want to go back far enough,
> look
> > > at Philadelphia, where Wm. Penn laid out the city with one-acre lots.
> That
> > > was the ideal-type then as now. It is just that now planners no longer
> > > believe in the city.
> >
> > william penn laid out the city, eh? sounds like planning to me.
> > planning commissions aren't new. community's have always been
> > planned. the question is what is good planning and what is poor
> > planning? that survey link i sent you earlier shows that more and
> > more people are getting fed up with traffic, just like me. if you
> > live in a community where traffic isn't that big of an issue, i'm
> > happy for you. it seems there are lots of people across the US who
> > don't.
so, where is it that you live, anyhow, george?
> >
> > i don't hate orlando, i love it. that's why i want to help it to be
> > the best it can be. having input into plans at the firm i work for is
> > one way i can do that. planning can be a good thing. what's so crazy
> > about the idea that maybe there are better ways to plan so that
> > traffic doesn't become a nightmare?
> >
> > i think we're approaching agreement on at least one thing. i'm
> > concerned about the viability of businesses when they're too isolated
> > and surrounded by residences.
>
> I am concerned with the homeowners in mixed land use areas who are
> subject to crime due to a business being located next to and in housing
> areas.
>
>
> i think a moderate approach is probably
> > best. i think we can bring commercial uses closer
>
> Why bother? What is closer? They are close enough right now. We now
> have in Durham oil change operations in neighborhood commercial. How often
> do people walk to get their oil changed?
you don't believe there's a traffic problem in our growing metro
areas, so why would you care about trying to find a solution? the
problem does exist, however. until you face that reality we're just
talking past each other. when i talk about commercial uses, i'm not
just talking about retail. i'm also talking about offices where
people can live closer to their work. there's absolutely no reason
why offices should be separated miles away from residences. can't you
see this institutionalizes congestion? oh, yeah, you don't believe
congestion exists, do you? i forgot for a second. sorry.
George Conklin
I challenge the idea that planning creates communities. Planning
creates houses in locations which planners want them in, but there is no
evidence that higher density creates communities. Rather, it makes
interpersonal relations harder as density goes up. If people wanted to live
such places they would demand such housing, which they have NOT.
Traffic was ALWAYS a problem in the urban areas. It is nothing new. The
longest commutes are in NYC where transit is most common. Transit basically
doubles commute times. I am not sure why you think that congested cities
are new. They always have been that way.
until you face that reality we're just
> talking past each other.
Cities are less congested today than they were 100 years ago.
when i talk about commercial uses, i'm not
> just talking about retail. i'm also talking about offices where
> people can live closer to their work.
The industrial city was always organized around travel. When Chicago
was a walking city in the pre-rail era, it was of necessity small. Half of
the population lived within 3.2 miles of the center. When the trolley car
came in, that radius extended to 12 miles. It enabled the city to grow.
Downtowns demanded travel to work. The old cellular city failed and the new
transit-oriented travel-oriented industrial city started.
there's absolutely no reason
> why offices should be separated miles away from residences.
See above. The offices would not be needed until the transit-oriented
city began anyway. Sears, for example, was a Chicago employer who shipped
goods all over the country. It was totally dependent on the rail system to
exist at all. Workers likewise got there by trolleys. Chicago was your
famous transit city.
can't you
> see this institutionalizes congestion? oh, yeah, you don't believe
> congestion exists, do you? i forgot for a second. sorry.
Congestion is less today than it ever was.
Baxter
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
Free software - Baxter Codeworks www.baxcode.com
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
"George Conklin" <georgec...@earthlink.net> wrote in message
news:2Bqgd.5666$kM....@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net...
>
>
> I challenge the idea that planning creates communities. Planning
> creates houses in locations which planners want them in, but there is no
> evidence that higher density creates communities. Rather, it makes
> interpersonal relations harder as density goes up. If people wanted to
live
> such places they would demand such housing, which they have NOT.
>
Then those waiting lists for condos in the Pearl District are not "demand"?
Interesting dictionary you use, georgie porgie. Oh, and those people in the
crowded, dense Pearl District DO feel a sense of community.
cadman009
> > uh-huh...(?) again, you're making no sense. good planning creates
> > better communities, but i don't think it forces anyone to live in
> > them.
> >
>
> I challenge the idea that planning creates communities. Planning
> creates houses in locations which planners want them in, but there is no
> evidence that higher density creates communities. Rather, it makes
> interpersonal relations harder as density goes up. If people wanted to live
> such places they would demand such housing, which they have NOT.
>
people are moving to communities with smaller centers and mixed uses
in droves. 2 cases in point in orlando are avalon park and baldwin
park. the housing in these communities is a mixture of densities.
they are just a little too high-density for my personal taste, but
people are moving in like crazy. apparently there's plenty of demand.
like i've said before, i think planners and developers will do well
to provide more hybrid communities where higher and lower densities
are both made available. let the individual buyers make their own
choices in that regard.
>
>
> > so, where is it that you live, anyhow, george?
> >
> > you don't believe there's a traffic problem in our growing metro
> > areas, so why would you care about trying to find a solution? the
> > problem does exist, however.
>
> Traffic was ALWAYS a problem in the urban areas. It is nothing new. The
> longest commutes are in NYC where transit is most common. Transit basically
> doubles commute times. I am not sure why you think that congested cities
> are new. They always have been that way.
>
>
>
> until you face that reality we're just
> > talking past each other.
>
> Cities are less congested today than they were 100 years ago.
>
>
> when i talk about commercial uses, i'm not
> > just talking about retail. i'm also talking about offices where
> > people can live closer to their work.
>
> The industrial city was always organized around travel. When Chicago
> was a walking city in the pre-rail era, it was of necessity small. Half of
> the population lived within 3.2 miles of the center. When the trolley car
> came in, that radius extended to 12 miles. It enabled the city to grow.
> Downtowns demanded travel to work. The old cellular city failed and the new
> transit-oriented travel-oriented industrial city started.
the cellular city didn't fail. it was virtually destroyed by an
experiment called suburbanism. suburbanism is now failing. it's time
we move on to the next experiment. this time, we should draw from and
learn from the past as well as seek to be innovative. modern, 20th
century planning, for the most part threw out all the principles
learned over the previous centuries in favor of a completely new
auto-centric idea. new urbanist planning brings sensibility back into
the mix. why do the old cities have such beauty and draw tourists
from all around the world? why can't the places we live in be works
of art and places that are pleasant to live and work in? i happen to
believe we can do a lot better than the standard canned spam suburbia
that we've tended to produce for the last 50 years.
>
>
>
> there's absolutely no reason
> > why offices should be separated miles away from residences.
>
> See above. The offices would not be needed until the transit-oriented
> city began anyway. Sears, for example, was a Chicago employer who shipped
> goods all over the country. It was totally dependent on the rail system to
> exist at all. Workers likewise got there by trolleys. Chicago was your
> famous transit city.
what does this have to do with anything? cities will be better if we
create smaller centers closer to residences. we won't be forcing
people to drive on congested highways if they prefer not to.
conventional separation of uses produces traffic congestion by forcing
people to travel farther to fill their daily needs of getting to work
and/or school, shopping, entertainment, and back home.
>
> can't you
> > see this institutionalizes congestion? oh, yeah, you don't believe
> > congestion exists, do you? i forgot for a second. sorry.
>
> Congestion is less today than it ever was.
statistics across the US don't support your theory. here's an excerpt
from an interesting article i found on this subject:
Has traffic reached the crisis point needed to spur action in America?
