6 ms·

Children Need Neighborhoods Where They Can Walk and Bike

132 points by jseliger 2y ago

Fhtitjfi 2y ago
[dead]
valleyjo 2y ago
I grew up in a suburb development where you couldn’t walk to anything. It was pretty isolated, until I had a car it was difficult for me to visit friends or do anything outside the house. I’m now living in an area that’s super walkable and has a community feel. My young kids bike every day to one of the four playgrounds nearby. They see friends every day too even if it’s just when they walk by our house. For me it highlights how lonely and isolating the suburb experience can be I don’t think I could go back to that and having experienced it the other way I would not want that for my kids.
- 082349872349872 2y ago
  The theory in my country is that if the roads ever aren't safe enough for kids to be walking/biking to school, they'd need to be made so.
  - defrost 2y ago
    Unless that requires culling magpies. If there are magpies about it's every child | cyclist for themselves.
    - 082349872349872 2y ago
      The magpies were there before the roads, so even if the land title registry doesn't explicitly note it, their ancient usage since time immemorial means under common law that they have swoop-of-way.
- matwood 2y ago
  Maybe our definitions of suburb are different. I live in what I would consider a suburb now. I see kids outside playing every day. I see teens playing basketball and tennis at the neighborhood courts. And, now that it's warming up, people at the pool. There is a grocery store at the entrance to the neighborhood, but for anything else someone would have to drive. I just fail to see how the local kids are harmed or isolated.
  - alamortsubite 2y ago
    Some American suburbs are set up in the way you describe, but in my experience they're a tiny minority. A simple test is whether or not kids can walk to school. If not, how are they able visit their friends from school who don't live in the same development? Are they safely able to walk or ride bikes, or are they isolated by car infrastructure that makes them dependent on parents driving them around? It sucks not being able to visit your friends.
    - nytesky 2y ago
      We can walk to our local elementary, but about half the kids can’t, but we live in a very walkable neighborhood (my kids can walk to a grocery store, Starbucks, toy store, library, chipotle, tennis courts, basketball courts, baseball field). But all our schools are fairly large, 600 elem, 1000 middle, 3000 high school, so even with density friends are far flung. Smaller schools would help, but now it’s hard to build more schools because of that density! (There used to be more elem schools but they closed a bunch when GenX went thru and school population dropped temporarily)
  - l72 2y ago
    It is important to differentiate between suburbs and sprawl. Many of the old suburbs are still dense, walkable, have a diverse mix of single and multi family housing with some small retail scattered in. However, that is not what most people think about when they think about American suburbs.
    - bluGill 2y ago
01100011 2y ago
Agree with this, but let's not forget public transportation. Yes, I biked and walked all over my region, but I also used buses to get to downtown(Seattle, from Auburn. Starting around 12 I think, in the late 80s). Without getting into a debate about the safety of some modern city centers, buses are a great tool for 10+ year old kids to get around town to places where they can walk and bike.
- lotsofpulp 2y ago
  A walkable and bike-able neighborhood will necessarily have to be dense enough such that public transit also makes sense.
- josephd79 2y ago
  12 year olds do not have that freedom anymore. People will flip out seeing kids that young doing something outside without adult supervision. They’ll call CPS on you.
  - GJim 2y ago
    > They’ll call CPS on you. So what? What are they doing to do about it? Your post is incomplete. (Analogy: I can decide I don't like you farting in the street and call a policeman on you, though I doubt they would do anything about it either!)
    - chiefalchemist 2y ago
      The point is, this isn't a problem of kids. The kids' situation is a symptom. The problem is the adults and the hypocrisy. We say "Kids should be outside. They need more exercise and less screen time. They need more unstructured play time. Etc." But then we cry "Nooooo. Stranger danger" and phone CPS if a child is "free ranging." Furthermore, no parent wants to be known as the CPS parent. And certainly no kid wants to be their kid. What can CPS do? It doesn't matter.The question is: what will be the reaction of your parental peers, their kids, teachers, coaches, etc., and your kid.
nakedrobot2 2y ago
A lot of europe in general, and Prague especially, is perfect for this. Well, bikes less so, but walking and public transport, absolutely. Plenty of little kids (from age 7 or 8, I'd guess) walking and taking the tram/bus to school in the morning, without supervision, and without worry. Just this one fact by itself demonstrates what a stable and safe Czech society is (sure it has other problems like any place).
