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Our self imposed scarcity of nice places

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Re: Our self imposed scarcity of nice places

#241

Post by jseban »

globular-toast wrote: post #236
null_object wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Walkability isn't uniform across Europe, Scandinavia or even within a single country: other people have mentioned Stockholm - which is still a walkable town, even though car-traffic is prioritized over cycles and pedestrians[0] - but other towns in Sweden are definitely not modelled for pedestrians. Nyköping is a town I need to visit regularly, and there pretty much all of the grocery and larger stores have been plac…

Motorised traffic, and cars in particular, are prioritised over non-motorised traffic everywhere I've been in the world, including Stockholm. The problem is cultural. You see, motorised traffic wins by default, unless there are strict rules to stop that happening. If you think about a street full of pedestrians, some will be quicker and stronger than others, but it's not OK for them to use their might to take priorit…

> The problem is cultural. You see, motorised traffic wins by default, unless there are strict rules to stop that happening.

It's not cultural, motorized traffic wins because it's more powerful.

> Right now a child is being taught to give way to cars because if they don't the car will kill them. Vehicles with enclosed cabs like cars are the worst because the drivers are completely removed from the road. Their experience is not human.

Subways, trams and buses will also kill them, that's just as dangerous.

Re: Our self imposed scarcity of nice places

#242

Post by jbjbjbjb »

Kaibeezy wrote: post #57

It’s not just scarcity. People “need” a place to park three or four huge (subsidized) vehicles. Also, people like to brag. N -thousand square feet and an n -car garage provide an objective measure. It’s harder to one-up by saying you have a really nice trattoria three blocks over.

My impression was the whole article is basically just “why don’t people like what I like”.

These houses are scarce but that doesn’t necessarily mean the mainstream market wants that. It’s a niche.

Re: Our self imposed scarcity of nice places

#243

Post by jameshart »

the__alchemist wrote: post #126
fsloth wrote: post #8

Fantastic cultural divide. This is one of the reasons why I read HN. Most of Europe is more or less walkable - one reason is that the largest urban centers predate cars, but intentional design AF (anno ford) is also a factor. I can bike or walk everywhere, and the only reason I have a car is that it makes grocery shopping much, much easier. I am not very green or anything, I just like to keep things simple. You can c…

Related: Most European cities are comparably beautiful compared to North American ones. Pick a random European city, and it's probably more aesthetically interesting than any in NA. I'm curious why this is the case (Older / less centrally-planned? A subjective difference in tastes?)

This is selective bias. Many European cities were devastated by bombing in the 1940s, forcing rebuilding of terrible building stock. Various dictatorships, of both the right and the left, have blighted cities around the continent with monstrous buildings. Past generations of urbanists rammed highways through cities or built ugly social experimental housing projects.

European towns and cities are mixed.

Re: Our self imposed scarcity of nice places

#244

Post by alex_smart »

oftenwrong wrote: post #187
sokoloff wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would like to (and do) raise my family like that. We live in Cambridge, MA; our kids walk to school and to play with friends in the park, I’ve never feared a mass shooting*, we have reasonable accommodations for cars, bikes, and pedestrians. * - Do you live in fear of drowning, choking, or bicycling? All are significantly higher lifetime risks in America than mass shootings. Drowning is 10x more likely but few live…

It's sad that "riding inside a car, van or truck" and "pedestrian" are so high on that list, but also surprising that "bicycling" is so significantly safer.

Lifetime odds of dying due to an activity is a poor indicator of how safe that activity is.

Lifetime odds of dying due to an activity = Probability of dying due to activity while performing it x Expected number of times that activity is performed in lifetime. (Only the first factor corresponds the inherent safety of the activity.)

It is not that bicycles are more dangerous than sharks. It is that people are cycling much more than they are interacting with sharks.

It is not that walking is more dangerous than cycling. It is that people are walking much more than they are cycling.

