It's a very old debate.
http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51lVkm%2B0uPL._SL500_AA300_.jpg
Alas, the problem was tackled much earlier:
http://www.allingtonbooks.com/allington/images/items/000028.jpg
― Do you like my indifference curves? (Sanpaku), Wednesday, 9 June 2010 16:48 (fourteen years ago) link
the fact that people who live in the burbs are unlikely to vote for or allow those zoning changes because none of them want to live near business or places/services that will gather groups of (possibly undesirable, possibly noisy, etc) people together.
why exactly is this an assumption? this seems like strawmanning of the highest degree
― Adolf Hipster (jjjusten), Wednesday, 9 June 2010 16:48 (fourteen years ago) link
and nah laurel, im not generalizing at all about what other suburbs are like, and i wouldnt be caught dead living in some that are around here. i just think that it bears mentioning that the preconceptions about "suburbs" getting tossed around on this thread are a little bizarre. some suburbs suck. so do some cities. some rural areas are awesome. some are not.
I mean I think you guys are just failing to see how I'm using the word suburb, (in the suburban vs. urban sense, and not in any sense related to the size, political border or location of a city) - your examples of 'suburbs that are actually nice!' are actually just suburbs that are not very suburban by this definition, and well...are almost by definition the opposite of the things I dislike about 'suburbs'.
― iatee, Wednesday, 9 June 2010 16:49 (fourteen years ago) link
Re redding-up the suburbs: Sidewalks and bike lanes are USELESS in parts of the country where the temperature is below freezing for half of the year, there could be several feet of snow on the ground, and everything you might want to buy or do is 5-50 miles from home. I gotta figure this is most of the northern US, from east to west?
Uh, not exactly. It snows about 2 days a year in the PNW. I hadn't taken the less temparate climates of other parts of the country into account tho.
― fuck being hard, suburbs are complicated (The Reverend), Wednesday, 9 June 2010 16:49 (fourteen years ago) link
"The fact that" usually signals the unfurling of an opinion.
― Filmmaker, Author, Radio Host Stephen Baldwin (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Wednesday, 9 June 2010 16:49 (fourteen years ago) link
brian setzer has a condo by where i work in mpls. i bet that shit cost a fortune
― the dj screwtape letters (upper mississippi sh@kedown), Wednesday, 9 June 2010 16:49 (fourteen years ago) link
I admit I only read like one-third of A Pattern Language before I gave it to my little brother for Christmas while he was in arch school. So I don't know shit about shit, obviously.
― the soul of the avocado escapes as soon as you open it (Laurel), Wednesday, 9 June 2010 16:50 (fourteen years ago) link
as it pertains to externalities, if you've got newly developed residential communities that explodes to such an extent that the freeway that feeds it can no longer manage the flow of traffic, the denizens of that suburb do not internalize the full cost of constructing expansion of that freeway.
xpost to add to goole's pts
― i don't always play indie, but when i do, i prefer xx (m bison), Wednesday, 9 June 2010 16:50 (fourteen years ago) link
that totally fucking false! minneapolis has lots of bike lanes and its a big reason why there's great numbers of bikers here.
i've been biking to work about 3 times a week and bike lanes make that possible.
― the dj screwtape letters (upper mississippi sh@kedown), Wednesday, 9 June 2010 16:51 (fourteen years ago) link
This whole discussion reminds me of a running (friendly) argument we've been having with friends. A couple years ago my wife and I turned into (apparently, according to this thread) worthless, boring fucks when we had the chance to buy a house in the suburbs. Now, this is where our argument comes in. Our house is literally four blocks from the Chicago city line and we live in a suburb that is pretty much at times an extension of the city - shared public transportation, all of that. So friends of ours started calling us "fucking suburbanites" all the time, but we found that kind of hilarious since they live in the city - but only a total of twelve blocks south of us, in a neighborhood that really isn't much different from ours (same tightly packed houses, garages on alleys, etc.). Its just kind of funny to see how hard and fast people draw these lines.
― he's always been a bit of an anti-climb Max (jon /via/ chi 2.0), Wednesday, 9 June 2010 16:51 (fourteen years ago) link
Do you...use govt money, tax concessions, whatever, to promote developing these businesses?
Start w/zoning. Suburbs were very often founded w/restrictions on commercial lots and minimum size to insure single family middle-class homes.
― If the US had a dictator we'd call him coach (Michael White), Wednesday, 9 June 2010 16:53 (fourteen years ago) link
Hey, back off, all of you alligators. You only have to read through yesterday's discussion itt to see plenty of evidence of people not wanting the outside world to intrude on their residential idyll and the American dream of perfect privacy, perfect quiet, perfect kingship of your own domain. And also plenty of people commenting that the dislikeable things about cities are their noise and congestion -- and at the same time, there's general agreement that one way to fix up and possibly save suburbia is to increase population density AND the number of places for people to gather for activities and/or services...which is going to lead to exactly what made people with a certain mindset MOVE to the suburbs in the first place.