- The_Colonel 2y ago
  A lot of the old, central parts of the city (think Zizkov) is not great for kids because it's very dense and cars drive everywhere. But the new residential developments and often even the old commie blocks are great for kids with a lot of free space, walking / no-car zones etc, plenty of playgrounds. For older kids, good public transportation and general safety are important too.
- lukan 2y ago
  Better than other places maybe, but certainly not perfect. The rise of the SUVs and car crowded roads in the cities speak against it. And also Prague have them, last time I checked. I am in the decision of moving from rural to city, but the cars and their danger for my children are the main reason to object.
  - ivnvrn 2y ago
    As a parent of a 9 year old who bikes two km to kayaking club and back three times a week, I see how much he likes it and how autonomous he instantly became. Me and my wife also got a couple of hours of freedom every day because we no longer have to transport him and wait in between. It looks like a small thing, but it feels almost life-changing. Previously, I was against multi-storey residential development and planned to own a private house in the suburbs. But then I got kids and moved to a place with dense civil infrastructure and started to use it daily. And I realized that if you can bike to school, shops, parks and a clinic in a couple of minutes, then for me it's much cooler than living at home and getting in the car every time you need something. Every time I think about my son crossing the road, I get scared as hell. But I have to be strong to step aside and not interfere with his growth =)
constantcrying 2y ago
I lived in a part of the city with great infrastructure (if it works), parks, etc. which I used heavily as a kid/teenager. Nowadays many of those places I would avoid visiting after dark if at all possible. If I had kids I would not let them go there alone, even rapes have happened there.
brikym 2y ago
The problem with the US is how uniformity the urban planning is. Of the hundreds of cities how many is walking, biking or public transport the primary means, or even a decent alternative, for your commute. We can't try out any new ideas in a few places before rolling them out to other places no everything has to be the McSame. I don't know why this is. Maybe the same 51% of voters win out everytime everywhere or maybe it's lobbying from the automotive industry. Maybe the argument always goes that we shouldn't invest in bike/train infra because someone tried it in the US and it was bad ironically because it was bad because of underinvestment.
- VelesDude 2y ago
  I'm not saying "because they are lazy!" but, I think it is a combination of a large portion of people wanting a large piece of land and planners just using cars to fill in the gaps on convenience. I do think that a lot of folks would prefer to have better public access to things like parks, it would mean a lot less personal maintenance. But this is a hard sell for some people that have a vision of a certain lifestyle. And for planners, they are probably working with some very tight budgets and timelines to deliver. It is just easier to produce yet another grid of McSame because they know there is an audience for it and it makes their jobs a lot easier. I do wonder where this will lead in decades down the line but for many that is not an issue they are considering.
  - chiefalchemist 2y ago
    > people wanting a large piece of land and planners just using cars to fill in the gaps on convenience. The US fed gov also did well to incentivize suburban home ownership in various ways. Suburban growth was a post-war feel good national narrative. The idea was as much sold it was bought.
    - VelesDude 2y ago
      Yep, like most things it is no one single thing driving it. They arise mutually.
tomohawk 2y ago
When children do do those things, people who have nothing better to do call the cops on the parents, and the cops actually respond. Many parents are afraid to let their kids out to do normal kid things and wont even let their kids walk home from the school bus stop. We've gone from a society where it was normal for kids to spend all day out and about without supervision, so one where play is highly regulated and monetized, and supervision is suffocating.
- lolinder 2y ago
  This is why children also need free range parenting laws: https://letgrow.org/ https://letgrow.org/
lupusreal 2y ago
Seems like a suburban/urban mentality to me, probably reflecting the background of the people who think this. Given my background, I think kids need neighborhoods where they can run around in the woods.
- smogcutter 2y ago
  Ok sure, but the point about autonomy and exploration remains.
globular-toast 2y ago