A survey of voters' attitudes about growth conducted by the
Washington, D.C.– based National Association of Realtors in 2001 found
that much of the anxiety about growth was traffic related, with open
space an important but secondary concern. Respondents reported much
higher dissatisfaction with their communities' efforts to ease traffic
congestion on local roads and highways (58 percent) than providing
parks and open space (39 percent). The National Association of Home
Builders (NAHB), also based in the District of Columbia, surveyed
attitudes toward growth at the end of 1999 in metropolitan Atlanta,
Denver, Minneapolis–St. Paul, San Diego, and Washington, D.C., and
discovered that about 80 percent of respondents in each area reported
that traffic congestion was a problem, with about half, or those in
all but Minneapolis–St. Paul, claiming it was a big problem. A
national survey of Americans' attitudes toward growth issues
commissioned by Smart Growth America, a nationwide coalition that
promotes smart growth and transportation choices, in September 2000
reported that 54 percent of respondents said traffic in their area had
gotten worse over the last three years.
http://experts.uli.org/Content/ResFellows/Dunphy/Dunphy_C20.htm
George Conklin
> "George Conklin" <georgec...@earthlink.net> wrote in message
> news:<2Bqgd.5666$kM....@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net>...
>> > uh-huh...(?) again, you're making no sense. good planning creates
>> > better communities, but i don't think it forces anyone to live in
>> > them.
>> >
>>
>> I challenge the idea that planning creates communities. Planning
>> creates houses in locations which planners want them in, but there is no
>> evidence that higher density creates communities. Rather, it makes
>> interpersonal relations harder as density goes up. If people wanted to
>> live
>> such places they would demand such housing, which they have NOT.
>>
>
> people are moving to communities with smaller centers and mixed uses
> in droves. 2 cases in point in orlando are avalon park and baldwin
> park. the housing in these communities is a mixture of densities.
> they are just a little too high-density for my personal taste, but
> people are moving in like crazy. apparently there's plenty of demand.
> like i've said before, i think planners and developers will do well
> to provide more hybrid communities where higher and lower densities
> are both made available. let the individual buyers make their own
> choices in that regard.
>
1% of the market is not a trend. Further, places like Celebration are
put up as the future since houses have almost no land with them and you have
to have any amusements in little park-like stuff in the middle of the
street. People with tons of money have moved in, but Celebration is
basically a failure with a lot of money invested.
The cellular city failed due to the trolley car system. It make the
industrial city possible. You cannot have factories with walking cities.
You cannot have anything other than people living with cottage industry in
their houses with a walking city. Suburbanization had zero to do with the
end of the walking cellular city. It simply was not possible to have that
city and still have transportation which made it possible for more than 20%
of the population of an area to live in cities. With only 1-2% of the
population today farming, cities cannot revert back to where they were in
the pre-industrial era.
suburbanism is now failing. it's time
> we move on to the next experiment. this time, we should draw from and
> learn from the past as well as seek to be innovative. modern, 20th
> century planning, for the most part threw out all the principles
> learned over the previous centuries in favor of a completely new
> auto-centric idea.
Modern urban organization did not depend on cars. Downtowns depended on
fixed-rail transit, which destroyed the cellular city.
cadman009
i don't hold up celebration as a great example, though it is a
successful one. on what do you base your evaluation of it as a
failure? i don't think it's the best example because it is too fakey.
it has a real downtown, but the whole place feels too much like a
movie set. i don't think that's what new urbanists are generally
after. one of the complaints about conventional suburbanism in some
of the new urbanist literature that i've read is that suburbanism is
too fakey. it's not authentic country or city, but a poor imitation
of elements of both. new urbanists are bringing variety and artistry
back into community planning and generally oppose the suburban track
house mentality. another criticism of suburbanism is the fact that
most strip malls don't take into account the history of the area they
are built in. they're generic, off-the-shelf designs that turn our
individual communities into bland, boring, imaginationless, monotonous
places. new urbanism views planning as true design and not just
enforcement of zoning and setbacks. it's a return to the traditional
idea that communities should be planned so that the parts all
contribute to the whole. conventional planning usually fails in that
regard.
>
>
>
>
> >>
> >>
> >> > so, where is it that you live, anyhow, george?
oh, yeah. where do you live? i'm really curious. i'm assuming it's
somewhere in north carolina.
> > the cellular city didn't fail. it was virtually destroyed by an
> > experiment called suburbanism.
>
> The cellular city failed due to the trolley car system. It make the
> industrial city possible. You cannot have factories with walking cities.
> You cannot have anything other than people living with cottage industry in
> their houses with a walking city. Suburbanization had zero to do with the
> end of the walking cellular city. It simply was not possible to have that
> city and still have transportation which made it possible for more than 20%
> of the population of an area to live in cities. With only 1-2% of the
> population today farming, cities cannot revert back to where they were in
> the pre-industrial era.
expand your imagination, man. walking cities are indeed possible.
i'm not advocating that all other forms of transportation be
abolished, but we could certainly do a better job of accomodating
pedestrian activity in many of our communities. i think this would be
a desirable thing. when pedestrians are not considered we force
people to drive when they might not choose to do so given the right
pedestrian facilities. you're always saying choice is better and what
people want. why don't you think we should design with transportation
choices in mind?
>
> suburbanism is now failing. it's time
> > we move on to the next experiment. this time, we should draw from and
> > learn from the past as well as seek to be innovative. modern, 20th
> > century planning, for the most part threw out all the principles
> > learned over the previous centuries in favor of a completely new
> > auto-centric idea.
>
>
> Modern urban organization did not depend on cars. Downtowns depended on
> fixed-rail transit, which destroyed the cellular city.
yes, i understand that rail transit was an important part in the
evolution of cities. we're not in any real disagreement there.
modern, conventional design though nowadays is almost completely
automobile-centered to the exclusion of all other modes. new urbanism
is a reordering of priorities so that the automobile is no longer the
over-riding consideration but is balanced out with pedestrian and mass
transit.
Baxter
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
Free software - Baxter Codeworks www.baxcode.com
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
"cadman009" <cadm...@lycos.com> wrote in message
news:ed63b9d2.04110...@posting.google.com...
> pedestrian facilities. you're always saying choice is better and what
> people want. why don't you think we should design with transportation
> choices in mind?
>
The only thing Conklin, Cote et al are good for is a) to laugh at, and/or b)
to help clarify your own thoughts on a particular subject (they're little
more than bots - maybe they *are* bots), and/or c) typing practice -- I've
much improved my typing skills since I subscribed to amUsenet.
George Conklin
I toured Celebration and took several rolls of pictures. Basically it is
a pice of suburbia with a lot of propaganda attached. Celebration however
is fake, as in stage set. For example, I have pictures of a house which
inside is what you would call a story and a half. But outside it looks
twice as high. Why? Because the upper half is fake, complete with
painted-on windows. The glass is not there, but the wood is painted black.
The so-called Idea House is the same. This is stage-set tricks.
one of the complaints about conventional suburbanism in some
> of the new urbanist literature that i've read is that suburbanism is
> too fakey. it's not authentic country or city, but a poor imitation
> of elements of both.
Why do planners state there must be a sharp division between city and
country? I have never understood why this is a planning criteria. But
Celebration is built largely as a stage set, with fake tops to buildings so
they can say do NOT look alike. A cottage-style house with about as much
room a a single-wide trailer cost over $200,000. That is why I say it was a
failure: half the house for twice the money.
new urbanists are bringing variety and artistry
> back into community planning
As Celebration did, where customers pay large sums for fake roofs?
and generally oppose the suburban track
> house mentality.
The reason why houses often look alike is to hold down the cost. The
same thing happened in NYC where even brownstones (which today cost $1
million or more) looked a like, row after row.
another criticism of suburbanism is the fact that
> most strip malls don't take into account the history of the area they
> are built in.
Cities constantly tore down and rebuilt areas in the industrial era.
they're generic, off-the-shelf designs that turn our
> individual communities into bland, boring, imaginationless, monotonous
> places.
