4 ms·

A simple note: why people should want to live there? If there is no more work in cities except for city services, witch happen to be more and more bound to some

by kkfx 2y ago

A simple note: why people should want to live there? If there is no more work in cities except for city services, witch happen to be more and more bound to some bigger/external entities, so no real margins to evolve for any local company, why be there? Yes, there are many desperate enough to flock anywhere if they see a possible accommodation, but how can they survive locally? After the '80s logistic revolution and then TLC/IT progress finally making offices useless in cities there is no viable economy anymore. The new right density for the economy of scale are single-family homes and small buildings spread enough to have room to change but not too far, intermixed with homes enough to avoid the US suburbs error. We can't have a new deal in dense cities. P.v. works best for self-consumption only and we heading toward cheap enough batteries to make almost-autonomous homes the norm in a large slice of the inhabited world (30kWh capacity per home at minimum), we can collect and store and clorate enough water to make semi-autonomous homes and various shops. It start to be cheaper than creating large aqueducts. We start to being able to treat sewers enough to been able to have local treatment instead of a sewerage network, we are not there, but near enough. The world change and we have to change accordingly meaning we can't keep up the immense infra we have made for cities while people move around to escape too frequently flooded areas, too hot areas and so on. We need infra for industries, and many industries need a certain size to be viable, but the trend it's clear we need to produce modern way to live less and less dependent on complex services existing on ground networks. We still need roads, personal air mobility and last-mile air mobility is still far despite certain claims https://www.easa.europa.eu/sites/default/files/dfu/uam-full-report.pdf https://www.easa.europa.eu/sites/default/files/dfu/uam-full-... but we know where we should go. Smart cities can't work like the old Fordlandia can't. Classic cities already not work anymore, so we do not have other options so far and we need to evolve anyway.

dgacmu 2y ago
Because cities are awesome: density gives you choice. In a city, if I have a gifted child, I almost certainly have several options for what school to send them to, many probably within walking distance. In a sparse suburb, I have one, unless they want an hour-long bus ride. Same goes for restaurants, and social activities -- and people! (i.e., potential friends) Cities are drastically more efficient. PV does -not- work best for personal consumption, that's actually the hardest way to go because you're not sharing available resources. Same goes for almost everything else you listed. What's not awesome are cities defined by gridlock and huge highways, something that is itself addressed by increasing the amount of residential space relative to office space.
- kkfx 2y ago
  Well, choice to consume, but nothing more. I was living in a big dense EU city, after others big&dense, now I'm living in the French Alps, at a short-range from the see, but high enough to have good climate, nature, still having services not like in a big city, but still enough, including good enough FTTH, roads, grocery with drive services and so on. Before? Well, before I can choose restaurants from all over the world, some fitness centers, some events, always and only services to consume and no real personal activity. Traffic congestion, lack of space and so on complete the game. no, thanks. In social terms my social life here with FAR LESS people around is IMPROVED because being less we are more social, we meet much more with different people instead of being in bubble if friends, very isolated from all others humans around. Surely mean cultural level is far lower, but due to the general cultural degradation these days to find interesting people for interesting dialogues internet is the sole means, we are too rarefied to meet IRL casually. Schools? Here every school have large green space and plenty of outdoor activities, yes not at walking distance but who care? Primary schools are normally in 30km radius on good roads, high schools are more rare, but not that far away and if young start to going out of home to study is a good thing for them. Universities became a bit more costly since you must be around them but again it's not that special. Cities IMO are SOLD to be efficient, and they are definitively not. Starting from the office model where you have a place to live, almost unused during the day, and a place to work almost only used during the day, and we build such mid/high rise buildings to use them only a bit less than half a day, wasting time for commuting, how efficient.... Oh, sure, to farm humans is efficient, to live farmed inside definitively not. P.a. actually work ONLY for self-consumption because on scale sharing energy is a nightmare for the grid, we do not have superconductive links, sharing means sharing locally, so have a locally very unstable demand for big power plants, the worst scenario for network stability, they can't keep the frequency with significant p.v. on grid. Instead IF we focus on self-consumption p.v. offer options to heat large quantity of water to have them in the night, when needed, to have geothermic heat pumps, heating the ground in summer to balance the heat get in the winter and so on. BTW cities can't exists without much highways: there anyone eat, and the food came from outside.
  - HDThoreaun 2y ago
    Can you accept that different people have different preferences? Yours are valid of course, why cant the city dwellers prefer what the city offers? You seem to understand the advantages the city has but just reject them as if everyone feels the same way as you do.

by kkfx 2y ago

dgacmu 2y ago

Because cities are awesome: density gives you choice. In a city, if I have a gifted child, I almost certainly have several options for what school to send them to, many probably within walking distance. In a sparse suburb, I have one, unless they want an hour-long bus ride. Same goes for restaurants, and social activities -- and people! (i.e., potential friends) Cities are drastically more efficient. PV does -not- work best for personal consumption, that's actually the hardest way to go because you're not sharing available resources. Same goes for almost everything else you listed. What's not awesome are cities defined by gridlock and huge highways, something that is itself addressed by increasing the amount of residential space relative to office space.

kkfx 2y ago
Well, choice to consume, but nothing more. I was living in a big dense EU city, after others big&dense, now I'm living in the French Alps, at a short-range from the see, but high enough to have good climate, nature, still having services not like in a big city, but still enough, including good enough FTTH, roads, grocery with drive services and so on. Before? Well, before I can choose restaurants from all over the world, some fitness centers, some events, always and only services to consume and no real personal activity. Traffic congestion, lack of space and so on complete the game. no, thanks. In social terms my social life here with FAR LESS people around is IMPROVED because being less we are more social, we meet much more with different people instead of being in bubble if friends, very isolated from all others humans around. Surely mean cultural level is far lower, but due to the general cultural degradation these days to find interesting people for interesting dialogues internet is the sole means, we are too rarefied to meet IRL casually. Schools? Here every school have large green space and plenty of outdoor activities, yes not at walking distance but who care? Primary schools are normally in 30km radius on good roads, high schools are more rare, but not that far away and if young start to going out of home to study is a good thing for them. Universities became a bit more costly since you must be around them but again it's not that special. Cities IMO are SOLD to be efficient, and they are definitively not. Starting from the office model where you have a place to live, almost unused during the day, and a place to work almost only used during the day, and we build such mid/high rise buildings to use them only a bit less than half a day, wasting time for commuting, how efficient.... Oh, sure, to farm humans is efficient, to live farmed inside definitively not. P.a. actually work ONLY for self-consumption because on scale sharing energy is a nightmare for the grid, we do not have superconductive links, sharing means sharing locally, so have a locally very unstable demand for big power plants, the worst scenario for network stability, they can't keep the frequency with significant p.v. on grid. Instead IF we focus on self-consumption p.v. offer options to heat large quantity of water to have them in the night, when needed, to have geothermic heat pumps, heating the ground in summer to balance the heat get in the winter and so on. BTW cities can't exists without much highways: there anyone eat, and the food came from outside.
- HDThoreaun 2y ago
  Can you accept that different people have different preferences? Yours are valid of course, why cant the city dwellers prefer what the city offers? You seem to understand the advantages the city has but just reject them as if everyone feels the same way as you do.