Put tiny businesses back into residential neighborhoods • Hacker News Board

Re: Put tiny businesses back into residential neighborhoods

#61

Post by hirundo » Fri, Jul 24, 2020, 2:52 AM UTC

Spooky23 wrote: post #30

madamelic wrote: post #2

Mixed use zoning is just about the best case situation for everyone. - Less reliance on cars, which results in less parking, which results in less traffic... it becomes self-perpetuating. - Better walkability - Knowing your corner store clerk or at least having a rapport with them - Healthier citizens, due to them walking everywhere (Go to NYC and see how few overweight people you see... not many unless they're touri…

In theory sure. In reality, the financial system is oriented towards big capital. My aunt ran a coffee shop that was established by grandparents in 1939. It was in the lobby of a office building in he central business district of our little city. The building was bought by a Chinese investor. Like other similar stores, her rent went up 5x and she shuttered. I live in a mixed use urban neighborhood. 50% of he storefro…

Teaching karate is a death business? In my limited experience the martial arts are overwhelmingly about defense and fitness. Making them predominantly a life business. A donut shop would be a better example of a death business.

Re: Put tiny businesses back into residential neighborhoods

#62

Post by tinyhouse » Fri, Jul 24, 2020, 2:54 AM UTC

smoe wrote: post #43

aahhahahaaa wrote: post #13

How did we slip away so far from this being fairly obvious? Cities have worked well this way for hundreds of years. Maybe the industrial revolution made cities too unpleasant? Were we too spoiled by the automobile industry and government roads? White flight from cities into the suburbs?

Never been to an US residential area and only "know" them from tv shows. Are they really pretty much completely devoid of businesses as this article indicates? No grocery / mom and pop stores, bars, restaurants, hair dressers etc.? That sounds very inconvenient. I always assumed you'd get some basic commercial everywhere.

It depends. There are different types of cities in the US. In general, if we're talking about suburbs, there are businesses but they are usually all centered at the same place. Usually referred to as the city center. This can be a smaller or big center, depending on the town. Then there are towns that have those big shopping plazas you usually have to drive to. The city center concept is much nicer in my opinion.

Re: Put tiny businesses back into residential neighborhoods

#63

Post by kilroy_jones » Fri, Jul 24, 2020, 2:54 AM UTC

Spooky23 wrote: post #30

madamelic wrote: post #2

Mixed use zoning is just about the best case situation for everyone. - Less reliance on cars, which results in less parking, which results in less traffic... it becomes self-perpetuating. - Better walkability - Knowing your corner store clerk or at least having a rapport with them - Healthier citizens, due to them walking everywhere (Go to NYC and see how few overweight people you see... not many unless they're touri…

In theory sure. In reality, the financial system is oriented towards big capital. My aunt ran a coffee shop that was established by grandparents in 1939. It was in the lobby of a office building in he central business district of our little city. The building was bought by a Chinese investor. Like other similar stores, her rent went up 5x and she shuttered. I live in a mixed use urban neighborhood. 50% of he storefro…

Assuming you're in America, most areas are not dense enough to accommodate mixed use zoning unless they start building up. The other half is getting priced out like your grandma.

Re: Put tiny businesses back into residential neighborhoods

#64

Post by kilroy_jones » Fri, Jul 24, 2020, 2:55 AM UTC

hirundo wrote: post #61

Spooky23 wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In theory sure. In reality, the financial system is oriented towards big capital. My aunt ran a coffee shop that was established by grandparents in 1939. It was in the lobby of a office building in he central business district of our little city. The building was bought by a Chinese investor. Like other similar stores, her rent went up 5x and she shuttered. I live in a mixed use urban neighborhood. 50% of he storefro…

Teaching karate is a death business? In my limited experience the martial arts are overwhelmingly about defense and fitness. Making them predominantly a life business. A donut shop would be a better example of a death business.

I think they meant a business that is destined to die. Could be wrong though.

Re: Put tiny businesses back into residential neighborhoods

#65

Post by mumblemumble » Fri, Jul 24, 2020, 2:57 AM UTC

chills wrote: post #28

lotsofpulp wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People wanted their children to be separate from people of other socioeconomic classes (and races), and the way to do that in the US is to move to a school district they others can’t afford.

This has also been the case for hundreds of years though.

Not to the same extent. It wasn't until cars became a thing that it became practical for most rich people to live more than a (healthy) walking distance away from working class people. If they lived too far away, then you wouldn't be able to have them work for you.

Re: Put tiny businesses back into residential neighborhoods

#66

Post by holler » Fri, Jul 24, 2020, 2:58 AM UTC

In Seattle this is prevalent, part of the charm.

