4 ms·

It doesn't sound like you lived in a place all that bad. The problem with the sprawl that I've lived in is that there is no chance for the community to develop.

by samd 16y ago

It doesn't sound like you lived in a place all that bad. The problem with the sprawl that I've lived in is that there is no chance for the community to develop. For a community to form there has to be some place where members of the community gather and see each other enough times to form relationships. That doesn't exist in my hometown, everybody gets in their car and drives to some place miles away then drives home. Even if you get to know people at these places the sprawl is so massive the odds are that they live miles and miles away from you. The closest (geographically) friend I had in high school lived 7 miles away; and I didn't live in a rural area, that was 7 miles of sub-divisions and strip malls.

CWuestefeld 16y ago
I was going to say much the same thing. The NJ town I live in has something like 4K residents. It's almost entirely zoned residential or residential/agricultural [1], but for a tiny corner where there's a single strip mall having a Chinese restaurant, a video store, and an auto parts store. Because the laws so thoroughly prevent non-residential uses, the people of the town have nothing to bring them together. I think this is the reason that, of my 4 neighbors, I've never met 2 of them although they've both lived there for about 2 years. Really, the only way in my town for people to meet is when they've got children sharing classes in the schools. I don't have kids, so I'm effectively not a part of whatever community there is. I wish that there was a nearby little grocery, or something. For practical purposes I'd like it, because I have to actually travel two towns away for anything I need to buy. But also for community purposes: if there were some place that I could bump into my neighbors occasionally, they'd be alot more like ... neighbors. But as the article notes, this is forbidden. [1] "Agricultural" doesn't mean a farm in this case, it means somebody who can pull off the fake farming requirement of generating >$500 of income from agricultural activities. I have one friend with a big lot that sells some firewood every year in order to lower his property tax by being agricultural.

by samd 16y ago

CWuestefeld 16y ago

I was going to say much the same thing. The NJ town I live in has something like 4K residents. It's almost entirely zoned residential or residential/agricultural [1], but for a tiny corner where there's a single strip mall having a Chinese restaurant, a video store, and an auto parts store. Because the laws so thoroughly prevent non-residential uses, the people of the town have nothing to bring them together. I think this is the reason that, of my 4 neighbors, I've never met 2 of them although they've both lived there for about 2 years. Really, the only way in my town for people to meet is when they've got children sharing classes in the schools. I don't have kids, so I'm effectively not a part of whatever community there is. I wish that there was a nearby little grocery, or something. For practical purposes I'd like it, because I have to actually travel two towns away for anything I need to buy. But also for community purposes: if there were some place that I could bump into my neighbors occasionally, they'd be alot more like ... neighbors. But as the article notes, this is forbidden. [1] "Agricultural" doesn't mean a farm in this case, it means somebody who can pull off the fake farming requirement of generating >$500 of income from agricultural activities. I have one friend with a big lot that sells some firewood every year in order to lower his property tax by being agricultural.