Industrial cities were the same...row after row of look-alike stores,
for example. I have several books which explain that. I also have pictures
of the cast-iron store fronts which were mass marketed in their era. Local
store keepers purchased them from suppliers and nailed them to the front of
their buildings. They look quaint today...in fact, the picture I have
states that the store is ready for rehabbing into an antique shop. But
these stores were the home of mass production of their era. The hand-made
was NOT urban. Rather, it was RURAL. Urban was and remains the home of
mass production.
new urbanism views planning as true design and not just
> enforcement of zoning and setbacks. it's a return to the traditional
> idea that communities should be planned so that the parts all
> contribute to the whole. conventional planning usually fails in that
> regard.
>
Those old so-called quaint buildings were mass production for their era.
They also were NOT built under the guise of planners.
>>
>> The cellular city failed due to the trolley car system. It make the
>> industrial city possible. You cannot have factories with walking cities.
>> You cannot have anything other than people living with cottage industry
>> in
>> their houses with a walking city. Suburbanization had zero to do with
>> the
>> end of the walking cellular city. It simply was not possible to have
>> that
>> city and still have transportation which made it possible for more than
>> 20%
>> of the population of an area to live in cities. With only 1-2% of the
>> population today farming, cities cannot revert back to where they were in
>> the pre-industrial era.
>
> expand your imagination, man. walking cities are indeed possible.
No, demographically they are IMPOSSIBLE. The large industrial city
could not exist without the end of the walking city. What are you going to
walk to? People are not happy having to live in a factory, are they?
Workers wanted to get AWAY from that. The bosses certain did too.
> i'm not advocating that all other forms of transportation be
> abolished, but we could certainly do a better job of accomodating
> pedestrian activity in many of our communities. i think this would be
> a desirable thing. when pedestrians are not considered we force
> people to drive when they might not choose to do so given the right
> pedestrian facilities. you're always saying choice is better and what
> people want. why don't you think we should design with transportation
> choices in mind?
People never walked in the industrial city if they could avoid it. They
had trolleys and buses and subways. NYC wants to build a subway on second
avenue so people don't have to walk two blocks to the subway. Remember, I
grew up without a car and know all about using public transportation. Yes,
my father could walk to work. The rest of us had about 1 hour each way.
Unless husband and wife work in the same place, someone must travel, and
often at great distance. Nor is walking to buy food, as we did,
interesting. It is a chore with very limited choice. Walking limits choice
of food to whatever it is some local store wants to sell. Walking LIMITS
your choices severely. You also cannot carry much home with you. So you go
to the store daily. For example, on Suday to get ice cream we had to run to
a local bakery, buy the ice cream, and hurry home to eat it (refrigerators
did not have a deep freeze section then). Or today you could walk home with
the ice cream but not from far away or it would melt.
>
>>
>> suburbanism is now failing. it's time
>> > we move on to the next experiment. this time, we should draw from and
>> > learn from the past as well as seek to be innovative. modern, 20th
>> > century planning, for the most part threw out all the principles
>> > learned over the previous centuries in favor of a completely new
>> > auto-centric idea.
>>
>>
>> Modern urban organization did not depend on cars. Downtowns depended
>> on
>> fixed-rail transit, which destroyed the cellular city.
>
> yes, i understand that rail transit was an important part in the
> evolution of cities. we're not in any real disagreement there.
> modern, conventional design though nowadays is almost completely
> automobile-centered to the exclusion of all other modes.
Before cars, the city was trolley-dependent. Before that they used horses
and mules on fixed rails. But what did trolley cars in? Cost. They were
very expensive to run and maintain. The trolley car peaked out in terms of
revenue return in 1914. By the 1950s, there was no way to pay any of the
bills and the old tracks were worn out.
new urbanism
> is a reordering of priorities so that the automobile is no longer the
> over-riding consideration but is balanced out with pedestrian and mass
> transit.
That is what they say, but the result is high cost, high crime, and
people crammed into smaller and smaller places to live. Calthorpe has a
long history of money-problems because what new urbanism is is quite simple:
high cost living. People posting here in the past have proclaimed that 850
square feet is big enough for any family. That and even smaller units are
what is required for the new urbanism to get off the ground. That is why
they make fun of McMansions...anything other than a small unit get a sigma
attached to it. Do you really want to live over a McDonalds? Or over a
Mexican restaurant, or any restaurant? You would be bathed in exhaust
fumes, smelly garbage, noise at all hours and so forth and so on.
cadman009
thanks for the heads-up. i did figure that out pretty quickly with
george, but it's all good. i can enjoy a lively discussion with just
about anybody. i've enjoyed your insightful posts, by the way. i'm
learning as quickly as i can. planning is a new direction for my
career. i'm having a blast with it so far. i only wish i'd thought
of pursuing this a few years ago.
Baxter
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
Free software - Baxter Codeworks www.baxcode.com
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
"cadman009" <cadm...@lycos.com> wrote in message
news:ed63b9d2.04110...@posting.google.com...
>
> thanks for the heads-up. i did figure that out pretty quickly with
> george, but it's all good. i can enjoy a lively discussion with just
> about anybody. i've enjoyed your insightful posts, by the way. i'm
> learning as quickly as i can. planning is a new direction for my
> career. i'm having a blast with it so far. i only wish i'd thought
> of pursuing this a few years ago.
You might be interested in investigating Portland (OR) planning - and the
now probably defunct Oregon Land-Use planning. Some good information at
http://www.friends.org/
George Conklin
Baxter is a joke. I took the time to type out basic standard urban
sociology and the history of the city because I thought you might learn some
FActs. But I guess you are one of those damn-the-facts types.
cadman009
> >> >> I challenge the idea that planning creates communities. Planning
> >> >> creates houses in locations which planners want them in, but there is
> >> >> no
> >> >> evidence that higher density creates communities. Rather, it makes
> >> >> interpersonal relations harder as density goes up. If people wanted
> >> >> to
> >> >> live
> >> >> such places they would demand such housing, which they have NOT.
> >> >>
> >> >
sounds like you will be very quick to challenge just about any good
idea. i don't agree with the simplistic idea that good design will
automatically make people nicer. i've heard that suggested before. i
don't quite buy it. i do believe however that a good well-designed
outdoor environment can help people to be healthier and happier. i'm
also not suggesting that higher density is the answer to all of our
ills. you must not be paying much attention to who you're posting to.
you're barking up the wrong tree. good planning creates better
communities. planning in the sense i am using it is by definition
about designing communities. i'm not talking about creating a utopia.
i'm just talking about designing cities, towns, villages, and
neighborhoods, and helping them to be decent places to work and live.
> >> > people are moving to communities with smaller centers and mixed uses
> >> > in droves. 2 cases in point in orlando are avalon park and baldwin
> >> > park. the housing in these communities is a mixture of densities.
> >> > they are just a little too high-density for my personal taste, but
> >> > people are moving in like crazy. apparently there's plenty of demand.
> >> > like i've said before, i think planners and developers will do well
> >> > to provide more hybrid communities where higher and lower densities
> >> > are both made available. let the individual buyers make their own
> >> > choices in that regard.
> >> >
> >>
> >> 1% of the market is not a trend.
i'm not sure where you're getting your figures. i have read for quite
a number of years now about communities that promise the things new
urbanists are finally able to accomplish. people have been dreaming
for years about living in newly built communities where they can live
within walking distance of shopping and have lots of nice parks to
walk and hang out in. back in the 80's community planners tried to
provide such places and came up against the fact that conventional,
post ww2 codes don't allow it, and banks wouldn't loan any money for
such communities. now public opinion is finally winning out and
communities are beginning to consider codes that allow mixed uses.
banks are following suit and starting to loan money for projects that
revive the old tradition of town-making. it is a trend, my friend.
you're basing everything on your personal taste here. to say
celebration is a failure is simply not true. celebration continues to
grow and thrive. like i say, i agree that it's too fake, but it's not
a failure. housing prices are very much out of control in the orlando
area in general. the fact that celebration's prices are slightly
higher than everage for orlando is an indication that there continues
to be a higher demand to live there than in other parts of the region.
i think it would actually be a much nicer place to live than most
standard suburbs. as other communities are built with the amenities
that the market is craving, the prices in celebration will likely have
to start leveling off to stay competitive. sorry, but your
generalization that new urbanist communities aren't in demand is shown
here to be completely false. the higher prices in celbration are
proof of that.