Re: Our self imposed scarcity of nice places

#245

Post by rekado »

ivanhoe wrote: post #136
rekado wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oh, you misunderstand. Involving a car would most definitely not make it a better solution. I have no interest whatsoever to involve cars in my life. Having to share the roads with them is bad enough. (The arrogance of space is ridiculous.) Deliveries: these cost little because people aren't paid properly. If I wanted to pay them properly, I wouldn't be able to use their services much. So instead of normalizing explo…

> and with different supermarkets in almost every direction, within 10mins on foot they most definitely can be avoided. You do realize that this is just your privilege? Most of people don't have everything in the walking reach, some would have to bike up a hill for a few kilometers to get to a shop, etc? Don't get me wrong, it's great that you can, but it's just a lucky consequence of where you live, not something th…

> You do realize that this is just your privilege?

Yes, that's the point, though. This discussion thread is about walkable cities.

I should also point out that urban planning that gives priority to people who walk benefits everyone, independent of their income. This cannot be said for designs that give priority to cars.

Re: Our self imposed scarcity of nice places

#246

Post by jameshart »

Neil44 wrote: post #199

My cynical view is that if you put not nice people into nice places, you make the places not nice, not the other way around. 99% of the time.

It seems weird to use ‘having a lot of money’ as a proxy measure for how nice someone is likely to be though?

Re: Our self imposed scarcity of nice places

#247

Post by jseban »

twelvechairs wrote: post #217
sokoloff wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Basic needs really shouldn't be investment material. Companies providing and selling food, energy, and consumer staples are investment materials. I don’t get why housing should be a special carve-out and don’t see a workable answer to how to provide food for everyone while banning all investment in companies that grow or sell food. These companies are invested in precisely because these are basic needs. The company…

The real difference (surprisingly not mentioned yet) is land for housing in cities is incredibly finite. Food, energy and consumer staples can be produced endlessly

The key here being housing in cities and I would also add in nice neighborhoods, in cities. You can still expand the city, and build more cities. For practical matters, land is not finite. Food and consumer staples are similarly finite if you only look at the nicest and most attractive versions of it. There is a constant "shortage" of michelin star food and ferraris

Re: Our self imposed scarcity of nice places

#248

Post by yarky »

jseban wrote: post #193
sandos wrote: post #178

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I live in Västerås which is sometimes touted as one of the, at least, top 10 cycling cities in Sweden with 390 kilometers of cycle/walking paths. And still we have expansive shopping malls outside of town which is heavily in favor or cars. We still have the downtown shopping but it can barely hang by, and parking is very expensive. It would not really have been possible to build all this shopping in the city center,…

Yeah it's just transport and travel that naturally outgrows the pace of walking and cycling, it's just technological progress.

> just technological progress.

Despite the social consequences.

Re: Our self imposed scarcity of nice places

#249

Post by bjornsing »

sokoloff wrote: post #116
torben-friis wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>The main issue is that there is just nowhere near enough housing to keep up with population increases, seemingly anywhere in the Western world. Not sure about Sweden but at least here (Spain) housing being bought for investment is much more of a problem than physical unavailability. And I don't mean it as a store of value: People (and companies) buy houses to rent them and have the rent payments pay for the mortgage…

> Basic needs really shouldn't be investment material. Companies providing and selling food, energy, and consumer staples are investment materials. I don’t get why housing should be a special carve-out and don’t see a workable answer to how to provide food for everyone while banning all investment in companies that grow or sell food. These companies are invested in precisely because these are basic needs. The company…

> banning all investment in companies that grow or sell food

Nobody wants to ban companies from building and selling houses. Buying them and keeping them as investment vehicles is something else entirely.

Re: Our self imposed scarcity of nice places

#250

Post by deadpannini »

jbjbjbjb wrote: post #242
Kaibeezy wrote: post #57

It’s not just scarcity. People “need” a place to park three or four huge (subsidized) vehicles. Also, people like to brag. N -thousand square feet and an n -car garage provide an objective measure. It’s harder to one-up by saying you have a really nice trattoria three blocks over.

My impression was the whole article is basically just “why don’t people like what I like”. These houses are scarce but that doesn’t necessarily mean the mainstream market wants that. It’s a niche.

When a niche becomes expensive, that indicates that there is a bigger market for it, even if it doesn't rise to the level of "mainstream."
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