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Nature has enormous emotional and cognitive benefits on people

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Re: Nature has enormous emotional and cognitive benefits on people

#261

Post by pharmakom »

throwaway894345 wrote: post #242
pharmakom wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We can better maintain mountains and forests by having dense living areas for most people. There should be good public transport links from these areas to national parks. The enemy of wilderness is not urbanists, it’s suburban sprawl.

Suburbs aren't typically replacing forests, they're typically replacing farms, and we have far more agricultural land than we need (we produce a huge surplus of food) that we aren't managing well in the first place. We can and should protect existing nature, expand our national parks, and incentivize the naturalization and public access of existing private lands; however, we can do this without packing everyone into…

There are a lot more factors to the equation than farming space. And what do you think was there before the farms?

Re: Nature has enormous emotional and cognitive benefits on people

#262

Post by throwaway894345 »

ryukafalz wrote: post #213
throwaway894345 wrote: post #188

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The US has 2.2 BN acres which is 7 acres for every man, woman, and child, and yet each person resides on maybe 0.05 acres (average lot size is .2 acres divided by average household size of 2.5 people/household is 0.08 rounding down because tens of millions don’t live in a single-family building). There is a tremendous amount of space that isn’t inhabited—much of that is used for farming, but we farm far more than we…

Sure, there’s plenty of space out in the middle of nowhere. But can you imagine the scale of the infrastructure that would be required to turn so much of that into living space? Think streets, water, sewer, power, food distribution, etc. Anyway, I’m not saying everyone should live in concrete jungles either. Think more like the Netherlands than New York City.

> Sure, there’s plenty of space out in the middle of nowhere. But can you imagine the scale of the infrastructure that would be required to turn so much of that into living space? Think streets, water, sewer, power, food distribution, etc.

My position is "we don't need to move everyone into cities or expand public transit infrastructure to every corner of the country". It is not "we should move everyone out of the cities and distribute them uniformly across the country".

> Anyway, I’m not saying everyone should live in concrete jungles either. Think more like the Netherlands than New York City.

The Netherlands has 10x the population density of the US, and the US probably would come to resemble NL if we didn't have the luxury of space. The US has a whole range of density, however--if you want something like NL, we certainly have it on offer, and I'm fully on board with making urban and suburban areas more people-friendly. I just disagree with people who think we all need to live urban lives.

Re: Nature has enormous emotional and cognitive benefits on people

#263

Post by throwaway894345 »

pharmakom wrote: post #261
throwaway894345 wrote: post #242

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Suburbs aren't typically replacing forests, they're typically replacing farms, and we have far more agricultural land than we need (we produce a huge surplus of food) that we aren't managing well in the first place. We can and should protect existing nature, expand our national parks, and incentivize the naturalization and public access of existing private lands; however, we can do this without packing everyone into…

There are a lot more factors to the equation than farming space. And what do you think was there before the farms?

> There are a lot more factors to the equation than farming space

Yes, but agricultural footprint is the dominating factor.

> And what do you think was there before the farms?

Nature, to my point. Recall that you're the one arguing that suburbs rather than agriculture is threatening nature:

> The enemy of wilderness is not urbanists, it’s suburban sprawl.

Re: Nature has enormous emotional and cognitive benefits on people

#264

Post by yodelshady »

throwaway894345 wrote: post #181
yodelshady wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I’m sure they’ve grown, but it’s still a big world out there people. I No, it just isn't. Humans have transformed seventy per cent of the land on Earth[1]. Including the deserts. Suburbs are the second most land intensive thing we do, after farming, and for almost every other developed-world country, this problem is more acute than in the US. Get some perspective. That is a "wind turbines cause global warming" leve…

The US has nearly 7 acres of land for every man, woman, and child and yet the average lot size is only .2 acres. Since the average household size is 2.5 people, that’s about 0.08 acres used per person. Moreover, that figure ignores apartment, condo, and other multi-family buildings, so the actual land usage per person is quite a lot lower. Of course, we also need farms to support people, but the US produces much more…

Did you misspell "world" as "US" ? Or are you dishonestly using non-representative figures? The US has a much smaller proportion of the developed world's men, women and children than it does the land, and those men, women and children are extremely carbon-intensive.

Re: Nature has enormous emotional and cognitive benefits on people

#265

Post by ehnto »

throwaway894345 wrote: post #236
ehnto wrote: post #155

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To be fair, you did the same, hence my defense specifically of anti-car thoughts. I very much agree that this isn't a dichotomy.

I certainly didn't frame anything as a dichotomy between suburbs and urban area. I did generalize cities as not having easy access to nature, which is strictly true even if there are exceptions that prove the rule. Generalization doesn't imply dichotomy.

Perhaps we're not gaining much from this clarification except resetting the stage, but the dichotomy I was seeing was anti-car vs pro-car, which for America I feel is synonymous with urban density vs suburbia due to the way zoning laws pretty much mandate suburbia be pro-car. The bit I was specifically rebutting was that anti-car is somehow anti-nature, which was what I felt you were implying.

My hope would be that a city planned more around human level interaction with less focus on cars would reduce urban size overall, and reduce suburban sprawl. Better integrating nature all the way from the outer burbs and in toward the city.