>
>
>
>
> new urbanists are bringing variety and artistry
> > back into community planning
>
> As Celebration did, where customers pay large sums for fake roofs?
>
the architecture in celebration is at least imaginitive and appeals to
a great many people. however, new urbanists generally agree that
authenticity and organic growth will produce better communities as
compared to the contrived imitation that is evident in celebration.
celebration's downtown is an unusual case in this regard.
>
>
> and generally oppose the suburban track
> > house mentality.
>
> The reason why houses often look alike is to hold down the cost. The
> same thing happened in NYC where even brownstones (which today cost $1
> million or more) looked a like, row after row.
you're apparantly missing my point that suburbia tends to leave out
artistry. that's not to discount that urban track houses can be
equally bad. i don't hold up urban design in general as being
superior just because it's urban. i would tend to say though that
older traditional communities tend to be more attractive because of
the fact that they tended to follow ancient and traditional rules of
layout and massing that have worked for centuries. modern design has
all but obliterated the old landscapes of many of our cities.
>
>
> another criticism of suburbanism is the fact that
> > most strip malls don't take into account the history of the area they
> > are built in.
>
> Cities constantly tore down and rebuilt areas in the industrial era.
>
yeah, but traditional architecture used to take the surroundings into
account and preserve the existing patterns. modern strip malls are
usually built with each store looking exactly the way that store looks
all across the country. this works for branding and bringing
attention to the individual store, but it makes for a bland, jumbled
streetscape with no sense of unity.
>
>
> they're generic, off-the-shelf designs that turn our
> > individual communities into bland, boring, imaginationless, monotonous
> > places.
>
> Industrial cities were the same...row after row of look-alike stores,
> for example. I have several books which explain that. I also have pictures
> of the cast-iron store fronts which were mass marketed in their era. Local
> store keepers purchased them from suppliers and nailed them to the front of
> their buildings. They look quaint today...in fact, the picture I have
> states that the store is ready for rehabbing into an antique shop. But
> these stores were the home of mass production of their era. The hand-made
> was NOT urban. Rather, it was RURAL. Urban was and remains the home of
> mass production.
>
artistry in architecture was valued highly years ago. modern
buildings are usually devoid of detailed imbellishments. this is
because everything is geared to cars passing by at highway speeds.
car-centered design degrades everything. you're looking at the wrong
history books. the industrial era was the beginning of modernism and
the degradation of architecture. traditional architecture was
pre-industrial.
>
>
> new urbanism views planning as true design and not just
> > enforcement of zoning and setbacks. it's a return to the traditional
> > idea that communities should be planned so that the parts all
> > contribute to the whole. conventional planning usually fails in that
> > regard.
> >
>
> Those old so-called quaint buildings were mass production for their era.
> They also were NOT built under the guise of planners.
>
i'm not just talking about buildings being considered art. i'm also
talking about how traditional community plans used to consider the
inclusion of greens and parks as a necessary part of making a
community livable. focal points such as town squares are pretty much
a thing of the past. they used to be considered essential, and they
are essential as it turns out. without them we don't have a sense of
where we are. we're at the 15,000th strip mall on the right. it just
doesn't feel like home.
cadman009
> "the wonderer" <thewond...@lycos.com> wrote in message
> news:5b4cddc8.04101...@posting.google.com...> news:<9YWcd.637$5i5...@newsread2.news.atl.earthlink.net>...
> > > > Here in the Netherlands,
> > >
> > > Here we go again. Only people in Europe know how to live and those of
> us
> > > in the USA are fools for not living like they do somewhere else.
> > >
> >
> > what are you? some kind of pro-american, anti-everybody-else bigot?
> > that'll win you a lot of credibility with intelligent people!
> >
>
> The old academic rant that Europe is the home of culture is bankrupt.
> Give it up.
>
>
> > >
> > > pretty much every neighborhood (even new-
> > > > built ones) seems to include space for neighborhood shops. They
> > > > will vary with the neighborhood, of course. For a small
> > > > neighborhood of family homes, this may mean a butcher, baker,
> > > > greengrocer, and newsstand.
> > >
> > > And why would anyone want to pay convenience store prices? Maybe
> YOU
> > > do.
> > >
> > >
> > > For a more populous neighborhood
> > > > including a number of apartment blocks, this may mean two
> > > > supermarkets, a couple of cafes, a pet shop, a wine and liquor
> > > > merchant, and a druggist, as well. (These are two actual examples
> > > > close to me.)
> > > >
> > > > And the same sort of thing (though perhaps not in as throughgoing
> > > > a manner) holds true in the more traditional urban areas of the
> > > > US in which I have lived. And here, just as in the US, there are
> > > > many other things that aren't really "neighborhood" items. For
> > > > clothing, electronics, bedroom and bath furnishings, etc., one
> > > > will likely head into the city center or to a larger shopping area,
> > > > and for major items, such as furniture, home appliances, building
> > > > materials, etc., one may head out of town entirely
> > > >
> > >
> > > City center for eletronics and furniture? Are you kidding? You
> would
> > > pay through the nose to shop in such stores. You need big box stores
> for
> > > that kind of thing.
> >
> > um, george, you really missed this one. i'm pretty sure he is talking
> > about big box stores being in the city centers.
> >
>
> Mostly they are NOT in city centers. And for good reasons too.
what would be those good reasons?
>
>
> > > On the other hand, my house is furnished almost
> > > entirely with used furniture and some of it does come from
> out-of-business
> > > department stores with the sign Antiques hanging over the door. Those
> > > stores are re-selling what they originally sold but about 50 years
> later.
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > > > But -- to conclude this now overly long message -- the point is
> > > > that many types of businesses don't really need any "drive-by
> > > > traffic" from outside the neighborhood in order to succeed,
> > >
> > > Even restaurants trying out the New Urbanism jive in the USA find
> they go
> > > bankrupt. Why? People get tired of the local restaurant after a few
> tries
> > > and then drive to new areas. But since parking is limited by the
> anti-car
> > > lobby, the restaurants cannot complete for new customers to replace the
> lost
> > > ones. They go broke.
> >
> > this is the kind of thing i'm addressing when i say that planners must
> > not allow this situation to occur. the retail and commercial stuff
> > near the neighborhoods must be designed so that they have plenty of
> > potential customers.
>
> You are not going to 'allow' stores to go broke? My my.
>
good planning won't place businesses where they won't get enough
traffic. this would almost surely make them go broke.
> it might take some analysis along with some
> > common sense to ensure that retail and commercial uses aren't too
> > isolated in the quest for close proximity to homes.
>
> And you must guarantee that people who live nearby must shop at the store
> you choose for them? I have news for you. They all go bankrupt.
you don't comprehend what you read very well, do you? i'm addressing
the very same problem you are, dummy. what, do you just love to argue
even if it means arguing with people who agree with you?
>
>
> a good plan will
> > avoid burying the businesses too far away from drive-by traffic. well
> > designed village and town centers will either draw people in from the
> > outside or catch them as they drive by.
> >
>
> That is why big box stores succeed and the New Urbanism bankrupts
> business. It is nice to think of everyone buying at small stores, but I
> know I cannot afford it.
i know that my interpretation of things may not be indicative of the
average new urbanist. i'm new to this stuff. i also like to think
for myself, and tend not to buy into any philosophy wholesale. the
logic that i am following as my understanding grows is that we can
take the current mix of businesses that you typically find in
conventional strips and rearrange them into centers that are more
attractive and more accessible to residences. the mix of small and
big stores can remain pretty much the same as it is now, it's just
their locations that we're messing around with. i abhor the drive
down semoran blvd. in altamonte springs so i pretty much hardly ever
go there. it's a standard commercial strip, only it goes on for miles
and miles with no breaks. the road is 8 lanes wide in some spots with
driveways in and out of shopping plazas so often that you're
constantly having to dodge the cars that are zipping in and out of the
travel lanes. the traffic is wall-to-wall, and the entire scene is
very unpleasant. my theory is that all these businesses being in one
long strip is actually hurting their business. the individual
businesses get lost in the shuffle, and there are many people like me
who elect to shop in other, more user-friendly areas rather than brave
that asphalt jungle. if planners would break up strips like this into
smaller centers in user-friendly towns and villages they wouldn't be
forcing anyone to shop in small stores. the centers would have the
same mix as the strip, only in a much more pleasant environment.
can't you just hear the birds chirping in the park that runs through
the center of it all? wow, that's a much better sound than the sound
of a thousand motors running waiting for the light to change at an 6-
or 8-lane intersection.
