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Interchange in Houston is the same size as an entire city center in Italy

texasmonthly.com

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Re: Interchange in Houston is the same size as an entire city center in Italy

#71

Post by iso1631 »

ben_w wrote: post #65
lordnacho wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a European, it's not the age that matters so much as the uniformity of American cities. A lot of places between the coasts seem to be the same simcity arranged slightly differently. Come to Europe and see very different styles within a short distance.

So much so, that I didn’t really understand SimCity until I visited the USA. I don’t think I’ve even seen a water tower outside the states, and if I have they are disguised as other things. (Unless you count the tanks on top of literally every Cypriot building, but even those are nothing like the American/SimCity type).

There's a few water towers around Norfolk - and a particularly brutalist one near Lowestoft not far from the furthest East point of the UK

Re: Interchange in Houston is the same size as an entire city center in Italy

#72

Post by occamrazor »

wongarsu wrote: post #62
exabrial wrote: post #7

The elephant in the room is the assumption that _everyone wants to be stacked on top of each other_. I do agree that designing cities around cars has ruined a lot of nice places though.

As a European, I don't like living in the same house as 5 other families, whose sleep schedule doesn't necessarily align with mine. The acoustic isolation is probably a lot better than in typical US houses, but not perfect either. However I do like living 3 minutes from the next supermarket, and 20 minutes from the city center with all the shop, and 25 minutes from my work (all distances by foot). I would love to hav…

For a reasonable price one can have _either_ a single-family house, _or_ an apartment close to the city centre in most European towns. Having both usually is possible for an exorbitant price.

Re: Interchange in Houston is the same size as an entire city center in Italy

#73

Post by refurb »

kaesar14 wrote: post #28
sp332 wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And yet not only is Houston quite rich (on average anyway), but it consistently ranks #2 for happiness among major metro areas in Harris Happiness polls. http://www.city-data.com/blog/646-satisfaction-life-happines...

And? Can't aspire to a better future where we don't sit in traffic for hours to get across the city, choking our skies with car smog and carbon dioxide that'll ruin the environment for future generations? Our design philosophy around cities are the biggest mistake made of 20th century American politics, and I'll die on that hill.

Don’t live there if you don’t like it?

Re: Interchange in Houston is the same size as an entire city center in Italy

#74

Post by iso1631 »

RcouF1uZ4gsC wrote: post #26
apacheCamel wrote: post #10

>Siena’s history dates back millennia. Houston, meanwhile, was founded in 1836. Every time I am made aware of just how young the US is, it blows me away. I've never been to Europe, I would really love to go some day, but I can only imagine the feeling of actually seeing these really old places/structures in person.

> I've never been to Europe, I would really love to go some day, but I can only imagine the feeling of actually seeing these really old places/structures in person. European cities are also relatively young. If you want to see old cities, you should visit the Middle East or China.

Athens dates back before cities like Damascus and Jehrico, and probably even before Luxor. Not aware of any cities in China older than about 2000BC.

Re: Interchange in Houston is the same size as an entire city center in Italy

#75

Post by Aardwolf »

You can find as big highway interchanges in Italy too, e.g.:

https://www.google.com/maps/@41.8177773,12.3911127,17z

And you can most likely find small cities with 30K people in the US too (though I had trouble finding one of this size near Houston when scrolling through Google maps because the cities there look less dense and don't appear to have a discernible center at least from the look of the grid pattern of the streets).

Re: Interchange in Houston is the same size as an entire city center in Italy

#77

Post by joshvm »

wongarsu wrote: post #62
exabrial wrote: post #7

The elephant in the room is the assumption that _everyone wants to be stacked on top of each other_. I do agree that designing cities around cars has ruined a lot of nice places though.

As a European, I don't like living in the same house as 5 other families, whose sleep schedule doesn't necessarily align with mine. The acoustic isolation is probably a lot better than in typical US houses, but not perfect either. However I do like living 3 minutes from the next supermarket, and 20 minutes from the city center with all the shop, and 25 minutes from my work (all distances by foot). I would love to hav…

I feel like this is more an issue with cheap construction (and what people will pay for) than anything else. I've stayed in people's apartments in the UK where the light fittings rattle if upstairs is running a wash. These flats aren't cheap either, in the South East they're eye-wateringly expensive for the build quality (eg 250k for an "entry" two bed flat in a commuter town). Having lived up north for a few years in a detached house with a garden, it would be extremely difficult to go back to a flat (especially one in London that costs double the price for half the space). There is a massive supermarket five minutes down the road from our house and town is 15 mins drive. These places absolutely exist for reasonable prices.

When/if we finally buy, we're looking at a rural, passive self-build where we can work remotely. The cost is about the same as a town house these days.

There isn't any technical reason why you couldn't put in proper isolation between floors or walls, aside from the fact it would slow down construction and be expensive. Proper insulation (both acoustic and thermal) also makes rooms smaller in a given footprint which is an issue for marketing.

Re: Interchange in Houston is the same size as an entire city center in Italy

#78

Post by heymijo »

swasheck wrote: post #30
blakesterz wrote: post #11

"Rather, Cold War–era urban design philosophy in the U.S. prioritized sprawl because older cities that had urbanized pre–World War II—New York, Chicago, Philadelphia, and Detroit—were seen as being susceptible to nuclear strikes. Less-dense cities such as Los Angeles and Houston were less likely to be targeted for a nuclear attack. Sprawl was a deterrent against Soviet aggression." That's the first time I've heard th…

I’ve also read that it was the byproduct of post war migration of whites who wanted access to the city but were afraid of the concentration of black people who resided in the city interior. (Stamped from the Beginning by Ibrim X Kendi)

No discussion of sprawl is complete without talking about Robert Moses. American highways, and highways around the world sprawl as they do because of Robert Moses.

Throughout Robert Cairo's 1344 page biography of Moses, the reader sees how Moses' racism and clasism impacted the massive influence he had on transportation and sprawl in America.

+1 for Stamped.

In addition, Redlining is a well researched and documented practice in America [0]

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Redlining#History

Re: Interchange in Houston is the same size as an entire city center in Italy

#79

Post by criddell »

save_ferris wrote: post #16
mc32 wrote: post #5

Ok? And? It’s interesting trivia but it doesn’t mean much. A well packed slum could fit 10x that amount in that land. Or you could have a vineyard or you could have a train station. It’s an arbitrary comparison. Land gets used in many different ways that make sense for the local people. Some seem “better” but that requires certain “assumptions “. Is arid desert “wasted”?

The article goes on to discuss the issue of sprawl and how cities like Houston are building themselves into a corner by constantly expanding infrastructure like this. The ironic part of this comparison is that Siena is a much older community than Houston, which, like most of America, embraced a sprawl mentality in the 50’s as a Cold War risk mitigation strategy. Climate change is arguably a more pressing threat to Ho…

There are lots of options for Houston to evolve. The city is mostly how the electorate wants it.

Re: Interchange in Houston is the same size as an entire city center in Italy

#80

Post by rhino369 »

lordnacho wrote: post #36
apacheCamel wrote: post #10

>Siena’s history dates back millennia. Houston, meanwhile, was founded in 1836. Every time I am made aware of just how young the US is, it blows me away. I've never been to Europe, I would really love to go some day, but I can only imagine the feeling of actually seeing these really old places/structures in person.

As a European, it's not the age that matters so much as the uniformity of American cities. A lot of places between the coasts seem to be the same simcity arranged slightly differently. Come to Europe and see very different styles within a short distance.

It's the result of a lot of growth and development by a common culture with high degrees of communication and trade in a very short amount of time.
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