4 ms·

This phenomenon is called “spatial discipline.” In much of the world, things are smaller and more carefully designed to fit in smaller spaces, or to do more wit

This phenomenon is called “spatial discipline.” In much of the world, things are smaller and more carefully designed to fit in smaller spaces, or to do more with less space. The US is a vast, open country, mostly plains. Even where people are concentrated, our cities are mostly post-car suburban sprawl. When you have a lot of money, land is abundant, and car transportation is assumed, there’s basically no reason to care about wasting lots of horizontal space with careless design. Thus the US has less spatial discipline than anywhere else in the world. Nearly everything here is the architectural equivalent of an electron app burning through gigs of ram to display text, because no one cares. This is “normal” and what people here are used to, which means a lot of people genuinely like it. I think it has a significant influence on culture; among other things, it makes us less sensitive to waste in general, and more prone to think of things as single-use and disposable.

silvestrov 4y ago
> basically no reason to care about wasting lots of horizontal space There is, but not obvious: the effect can be seen in Silicon Valley where it takes forevery to get anywhere because you need to drive a long distance to get to your destination because it is so far away. Long distances make for congestion when cars are the main method of transportation (also: see LA). Subways (and cyckling) scale a lot better. See Paris/London or Tokyo or Amsterdam/Copenhagen.
throwaway894345 4y ago
I appreciate that your comment doesn’t leave it at “Americans are stupid and morally deficient” in explaining why American cities sprawl. > among other things, it makes us less sensitive to waste in general, and more prone to think of things as single-use and disposable. I think this is mostly down to consumerism. Companies made a lot of money off of the wealthy American middle class in the late 20th century (and up to now) and convincing them to work more to spend more on cheap, disposable things was/is immensely lucrative. I’m sure in some indirect way, wasting space only helps reinforce the notion that waste in general is okay, but I don’t see it as a primary driver. To that end, does anyone know of any organized initiatives to get people to move away from disposable plastic junk (often imported from China or some other place with abhorrent track records for environment, working conditions, political repression, etc) and toward a less consumerist culture (fewer more expensive possessions that we mend when they break rather than throwing them away)?
rstuart4133 4y ago
> Thus the US has less spatial discipline than anywhere else in the world. Even when compared to places like Canada and Australia? Canada's population density is 4 people/km2, Australia is 3 people/km2 and the USA is 36 people/km2. That said, as an Australian visiting the Netherlands (508 people/km2), one of the first things that caught eye was the residential garbage disposal. In the Netherlands you don't have single house bins that are picked up house by house. Instead they cart their kitchen garbage bags out to communal bins in the street. Those communal bins look like this: https://utrechtselect.nl/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/recyclebak-768x544.jpg https://utrechtselect.nl/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/recycleb... They are small on the surface because the bin is under ground. It's more efficient in so many ways. They aren't just saving space in the street - the house doesn't need storage space for a weeks worth of garbage. And being the Netherlands, the weeks worth garbage is separated into 4 recycling types. And the garbage truck doesn't have to stop at each house, but rather just once per street.
- bitwize 4y ago
  The USA is very much like Australia. Major difference is it takes about 20 km to go from, say, Brisbane CBD to the boonies in Australia -- whereas in the USA, particularly the northeast corridor, you have to go a bit farther through densely but not too densely populated suburbs. If you want to see what spatial discipline looks like, check out Japan. I've always been impressed by Boston's ramification into side streets and back alleys where interesting shops, bars, and restaurants can be found. But a Japanese city ramifies a couple of iterations deeper: the side streets have side streets, the back alleys have back alleys. And they are littered with family-owned restaurants, tiny bars where you can have a conversation (unlike American bars where you have to shout to be heard over the sportsball game on every TV and the entire bar screaming when a score is made), and specialty shops of every sort. The shop you're interested in may be on the fourth, fifth, or tenth floor of a building. Any square meter that can be converted to retail space, will be. Train stations play host to entire subterranean strip malls. It's nuts. It's kind of cyberpunk. Or rather, cyberpunk borrowed from the aesthetics that blossomed on Asian city design constraints, particularly those of Japan, Hong Kong proper, and Kowloon Walled City.
throwaheyy 4y ago
The effect is very noticeable in e.g. dashcam videos posted on Reddit. Ignoring obvious factors like side of the road driving on, videos from the USA are very obvious from the scale of the urban/suburban environment with huge roads and intersections, huge cars/utes/SUVs and buildings very far apart. Videos from Australia show a more scaled down environment, with much narrower roads and lanes and smaller intersections, buildings closer to the road and not set back behind large parking lots. Videos from Britain, further still. Videos from Canadian cities eg. Toronto look like a weird hybrid with an Australian-city level scale but with cars and road signs from the USA. As an Australian living in USA I am often surprised by how long it takes to walk a distance that looks like not very much on a map.

