5 ms·

This point of view ignores the fact that suburbs are also necessary for employers to be able to have an ample worker pool without paying salaries that are high

by bbarn 4y ago

This point of view ignores the fact that suburbs are also necessary for employers to be able to have an ample worker pool without paying salaries that are high enough to afford city-only residents (a cost that would go even higher as more people moved into a city for work). Many people in suburbs who work in cities would not be able to afford living in that city, or, flat out refuse to because cities aren't always the best places for families. Suburbs are a compromise.

BeFlatXIII 4y ago
As I said elsewhere in the thread, larger apartments plus adequate soundproofing would go a long way to making urban living realistic for families.
dionidium 4y ago
Urbanization is a compromise (primarily of access vs. space/privacy). Suburbs, on the other hand, are a stubborn refusal to compromise. Everybody has to make tradeoffs about cost, space, time, etc, but suburbanites say, "no, no, no -- no tradeoffs for me. In this narrow zone we're just going to make it illegal to build the kind of housing that acknowledges the tradeoffs of urban life. In this zone it is illegal to make urban housing. In this zone tradeoffs are forbidden and you just have to be rich enough to ignore them to live here."
- jjav 4y ago
  > no tradeoffs for me Of course there are tradeoffs, usually in the form of a longer commute. > In this zone it is illegal to make urban housing. So you'd propose forcefully building your preferred style of housing everywhere, even if the local residents don't want it? Short of declaring a dictatorship, it won't succeed to force everyone to live in the same style of building. A very large part of the population has no interest in living in a high-rise apartment.
  - dionidium 4y ago
    > So you'd propose forcefully building your preferred style of housing everywhere, even if the local residents don't want it? Forcefully? When someone builds an apartment building on their own private property and voluntarily rents the units to other free actors, then obviously nobody was forced to do anything. The neighbors, on the other hand, would like to force the property owner to do something else with their land. It's very important that we get this part clear in our minds. Zoning is coercion, not the other way around. You'll sometimes see headlines about a "single-family home ban" whenever a city does zoning reform. No such thing exists. When we allow more uses on a city lot, we obviously have banned nothing. And, I care about as much what the neighbors want me to do with my private property as I care what they think about my right to free expression. It's not subject to a vote. These rights are codified in our Constitution. They are not subject to a popularity contest. Some things are fundamental. We wrote those things down in a special document and put it in a folder titled, "things you don't get to vote on." > Short of declaring a dictatorship, it won't succeed to force everyone to live in the same style of building. A very large part of the population has no interest in living in a high-rise apartment. It's an enormous country and those people should feel free to hit the bricks (they can move, in other words). Or, hey, this is America. If you want to control what happens on a piece of private property, then buy it.
    - jjav 4y ago
      > It's an enormous country and those people should feel free to hit the bricks (they can move, in other words). Or, hey, this is America. If you want to control what happens on a piece of private property, then buy it. Those two sentences are contradictory. If someone owns a plot of land with a single family home, they do get to control it by staying put living in the house they like. They don't have to "hit the bricks" just because you'd prefer to tear it down to build a highrise.
      - dionidium 4y ago
        > They don't have to "hit the bricks" just because you'd prefer to tear it down to build a highrise. Do you think I'm talking about eminent domain, or something? I am not. I can't build a highrise on their property unless they let me. They're going to have to voluntarily sell me the land before I can do anything with it. I'm not proposing anything except that they be allowed to do that, if they wish to. They don't have to do anything.
throw0101a 4y ago
> Many people in suburbs who work in cities would not be able to afford living in that city, or, flat out refuse to because cities aren't always the best places for families. City/property is expensive because it is desirable. The US stopped building that kind of thing post-WW2, so the supply is finite and generally not growing anymore. Zoning is such that only car-centric, low-density developments are generally allowed. There is nothing to prevent a policy change to allow "city" building like used to happen pre-WW2: * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Streetcar_suburb https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Streetcar_suburb * https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MWsGBRdK2N0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MWsGBRdK2N0 > Suburbs are a compromise. No, they are bad design that devours land like a locust which causes unnecessarily high energy use and has made climate change worse: * https://transportgeography.org/contents/chapter4/environmental-footprint-of-transportation/urban-density-energy-consumption/ https://transportgeography.org/contents/chapter4/environment... There is no good reason for car-centric suburbs, especially when the residents do not pay the externalities of their life style.

