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Suburban sprawl is stifling the US economy

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Re: Suburban sprawl is stifling the US economy

#21

Post by erispoe »

CamperBob2 wrote: post #17
pyre wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> excessively large public transit systems Because the "real" solution is for every single person to own and drive a car that seats 4, but 99% of the time only has 1 person in it?

People who can afford to do so usually avoid public transportation. Instead of posting a new edition of the same self-righteous HN thread bewailing other peoples' choices practically every single day of the week, it might be interesting to examine the apparent dissonance between the way amateur urban planners think things should work, and the way they actually do.

Yeah, tech workers in SF making 150-300k certainly "can't afford to drive" I am sure.

Re: Suburban sprawl is stifling the US economy

#22

Post by hippich »

I kinda have mixed feelings about it (and I plan to move out even further, since my job allows remoting.)

The thing is, money "lost" are spend on wages for people building roads, infrastructure, houses, etc. And this type of work more often done by local workforce, not some international company with bank accounts in caymans.

So... how exactly money are "lost"? Lost by whom exactly? People found jobs, which otherwise would not exists, and more infrastructure is built. Which in turn bring more people to live there, which in turn brings more local jobs (i.e. mom-n-pop AC/plumbing/electric company, Homedepot, etc)

And built roads are not quite wasteful too - as far as I know roads drive economy, not subdue it.

Re: Suburban sprawl is stifling the US economy

#23

Post by BrainInAJar »

acveilleux wrote: post #8
happytrails wrote: post #4

Suburbs are horribly designed, case in point Irvine CA. Worst place I have ever been too. Giant 8 lane surface streets but still endless traffic. No useful public transit so everyone is sitting in a car. The future looks bleak for socal unless population normalizes.

My favourite part of suburbs is the grid of street maximally designed to make driving over them less efficient than avoiding them. Intuitively one would think this decreases traffic but instead it turns the neighbourhood into a kind of watershed where all traffic quickly converges to the same few progressively broader street. The harder the grid planner tried to inhibit through-traffic, the worse the effect.

it also makes them much more dangerous, because corners & de-normalizing seeing people walking on/near the streets

Re: Suburban sprawl is stifling the US economy

#24

Post by BrainInAJar »

crimsonalucard wrote: post #5

An individual with the choice of living in the city or in suburbia is faced with a conundrum. Although you would think that by living in the city the individual will save money by expending significantly less natural resources and dramatically lowering his carbon footprint, it ironically costs him less money to do the exact opposite by living in the suburbs. This is because if the individual chooses to live in the ci…

Only short-term. Once you factor in gas, ownership of multiple cars, etc it's cheaper to live in the city. Doubly so if your time isn't worthless (time sitting in traffic is working for free)

Re: Suburban sprawl is stifling the US economy

#25

Post by learc83 »

philwelch wrote: post #19
CamperBob2 wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People who can afford to do so usually avoid public transportation. Instead of posting a new edition of the same self-righteous HN thread bewailing other peoples' choices practically every single day of the week, it might be interesting to examine the apparent dissonance between the way amateur urban planners think things should work, and the way they actually do.

That's a product of urban design, not a cause or a premise. Rich New York bankers don't drive cars.

>Rich New York bankers don't drive cars.

But do they take public transportation? Or do they use a car service?

They're paying to avoid public transportation exactly like the OP said.

Re: Suburban sprawl is stifling the US economy

#26

Post by IndianAstronaut »

ageek123 wrote: post #2

But NIMBYs who won't allow construction in cities have made cities unaffordable.

Nimbys are causing havoc in Austin. My old VP bought a giant house on the west side of town and now wants to prohibit building there so as to keep up land values. There are also lots of groups that dont want high rises, etc. Property prices are shooting up now.

Re: Suburban sprawl is stifling the US economy

#27

Post by droopyEyelids »

xigency wrote: post #13

This is not something I see in a city like Chicago. Even with a thinning population in the city proper, there are a wide variety of jobs reaching out from the city to the suburbs and more than adequate transportation with plenty of "walkable" neighborhoods. This is an interesting idea to explore, and I definitely have seen some more sprawling areas in this country (L.A., San Jose), but New York and Chicago don't fit…

Thats only true for the wealthiest in Chicago. Consider this map of food deserts. http://www.yogagardens.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/10/food-d... Unless you live somewhere nice, you can't walk to the grocery store.