Adults need it too. Why is locomotion considered something only a child would do? Walking should be a human right. People should be able to walk and not regress into blobs that need wheelchairs to get around. Cars are awful. The only way to get away from them is to get a car yourself. And even then you've you too get a big one because everyone now has a bigger car than you. Oh and don't forget insanely powerful or you're never going to win your way on to a roundabout. It's a race to the bottom. We need to take back our living places from cars. Why do people need to drive right up to their houses every day? Put car parks out of town and ban cars from towns. Imagine how much more space we'd have. Let people drive in at 15mph to drop stuff off at their houses, but it gets parked out of town. Use a bicycle to access your car when you need it. Unfortunately you just can't take a single thing away from people. Literally everyone will tell you they hate cars. They hate the noise and the pollution. They'll tell you it's the number one reason they don't cycle anywhere. But take away their car?! Never!
- VS1999 2y ago
  You can't guarantee positive human rights as vague as walking, especially when public opinion is against you. It's unproductive and meaningless to people who aren't already on your side enough to know what something as bizarre as "walking should be a human right" means.
underseacables 2y ago
Huge problem: CPS will arrest the parents for allowing their children to walk around the neighborhood. When I was a kid, I went all over the neighborhood, made friends everywhere. Today, that's not possible. Karens will call the police, and the government will fine the parents, or worse take the children away. https://komonews.com/amp/news/nation-world/cps-called-after-parents-let-young-kids-walk-a-mile-home-alone-from-park-twice-11-21-2015 https://komonews.com/amp/news/nation-world/cps-called-after-... https://reason.com/2015/01/14/cops-and-cps-threaten-parents-whose-kids/ https://reason.com/2015/01/14/cops-and-cps-threaten-parents-... https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/maryland-couple-want-free-range-kids-but-not-all-do/2015/01/14/d406c0be-9c0f-11e4-bcfb-059ec7a93ddc_story.html https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/maryland-coup...
- lolinder 2y ago
  Push for free range parenting laws or move to a state that has them: https://letgrow.org/states/ https://letgrow.org/states/
- onthecanposting 2y ago
  This depends on location. Kids walk and bike where I live, but the streets are narrow and drained by open ditches, so there is more risk than streets with pedestrian access built in. Drivers are usually considerate of this and go slowly, though.
jqpabc123 2y ago
Children still walk and bike? In my neighborhood, if it isn't battery powered, the kids don't want it.
- interludead 2y ago
  It's a pity to hear
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
hahajk 2y ago
Everyone here is saying cul de sac suburbs do not give kids freedom, but they do for kids younger than 12. We moved to this "mc same" neighborhood when my daughter was 5 and she's been able to leave in the morning on her bike and be back by dinner, playing with friends around the neighborhood. Now that she's 8 she can take her 3 y.o. brother to the park down the street. If we lived in a denser, walkable neighborhood I wouldn't allow any of that to happen until she was in middle school. (the is east coast US for context)
- crote 2y ago
  The main problem is that the cul-de-sac neighborhoods are often poorly designed. Two houses which are a stone's throw separated can be a 30-minute walk away, simply because nobody bothered to add pedestrian / cyclist shortcuts. The entire neighborhood is designed around cars, so any kid walking down the street is forced to interact with cars. Also, there's no reason why a cul-de-sac neighborhood can't be dense and walkable. Street layout and density are only tangentially related.
  - kjkjadksj 2y ago
    When you are a kid playing in the suburbs you often make shortcuts neither the developers nor current homeowners realize are there
    - ovulator 2y ago
      Absolutely, crawling over neighbor fences were no big deal getting to my friends house to cut a trip around the sidewalk.
      - paradox460 2y ago
        When I was a kid, my dad and the neighbor put a gate between our yards, so we could play with each other
- yowzadave 2y ago
  Yeah, I live in New York City, which is much more walkable than the suburb that I grew up in…but still feels less viable for letting my kids range freely. There are just so many more cars, and there is always construction and/or otherwise obstructed bike lanes and sidewalks—you have to be extremely aware and defensive on a bicycle. On the other hand, I grew up in a little cul-de-sac that was perfect for kids to bike around precisely because cars were infrequent. We walked to and from grade school and middle school unsupervised, with our friends who also lived in the neighborhood. In NYC, parents are a bit nuts about schools, so they rarely just walk their kid to the nearest school—they end up taking the train and/or driving to whatever place they think will maximize their kid’s college prospects, which results in a lot of unnecessary transportation.
TiredOfLife 2y ago
What did children do before 1817?
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
hulitu 2y ago
> Children Need Neighborhoods Where They Can Walk and Bike Land is too expensive to be wasted on playgrounds. /s

