Earlier quoted context omitted.
Whenever the author of an article I criticize shows up, I feel like I was over-bearingly rude. Was I?
Not at all!
Oh, good. It wasn't my intention to be.
Why Suburbia Sucks
221–230 of 298 posts
Re: Why Suburbia Sucks
#222Suburbia exists because people want a quiet, relatively safe place for their kids to grow up. I didn't realize this until I had children myself. I remember reaching my teenage years and cursing the dull, boring, culturally bankrupt suburbian neighborhood I grew up in. I left the minute it became feasible. Fast forward to now, and I'm right back in the 'burbs, in a house where my kids have access to safe streets, park…
This exactly... my friends live in the city and make the same amount of money as me. Pay 50% more for a house and pay for private school, an additional 20K a year. Just to be closer to some nice restaurants? No thanks. my suburban life is quite and close to starbucks, Im satisfied.
You miss the idea, no fact, that the people in the city scoff at the idea of considering Olive Garden a fancy meal
Re: Why Suburbia Sucks
#223For just one small example of many: life in a subdivision cul-de-sac stops children exploring and becoming conversant with the wider world around them because it tethers their social lives and activities to their busy parents’ willingness to drive them somewhere. There’s literally nowhere for them to go. What is this post talking about? I grew up on a cul-de-sac, and I was always outside playing with my friends. When…
This graf occurs very early in the post and I winced at it too and had to mentally grit myself into reading the rest of the post. I agree, it's a silly argument and the post would be better without it. But apart from the imprecision of the term "suburb" (the list of suburbs that defy his characterizations is huge), the actual enumerated arguments of the post are much better supported.
Re: Why Suburbia Sucks
#224Having lived & worked quite a long time in wildly different metro areas -- Santa Clara/Mountain View, Indianapolis, Austin -- this article raises more questions for me more than anything. What is a suburb, by the author's definition? It seems like it's an area outside the urban core of a city, I guess. But here in Austin, I'm buying a house away from the urban core of downtown, in a subdivision, but it's in a largely…
I don't want to overstep, but I'm curious what part of Austin you are describing. I can't think of any place that is largely undeveloped but is a 2-3 minute drive from a museum.
Yeah museum was inadvertently misleading. Just talking about the Thinkery at Mueller. A children's museum. Was already thinking past that sentence as I was typing it out.
edit: Also, it's more than 3 min by car. It's less than 3 miles but definitely not doing 60mph all the way there.
Re: Why Suburbia Sucks
#225Having lived & worked quite a long time in wildly different metro areas -- Santa Clara/Mountain View, Indianapolis, Austin -- this article raises more questions for me more than anything. What is a suburb, by the author's definition? It seems like it's an area outside the urban core of a city, I guess. But here in Austin, I'm buying a house away from the urban core of downtown, in a subdivision, but it's in a largely…
He's attacking American-style, super-sprawly suburbs, not suburbs in general.
Well fine but that's what I'm saying in my first paragraph. There's a particular kind of suburb he's talking about but it definitely is not inclusive of all suburbs.
Re: Why Suburbia Sucks
#226Earlier quoted context omitted.
> The elephant in the room people don't want to acknowledge is that suburbia has mostly been a way to flee from and exclude social decay. This is why I bought in a socially conservative neighborhood: people implicitly police one another into basic civic decency, and I'd much rather suffer an occasional scolding from a few overzealous busybodies than bear the burden of intergenerational poverty and crime. Sure, I may…
> few overzealous busybodies than bear the burden of intergenerational poverty and crime. New York city in recent years has had about 350 homicides and 250 traffic deaths (600 total). The state of Virginia, which has the same population (8m people), has 700 traffic deaths and 300-350 homicides. In other words, you're almost twice as likely to die in Virginia (a mostly suburban and rural state), than in the densest ci…
There is more to safety than simply violent crimes, non-violent crimes are a worry as well. I agree modern urban cores in American are just as safe in terms of violent crime as any suburb, but I would be interested in seeing how non-violent and property crimes compare. It wouldn't surprise me if they are just as safe as suburbs in that context as well, but it doesn't seem to be talked about nearly as much.
