4 ms·

There's truth to that, but Paris and Barcelona are some of the densest cities on the planet. People really underestimate how much you can get just with 5 storie

by CPLX 5y ago

There's truth to that, but Paris and Barcelona are some of the densest cities on the planet. People really underestimate how much you can get just with 5 stories or so if you do it consistently. As anyone who's been to those places knows there's no sacrifice of beauty, sun, or livability really.

et-al 5y ago
> People really underestimate how much you [density] can get just with 5 stories or so if you do it consistently. This is the rub, right? We can only redevelop a block or two at a time, so the only choice is for 10+ story towers. Especially because land is so expensive in these cities. I'm curious if new residential buildings (non-luxury if that even exists) in Paris or Barcelona are only 5-6 stories high.
- ceras 5y ago
  > We can only redevelop a block or two at a time, so the only choice is for 10+ story towers. Especially because land is so expensive in these cities. That's not necessarily true: it's much easier to build a duplexes/triplexes than a high-rise. Companies that can build the former cannot necessarily build the latter. IIRC when Bloomberg downzoned many "missing middle" outer-borough neighborhoods and upzoned core areas to support high-rises in NYC, many small building companies couldn't transition and just folded. > I'm curious if new residential buildings (non-luxury if that even exists) in Paris or Barcelona are only 5-6 stories high. I'm curious to see actual data on this, but many (most? almost all?) European cities have zoning rules that prevent building much taller than that in residential areas. It's especially true near the city center, where the restriction may apply to all buildings. So my guess would be it's still pretty common to not build high-rises in European cities -- similar to many NYC neighborhoods outside Manhattan (that weren't downzoned by Bloomberg).
mywittyname 5y ago
And getting rid of cars! Pre-1920s neighborhoods in the USA are dense, yet spacious. So much of the density problems in America are due to our over-reliance on cars.
- trgn 5y ago
  This is _it_. There are so many good examples of dense but verdant urbanism in the US. But they all predate cars. Funny thing is, people still will pay top dollar to either live in these neighborhoods, or visit them on vacation (Savanah, Charleston, New Orleans, Ashville, ...). It's a complete tragedy, the answer is right there. Just do the same thing they did then, but today.
  - milkytron 5y ago
    > It's a complete tragedy, the answer is right there. Just do the same thing they did then, but today. The problem is that building like that has been outlawed with euclidean zoning.
- opportune 5y ago
  Many people are in denial that neighborhoods like these are possible despite them existing in pockets of the US (I live in one in SF) and ALL over the world. All you need to do is not surrender space to cars and allow density - and have the demand to support the density - and it just works.
  - stjohnswarts 5y ago
    If you allow such units to be built, you can't leave out that little factoid. It's not all about cars.
- stjohnswarts 5y ago
  I prefer living in the burbs and working remote. I do think that zoning should be much more lenient for housing in urban areas though. Not everything has to be one size fits all. NIMBYs definitely need to go though.
kiba 5y ago
Supposed you have 300 people living in a square kilometer on a single floor. If you double the number of floors by 5, you get 1500 people per square kilometer.

by CPLX 5y ago

et-al 5y ago

> People really underestimate how much you [density] can get just with 5 stories or so if you do it consistently. This is the rub, right? We can only redevelop a block or two at a time, so the only choice is for 10+ story towers. Especially because land is so expensive in these cities. I'm curious if new residential buildings (non-luxury if that even exists) in Paris or Barcelona are only 5-6 stories high.

ceras 5y ago
> We can only redevelop a block or two at a time, so the only choice is for 10+ story towers. Especially because land is so expensive in these cities. That's not necessarily true: it's much easier to build a duplexes/triplexes than a high-rise. Companies that can build the former cannot necessarily build the latter. IIRC when Bloomberg downzoned many "missing middle" outer-borough neighborhoods and upzoned core areas to support high-rises in NYC, many small building companies couldn't transition and just folded. > I'm curious if new residential buildings (non-luxury if that even exists) in Paris or Barcelona are only 5-6 stories high. I'm curious to see actual data on this, but many (most? almost all?) European cities have zoning rules that prevent building much taller than that in residential areas. It's especially true near the city center, where the restriction may apply to all buildings. So my guess would be it's still pretty common to not build high-rises in European cities -- similar to many NYC neighborhoods outside Manhattan (that weren't downzoned by Bloomberg).

mywittyname 5y ago

And getting rid of cars! Pre-1920s neighborhoods in the USA are dense, yet spacious. So much of the density problems in America are due to our over-reliance on cars.

trgn 5y ago
This is _it_. There are so many good examples of dense but verdant urbanism in the US. But they all predate cars. Funny thing is, people still will pay top dollar to either live in these neighborhoods, or visit them on vacation (Savanah, Charleston, New Orleans, Ashville, ...). It's a complete tragedy, the answer is right there. Just do the same thing they did then, but today.
- milkytron 5y ago
  > It's a complete tragedy, the answer is right there. Just do the same thing they did then, but today. The problem is that building like that has been outlawed with euclidean zoning.
opportune 5y ago
Many people are in denial that neighborhoods like these are possible despite them existing in pockets of the US (I live in one in SF) and ALL over the world. All you need to do is not surrender space to cars and allow density - and have the demand to support the density - and it just works.
- stjohnswarts 5y ago
  If you allow such units to be built, you can't leave out that little factoid. It's not all about cars.
stjohnswarts 5y ago
I prefer living in the burbs and working remote. I do think that zoning should be much more lenient for housing in urban areas though. Not everything has to be one size fits all. NIMBYs definitely need to go though.

kiba 5y ago

Supposed you have 300 people living in a square kilometer on a single floor. If you double the number of floors by 5, you get 1500 people per square kilometer.