132 points by jseliger 2y ago

[dead]

I grew up in a suburb development where you couldn’t walk to anything. It was pretty isolated, until I had a car it was difficult for me to visit friends or do anything outside the house. I’m now living in an area that’s super walkable and has a community feel. My young kids bike every day to one of the four playgrounds nearby. They see friends every day too even if it’s just when they walk by our house. For me it highlights how lonely and isolating the suburb experience can be I don’t think I could go back to that and having experienced it the other way I would not want that for my kids.

082349872349872 2y ago
The theory in my country is that if the roads ever aren't safe enough for kids to be walking/biking to school, they'd need to be made so.
- defrost 2y ago
  Unless that requires culling magpies. If there are magpies about it's every child | cyclist for themselves.
  - 082349872349872 2y ago
    The magpies were there before the roads, so even if the land title registry doesn't explicitly note it, their ancient usage since time immemorial means under common law that they have swoop-of-way.
matwood 2y ago
Maybe our definitions of suburb are different. I live in what I would consider a suburb now. I see kids outside playing every day. I see teens playing basketball and tennis at the neighborhood courts. And, now that it's warming up, people at the pool. There is a grocery store at the entrance to the neighborhood, but for anything else someone would have to drive. I just fail to see how the local kids are harmed or isolated.
- alamortsubite 2y ago
  Some American suburbs are set up in the way you describe, but in my experience they're a tiny minority. A simple test is whether or not kids can walk to school. If not, how are they able visit their friends from school who don't live in the same development? Are they safely able to walk or ride bikes, or are they isolated by car infrastructure that makes them dependent on parents driving them around? It sucks not being able to visit your friends.
  - nytesky 2y ago
    We can walk to our local elementary, but about half the kids can’t, but we live in a very walkable neighborhood (my kids can walk to a grocery store, Starbucks, toy store, library, chipotle, tennis courts, basketball courts, baseball field). But all our schools are fairly large, 600 elem, 1000 middle, 3000 high school, so even with density friends are far flung. Smaller schools would help, but now it’s hard to build more schools because of that density! (There used to be more elem schools but they closed a bunch when GenX went thru and school population dropped temporarily)
- l72 2y ago
  It is important to differentiate between suburbs and sprawl. Many of the old suburbs are still dense, walkable, have a diverse mix of single and multi family housing with some small retail scattered in. However, that is not what most people think about when they think about American suburbs.
  - bluGill 2y ago

01100011 2y ago

Agree with this, but let's not forget public transportation. Yes, I biked and walked all over my region, but I also used buses to get to downtown(Seattle, from Auburn. Starting around 12 I think, in the late 80s). Without getting into a debate about the safety of some modern city centers, buses are a great tool for 10+ year old kids to get around town to places where they can walk and bike.

lotsofpulp 2y ago
A walkable and bike-able neighborhood will necessarily have to be dense enough such that public transit also makes sense.
josephd79 2y ago
12 year olds do not have that freedom anymore. People will flip out seeing kids that young doing something outside without adult supervision. They’ll call CPS on you.
- GJim 2y ago
  > They’ll call CPS on you. So what? What are they doing to do about it? Your post is incomplete. (Analogy: I can decide I don't like you farting in the street and call a policeman on you, though I doubt they would do anything about it either!)
  - chiefalchemist 2y ago
    The point is, this isn't a problem of kids. The kids' situation is a symptom. The problem is the adults and the hypocrisy. We say "Kids should be outside. They need more exercise and less screen time. They need more unstructured play time. Etc." But then we cry "Nooooo. Stranger danger" and phone CPS if a child is "free ranging." Furthermore, no parent wants to be known as the CPS parent. And certainly no kid wants to be their kid. What can CPS do? It doesn't matter.The question is: what will be the reaction of your parental peers, their kids, teachers, coaches, etc., and your kid.

nakedrobot2 2y ago

A lot of europe in general, and Prague especially, is perfect for this. Well, bikes less so, but walking and public transport, absolutely. Plenty of little kids (from age 7 or 8, I'd guess) walking and taking the tram/bus to school in the morning, without supervision, and without worry. Just this one fact by itself demonstrates what a stable and safe Czech society is (sure it has other problems like any place).

