33 ms·

I think you need to go one level deeper: People needing to move non-trivial distances for periodic tasks shapes everything. Cars, and thus car parking, come abo

I think you need to go one level deeper: People needing to move non-trivial distances for periodic tasks shapes everything. Cars, and thus car parking, come about because of this need. Even before cars existed, roads and parking (such as hitching posts and stables) still existed because people needed to move. And even bicycles (electric or not) need parking too. There are startups dedicated to creating automated bike parking garages to limit theft.

ttymck 3y ago
Why do I need to go to the mall? Because there is no retail zoning closer to my home.
- kelseyfrog 3y ago
  Yep, cars facilitate cities of unsustainably low density. Reducing car use results in either migration to restore the density equilibrium, transit, or in situ densification. Pick at least one.
- balfirevic 3y ago
  My city has plenty of all kinds of shops where people live, but they (and I) still go to malls because shops there are larger and better equipped, there are more of them and you can walk between them at nice temperature and protected from the rain.
  - lotsofpulp 3y ago
    Yes, small shops in neighborhoods will never be able to match the price to utility ratio of large shopping complexes with businesses like Costco, Target, Walmart, Best Buy, Ikea, Home Depot, Apple, Kroger, etc. As long as one has access to a personal car, and those above big businesses are available within 30min, even 45min, it is basically impossible for a smaller, local retailer to compete. And now you have the internet and delivery to your door to compete with too.
  - ttymck 3y ago
    Glad to hear it. Sounds like you have an excellent balance of options available to you. It seems like a not insignificant amount of malls aren't sustaining themselves, so I wonder if the balance you described is a world where malls can thrive.
- falcolas 3y ago
  Because some things are too expensive to keep in stock (at least with any variety in styles/brands/etc) at local retail stores? Clothing, hobby supplies, computer peripherals, etc.
  - ttymck 3y ago
    Why is that?
- hughesjj 3y ago
  Thankfully changing retail zoning is as cheap and expedient as writing a document. Regrettably legislation takes a while to move, but given any solution to this problem will require legislation changes anyway, the marginal value for just allowing mixed use commercial/residential zoning is effectively nil.
  - gretch 3y ago
    > changing retail zoning is as cheap and expedient as writing a document This vastly underestimates the problem. It’s like saying all you need to be president is have people write your name on their ballots. Are people in this city amenable to mixed zoning? The forces that decided this in the first place still exist and have to be disentrenched
SamBorick 3y ago
> People needing to move non-trivial distances for periodic tasks shapes everything. Cars, and thus car parking, come about because of this need. This is not true. Every city in the US used to have a robust public transit system. No cars or parking lots needed. You can hitch 2 horses per car space, and 10-20 bikes in the same space. Those pre-car public transit systems were bankrupted by artificially low fares, and because a small number of cars literally got in the way: https://www.vox.com/2015/5/7/8562007/streetcar-history-demise https://www.vox.com/2015/5/7/8562007/streetcar-history-demis...
- falcolas 3y ago
  > Every city in the US used to have a robust public transit system. Every major urban center, perhaps. No city in Montana (I'll go so far as to say the midwest, minus perhaps Chicago) has a "robust" public transit system. And even when we create a perfect 15 minute utopia, people will still need one-off transportation on a periodic basis to spots more than 15 minutes away. Doctor visits, specialized purchases, bulk orders, building materials, recreation, etc.
  - OGWhales 3y ago
    > Every major urban center, perhaps. No city in Montana (I'll go so far as to say the midwest, minus perhaps Chicago) has a "robust" public transit system. Your comment is talking about the present tense while theirs is not. I’m sure they would agree with you that non-car transportation options are lacking currently. I don’t know what Midwest transportation options were before we entered this car dependency era, from a quick search it appears streetcars were a thing there (which is what their linked article was about). > And even when we create a perfect 15 minute utopia, people will still need one-off transportation on a periodic basis to spots more than 15 minutes away. Doctor visits, specialized purchases, bulk orders, building materials, recreation, etc. You can include options for cars without making them the main method of transportation for everything. Having cars as an option is not the problem, designing everything around cars and letting other options fall to the wayside is the problem.
  - 8note 3y ago
MezzoDelCammin 3y ago
this topic is a bit of a rabbit hole. Yes, roads have always been there. Massive car infrastructure and parking has not. Looking back in time, most people would actually walk for most of their daily life. That reflected in how cities and villages were built. This layout has only changed after we started adopting cars as default mean of transportation (mostly 1930s and later, with some exceptions).
- falcolas 3y ago
  This may be an artifact of where I live, but most rural areas have always had a centralized city (post office, bar, church), and the vast majority of folks who called that village/city their home lived miles away from it on their farms. Horses and carriages were a practical requirement, since walking all day one way to visit the grocer was unrealistic.
  - jltsiren 3y ago
    Rural living traditionally meant living in dense villages surrounded by farmland. Lonely farms were more common in the frontier. There was safety in numbers, and living next to other households allowed sharing things that were too expensive for most households.
    - falcolas 3y ago
      Not really. At least, never in the US. Plantations, for example, are fairly distant from each other, and from their associated towns.
      - MezzoDelCammin 3y ago
        There are always exceptions and edge cases. Plantations and farms are generally neither known as examples of urban design, nor are they homes for majority of population of any state. But even using the example of 18th century plantation - the idea of a parking lot for more than a dozen or so horse drawn carriages seems somewhat... straight out of Flinstones. I agree that You can find some early examples of the modern "carriage-based" urbanism earlier than in the 20th century, but those would be very specific cases. If 90% of the population lives in some denser urban setting and mostly walks, "their" neighborhoods will reflect that in how and where they are built (at least after a generation or two that's necessary for construction). Same reasoning applies if that ratio changes and within a generation or two, everyone suddenly can afford to own a car. The question is now which way do we (and, by proxy, the politicians we elect) want to promote.
commandlinefan 3y ago
> People needing to move non-trivial distances for periodic tasks Or being required to even if their job can be effectively done from home (and consists entirely of slack message and zoom calls with remote coworkers whether they pollute the planet driving into the office or not).