by bbarn 4y ago

BeFlatXIII 4y ago

As I said elsewhere in the thread, larger apartments plus adequate soundproofing would go a long way to making urban living realistic for families.

dionidium 4y ago

Urbanization is a compromise (primarily of access vs. space/privacy). Suburbs, on the other hand, are a stubborn refusal to compromise. Everybody has to make tradeoffs about cost, space, time, etc, but suburbanites say, "no, no, no -- no tradeoffs for me. In this narrow zone we're just going to make it illegal to build the kind of housing that acknowledges the tradeoffs of urban life. In this zone it is illegal to make urban housing. In this zone tradeoffs are forbidden and you just have to be rich enough to ignore them to live here."

jjav 4y ago
> no tradeoffs for me Of course there are tradeoffs, usually in the form of a longer commute. > In this zone it is illegal to make urban housing. So you'd propose forcefully building your preferred style of housing everywhere, even if the local residents don't want it? Short of declaring a dictatorship, it won't succeed to force everyone to live in the same style of building. A very large part of the population has no interest in living in a high-rise apartment.
- dionidium 4y ago
  > So you'd propose forcefully building your preferred style of housing everywhere, even if the local residents don't want it? Forcefully? When someone builds an apartment building on their own private property and voluntarily rents the units to other free actors, then obviously nobody was forced to do anything. The neighbors, on the other hand, would like to force the property owner to do something else with their land. It's very important that we get this part clear in our minds. Zoning is coercion, not the other way around. You'll sometimes see headlines about a "single-family home ban" whenever a city does zoning reform. No such thing exists. When we allow more uses on a city lot, we obviously have banned nothing. And, I care about as much what the neighbors want me to do with my private property as I care what they think about my right to free expression. It's not subject to a vote. These rights are codified in our Constitution. They are not subject to a popularity contest. Some things are fundamental. We wrote those things down in a special document and put it in a folder titled, "things you don't get to vote on." > Short of declaring a dictatorship, it won't succeed to force everyone to live in the same style of building. A very large part of the population has no interest in living in a high-rise apartment. It's an enormous country and those people should feel free to hit the bricks (they can move, in other words). Or, hey, this is America. If you want to control what happens on a piece of private property, then buy it.
  - jjav 4y ago
    > It's an enormous country and those people should feel free to hit the bricks (they can move, in other words). Or, hey, this is America. If you want to control what happens on a piece of private property, then buy it. Those two sentences are contradictory. If someone owns a plot of land with a single family home, they do get to control it by staying put living in the house they like. They don't have to "hit the bricks" just because you'd prefer to tear it down to build a highrise.
    - dionidium 4y ago
      > They don't have to "hit the bricks" just because you'd prefer to tear it down to build a highrise. Do you think I'm talking about eminent domain, or something? I am not. I can't build a highrise on their property unless they let me. They're going to have to voluntarily sell me the land before I can do anything with it. I'm not proposing anything except that they be allowed to do that, if they wish to. They don't have to do anything.

throw0101a 4y ago

> Many people in suburbs who work in cities would not be able to afford living in that city, or, flat out refuse to because cities aren't always the best places for families. City/property is expensive because it is desirable. The US stopped building that kind of thing post-WW2, so the supply is finite and generally not growing anymore. Zoning is such that only car-centric, low-density developments are generally allowed. There is nothing to prevent a policy change to allow "city" building like used to happen pre-WW2: * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Streetcar_suburb https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Streetcar_suburb * https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MWsGBRdK2N0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MWsGBRdK2N0 > Suburbs are a compromise. No, they are bad design that devours land like a locust which causes unnecessarily high energy use and has made climate change worse: * https://transportgeography.org/contents/chapter4/environmental-footprint-of-transportation/urban-density-energy-consumption/ https://transportgeography.org/contents/chapter4/environment... There is no good reason for car-centric suburbs, especially when the residents do not pay the externalities of their life style.