>
>
> > i would also say that having a couple of local restaurants
> > strategically located in a village or town center if done properly can
> > potentially get lots of business from within and without the local
> > community.
>
> Until they get tired of it and then they go bankrupt. That is
> well-documented.
bankrupt, bankrupt, bankrupt. was that the word of the day on your
calendar when you wrote this or something? what is well documented is
that people hate traffic jams and love small towns. i think i've
already asked you this about 6 times. where do you live? do you mind
telling me? i'm really curious. it might help me to understand your
frame of reference. apparently you don't live in a sprawling,
populous community if you don't think traffic is a problem for people.
George Conklin
> news:<qvdid.17581$5i5....@newsread2.news.atl.earthlink.net>...
>> >> >> I challenge the idea that planning creates communities.
>> >> >> Planning
>> >> >> creates houses in locations which planners want them in, but there
>> >> >> is
>> >> >> no
>> >> >> evidence that higher density creates communities. Rather, it makes
>> >> >> interpersonal relations harder as density goes up. If people
>> >> >> wanted
>> >> >> to
>> >> >> live
>> >> >> such places they would demand such housing, which they have NOT.
>> >> >>
>> >> >
>
> sounds like you will be very quick to challenge just about any good
> idea. i don't agree with the simplistic idea that good design will
> automatically make people nicer. i've heard that suggested before. i
> don't quite buy it. i do believe however that a good well-designed
> outdoor environment can help people to be healthier and happier.
From looking at real neighborhoods, the cul-de-sac neighborhoods built
since 1945 maximize community, health and happiness based on factual data.
i'm
> also not suggesting that higher density is the answer to all of our
> ills. you must not be paying much attention to who you're posting to.
> you're barking up the wrong tree. good planning creates better
> communities.
Except there is no evidence of this except assertion by planners
themselves. Have you read Gans' book The Levittowners? It pretty well
shoots holes in the idea that Levittowns and other cost-effective
communities are bad for you. The inhabitants were very pleased to escape
from the old-fasioned urban environment which is pushed today by planners.
planning in the sense i am using it is by definition
> about designing communities. i'm not talking about creating a utopia.
> i'm just talking about designing cities, towns, villages, and
> neighborhoods, and helping them to be decent places to work and live.
>
Planning is about ideal-types which do not exist in the real world.
>> >> > people are moving to communities with smaller centers and mixed uses
>> >> > in droves. 2 cases in point in orlando are avalon park and baldwin
>> >> > park. the housing in these communities is a mixture of densities.
>> >> > they are just a little too high-density for my personal taste, but
>> >> > people are moving in like crazy. apparently there's plenty of
>> >> > demand.
>> >> > like i've said before, i think planners and developers will do well
>> >> > to provide more hybrid communities where higher and lower densities
>> >> > are both made available. let the individual buyers make their own
>> >> > choices in that regard.
>> >> >
>> >>
>> >> 1% of the market is not a trend.
>
> i'm not sure where you're getting your figures. i have read for quite
> a number of years now about communities that promise the things new
> urbanists are finally able to accomplish. people have been dreaming
> for years about living in newly built communities where they can live
> within walking distance of shopping and have lots of nice parks to
> walk and hang out in. back in the 80's community planners tried to
> provide such places and came up against the fact that conventional,
> post ww2 codes don't allow it,
This is a myth too, because there has been no demand for people who want
to live over stores or to buy their goods at expensive stores. Rather,
people flock to Wal-Mart. Planners call them big boxes and try to stop them
from being built. Why?
and banks wouldn't loan any money for
> such communities. now public opinion is finally winning out and
> communities are beginning to consid ercodesthatallowmixeduses.
> banks are following suit and starting to loan money for projects that
> revive the old tradition of town-making. it is a trend, my friend.
>
I am glad you think it is a trend. Towns you like were not planned by
anyone. They just grew up. But if you like small towns, then you must like
cars because people tend to spread out into new towns and not grow at the
edge of cities. ACCESS had an article on this a few years ago.
It is fine for those who have tons of money. Planning raises costs and
Celebration is a good example of it.
celebration continues to
> grow and thrive. like i say, i agree that it's too fake, but it's not
> a failure. housing prices are very much out of control in the orlando
> area in general.
Oh come on. Selling something for about twice the going rate and
calling that a success is simply true only if you have tons of money and
want a niche product.
the fact that celebration's prices are slightly
> higher than everage for orlando
Wrong. My parents lived in Orlando and I know what they paid for a house
and what they sold it for. The same square footage at Celebration was twice
as expensive. They had a small brick rancher, 3 bedrooms and a very
friendly block of people to interact with. My mother in particular loved
it. (They are dead now having died of old age).
is an indication that there continues
> to be a higher demand to live there than in other parts of the region.
High demand? They were having problems all over the place and has not
Disney pulled out due to poor returns? Disney does not stay with failure.
> i think it would actually be a much nicer place to live than most
> standard suburbs.
Based on the experience of my parents, Orlando was a very nice place to
live. They liked their neighbors and the church they attended.
Unfortunately, old age caught up with them and they had to move to Raleigh,
NC.
as other communities are built with the amenities
> that the market is craving, the prices in celebration will likely have
> to start leveling off to stay competitive. sorry, but your
> generalization that new urbanist communities aren't in demand is shown
> here to be completely false. the higher prices in celbration are
> proof of that.
>
No, it is a niche market pushed by planners who, like you, state that we
need community. You have not shown that building expensive houses close
together at high prices promotes community.
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> new urbanists are bringing variety and artistry
>> > back into community planning
>>
>> As Celebration did, where customers pay large sums for fake roofs?
>>
>
> the architecture in celebration is at least imaginitive and appeals to
> a great many people. however, new urbanists generally agree that
> authenticity and organic growth will produce better communities as
> compared to the contrived imitation that is evident in celebration.
> celebration's downtown is an unusual case in this regard.
>
Do you call that a downtown? Is that fakeo antique shop still there
selling reproductions?
>>
>>
>> and generally oppose the suburban track
>> > house mentality.
>>
>> The reason why houses often look alike is to hold down the cost. The
>> same thing happened in NYC where even brownstones (which today cost $1
>> million or more) looked a like, row after row.
>
> you're apparantly missing my point that suburbia tends to leave out
> artistry.
So did row houses in Philadelphia. They were all alike, block after
block. But they were very, very inexpensive.
that's not to discount that urban track houses can be
> equally bad. i don't hold up urban design in general as being
> superior just because it's urban. i would tend to say though that
> older traditional communities tend to be more attractive because of
> the fact that they tended to follow ancient and traditional rules of
> layout and massing that have worked for centuries.
Row houses are good 'massing,' whatever that might mean. Density is not
attractive.
modern design has
> all but obliterated the old landscapes of many of our cities.
>
>>
>>
>> another criticism of suburbanism is the fact that
>> > most strip malls don't take into account the history of the area they
>> > are built in.
>>
>> Cities constantly tore down and rebuilt areas in the industrial era.
>>
>
> yeah, but traditional architecture used to take the surroundings into
> account and preserve the existing patterns. modern strip malls are
> usually built with each store looking exactly the way that store looks
> all across the country. this works for branding and bringing
> attention to the individual store, but it makes for a bland, jumbled
> streetscape with no sense of unity.