ttymck 3y ago

Why do I need to go to the mall? Because there is no retail zoning closer to my home.

kelseyfrog 3y ago
Yep, cars facilitate cities of unsustainably low density. Reducing car use results in either migration to restore the density equilibrium, transit, or in situ densification. Pick at least one.
balfirevic 3y ago
My city has plenty of all kinds of shops where people live, but they (and I) still go to malls because shops there are larger and better equipped, there are more of them and you can walk between them at nice temperature and protected from the rain.
- lotsofpulp 3y ago
  Yes, small shops in neighborhoods will never be able to match the price to utility ratio of large shopping complexes with businesses like Costco, Target, Walmart, Best Buy, Ikea, Home Depot, Apple, Kroger, etc. As long as one has access to a personal car, and those above big businesses are available within 30min, even 45min, it is basically impossible for a smaller, local retailer to compete. And now you have the internet and delivery to your door to compete with too.
- ttymck 3y ago
  Glad to hear it. Sounds like you have an excellent balance of options available to you. It seems like a not insignificant amount of malls aren't sustaining themselves, so I wonder if the balance you described is a world where malls can thrive.
falcolas 3y ago
Because some things are too expensive to keep in stock (at least with any variety in styles/brands/etc) at local retail stores? Clothing, hobby supplies, computer peripherals, etc.
- ttymck 3y ago
  Why is that?
hughesjj 3y ago
Thankfully changing retail zoning is as cheap and expedient as writing a document. Regrettably legislation takes a while to move, but given any solution to this problem will require legislation changes anyway, the marginal value for just allowing mixed use commercial/residential zoning is effectively nil.
- gretch 3y ago
  > changing retail zoning is as cheap and expedient as writing a document This vastly underestimates the problem. It’s like saying all you need to be president is have people write your name on their ballots. Are people in this city amenable to mixed zoning? The forces that decided this in the first place still exist and have to be disentrenched

