4 ms·
The best way is to change our communities, even if that takes time and money.
by antiframe 3mo ago
The best way is to change our communities, even if that takes time and money.
- denkmoon 3mo agoLike everything else community construction responds to incentives. So we need to structurally incentivise short distance commute communities. Congestion pricing seems like a reasonable first step.
- collabs 3mo agoIt is difficult for me to admit I'm an idiot but when I was younger and living in an apartment, I loved the idea of a single family home. And now that I'm living in a single family home, I feel like I was wrong all along. Not that I want to go back to the apartment I was in before. Dear lord no but the idea of a mixed use building not too tall only like first floor with high ceilings for business or shops with two or at the most three floors above for residential units feels like the ideal sweet spot. Ideally with a lot of these close together to have everything I need within a walking distance but also a subway station within a walking distance if I need to go farther.
- SilverElfin 3mo agoDo you have kids? I feel like apartment living as a family is worse than a spacious single family home and yard and all that. I suspect that preference holds true for most people.
- asdff 3mo agoMost kids are only into playing in the yard for a couple years really. Before long they are preteens living in their room, probably seething at the fact they need a ride from a parent to hang out with any of their friends. Apartments can also have stuff you could never afford that a kid would like, such as a massive pool (try pricing out a new build pool these days).
- fragmede 3mo agoCommunity shared parks can serve the purpose that a SFH yard serves for kids, but you have to interact with other people and we can't have that.
- breezybottom 3mo agoLmao what? Everything about this comment is nuts.
- throw0101a 3mo ago> I feel like apartment living as a family is worse than a spacious single family home and yard and all that. I suspect that preference holds true for most people. And families do it in NYC, and Hong Kong, and Germany, and Spain (AFAICT, 65%), and…
- inigyou 3mo agoThey manage, but it's not a good experience. The apartments are usually too small for families and the ones that are big enough are too expensive. This is solvable, but has not been solved. Think about having to share a bedroom with your child, and when they're old enough to need their own one, putting up a partition wall and having each be less than half the size of a normal bedroom, very cramped. And you don't get a living room. (If you did have a living room, now it's your bedroom while the child gets the actual bedroom)
- segfaltnh 3mo agoI wasted a decade trying to live in single family homes. Now at 40 my wife and I are living in a small city in a condo and couldn't be happier. Neither of us enjoyed the workload of managing a SFH. Dont force yourself to stay if you aren't happy, you'll wish you moved sooner (I do).
- matwood 3mo agoPeople also change and want different things at different parts of their life. Young and single - living in an apartment is amazing. Once someone is coupled up, has kids, and some animals, a SFH also looks much more appealing. Once the kids are gone, then an apartment/condo starts to look pretty attractive again.
- breezybottom 3mo agoNever in my life has living in an apartment seemed appealing. But I suppose that depends on the apartments you can afford.
- ctkhn 3mo agoDepending on where you are, there are nice middle class apartments that can be family friendly. I have friends not in tech in my same neighborhood with a three bedroom place for 1500. Granted this is the midwest and not SF but their place is near the train to get downtown for work and surrounded with a lot of parks for baseball, soccer etc for kids
- bluGill 3mo agoA not top tall building doesn't have enough people to be mixed use. Cities often cheat their with several side streets of residential (it might be zoned mix use but it isn't) only for every street of mixed use. People on the non mixed use streets travel to the mixed use one.
- baggy_trough 3mo agoWhat if you don't want to live in a dense community?
- slyall 3mo agoWell just live somewhere that is so lacking in density there is no congestion. Or a small town that is surrounded by farms. Just avoid suburban housing as far as the eye can see with a limited number of roads everyone gets funneled on to.
- SilverElfin 3mo agoI’ve done that and those areas change over time. A town becomes more like a small city. A small city becomes more dense. Etc. Then all the urbanists move the goal posts and ask why you didn’t live somewhere else.
- cman1444 3mo agoVery case dependent of course. There are loads of small towns that have stagnant or shrinking populations all across the US.
- asdff 3mo agoJust move to the rust belt. If you are going to move to a growing job market don’t be surprised when the job market grows and triggers demand for development.
- breezybottom 3mo agoYou don't have to be surprised to disagree with it. What's the limiting principle here? Every city should grow to the size of Tokyo?
- denkmoon 3mo agoGod forbid society grows around you. How dare all those productive aspiring people build things near you. Did they not know you had exclusive right of refusal on nearby development?
- adrianN 3mo agoThere is little hope for that as long as driving is heavily subsidized.
- xnx 3mo agoHow is driving subsidized?
- adrianN 3mo agoOne example is the requirement to have parking spaces.
- asdff 3mo agoMassive ongoing investment into roads. EV incentives that would pay for 3-4 ebikes outright. Big 3 bailout. Cash for clunkers. Impact fees from developers towards roads. As others said parking requirements. There is so much beyond that too.
- ErroneousBosh 3mo ago> Massive ongoing investment into roads Okay, let's stop spending money on roads then. How are you at riding your bike through mud? Pretty good? Got nice chunky tyres?
- adrianN 3mo agoRoad wear increases with the fourth power of axle weight iirc. Bike paths are orders of magnitude cheaper and need a lot less space.
- ErroneousBosh 3mo ago> Road wear increases with the fourth power of axle weight iirc That's not actually true, and the paper that describes the "fourth power" thing even says that right up front. If you massively oversimplify the model so that you've got all vehicles fitted with infinitely hard bicycle tyres on a perfectly smooth surface, it kind of works out, but not quite.