The_Colonel 2y ago
A lot of the old, central parts of the city (think Zizkov) is not great for kids because it's very dense and cars drive everywhere. But the new residential developments and often even the old commie blocks are great for kids with a lot of free space, walking / no-car zones etc, plenty of playgrounds. For older kids, good public transportation and general safety are important too.
lukan 2y ago
Better than other places maybe, but certainly not perfect. The rise of the SUVs and car crowded roads in the cities speak against it. And also Prague have them, last time I checked. I am in the decision of moving from rural to city, but the cars and their danger for my children are the main reason to object.
- ivnvrn 2y ago
  As a parent of a 9 year old who bikes two km to kayaking club and back three times a week, I see how much he likes it and how autonomous he instantly became. Me and my wife also got a couple of hours of freedom every day because we no longer have to transport him and wait in between. It looks like a small thing, but it feels almost life-changing. Previously, I was against multi-storey residential development and planned to own a private house in the suburbs. But then I got kids and moved to a place with dense civil infrastructure and started to use it daily. And I realized that if you can bike to school, shops, parks and a clinic in a couple of minutes, then for me it's much cooler than living at home and getting in the car every time you need something. Every time I think about my son crossing the road, I get scared as hell. But I have to be strong to step aside and not interfere with his growth =)

constantcrying 2y ago

I lived in a part of the city with great infrastructure (if it works), parks, etc. which I used heavily as a kid/teenager. Nowadays many of those places I would avoid visiting after dark if at all possible. If I had kids I would not let them go there alone, even rapes have happened there.

brikym 2y ago

The problem with the US is how uniformity the urban planning is. Of the hundreds of cities how many is walking, biking or public transport the primary means, or even a decent alternative, for your commute. We can't try out any new ideas in a few places before rolling them out to other places no everything has to be the McSame. I don't know why this is. Maybe the same 51% of voters win out everytime everywhere or maybe it's lobbying from the automotive industry. Maybe the argument always goes that we shouldn't invest in bike/train infra because someone tried it in the US and it was bad ironically because it was bad because of underinvestment.

VelesDude 2y ago
I'm not saying "because they are lazy!" but, I think it is a combination of a large portion of people wanting a large piece of land and planners just using cars to fill in the gaps on convenience. I do think that a lot of folks would prefer to have better public access to things like parks, it would mean a lot less personal maintenance. But this is a hard sell for some people that have a vision of a certain lifestyle. And for planners, they are probably working with some very tight budgets and timelines to deliver. It is just easier to produce yet another grid of McSame because they know there is an audience for it and it makes their jobs a lot easier. I do wonder where this will lead in decades down the line but for many that is not an issue they are considering.
- chiefalchemist 2y ago
  > people wanting a large piece of land and planners just using cars to fill in the gaps on convenience. The US fed gov also did well to incentivize suburban home ownership in various ways. Suburban growth was a post-war feel good national narrative. The idea was as much sold it was bought.
  - VelesDude 2y ago
    Yep, like most things it is no one single thing driving it. They arise mutually.

tomohawk 2y ago

When children do do those things, people who have nothing better to do call the cops on the parents, and the cops actually respond. Many parents are afraid to let their kids out to do normal kid things and wont even let their kids walk home from the school bus stop. We've gone from a society where it was normal for kids to spend all day out and about without supervision, so one where play is highly regulated and monetized, and supervision is suffocating.

lolinder 2y ago
This is why children also need free range parenting laws: https://letgrow.org/ https://letgrow.org/

lupusreal 2y ago

Seems like a suburban/urban mentality to me, probably reflecting the background of the people who think this. Given my background, I think kids need neighborhoods where they can run around in the woods.

smogcutter 2y ago
Ok sure, but the point about autonomy and exploration remains.

globular-toast 2y ago

Adults need it too. Why is locomotion considered something only a child would do? Walking should be a human right. People should be able to walk and not regress into blobs that need wheelchairs to get around. Cars are awful. The only way to get away from them is to get a car yourself. And even then you've you too get a big one because everyone now has a bigger car than you. Oh and don't forget insanely powerful or you're never going to win your way on to a roundabout. It's a race to the bottom. We need to take back our living places from cars. Why do people need to drive right up to their houses every day? Put car parks out of town and ban cars from towns. Imagine how much more space we'd have. Let people drive in at 15mph to drop stuff off at their houses, but it gets parked out of town. Use a bicycle to access your car when you need it. Unfortunately you just can't take a single thing away from people. Literally everyone will tell you they hate cars. They hate the noise and the pollution. They'll tell you it's the number one reason they don't cycle anywhere. But take away their car?! Never!

