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Great, thorough read. As someone that doesn’t have any life experience of what towns/suburban development was like prior to the 1990s, what was interesting is t

Great, thorough read. As someone that doesn’t have any life experience of what towns/suburban development was like prior to the 1990s, what was interesting is the part where the article brought up the types of big changes happening after WWII. Building roads everywhere, zoning houses with big yards, building big new commercial complexes on the outskirts because they needed more land. It seems like there was a ton of exuberance and pride post-WWII, but terrible investment strategizing. All these “developments of the future” saddle so much cost over time that it makes the financial balancing act to stay long-term sustainable very precarious. (Of course, this is all retrospective looking after the fact). What seems like a crazy takeaway is: with these towns like Galesburg that have been around over 150 years, it seems like the town planners in the 1870s had better judgement than the ones post-WWII. Despite the conventional thinking of the last 60 years across these towns being all those bad investment decisions were believed to be the pinnacle of American real estate development and bonafide testaments of greatness.

masklinn 5y ago
> It seems like there was a ton of exuberance and pride post-WWII, but terrible investment strategizing. All these “developments of the future” saddle so much cost over time that it makes the financial balancing act to stay long-term sustainable very precarious. (Of course, this is all retrospective looking after the fact). Do note that it was not just "exuberance and pride", it was also a way to get white families out of inner-city mixed-race neighbourhoods, and to enforce segregation. This was not a secret either e.g. William Levitt refused to sell levittown homes to racial minorities, and deeds came with a racial covenant.
- throwawayboise 5y ago
  How does this matter to how we tackle the financial problems of cities in 2022?
  - masklinn 5y ago
    … I was specifically replying to a segment about the reasoning behind the creation of those places, to indicate that financial viability far from the only input into their design. If these cities were not created with financial viability at the forefront, it’s unlikely you can magically make them financially viable. But I guess you’re more of the “ignoring inconvenient history” persuasion. I’ve had bosses like that, always asking for solutions to the problems they’d created (against advice) and oddly enough never interested in riot cause analysis when there was any chance it would not be favorable to them.

masklinn 5y ago

> It seems like there was a ton of exuberance and pride post-WWII, but terrible investment strategizing. All these “developments of the future” saddle so much cost over time that it makes the financial balancing act to stay long-term sustainable very precarious. (Of course, this is all retrospective looking after the fact). Do note that it was not just "exuberance and pride", it was also a way to get white families out of inner-city mixed-race neighbourhoods, and to enforce segregation. This was not a secret either e.g. William Levitt refused to sell levittown homes to racial minorities, and deeds came with a racial covenant.

throwawayboise 5y ago
How does this matter to how we tackle the financial problems of cities in 2022?
- masklinn 5y ago
  … I was specifically replying to a segment about the reasoning behind the creation of those places, to indicate that financial viability far from the only input into their design. If these cities were not created with financial viability at the forefront, it’s unlikely you can magically make them financially viable. But I guess you’re more of the “ignoring inconvenient history” persuasion. I’ve had bosses like that, always asking for solutions to the problems they’d created (against advice) and oddly enough never interested in riot cause analysis when there was any chance it would not be favorable to them.