I might not have pretty graphs or studies to quote to back it up, but I hardly manufactured it out of whole straw.
― the soul of the avocado escapes as soon as you open it (Laurel), Wednesday, 9 June 2010 16:54 (fourteen years ago) link
your friends sound kinda dickish tbh
― the dj screwtape letters (upper mississippi sh@kedown), Wednesday, 9 June 2010 16:54 (fourteen years ago) link
xpost
much of political nyc and la are absolutely 'suburban' - so yeah, city borders lines are generally meaningless from this POV
xp
― iatee, Wednesday, 9 June 2010 16:54 (fourteen years ago) link
sorry for using the correct definition of "suburb" and not your personal, negative-connatation-already-included definition
yeah the govt home owner subsidies are some bullshit
― hope this helps (Granny Dainger), Wednesday, 9 June 2010 16:54 (fourteen years ago) link
Oh yeah, I forgot you fuckers got voted #1 biking city ahead of use when we have way more bicyclists than you. Grrrr! Anger!
― fuck being hard, suburbs are complicated (The Reverend), Wednesday, 9 June 2010 16:55 (fourteen years ago) link
ahead of us*
there is no 'correct definition of suburb' ffs
― iatee, Wednesday, 9 June 2010 16:55 (fourteen years ago) link
Nah, I know them well enough to know they don't mean harm by it, but they are totally the types that will never move out of the city and don't understand how anybody could do so. They aren't being dicks, but there is a lot of truth when the say it.
― he's always been a bit of an anti-climb Max (jon /via/ chi 2.0), Wednesday, 9 June 2010 16:58 (fourteen years ago) link
― hope this helps (Granny Dainger), Wednesday, June 9, 2010 9:54 AM Bookmark
No disagreement.
― fuck being hard, suburbs are complicated (The Reverend), Wednesday, 9 June 2010 16:58 (fourteen years ago) link
Laurel, I'd like to think there's a happy medium between super hi density urban living and bloated inefficient unsustainable suburban sprawl. ie you can shift current suburbs TOWARDS the hi density urban model and obtain much of its benefits while still retaining much of the attractions of suburban living.
― hope this helps (Granny Dainger), Wednesday, 9 June 2010 16:58 (fourteen years ago) link
well "suburb" as a legally distinct entity separated from "the city" is a different thing from low-density single-owner freeway-dependent developments. but when you way "suburb" everybody is talking about the latter.
i mean, one radical solution i'd propose is erasing all urban-suburban legal boundaries and have each metro area as one constituency under one administration. bingo, problem solved.
― goole, Wednesday, 9 June 2010 16:59 (fourteen years ago) link
jvc but i don't understand--if you live blocks apart and the neighborhoods are similar the fact that they're within chicago city limits is that valuable to them?
― call all destroyer, Wednesday, 9 June 2010 16:59 (fourteen years ago) link
Granny otm.
― fuck being hard, suburbs are complicated (The Reverend), Wednesday, 9 June 2010 16:59 (fourteen years ago) link
my sister lives in the suburbs and i live in an urban neighborhood in minneapolis..her's is very new development big homes, cul de sacs, etc
but honestly....they seem to be way more engaged in their neighborhood than we are...it's just very safe and everyone has elementary aged kids and everyone's kids hangs out at everyone else's house and they have little pool gatherings in the summertime....
i lived in the same house for 9 years and BARELY knew my neighbors
― fuck being hard, suburbs are complicated (The Reverend), Wednesday, June 9, 2010 4:55 PM (14 seconds ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink
We started this gangsta shit? And this the motherfuckin' thanks we get?
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/a/a3/Tallbike.jpg/450px-Tallbike.jpg
http://images.tribe.net/tribe/upload/photo/a27/d7f/a27d7ff7-6227-44b7-ab09-1923fafa3f82
― the dj screwtape letters (upper mississippi sh@kedown), Wednesday, 9 June 2010 16:59 (fourteen years ago) link
totally don't know what you mean by "is"????????? cause for me "is" means "bathwater".
― hope this helps (Granny Dainger), Wednesday, 9 June 2010 16:59 (fourteen years ago) link
i mean i guess technically i moved to a suburb of boston last week but it's the damn city afaic
or elect iatee to a zoning commission in North Korea.
― Filmmaker, Author, Radio Host Stephen Baldwin (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Wednesday, 9 June 2010 17:00 (fourteen years ago) link
people who live near where they work create fewer externalities...what is complicated about this idea?
What if they work in a POLLUTION FACTORY, smarty-pants?
BTW I live in a city where it's below freezing mostly from December to April and I would KILL for more bike lanes and sidewalks.
