Why is there no multilevel parking? All that space can't be cheap. Is there zoning laws against it?
The Rise of “Movie-Set Urbanism”
11–20 of 209 posts
Re: The Rise of “Movie-Set Urbanism”
#12> Until you deal with the parking problem—which is done by building truly mixed-use places where people can meet their daily needs without hopping in the car—you haven’t created true urbanism.
Daily needs means jobs for both you and your spouse, which won’t be in some random subdivision in Florida. It means schools, which don’t appear to be there either. It means the kids’ after school activities, again, missing from this plan. And if you don’t have kids or a spouse, then you should just live in the city anyway. This is an alternative to the sprawling suburban subdivision, not a downtown block.
Developers create these “drive to urbanism” layouts (like Reston Town Center in Northern Virginia) because thats what’s workable given the planning constraints of the larger system. This happens in “real cities” too. When I lived in a newly-redeveloped area of downtown DC, we still ended up driving a lot. My work was on the other side of town. The grocery store across the street was an awful, over priced Safeway. My daughter’s school was over in Georgetown, a 30 minute drive away. Driving is unavoidable unless these communities are highly self contained.
Re: The Rise of “Movie-Set Urbanism”
#13Reminds me of Facadism as part of the larger pattern of cargo culting trends in development to try to gain the benefits of the "new way" without deeper changes resulting in nothing really different. On the parking issue and related housing shortages I wonder how viable an attempted rail primary based housing development project to a major city would be in the US for NIMBY dodging. Apparently that is fairly common in…
I think this is the idea behind culdesac (no private cars or parking in development, on light rail, carshare at periphery) but we'll see how that pans out.
Re: The Rise of “Movie-Set Urbanism”
#14I think he's barking up the wrong tree. The problem isn't "movie set urbanism", it's just boring, old "too much parking". Too much parking creates sparseness which reduces walkability. But putting parking behind stores ("movie sets") creates a human scale street space. While organic urban growth should be cherished, there are extreme cases, like most American towns and cities, where urbanism needs to be forcefully bo…
If you don't have of street parking you get congestion as people park on streets - that is the reason why planners mandate of street parking.
Re: The Rise of “Movie-Set Urbanism”
#15Florida is almost entirely a place where you need a car to do anything. It is so absurdly spread-out that even driving at high speed on their high speed roads is a remarkably slow way to get anywhere. If people cannot park there, they cannot get there. Even if you built a real urban walkable neighbourhood with housing, stores, schools, offices, churches - a place where people could truly walk to all of their daily needs - the people that lived there would still need multiple cars per family in order to access the outside world. It would be like living on an island. Attempting to leave on foot would be like trying to swim across the ocean. If you don't die of dehydration or exhaustion first, you will probably killed by a shark/car before you get anywhere. Ironically, about 1 in 4 Florida drivers are uninsured. One fake town centre is merely a tiny, amusing symptom of a giant chicken-and-egg problem.
Re: The Rise of “Movie-Set Urbanism”
#16I think he's barking up the wrong tree. The problem isn't "movie set urbanism", it's just boring, old "too much parking". Too much parking creates sparseness which reduces walkability. But putting parking behind stores ("movie sets") creates a human scale street space. While organic urban growth should be cherished, there are extreme cases, like most American towns and cities, where urbanism needs to be forcefully bo…
> You get something that is an entertainment product—it looks cute, but it’s functionally like a movie set or a theme park. Its design has the aesthetic signifiers of a traditional town, but none of the functionality, none of the deep responsiveness to the needs of the people living there.
I think he encapsulates things nicely here. Barring some exceptions, town/village life in the US is basically non-existent. There are no central squares/plazas, no pedestrian only downtowns, no local bakeries/butchers/grocers, no transit, etc. Everything is a facade designed around the car.
Re: The Rise of “Movie-Set Urbanism”
#17Reminds me of Facadism as part of the larger pattern of cargo culting trends in development to try to gain the benefits of the "new way" without deeper changes resulting in nothing really different. On the parking issue and related housing shortages I wonder how viable an attempted rail primary based housing development project to a major city would be in the US for NIMBY dodging. Apparently that is fairly common in…
I think this is the idea behind culdesac (no private cars or parking in development, on light rail, carshare at periphery) but we'll see how that pans out.
It wont work this is single young architects work that lead to high rise disasters in the 1970's and 60's
Re: The Rise of “Movie-Set Urbanism”
#18While not perfect, this type of development is already a step-up above the unwalkable so called "power center". They have great upgrade potential when we'll figure out public transport. The parking lots closest to the walkable public strip can be turned into mixed use buildings.
Solving infrastructure and public transit problems is not the job of real estate developers. It is our job as a society. There has to be political consensus on how we want our communities to be planned. The developer will then do what they can with the rules we impose.
Unfortunately, the consensus is largely that we love cars. Maybe we should be paying for influential people to spend a month without a car in a walkable european city.
Re: The Rise of “Movie-Set Urbanism”
#19> Until you deal with the parking problem—which is done by building truly mixed-use places where people can meet their daily needs without hopping in the car—you haven’t created true urbanism. Daily needs means jobs for both you and your spouse, which won’t be in some random subdivision in Florida. It means schools, which don’t appear to be there either. It means the kids’ after school activities, again, missing from…
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Re: The Rise of “Movie-Set Urbanism”
#20Reminds me of Facadism as part of the larger pattern of cargo culting trends in development to try to gain the benefits of the "new way" without deeper changes resulting in nothing really different. On the parking issue and related housing shortages I wonder how viable an attempted rail primary based housing development project to a major city would be in the US for NIMBY dodging. Apparently that is fairly common in…
I think this is the idea behind culdesac (no private cars or parking in development, on light rail, carshare at periphery) but we'll see how that pans out.
No private cars in the development? OK, that means the housebound can't live there, because people like home health nurses can't be asked to drag equipment and other supplies from the closest parking to wherever the person lives. With many First-World countries looking at aging populations, this is going to limit the appeal of such developments.