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> Farms aren’t typically in the suburbs. (Manufacturing, yes.) Farms are actually usually adjacent to suburbs. As the suburb ends it switches to farm land. So

by ars 2y ago

> Farms aren’t typically in the suburbs. (Manufacturing, yes.) Farms are actually usually adjacent to suburbs. As the suburb ends it switches to farm land. So when the farmer wants services he doesn't need to go in the city, he can go to the suburb. He can't go to the city anyway, there's nowhere to park his car, and he has no other way to get there. > I live in a rural suburb, and it should be expensive. It’s a luxury. I probably quintupled my carbon footprint by choosing it Suburbs are cheaper than cities. Just look at the salaries of the people that live in both places. And your carbon footprint is probably lower than a city, cities are very wasteful places because they can be: People have more money there. A small example: In a suburb you buy in bulk and store it. In a city you buy for a day or two. The carbon footprint difference between those two options is huge, it takes an enormous amount of energy to keep the city constantly stocked with retail products because you have to distribute small quantities of everything to so many places, as opposed to a central area with bulk quantities. I've been in both places. In a city you can buy paper plates for so cheap (relative to your salary) it simply doesn't make sense to have real dishes - you don't have room for them anyway. People waste enormous amounts of goods (relative to suburbs) because the cost of "things" is very low relative to their salary.

namdnay 2y ago
And how are these suburban shoppers getting to this central area with bulk quantities? Walking? Cycling? Buses? Nah … they’re burning gasoline
- ars 2y ago
  They are, but they are not doing it very often. You go to a Costco type store monthly, not daily. And you combine trips and basically have a monthly "shopping day". You end up using less energy than your city dwelling friends.
resolutebat 2y ago
And your carbon footprint is probably lower than a city, cities are very wasteful places because they can be. This (and basically your entire argument) is flat out incorrect. A McMansion uses vastly more energy to build and maintain than an apartment, and apartment dwellers in a city don't need to drive to work, to school, to the shops, for a night out, etc. https://arstechnica.com/science/2014/01/suburbanites-lead-their-urban-counterparts-in-carbon-emissions/ https://arstechnica.com/science/2014/01/suburbanites-lead-th...
- ars 2y ago
  Nice study - but it forgets to "bill" urban areas for the energy used by mass transit, and it doesn't bill them for the extra energy it takes to provide services to them. Shipping things to urban areas whether to a house or a store takes far more energy than to a suburban area because you have to ship smaller quantities more frequently (due to lack of storage). But this study doesn't include that. It's really not hard to check for yourself: Compare the prices of some item in an urban store vs a suburban store - it's way cheaper out of the city. That extra cost is there because of the extra energy it takes.
JumpCrisscross 2y ago
> As the suburb ends it switches to farm land No, farmers aren't living in Houston, Phoenix or Sunnyvale. Surburbs abut cities. Our farms are in rural territory, closer to industry (specifically: logistics) than cul-de-sacs. > Suburbs are cheaper than cities. Just look at the salaries of the people that live in both places Look at disposable incomes. Cities have higher-earning, more-productive and lower (on average) cost-paying residents. (Slimmer ones, too [1].) What masks that is the variance and split housing. Go to a suburb, and the dispoable income is around a Ruby Tuesday's tab because it's an inefficient mode of living. > In a city you can buy paper plates for so cheap (relative to your salary) it simply doesn't make sense to have real dishes I've rarely eaten a meal on a paper plate in a city. Only in suburbs, frequently at get-togethers. It's tedious to go out and buy bulky crap, so you buy durable dishes once. > In a suburb you buy in bulk and store it See above about the incentives around purchasing disposable crap wastefully, as well as unhealthy processed (albeit shelf stable) foods. Again, I agree with rural/suburban living. But it should be expensive. With most of the world now in cities, we'll see those costs increasingly redistributed. (Exhibit A: congestion pricing.) [1] https://www.npr.org/sections/goatsandsoda/2019/05/08/721373756/study-shatters-preconceived-notions-about-urban-vs-rural-obesity https://www.npr.org/sections/goatsandsoda/2019/05/08/7213737...
- ghaff 2y ago
  Some. My exurban town outside of Boston has orchards and farms. Not big industrial farms obviously but farms. My neighbor literally right next door has 100 tree apple orchard and a horse pasture. There’s a farm stand a mile down the road where they grow vegetables. This is about an hour west of Boston. A bit beyond classic suburbs but not by that much.
- jjav 2y ago
  > it's an inefficient mode of living Maximum efficiency would be racks of sleeping capsules stacked in a back room of the office where you work. I'm glad maximizing efficiency isn't the one and only criteria for housing.
- ars 2y ago
  > No, farmers aren't living in Houston, Phoenix or Sunnyvale. That's not even true. They live right next to it. I pulled up Houston on Google Maps and there was an ad for "Dewberry Farm" right there. The center of Houston is dense city, surrounded by a ring of suburb, surrounded by a ring of farms. Are we not looking at the same map? (Phoenix doesn't count, it's a desert, no farms there.) A get together doesn't count in terms of dishes, I'm talking about day to day. Every person I've visited in a city uses far more disposable stuff that the suburban person I've visited. I've lived in all kinds of places (not farm though), and I've found suburban to be the least wasteful, and cities to be the most wasteful. Rural is hard to categorize - they tend to be more self sufficient.