― I guess for copraphiles this is gonna be awesome (Pancakes Hackman), Wednesday, 9 June 2010 17:00 (fourteen years ago) link
Granny OTM, I mean, here's a view of my neighborhood in the suburbs.
― he's always been a bit of an anti-climb Max (jon /via/ chi 2.0), Wednesday, 9 June 2010 17:00 (fourteen years ago) link
― goole, Wednesday, June 9, 2010 12:59 PM (1 minute ago)
i am for this, also abolish states thx
― harbl, Wednesday, 9 June 2010 17:01 (fourteen years ago) link
I mean, by implication, if it's below freezing for half the year, that still makes bike lanes and sidewalks usable for the other half of the year. And even then, they're still useful for walking to bus routes, etc. Plus, I saw plenty of hardcore cyclists biking to work all winter long in Cleveland. I haven't worked up to that, but I hope to.
― I guess for copraphiles this is gonna be awesome (Pancakes Hackman), Wednesday, 9 June 2010 17:03 (fourteen years ago) link
Many American cities are single-family dwelling sprawls. I've lived in lots of 'suburbs' but ones like Mill Valley or Sausalito are distinctly different from even the western part of the city of San Francisco.
― If the US had a dictator we'd call him coach (Michael White), Wednesday, 9 June 2010 17:03 (fourteen years ago) link
erasing all urban-suburban legal boundaries and have each metro area as one constituency under one administration.
Megalopolis, here we come!
they seem to be way more engaged in their neighborhood than we are...it's just very safe and everyone has elementary aged kids and everyone's kids hangs out at everyone else's house and they have little pool gatherings in the summertime....
Do you think it would be accurate to say that some of the ease of their suburban community comes from the fact that many/most of the residents are very similar to the others with their priorities and where they are in life? This strikes me as the comforts of similarity, that we feel better w people most like us. It might make it easier to know and/or feel good about knowing your neighbors, but it's not a very...robust community.
― the soul of the avocado escapes as soon as you open it (Laurel), Wednesday, 9 June 2010 17:04 (fourteen years ago) link
It's like a mono-culture.
― the soul of the avocado escapes as soon as you open it (Laurel), Wednesday, 9 June 2010 17:05 (fourteen years ago) link
uh oh
― harbl, Wednesday, 9 June 2010 17:05 (fourteen years ago) link
All the "best" suburbs of Chicago owe their existence to being on train lines. Most of the worst owe it to being near interstate exits. That being said, an attitude of "cars are evil and so are car owners" is so reductive and unproductive I don't even know where to start.
― hope this helps (Granny Dainger), Wednesday, 9 June 2010 17:06 (fourteen years ago) link
jesus
― Filmmaker, Author, Radio Host Stephen Baldwin (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Wednesday, 9 June 2010 17:06 (fourteen years ago) link
Having been born in the San Fernando Valley and having had grandparents and then my mom live in Sacto, I can tell you that, for me, suburbia is hell.
― If the US had a dictator we'd call him coach (Michael White), Wednesday, 9 June 2010 17:06 (fourteen years ago) link
I see what you are getting at Laurel, but some of these communities can be surprisingly diverse! I mean, our block alone is home to two gay couples and a really wide range of backgrounds. But, also, a notably liberal and lolcollege town.
― he's always been a bit of an anti-climb Max (jon /via/ chi 2.0), Wednesday, 9 June 2010 17:06 (fourteen years ago) link
That being said, an attitude of "cars are evil and so are car owners" is so reductive and unproductive I don't even know where to start.
find somewhere to start!
― iatee, Wednesday, 9 June 2010 17:06 (fourteen years ago) link
eh that "community involvement" thing is just about having kids in school imo
― goole, Wednesday, 9 June 2010 17:07 (fourteen years ago) link
I'm just saying, suburbs can be diverse and don't always have to be 100% white, middle-class.
― he's always been a bit of an anti-climb Max (jon /via/ chi 2.0), Wednesday, 9 June 2010 17:07 (fourteen years ago) link
is this a thread about the new Arcade Fire record?
― ksh, Wednesday, 9 June 2010 17:07 (fourteen years ago) link
a new idea for this thread
― harbl, Wednesday, 9 June 2010 17:07 (fourteen years ago) link
Some of those people at the pool gatherings also attend meetings with their local commissioner every other Tuesday. I know this from my parents' experience. That's the only kind of "robust" community that makes sense.
― Filmmaker, Author, Radio Host Stephen Baldwin (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Wednesday, 9 June 2010 17:08 (fourteen years ago) link
― goole, Wednesday, 9 June 2010 09:59 (6 minutes ago)
Is this a bad idea? If a city and its suburbs are related
― cherry blossom, Wednesday, 9 June 2010 17:09 (fourteen years ago) link
no i think it would be great, it would be like finland
― harbl, Wednesday, 9 June 2010 17:10 (fourteen years ago) link