Re: Why Suburbia Sucks
#227Having lived & worked quite a long time in wildly different metro areas -- Santa Clara/Mountain View, Indianapolis, Austin -- this article raises more questions for me more than anything. What is a suburb, by the author's definition? It seems like it's an area outside the urban core of a city, I guess. But here in Austin, I'm buying a house away from the urban core of downtown, in a subdivision, but it's in a largely…
> In areas of such inflated housing prices, isn't suburbia supposed to be a pressure valve? All of his definitions of suburbia apply to Portola Valley, which I would never describe as being a pressure valve on inflated housing prices[1] in South Bay. [1] https://www.redfin.com/CA/Portola-Valley/16-Santa-Maria-Ave-...
Did you mean to link to empty land plot? It's beautiful though, but doesn't look like what is being discussed in article.
Re: Why Suburbia Sucks
#228Suburbia exists because people want a quiet, relatively safe place for their kids to grow up. I didn't realize this until I had children myself. I remember reaching my teenage years and cursing the dull, boring, culturally bankrupt suburbian neighborhood I grew up in. I left the minute it became feasible. Fast forward to now, and I'm right back in the 'burbs, in a house where my kids have access to safe streets, park…
> Fast forward to now, and I'm right back in the 'burbs, in a house where my kids have access to safe streets, parks, and decent schools. You seem to be confused. The article is saying that American suburbs are particularly poorly designed, not that suburbs as a general rule are terrible. Here is Gröbenzell, a suburb just west of Munich that's surrounded by farmland: https://www.google.com/maps/place/Gr%C3%B6benzell,…
I live in a suburb in the Netherlands and recently visited a school friend who now lives in a nice US suburb. We both have families with kids about the same age. We compared our living conditions.
His beautiful wooden house stands on ten times the area as mine, with a very nice garden and ample parking space. It looks very nice. But my concrete/brick house is bigger inside, and much better constructed. Parking space for visitors can be an issue with me.
Our kids go to school by bike. His kids can't. Although the school is not far, biking is too unsafe. They go by bus. The school even closes when there is snow, because that would make even the bus too unsafe!
Our kids play in the street with their friends, they walk up to each others houses spontaneously when they want to play. My friends' kids had fewer friends, had to set playdates, and played more online.
The conversation we had confirmed many more things from the article.
Re: Why Suburbia Sucks
#229Suburbia exists because people want a quiet, relatively safe place for their kids to grow up. I didn't realize this until I had children myself. I remember reaching my teenage years and cursing the dull, boring, culturally bankrupt suburbian neighborhood I grew up in. I left the minute it became feasible. Fast forward to now, and I'm right back in the 'burbs, in a house where my kids have access to safe streets, park…
The entirety of Europe and many countries with colder climates, where suburbia would be unsustainable due to heating costs manage to raise children in safe environments just fine. Unless you're citing studies that explicitly show suburbia results in better outcomes for children than being raised in urban environments ceteris paribus, it seems like the only argument you're producing here is your own lack of perspectiv…
> many countries with colder climates, where suburbia would be unsustainable due to heating costs
Which countries are these?
Re: Why Suburbia Sucks
#230Earlier quoted context omitted.
The scale is debatable, but there is a lot more evidence for this than you might think. It's also a lot more than just gas, paint, water pipes, sodder, even fillings also made significant contributions. IMO, scale is not that important as the preverbial straw that broke the camels back is important, but so are all the others that get to that point. A leaning disability on it's own might not lead to violence, but it d…
My point is that I'm not concerned about what I, you, or other laymen think about the science, here. I'm concerned about what the scientific community thinks. The scientific community does not accept the claimed social effects for lead. It's quite literally fringe science.
Appreciate your point of view. Another poster mentioned a paper by James J. Feigenbaum† and Christopher Muller‡. Are they some of the scientists you mentioned and labeled as "fringe", in regard to their point of view?
Clearly, violence in communities are multi-faceted topic that cannot be easily explained by something so simple as Lead. However, it might be a possible contributor.
That being said, I do agree with you that the tactics of destroying communities and creating housing projects was clearly a novel idea with terrible implementations and less then desirable outcomes. I work with a lot of folk from housing projects and I've met some really smart people who, without a life line[0], will never get out of poverty. It's a shame really - just by law of averages, politicians should realize that some of the housing projects are harboring brilliant individuals that will never be able to contribute to society within their full potential.
My network tech is from Gun Hill Road in The Bronx, which has an incredibly high crime rate but he can take an engine apart, then back together, within some impressive amount of time judge by Local246[1] (Mechanics Union in NYC). In reality, he really shouldn't be working in our company but in some swanky car modifications shop but they won't hire him based on many different factors. Really, a shame.
[0] - I'm implying that someone would have to hire them to let an individual prove themselves.
[1] - http://nyclocal246.org/