Having visited many of Japans incredibly dense cities, and ending up yearning for the sight of a tree, I can totally see the negatives of extreme density, and that's definitely not what I'd want from a low-car city. I also live in a fairly exceptional city in regards to nature, I have national parks outside my doorstep and can ride from suburbia into the city and from the city to the beach along reserves and greenways, not just parks but regenerated forest, so I can see the very thing I'm advocating for and I fucking love it. The bad parts of my city are always related to how car infrastructure has ruined that in some way. That's why I'm passionate about it.

Re: Nature has enormous emotional and cognitive benefits on people

#266

Post by JohnBooty »

yongjik wrote: post #71
throwaway894345 wrote: post #6

This is the sort of thing I think about when the pro-urban/pro-density/anti-car people talk about their vision for the world. I live in a city now, and the lack of substantial nature is suffocating to the extent that I plan to move. The idea that we should all live this way to conserve space—a resource which is only scarce in these urban places—seems excessive to put it mildly. EDIT: A lot of urban folks are rebuttin…

It feels weird to argue against suburbs while I'm living there, but... Most pro-density/pro-mass-transit people aren't arguing against rural lifestyle. They're against suburban, car-dominated lifestyle. I'll conjecture that, for many people, the potential benefit of living "close to nature" is more than negated by driving everywhere. Commuting in a subway in a mega-city easily racks up thirty minutes of brisk walking…

   ...suburban, car-dominated lifestyle.

   I'll conjecture that, for many people, the potential 
   benefit of living "close to nature" is more than negated 
   by driving everywhere
It's not possible for everyone, of course, but the work-from-home rural/suburban lifestyle has a lot more plusses than minuses IMO.

It's close to nature, and my driving is very minimal. In an average month I spend maybe 3 hours in a car. Can walk in the park every day, etc.

Re: Nature has enormous emotional and cognitive benefits on people

#267

Post by JohnBooty »

ryukafalz wrote: post #154
throwaway894345 wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I hear a lot of them argue about how rural people waste space and how they’re sick of subsidizing rural infrastructure and we should impose policies which further incentivize people to migrate from rural to urban areas. The thrust of the issue seems to be directed at suburbs (if only because many of these folks are only marginally aware of the world beyond the suburbs), but rural life is still wholly incompatible wit…

> and how they’re sick of subsidizing rural infrastructure I mean, it’s fine if you want to live somewhere rural, but why should that be subsidized?

    I mean, it’s fine if you want to live somewhere 
    rural, but why should that be subsidized?
I mean, it's fine if you want to live somewhere urban, but why should that be subsidized?

I don't think we should necessarily subsidize more heavily for folks who want to live rural, but many want/need to. Of course we should subsidize schools, utilities, and other human rights for them just like we do for urban areas.

I'm also not convinced rural areas are more expensive to subsidize. Clearly many things are more expensive in rural areas, but also many things are more expensive in cities. That's a complicated equation to put it mildly.

Re: Nature has enormous emotional and cognitive benefits on people

#268

Post by wbsss4412 »

toomuchtodo wrote: post #252
wbsss4412 wrote: post #247

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The issue is that people want to explode housing capacity ASAP in relatively limited geographic areas within cities. If mid rise was actually broadly incentivized, it wouldn’t be that challenging to rapidly increase that stock. Strong towns [0] advocates a more bottom up approach to development, and is a good resource for anyone interested in how to add density in a sane manner. [0] https://www.strongtowns.org/

How do you properly forecast housing need so your development curve (and the foundational urban planning necessary) aligns with the housing demand curve while keeping said housing affordable? The CCP seems to have been very successful with their "build an entire city and move people into it model" (seeing the cities have filled), but I'm unsure how it works in a more capitalistic model.

As long as there is zoning in place for sufficient increases in supply, the market will build to meet demand.

The issue in the US is that zoning is excessively restrictive.

Re: Nature has enormous emotional and cognitive benefits on people

#269

Post by teachrdan »

president wrote: post #7
throwaway894345 wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, I remember being a proud NPR listener back before they went off the deep end. I’m still hoping it’s a phase they grow out of.

I realized this too, then realized all of their sponsored segments are left leaning organizations and foundations.

Do you have any data to back up this assertion? The latest list of sponsors I've found, from 2019, shows these companies in the $1,000,000+ category. Can you spot a single one that is "left leaning"? (I'm tempted to make a bad joke here about a misunderstanding around the name "Progressive Insurance".)

Angie’s List

General Motors Corporation

Lumber Liquidators

Northwestern Mutual Foundation

Novo Nordisk

Progressive Casualty Insurance Company

Prudential Financial

State Farm Mutual Automobile Insurance Company

https://media.npr.org/documents/about/annualreports/NPRSpons...

Re: Nature has enormous emotional and cognitive benefits on people

#270

Post by QuikAccount »

pif wrote: post #146
QuikAccount wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem with making cities green, like the problem with everything else, is terrible city design. There is quite a bit of greenery where I live and it is all anxiety inducing because it is planted near intersections and cutting off line of sight so you can't see pedestrians well or oncoming traffic. There are certain areas that have these wonderful bushes, too bad they opted for those bushes instead of sidewalks…

> it is planted near intersections and cutting off line of sight You've just described a wonderful and very intelligent form of traffic calming.

They aren't calming when I can't see shit when pulling out into an intersection and turning.
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