>
Remember the example of the cast iron store fronts which merchants in the
1890s nailed to the front of their stores? Why did they do that? Because
they were taking part in the mass production of the era, and those downtowns
did tend to look alike. They were alike. They only look quaint NOW. Urban
areas are products of mass consumption, not cottage industries.
Urbanization did away with the traditions of rural areas. Gemeinschaft
faded and gesellschaft took over. Folk art died and mass production took
over. People in cities stopped producing music themselves and began to
purchase it. Culture was mass produced and still is for cities.
>>
>>
>> they're generic, off-the-shelf designs that turn our
>> > individual communities into bland, boring, imaginationless, monotonous
>> > places.
>>
>> Industrial cities were the same...row after row of look-alike stores,
>> for example. I have several books which explain that. I also have
>> pictures
>> of the cast-iron store fronts which were mass marketed in their era.
>> Local
>> store keepers purchased them from suppliers and nailed them to the front
>> of
>> their buildings. They look quaint today...in fact, the picture I have
>> states that the store is ready for rehabbing into an antique shop. But
>> these stores were the home of mass production of their era. The
>> hand-made
>> was NOT urban. Rather, it was RURAL. Urban was and remains the home of
>> mass production.
>>
>
> artistry in architecture was valued highly years ago.
Urbanization did away with that. Urbanization was and is mass production
of the look-alike, as in cast iron fronts for stores which made them look
alike all over the country in the 1890s.
modern
> buildings are usually devoid of detailed imbellishments. this is
> because everything is geared to cars passing by at highway speeds.
You mean the Seagrams building in NYC was devoited of imbellishments
because of all the high speed travel there? ha ha ha. It was built that
way because architects wanted it that way.
> car-centered design degrades everything. you're looking at the wrong
> history books.
You cannot rewrite history. Check out Amos Hawley's urban development
books for some real facts.
the industrial era was the beginning of modernism and
> the degradation of architecture. traditional architecture was
> pre-industrial.
>
Yes, fine. But cities were mass production, not preindustrial. Have you
read Sjoberg's book The Preindustrial City? Try it out.
>>
>>
>> new urbanism views planning as true design and not just
>> > enforcement of zoning and setbacks. it's a return to the traditional
>> > idea that communities should be planned so that the parts all
>> > contribute to the whole. conventional planning usually fails in that
>> > regard.
>> >
>>
>> Those old so-called quaint buildings were mass production for their
>> era.
>> They also were NOT built under the guise of planners.
>>
>
> i'm not just talking about buildings being considered art. i'm also
> talking about how traditional community plans used to consider the
> inclusion of greens and parks as a necessary part of making a
> community livable.
I am not sure what Central Park in NYC does for people living in the
city, except for a few thousand who can use the park every day. For the
city child, you play in the streets, against old factory buildings and think
of anything green as something for someone else.
focal points such as town squares are pretty much
> a thing of the past.
Towns small enoughf or town squares were small enough to have have
houses with yards. It was in those yards that children played. Private
land is open space too. I really wonder why planners in general think of
private yards as 'lost to development,' but a park somewhere is good, even
if dangerous.
they used to be considered essential, and they
> are essential as it turns out. without them we don't have a sense of
> where we are. we're at the 15,000th strip mall on the right. it just
> doesn't feel like home.
Why does home have to be public space? I think of home, as do most
Americans, as private space.
George Conklin
But New Urbanism does just that. That is why Peter Calthorpe's designs
are such business failures. People are just not going to pay high prices so
they can walk.
The average commute time in the USA is 20 minutes. People do like small
towns. But that is not urbanization.
i think i've
> already asked you this about 6 times. where do you live? do you mind
> telling me? i'm really curious. it might help me to understand your
> frame of reference. apparently you don't live in a sprawling,
> populous community if you don't think traffic is a problem for people.
I don't think that traffic is a problem when the average person gets to
work in 20 minutes...check the census out on this.
I have 2 houses. One a cabin in the mountains but my main residence is
in Durham, NC. I thought everyone knew that. My children are in Raleigh,
Durham and Winston-Salem. One works in RTP.
cadman009
i wouldn't say that. i appreciate your conversation, i really do. it
does get frustrating when we seem to talk past each other, though.
one thing that bothers me is when you assume that i'm taking extreme
positions that i'm really not taking. listening a little before you
talk helps with things like that. the basics of sociology and history
are indeed helpful. it's also helpful to have an open mind when
considering the possibilities for the future. open-mindedness is
necessary when considering the merits or lack thereof of any new
ideas. if we don't approach new thoughts with at least a slightly
open mind we will never progress beyond where we've already been.
cadman009
> >> >> >> I challenge the idea that planning creates communities.
> >> >> >> Planning
> >> >> >> creates houses in locations which planners want them in, but there
> >> >> >> is
> >> >> >> no
> >> >> >> evidence that higher density creates communities.
planning can create all kinds of wonderful things. it can also create
some pretty awful things.
> planning in the sense i am using it is by definition
> > about designing communities. i'm not talking about creating a utopia.
> > i'm just talking about designing cities, towns, villages, and
> > neighborhoods, and helping them to be decent places to work and live.
> >
>
> Planning is about ideal-types which do not exist in the real world.
exactly what do you mean here?
>
>
>
> >> >> > people are moving to communities with smaller centers and mixed uses
> >> >> > in droves. 2 cases in point in orlando are avalon park and baldwin
> >> >> > park. the housing in these communities is a mixture of densities.
> >> >> > they are just a little too high-density for my personal taste, but
> >> >> > people are moving in like crazy. apparently there's plenty of
> >> >> > demand.
> >> >> > like i've said before, i think planners and developers will do well
> >> >> > to provide more hybrid communities where higher and lower densities
> >> >> > are both made available. let the individual buyers make their own
> >> >> > choices in that regard.
> >> >> >
> >> >>
> >> >> 1% of the market is not a trend.
> >
> > i'm not sure where you're getting your figures. i have read for quite
> > a number of years now about communities that promise the things new
> > urbanists are finally able to accomplish. people have been dreaming
> > for years about living in newly built communities where they can live
> > within walking distance of shopping and have lots of nice parks to
> > walk and hang out in. back in the 80's community planners tried to
> > provide such places and came up against the fact that conventional,
> > post ww2 codes don't allow it,
>
> This is a myth too, because there has been no demand for people who want
> to live over stores or to buy their goods at expensive stores. Rather,
> people flock to Wal-Mart. Planners call them big boxes and try to stop them
> from being built. Why?
residences over stores is just simply good use of space in an urban
setting. if they are built and nobody moves into them, then you might
have a point. if codes don't allow them, then we'll never know if the
demand is there or not, will we? developers should be allowed to
build them if they think they'll sell. where's the harm in that?
it's not only planners, but everyday nimby's who try to stop wal-marts
from being built. nimby's also usually don't want elevated
expressways plowing through old pre-ww2 neighborhoods. why do you
think that might be?
George Conklin
> "George Conklin" <nil...@earthlink.net> wrote in message
news:<4cMid.769$_J2....@newsread2.news.atl.earthlink.net>...
> > >> >> >> I challenge the idea that planning creates communities.
> > >> >> >> Planning
> > >> >> >> creates houses in locations which planners want them in, but
there
> > >> >> >> is
> > >> >> >> no
> > >> >> >> evidence that higher density creates communities.
>
> planning can create all kinds of wonderful things. it can also create
> some pretty awful things.
>
But there is still no evidence that density builds communities. The
evidence we have suggests that density creates opportunities for crime and
observed higher crime rates. Further we have evidence that crowding results
in withdrawal, not community.
> > planning in the sense i am using it is by definition
> > > about designing communities. i'm not talking about creating a utopia.
> > > i'm just talking about designing cities, towns, villages, and
> > > neighborhoods, and helping them to be decent places to work and live.