SamBorick 3y ago

> People needing to move non-trivial distances for periodic tasks shapes everything. Cars, and thus car parking, come about because of this need. This is not true. Every city in the US used to have a robust public transit system. No cars or parking lots needed. You can hitch 2 horses per car space, and 10-20 bikes in the same space. Those pre-car public transit systems were bankrupted by artificially low fares, and because a small number of cars literally got in the way: https://www.vox.com/2015/5/7/8562007/streetcar-history-demise https://www.vox.com/2015/5/7/8562007/streetcar-history-demis...

falcolas 3y ago
> Every city in the US used to have a robust public transit system. Every major urban center, perhaps. No city in Montana (I'll go so far as to say the midwest, minus perhaps Chicago) has a "robust" public transit system. And even when we create a perfect 15 minute utopia, people will still need one-off transportation on a periodic basis to spots more than 15 minutes away. Doctor visits, specialized purchases, bulk orders, building materials, recreation, etc.
- OGWhales 3y ago
  > Every major urban center, perhaps. No city in Montana (I'll go so far as to say the midwest, minus perhaps Chicago) has a "robust" public transit system. Your comment is talking about the present tense while theirs is not. I’m sure they would agree with you that non-car transportation options are lacking currently. I don’t know what Midwest transportation options were before we entered this car dependency era, from a quick search it appears streetcars were a thing there (which is what their linked article was about). > And even when we create a perfect 15 minute utopia, people will still need one-off transportation on a periodic basis to spots more than 15 minutes away. Doctor visits, specialized purchases, bulk orders, building materials, recreation, etc. You can include options for cars without making them the main method of transportation for everything. Having cars as an option is not the problem, designing everything around cars and letting other options fall to the wayside is the problem.
- 8note 3y ago

MezzoDelCammin 3y ago

this topic is a bit of a rabbit hole. Yes, roads have always been there. Massive car infrastructure and parking has not. Looking back in time, most people would actually walk for most of their daily life. That reflected in how cities and villages were built. This layout has only changed after we started adopting cars as default mean of transportation (mostly 1930s and later, with some exceptions).

falcolas 3y ago
This may be an artifact of where I live, but most rural areas have always had a centralized city (post office, bar, church), and the vast majority of folks who called that village/city their home lived miles away from it on their farms. Horses and carriages were a practical requirement, since walking all day one way to visit the grocer was unrealistic.
- jltsiren 3y ago
  Rural living traditionally meant living in dense villages surrounded by farmland. Lonely farms were more common in the frontier. There was safety in numbers, and living next to other households allowed sharing things that were too expensive for most households.
  - falcolas 3y ago
    Not really. At least, never in the US. Plantations, for example, are fairly distant from each other, and from their associated towns.
    - MezzoDelCammin 3y ago
      There are always exceptions and edge cases. Plantations and farms are generally neither known as examples of urban design, nor are they homes for majority of population of any state. But even using the example of 18th century plantation - the idea of a parking lot for more than a dozen or so horse drawn carriages seems somewhat... straight out of Flinstones. I agree that You can find some early examples of the modern "carriage-based" urbanism earlier than in the 20th century, but those would be very specific cases. If 90% of the population lives in some denser urban setting and mostly walks, "their" neighborhoods will reflect that in how and where they are built (at least after a generation or two that's necessary for construction). Same reasoning applies if that ratio changes and within a generation or two, everyone suddenly can afford to own a car. The question is now which way do we (and, by proxy, the politicians we elect) want to promote.

commandlinefan 3y ago

> People needing to move non-trivial distances for periodic tasks Or being required to even if their job can be effectively done from home (and consists entirely of slack message and zoom calls with remote coworkers whether they pollute the planet driving into the office or not).