silvestrov 4y ago

> basically no reason to care about wasting lots of horizontal space There is, but not obvious: the effect can be seen in Silicon Valley where it takes forevery to get anywhere because you need to drive a long distance to get to your destination because it is so far away. Long distances make for congestion when cars are the main method of transportation (also: see LA). Subways (and cyckling) scale a lot better. See Paris/London or Tokyo or Amsterdam/Copenhagen.

throwaway894345 4y ago

I appreciate that your comment doesn’t leave it at “Americans are stupid and morally deficient” in explaining why American cities sprawl. > among other things, it makes us less sensitive to waste in general, and more prone to think of things as single-use and disposable. I think this is mostly down to consumerism. Companies made a lot of money off of the wealthy American middle class in the late 20th century (and up to now) and convincing them to work more to spend more on cheap, disposable things was/is immensely lucrative. I’m sure in some indirect way, wasting space only helps reinforce the notion that waste in general is okay, but I don’t see it as a primary driver. To that end, does anyone know of any organized initiatives to get people to move away from disposable plastic junk (often imported from China or some other place with abhorrent track records for environment, working conditions, political repression, etc) and toward a less consumerist culture (fewer more expensive possessions that we mend when they break rather than throwing them away)?

rstuart4133 4y ago

> Thus the US has less spatial discipline than anywhere else in the world. Even when compared to places like Canada and Australia? Canada's population density is 4 people/km2, Australia is 3 people/km2 and the USA is 36 people/km2. That said, as an Australian visiting the Netherlands (508 people/km2), one of the first things that caught eye was the residential garbage disposal. In the Netherlands you don't have single house bins that are picked up house by house. Instead they cart their kitchen garbage bags out to communal bins in the street. Those communal bins look like this: https://utrechtselect.nl/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/recyclebak-768x544.jpg https://utrechtselect.nl/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/recycleb... They are small on the surface because the bin is under ground. It's more efficient in so many ways. They aren't just saving space in the street - the house doesn't need storage space for a weeks worth of garbage. And being the Netherlands, the weeks worth garbage is separated into 4 recycling types. And the garbage truck doesn't have to stop at each house, but rather just once per street.

bitwize 4y ago
The USA is very much like Australia. Major difference is it takes about 20 km to go from, say, Brisbane CBD to the boonies in Australia -- whereas in the USA, particularly the northeast corridor, you have to go a bit farther through densely but not too densely populated suburbs. If you want to see what spatial discipline looks like, check out Japan. I've always been impressed by Boston's ramification into side streets and back alleys where interesting shops, bars, and restaurants can be found. But a Japanese city ramifies a couple of iterations deeper: the side streets have side streets, the back alleys have back alleys. And they are littered with family-owned restaurants, tiny bars where you can have a conversation (unlike American bars where you have to shout to be heard over the sportsball game on every TV and the entire bar screaming when a score is made), and specialty shops of every sort. The shop you're interested in may be on the fourth, fifth, or tenth floor of a building. Any square meter that can be converted to retail space, will be. Train stations play host to entire subterranean strip malls. It's nuts. It's kind of cyberpunk. Or rather, cyberpunk borrowed from the aesthetics that blossomed on Asian city design constraints, particularly those of Japan, Hong Kong proper, and Kowloon Walled City.

throwaheyy 4y ago

The effect is very noticeable in e.g. dashcam videos posted on Reddit. Ignoring obvious factors like side of the road driving on, videos from the USA are very obvious from the scale of the urban/suburban environment with huge roads and intersections, huge cars/utes/SUVs and buildings very far apart. Videos from Australia show a more scaled down environment, with much narrower roads and lanes and smaller intersections, buildings closer to the road and not set back behind large parking lots. Videos from Britain, further still. Videos from Canadian cities eg. Toronto look like a weird hybrid with an Australian-city level scale but with cars and road signs from the USA. As an Australian living in USA I am often surprised by how long it takes to walk a distance that looks like not very much on a map.