> > >
> >
> > Planning is about ideal-types which do not exist in the real world.
>
> exactly what do you mean here?
>
Planners say they are building community. They present no evidence of
this except horse stories.
It is the type of housing people flee when they leave the old city. Do
you want to live over a restaurant with the smoke, garbage odors and noise,
not to mention the roaches?
if they are built and nobody moves into them, then you might
> have a point.
There are all kinds of empty places above old stores now. They have been
left. Doctors don't use that kind of space today, nor do dentists and
others who used to use that kind of space. As the old dentists died off
after 1950, such offices went empty. Some I know of have become antique
shops.
if codes don't allow them, then we'll never know if the
> demand is there or not, will we? developers should be allowed to
> build them if they think they'll sell. where's the harm in that?
> it's not only planners, but everyday nimby's who try to stop wal-marts
> from being built.
No, planners hate big boxes. I am not sure why. NIMBYs join in on that
one.
nimby's also usually don't want elevated
> expressways plowing through old pre-ww2 neighborhoods. why do you
> think that might be?
If modern roads bypass the city, they are accused to destroying the city.
If modern roads go through cities, they are also accused of destroying the
city. In both cases, the charge is the same. Why?
cadman009
> > planning can create all kinds of wonderful things. it can also create
> > some pretty awful things.
> >
>
> But there is still no evidence that density builds communities. The
> evidence we have suggests that density creates opportunities for crime and
> observed higher crime rates. Further we have evidence that crowding results
> in withdrawal, not community.
>
>
i've already addressed the fact that the "evidence" you have already
submitted can't be considered conclusive. the test cases you cite are
very narrow in scope. there are many other factors that go into
whether a community is safe or not. adequate lighting and increased
street activity are very powerful deterrants to crime. when people
live in business districts the crime in those districts goes down
because the presence of more observers makes crime more risky.
higher density leads to withdrawal? suburbs that lack any public
spaces limit the possibility of incidental human contact. when all
public spaces are exchanged for private you are killing a huge avenue
for neighbors to meet each other. old fashioned suburbs used to have
parks and greens. the modern trend to eliminate almost all parks and
greens is a sad commentary on the values of those who have been
allowed to gain most of the control of the planning process, namely,
the builders and developers. yes, there will always be the pressure
to build cheap, but we have to consider the long-term effects on
future generations. being blind to the fact that some people like
public spaces and failing to provide them brings the whole quality of
life down in any community. use some common sense.
> > > Planning is about ideal-types which do not exist in the real world.
> >
> > exactly what do you mean here?
> >
>
> Planners say they are building community. They present no evidence of
> this except horse stories.
pardon my ignorance, but what's a "horse story"?
> > residences over stores is just simply good use of space in an urban
> > setting.
>
> It is the type of housing people flee when they leave the old city. Do
> you want to live over a restaurant with the smoke, garbage odors and noise,
> not to mention the roaches?
>
maybe this would be great way of policing dirty restaurants. they're
not really supposed to have roaches, you know. as for smoke and
garbage, the garbage is hopefully isolated in an alley, and the smoke
goes out vents on the roof. not a problem.
>
> if they are built and nobody moves into them, then you might
> > have a point.
>
> There are all kinds of empty places above old stores now. They have been
> left. Doctors don't use that kind of space today, nor do dentists and
> others who used to use that kind of space. As the old dentists died off
> after 1950, such offices went empty. Some I know of have become antique
> shops.
delapidation and abandonment of huge sections of aging cities is a
major problem that good planning can help to fix. i don't think it's
mixed use arrangements that are causing the abandonment that you cite.
among other things, it is conventional zoning, planning, and tax laws
that have created the abandonment of aging sections of our cities.
when communities enact smart laws the older sections of cities are
continually revitalized as a normal matter of course.
>
>
> if codes don't allow them, then we'll never know if the
> > demand is there or not, will we? developers should be allowed to
> > build them if they think they'll sell. where's the harm in that?
> > it's not only planners, but everyday nimby's who try to stop wal-marts
> > from being built.
>
> No, planners hate big boxes. I am not sure why. NIMBYs join in on that
> one.
>
try asking a good cross section of the general public what they would
think of a wal-mart being built next to their house.
>
> nimby's also usually don't want elevated
> > expressways plowing through old pre-ww2 neighborhoods. why do you
> > think that might be?
>
> If modern roads bypass the city, they are accused to destroying the city.
> If modern roads go through cities, they are also accused of destroying the
> city. In both cases, the charge is the same. Why?
expressways (modern roads, as you call them) destroy nearly
everything. truly modern urban roads are now being built to
accomodate cars, bicycles, and pedestrians. they improve and enliven
the community rather than making it unliveable. cars don't have to be
catered to at the expense of pedestrians. conventional planning does
just that.
Baxter
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
Free software - Baxter Codeworks www.baxcode.com
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
"cadman009" <cadm...@lycos.com> wrote in message
news:ed63b9d2.04110...@posting.google.com...
> "George Conklin" <georgec...@earthlink.net> wrote in message
news:<nBRjd.21341$KJ6....@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>...
> >
> > Planners say they are building community. They present no evidence
of
> > this except horse stories.
>
> pardon my ignorance, but what's a "horse story"?
Georgie is simply mad because a few rich folk have bought up farms in his
area to raise horses. No planners were not actually involved - but that
doesn't stop georgie porgie.
cadman009
> > good planning won't place businesses where they won't get enough
> > traffic. this would almost surely make them go broke.
> >
>
> But New Urbanism does just that. That is why Peter Calthorpe's designs
> are such business failures. People are just not going to pay high prices so
> they can walk.
why is it that you don't think big box stores should be built in city
centers? i think we can generally keep the same mix that we see in
suburban communities now, and just break up the commercial strips into
smaller centers bringing them closer to residences. i think more big
box stores could be moved into urban town centers rather than locating
them in suburban strips. big box stores are made for car trips,
anyway. village centers can accomodate big box stores too, though in
limited number. you don't think those ideas are too outlandish, do
you?
> > bankrupt, bankrupt, bankrupt. was that the word of the day on your
> > calendar when you wrote this or something? what is well documented is
> > that people hate traffic jams and love small towns.
>
> The average commute time in the USA is 20 minutes. People do like small
> towns. But that is not urbanization.
creating towns and villages is part of what new urbanism is reviving.
new urbanism isn't all about reviving the industrial city as you seem
to think it is. i've also been saying all along that i agree with
some elements of new urbanist thought more than others. i think we
can break up suburban sprawl and create smaller urban centers without
going crazy with increased densities. this is just my theory, but i
do see it working in a lot of the communities my firm is working on
using a "hybrid" approach, a mix of densities.
> I don't think that traffic is a problem when the average person gets to
> work in 20 minutes...check the census out on this.
i'll have to root around for some statistics that address what i'm
talking about. the most serious traffic problems are in our sprawling
metro areas, obviously. if you average it out across the country
that's not necessarily going to give you a true picture of the problem
that i'm talking about.
>
> I have 2 houses. One a cabin in the mountains but my main residence is
> in Durham, NC. I thought everyone knew that. My children are in Raleigh,
> Durham and Winston-Salem. One works in RTP.
i guess your commute's pretty easy.
Baxter
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
Free software - Baxter Codeworks www.baxcode.com
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
"cadman009" <cadm...@lycos.com> wrote in message
news:ed63b9d2.04110...@posting.google.com...
> "George Conklin" <nil...@earthlink.net> wrote in message
news:<dgMid.772$_J2...@newsread2.news.atl.earthlink.net>...
> >
> > But New Urbanism does just that. That is why Peter Calthorpe's
designs
> > are such business failures. People are just not going to pay high
prices so
> > they can walk.
>
> why is it that you don't think big box stores should be built in city
> centers? i think we can generally keep the same mix that we see in
> suburban communities now, and just break up the commercial strips into
> smaller centers bringing them closer to residences. i think more big
> box stores could be moved into urban town centers rather than locating
> them in suburban strips. big box stores are made for car trips,
> anyway. village centers can accomodate big box stores too, though in
> limited number. you don't think those ideas are too outlandish, do
> you?