by ars 2y ago

namdnay 2y ago

And how are these suburban shoppers getting to this central area with bulk quantities? Walking? Cycling? Buses? Nah … they’re burning gasoline

ars 2y ago
They are, but they are not doing it very often. You go to a Costco type store monthly, not daily. And you combine trips and basically have a monthly "shopping day". You end up using less energy than your city dwelling friends.

resolutebat 2y ago

And your carbon footprint is probably lower than a city, cities are very wasteful places because they can be. This (and basically your entire argument) is flat out incorrect. A McMansion uses vastly more energy to build and maintain than an apartment, and apartment dwellers in a city don't need to drive to work, to school, to the shops, for a night out, etc. https://arstechnica.com/science/2014/01/suburbanites-lead-their-urban-counterparts-in-carbon-emissions/ https://arstechnica.com/science/2014/01/suburbanites-lead-th...

ars 2y ago
Nice study - but it forgets to "bill" urban areas for the energy used by mass transit, and it doesn't bill them for the extra energy it takes to provide services to them. Shipping things to urban areas whether to a house or a store takes far more energy than to a suburban area because you have to ship smaller quantities more frequently (due to lack of storage). But this study doesn't include that. It's really not hard to check for yourself: Compare the prices of some item in an urban store vs a suburban store - it's way cheaper out of the city. That extra cost is there because of the extra energy it takes.

JumpCrisscross 2y ago

> As the suburb ends it switches to farm land No, farmers aren't living in Houston, Phoenix or Sunnyvale. Surburbs abut cities. Our farms are in rural territory, closer to industry (specifically: logistics) than cul-de-sacs. > Suburbs are cheaper than cities. Just look at the salaries of the people that live in both places Look at disposable incomes. Cities have higher-earning, more-productive and lower (on average) cost-paying residents. (Slimmer ones, too [1].) What masks that is the variance and split housing. Go to a suburb, and the dispoable income is around a Ruby Tuesday's tab because it's an inefficient mode of living. > In a city you can buy paper plates for so cheap (relative to your salary) it simply doesn't make sense to have real dishes I've rarely eaten a meal on a paper plate in a city. Only in suburbs, frequently at get-togethers. It's tedious to go out and buy bulky crap, so you buy durable dishes once. > In a suburb you buy in bulk and store it See above about the incentives around purchasing disposable crap wastefully, as well as unhealthy processed (albeit shelf stable) foods. Again, I agree with rural/suburban living. But it should be expensive. With most of the world now in cities, we'll see those costs increasingly redistributed. (Exhibit A: congestion pricing.) [1] https://www.npr.org/sections/goatsandsoda/2019/05/08/721373756/study-shatters-preconceived-notions-about-urban-vs-rural-obesity https://www.npr.org/sections/goatsandsoda/2019/05/08/7213737...

ghaff 2y ago
Some. My exurban town outside of Boston has orchards and farms. Not big industrial farms obviously but farms. My neighbor literally right next door has 100 tree apple orchard and a horse pasture. There’s a farm stand a mile down the road where they grow vegetables. This is about an hour west of Boston. A bit beyond classic suburbs but not by that much.
jjav 2y ago
> it's an inefficient mode of living Maximum efficiency would be racks of sleeping capsules stacked in a back room of the office where you work. I'm glad maximizing efficiency isn't the one and only criteria for housing.
ars 2y ago
> No, farmers aren't living in Houston, Phoenix or Sunnyvale. That's not even true. They live right next to it. I pulled up Houston on Google Maps and there was an ad for "Dewberry Farm" right there. The center of Houston is dense city, surrounded by a ring of suburb, surrounded by a ring of farms. Are we not looking at the same map? (Phoenix doesn't count, it's a desert, no farms there.) A get together doesn't count in terms of dishes, I'm talking about day to day. Every person I've visited in a city uses far more disposable stuff that the suburban person I've visited. I've lived in all kinds of places (not farm though), and I've found suburban to be the least wasteful, and cities to be the most wasteful. Rural is hard to categorize - they tend to be more self sufficient.