VS1999 2y ago
You can't guarantee positive human rights as vague as walking, especially when public opinion is against you. It's unproductive and meaningless to people who aren't already on your side enough to know what something as bizarre as "walking should be a human right" means.

underseacables 2y ago

Huge problem: CPS will arrest the parents for allowing their children to walk around the neighborhood. When I was a kid, I went all over the neighborhood, made friends everywhere. Today, that's not possible. Karens will call the police, and the government will fine the parents, or worse take the children away. https://komonews.com/amp/news/nation-world/cps-called-after-parents-let-young-kids-walk-a-mile-home-alone-from-park-twice-11-21-2015 https://komonews.com/amp/news/nation-world/cps-called-after-... https://reason.com/2015/01/14/cops-and-cps-threaten-parents-whose-kids/ https://reason.com/2015/01/14/cops-and-cps-threaten-parents-... https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/maryland-couple-want-free-range-kids-but-not-all-do/2015/01/14/d406c0be-9c0f-11e4-bcfb-059ec7a93ddc_story.html https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/maryland-coup...

lolinder 2y ago
Push for free range parenting laws or move to a state that has them: https://letgrow.org/states/ https://letgrow.org/states/
onthecanposting 2y ago
This depends on location. Kids walk and bike where I live, but the streets are narrow and drained by open ditches, so there is more risk than streets with pedestrian access built in. Drivers are usually considerate of this and go slowly, though.

jqpabc123 2y ago

Children still walk and bike? In my neighborhood, if it isn't battery powered, the kids don't want it.

interludead 2y ago
It's a pity to hear

deleted 2y ago

[deleted]

hahajk 2y ago

Everyone here is saying cul de sac suburbs do not give kids freedom, but they do for kids younger than 12. We moved to this "mc same" neighborhood when my daughter was 5 and she's been able to leave in the morning on her bike and be back by dinner, playing with friends around the neighborhood. Now that she's 8 she can take her 3 y.o. brother to the park down the street. If we lived in a denser, walkable neighborhood I wouldn't allow any of that to happen until she was in middle school. (the is east coast US for context)

crote 2y ago
The main problem is that the cul-de-sac neighborhoods are often poorly designed. Two houses which are a stone's throw separated can be a 30-minute walk away, simply because nobody bothered to add pedestrian / cyclist shortcuts. The entire neighborhood is designed around cars, so any kid walking down the street is forced to interact with cars. Also, there's no reason why a cul-de-sac neighborhood can't be dense and walkable. Street layout and density are only tangentially related.
- kjkjadksj 2y ago
  When you are a kid playing in the suburbs you often make shortcuts neither the developers nor current homeowners realize are there
  - ovulator 2y ago
    Absolutely, crawling over neighbor fences were no big deal getting to my friends house to cut a trip around the sidewalk.
    - paradox460 2y ago
      When I was a kid, my dad and the neighbor put a gate between our yards, so we could play with each other
yowzadave 2y ago
Yeah, I live in New York City, which is much more walkable than the suburb that I grew up in…but still feels less viable for letting my kids range freely. There are just so many more cars, and there is always construction and/or otherwise obstructed bike lanes and sidewalks—you have to be extremely aware and defensive on a bicycle. On the other hand, I grew up in a little cul-de-sac that was perfect for kids to bike around precisely because cars were infrequent. We walked to and from grade school and middle school unsupervised, with our friends who also lived in the neighborhood. In NYC, parents are a bit nuts about schools, so they rarely just walk their kid to the nearest school—they end up taking the train and/or driving to whatever place they think will maximize their kid’s college prospects, which results in a lot of unnecessary transportation.

TiredOfLife 2y ago

What did children do before 1817?

deleted 2y ago

[deleted]

hulitu 2y ago

> Children Need Neighborhoods Where They Can Walk and Bike Land is too expensive to be wasted on playgrounds. /s