There's been a number of plans advanced for putting Big Box stores such as
Home Depot almost in downtown Portland.
George Conklin
> "George Conklin" <georgec...@earthlink.net> wrote in message
news:<nBRjd.21341$KJ6....@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>...
> > > planning can create all kinds of wonderful things. it can also create
> > > some pretty awful things.
> > >
> >
> > But there is still no evidence that density builds communities. The
> > evidence we have suggests that density creates opportunities for crime
and
> > observed higher crime rates. Further we have evidence that crowding
results
> > in withdrawal, not community.
> >
> >
>
> i've already addressed the fact that the "evidence" you have already
> submitted can't be considered conclusive.
It is conclusively proven that urban areas have higher crime rates than
suburban, and the lowest is rural. There is no debating that.
the test cases you cite are
> very narrow in scope. there are many other factors that go into
> whether a community is safe or not. adequate lighting and increased
> street activity are very powerful deterrants to crime.
You are wrong about that one. The more people pass your house, the
HIGHER the risk. This has been known since the 1930s.
> higher density leads to withdrawal? suburbs that lack any public
> spaces limit the possibility of incidental human contact.
You have that backwards too. Milgram and others showed that in the
larger cities, people withdraw from each other. Further, others have shown
that the larger the city, the fewer percentage of the population which
votes. Why? They withdraw from public participation.
These are the objective facts.
when all
> public spaces are exchanged for private you are killing a huge avenue
> for neighbors to meet each other.
Are you kidding? You have that backwards.
old fashioned suburbs used to have
> parks and greens. the modern trend to eliminate almost all parks and
> greens is a sad commentary on the values of those who have been
> allowed to gain most of the control of the planning process, namely,
> the builders and developers. yes, there will always be the pressure
> to build cheap, but we have to consider the long-term effects on
> future generations.
Private space is more important to people than unregulated public space,
which causes crime. This is a cultural value, but one which you dislike.
Why?
People used to ride horses. Did that build community? Why are you so
lonely?
I just got back from a planning meeting and we all voted together without
a single dissent on stopping penetration into old neighborhoods of
multi-family housing and not forcing established communities to accept
through streets (aka connectivity).
George Conklin
news:<dgMid.772$_J2...@newsread2.news.atl.earthlink.net>...
>
> > > good planning won't place businesses where they won't get enough
> > > traffic. this would almost surely make them go broke.
> > >
> >
> > But New Urbanism does just that. That is why Peter Calthorpe's
designs
> > are such business failures. People are just not going to pay high
prices so
> > they can walk.
>
> why is it that you don't think big box stores should be built in city
> centers?
You can't park there, that's why.
Jack May
>i think we
> can break up suburban sprawl and create smaller urban centers without
> going crazy with increased densities. this is just my theory,
What you have to worry about is if you will have a non-hierarchical system
of transportation where all travel is on normal city streets of about the
same size. That will greatly increase travel time, pollution, gas
consumption, and CO2.
Hierarchical designs is in roads, your blood circulation, and many other man
made or natural things. With hierarchical design, you spend less time in
small traffic areas and work your way up to bigger and faster routes to you
get to the large freeways (or major arteries in your body) for the highest
capacity, fastest routes.
Having mainly big routes like in train design means you can't get to the
large route without a lot of time and problems. A city or your body would
die if circulation can't get out away from the big route in a reasonable
time.
The opposite is all small city streets where it takes too long to get
anywhere because of all the slow speeds. Your legs would probably die and
fall off if the blood could only get to them through the tiny blood vessels.
So the best combinations tends to be a fractal like distribution of road
sizes or blood vessels. There are reasons why these fractal like pattern
occur so often in nature and in man made systems like roads and the
Internet.
but i
> do see it working in a lot of the communities my firm is working on
> using a "hybrid" approach, a mix of densities.
That is a potentially good start to a fractal design, although planners
often work on too few size levels to get an effective distribution for the
most effective designs.
>
>> I don't think that traffic is a problem when the average person gets
>> to
>> work in 20 minutes...check the census out on this.
>
> i'll have to root around for some statistics that address what i'm
> talking about. the most serious traffic problems are in our sprawling
> metro areas, obviously.
Not obvious at all. The worst traffic conditions are in dense areas like
LA, SF, and NYC
Jack May
> talking about. the most serious traffic problems are in our sprawling
> metro areas, obviously.
There is a summary of data at
http://www.publicpurpose.com/pp57-density.htm
that says your assumption is not correct
Baxter
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
Free software - Baxter Codeworks www.baxcode.com
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
"George Conklin" <georgec...@earthlink.net> wrote in message
news:Yffkd.22410$KJ6....@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net...
>
>
> It is conclusively proven that urban areas have higher crime rates than
> suburban, and the lowest is rural. There is no debating that.
No george, it IS debatable. You've made the claim again and again, yet have
never, ever been able to support it.
Baxter
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
Free software - Baxter Codeworks www.baxcode.com
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
"George Conklin" <georgec...@earthlink.net> wrote in message
news:wgfkd.22412$KJ6....@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net...
>
> "cadman009" <cadm...@lycos.com> wrote in message
> news:ed63b9d2.04110...@posting.google.com...
> >
> > why is it that you don't think big box stores should be built in city
> > centers?
>
> You can't park there, that's why.
Home Depot apparently doesn't agree with you - they DO want to build a store
in downtown Portland.
Baxter
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
Free software - Baxter Codeworks www.baxcode.com
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
"Jack May" <jack...@comcast.net> wrote in message
news:Ijgkd.69668$HA.49223@attbi_s01...
publicpurpose.com is an anti-transit, anti-urban propaganda mill.
George Conklin
According to an old article in ACCESS, it is roads which encourage
multiple small centers. Transit encourages large cities to expand at the
edges. That is why large cities want to push transit. It is a competition
thing. They want the population and do not want people in smaller units.
But growth in smaller units is what is defined today a sprawl, which of
course really reflects the decline of smaller units in more remote places
and the growth of the large city.
> but i
> > do see it working in a lot of the communities my firm is working on
> > using a "hybrid" approach, a mix of densities.
>
> That is a potentially good start to a fractal design, although planners
> often work on too few size levels to get an effective distribution for the
> most effective designs.
> >
> >> I don't think that traffic is a problem when the average person gets
> >> to
> >> work in 20 minutes...check the census out on this.
> >
> > i'll have to root around for some statistics that address what i'm
> > talking about. the most serious traffic problems are in our sprawling
> > metro areas, obviously.
>
> Not obvious at all. The worst traffic conditions are in dense areas like
> LA, SF, and NYC
>
>
The longest commute times are in NYC, for example.
Jack May
> this listing is from 2000. the highest ranked commute time in the US
> is sussex, nj with a 38.3 min. average commute. that may not sound
> all that bad till you see that from 1990 to 2000 that time went up by
> 15.1%! that's just in one year, dude. that's a definite problem.
> many of the cities in this extensive list have similar percentages of
> change within that one year period.
The obvious question is what caused the large jump in average commute time.
The next question is what could have been done, if anything, to prevent the
large increase and how are they responding to solve the large increase in
traffic.
Traffic increases are usually a direct function of the number of new jobs
brining people into the area. Is that area having and economic boom at
this time?
I do know that even Silicon Valley that has been very slow to recover from
the dot-com fiasco is starting to recover now and traffic congestion is
increasing.
George Conklin
>
> > I don't think that traffic is a problem when the average person gets
to
> > work in 20 minutes...check the census out on this.
>
> a traffic problem that's getting visibly worse by the day. here's a
> link to show you what's happening around the nation.
>
I am interested in the census results,which are objective, not in horse
stories. The simple FAct is that the averge person gets to work in 20
minutes and thus is quite happy.