Re: Put tiny businesses back into residential neighborhoods

#67

Post by wincy » Fri, Jul 24, 2020, 2:59 AM UTC

lotsofpulp wrote: post #15

aahhahahaaa wrote: post #13

How did we slip away so far from this being fairly obvious? Cities have worked well this way for hundreds of years. Maybe the industrial revolution made cities too unpleasant? Were we too spoiled by the automobile industry and government roads? White flight from cities into the suburbs?

People wanted their children to be separate from people of other socioeconomic classes (and races), and the way to do that in the US is to move to a school district they others can’t afford.

Heck yes I want to move away from socioeconomic classes that could potentially put my daughter in harms way. We lived in a lower class neighborhood and while my two year old daughter was playing with a shovel in the front yard a drug deal went bad at the house across from us and the kid (he was maybe 16) started shooting his gun into the air. I’d stopped his mom from strangling him two years before that. Before that, I’d stopped his mother from being assaulted by her boyfriend a few years before. And until my daughter was born, I didn’t really care.

But thinking of my daughter getting hit by a stray bullet was terrifying, and we got a mortgage and moved to a house worth 6x the price a few months later. It was sad because our neighbors behind us were Venezuelan refugees with two kids and we got along really well.

I’m not ashamed of wanting to keep my children safe, and I’m not going to put them at risk so I can fulfill others vague notions of “inclusiveness”. The police took 45+ minutes to show up any time I called.

Funny thing is, the middle class neighborhood I live in now is much MORE diverse, not less. We have Africans, Southern Asians, East Asians, Spaniards, Russians, and all manner of professionals from all over the world. We bought the house from some Pakistanis. Heck, my neighbor is a convicted felon for dealing in his younger days but even him and his wife and six kids are okay.

Re: Put tiny businesses back into residential neighborhoods

#68

Post by Spooky23 » Fri, Jul 24, 2020, 3:00 AM UTC

hirundo wrote: post #61

Spooky23 wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In theory sure. In reality, the financial system is oriented towards big capital. My aunt ran a coffee shop that was established by grandparents in 1939. It was in the lobby of a office building in he central business district of our little city. The building was bought by a Chinese investor. Like other similar stores, her rent went up 5x and she shuttered. I live in a mixed use urban neighborhood. 50% of he storefro…

Teaching karate is a death business? In my limited experience the martial arts are overwhelmingly about defense and fitness. Making them predominantly a life business. A donut shop would be a better example of a death business.

Sorry, if you see a development with any vacancy, a martial arts place, and a subway/Chinese joint, that’s usually a dying development.

Re: Put tiny businesses back into residential neighborhoods

#69

Post by Cogito » Fri, Jul 24, 2020, 3:01 AM UTC

epistasis wrote: post #33

aahhahahaaa wrote: post #13

How did we slip away so far from this being fairly obvious? Cities have worked well this way for hundreds of years. Maybe the industrial revolution made cities too unpleasant? Were we too spoiled by the automobile industry and government roads? White flight from cities into the suburbs?

Yes, basically it comes down to racism and classism, and a bit of the fight against communism. There used to be racial covenants that ensures racial segregation. As soon as those were rendered illegal, people started zoning for "public safety" and such. The original decision (Euclid?) that rendered zoning legal explicitly states concerns about lower income people degrading neighborhoods if multi-family residences are…

> The rise of the automobile and destruction of commuter rail lead to a ton of land accessible to people who worked in cities. And in conjunction with the exclusionary zoning that was used to protect the capitalistic gains of property values, the idea of mixed-use zoning became antiquated and counter productive to financial and social interests.

This is a solid argument, but I don't see the link between this and racism/classism.

Perhaps it implies a link to some kind of 'systemic classism', as when individual people make decisions to benefit themselves, those with money tend to have more agency.

It seems like everywhere cars and rail allowed suburbanisation people jumped at the chance to get a comfortable home on large lots at a cheap price. It turns out massive, exclusion-zoned suburbs were short-sighted, and many places are now pursuing a 'city of villages' planning strategy.

It's not obvious to me that, if you take out any explicit class or race biases, the world wouldn't have followed the same path with respect to businesses in these suburbs.

Re: Put tiny businesses back into residential neighborhoods

#70

Post by tinyhouse » Fri, Jul 24, 2020, 3:01 AM UTC

munk-a wrote: post #32

lotsofpulp wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People wanted their children to be separate from people of other socioeconomic classes (and races), and the way to do that in the US is to move to a school district they others can’t afford.

Not just afford - often time those suburbs specifically barred non-whites from owning property. Additionally red-lining and racist loan practices forced that wealth gap to grow. But I think that's separate from the car issue, mostly. Originally satellite communities had commercial services - local shops and the like. But those were phased out due to a lack of demand, I think due to societal shifts that were egged on…

Are you speculating or do you have specific examples? It sounds far fetched. Not to mention that whites are not even a majority in many of the wealthy suburbs. Many of Asian and Indian families.