Chicago also has, for the most part, segregated neighborhoods for work and living. If you're wealthy, you can afford to live within walking distance of white collar jobs, if not you're stuck.

Also, Chicago is a bit of an abnormality in the US for paying some attention to cycling infrastructure.

Re: Suburban sprawl is stifling the US economy

#28

Post by moogleii »

happytrails wrote: post #4

Suburbs are horribly designed, case in point Irvine CA. Worst place I have ever been too. Giant 8 lane surface streets but still endless traffic. No useful public transit so everyone is sitting in a car. The future looks bleak for socal unless population normalizes.

>case in point Irvine CA. Worst place I have ever been too.

Ha, no way. If it's the worst place you've been to, then I can only imagine you have not been to many places. Admittedly it lacks good mass transit, but that's true of most of California (I personally would say all, because SF mass transit isn't great either, it just happens to make the rest of California look barbaric - I say this as a proud Californian). And the car culture is especially strong in SoCal. Not to mention Irvine was originally intended to be a suburban community, not a metropolis. A measure was put forth to add light rail a few years ago, but the "not in my backyard" folks voted it down.

It has 8 lane surface streets precisely because of forethought (it's a planned city, btw). Most of the north-south roads have 65 mph speed limits. You don't get that without proper planning and zoning. It operates its own shuttle service independent of the county. Then there's the high ratio of parks, green belts, wildlife reserves, and dedicated bike lanes relative to its neighbors. Demand to live there is outstripping supply, which leads to traffic, which admittedly sucks and hopefully Californians will realize you can't keep throwing more lanes at the problem. I'm in Manhattan now, and sure, Irvine can seem like a quaint provincial town in comparison, but the worst place you've ever been to? Horribly designed? Cue eye-rolling.

Re: Suburban sprawl is stifling the US economy

#29

Post by danjayh »

hippich wrote: post #22

I kinda have mixed feelings about it (and I plan to move out even further, since my job allows remoting.) The thing is, money "lost" are spend on wages for people building roads, infrastructure, houses, etc. And this type of work more often done by local workforce, not some international company with bank accounts in caymans. So... how exactly money are "lost"? Lost by whom exactly? People found jobs, which otherwise…

The other thing that this article ignores is that not everybody wants to live in an urban setting. Indeed, I suspect that to the people who live in the suburban sprawl, the money doesn't appear "lost" at all - in fact, they probably see it as money well spent for what they consider to be an improved standard of living. Personally, I live on 11 acres about 15 miles and a 17 minute drive from work. Although I could have a 5 minute, 3 mile drive if I felt like living in the 'burbs (my employer is located in the suburban part of town), to me the additional cost and time that I spend on transportation is well worth it (I don't particularly enjoy having neighbors any closer than a few hundred meters/yards, and my wife enjoys keeping a couple of horses). I suspect that those people who live in the suburbs enjoy their 3/4 acre lots with enough space to put in a swimming pool and a McMansion (say what you want about them, but McMansions are nice places to live ... although I live in a relatively modest 1500sqft/140 m^2 house). "Different strokes for different folks" really seems to apply here.

Re: Suburban sprawl is stifling the US economy

#30

Post by acveilleux »

CamperBob2 wrote: post #17
pyre wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> excessively large public transit systems Because the "real" solution is for every single person to own and drive a car that seats 4, but 99% of the time only has 1 person in it?

People who can afford to do so usually avoid public transportation. Instead of posting a new edition of the same self-righteous HN thread bewailing other peoples' choices practically every single day of the week, it might be interesting to examine the apparent dissonance between the way amateur urban planners think things should work, and the way they actually do.

I take transit to work. I make a good living. I could chose to drive but where I live (Montreal) has good public transit. It takes me 20-25 minutes to get to work by subway (door to door.)

Mostly it's that I work downtown and chose to buy my condo in a neighbourhood with good transit. As a result, driving would "save" me 5 to 10 minutes but require 300$/month parking spot to actually save any time.

If I worked out in an industrial park (where my employer also has an office) driving would be a no-brainer however. Parking out there is free and transit is annoying (bus every 15-30 minutes during rush hour only, multiple connections.) At that office, from my house driving saves 10-15 minutes of commute during rush hour and 15-45 minutes outside of it. In extreme cases (our support staff working the graveyard shift) driving saves 2+ hours or a very expensive taxi ride.

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