Nothing wrong with that, I wish I did too
Nearly six in 10 US young adults live within 10 miles of where they grew up
151–160 of 280 posts
Re: Nearly six in 10 US young adults live within 10 miles of where they grew up
#152Earlier quoted context omitted.
See the Strong Towns article "The Growth Ponzi Scheme" [1] and the ASCE Infrastructure Report Card for more concrete data [2]. The gist is that we've funded the construction of our infrastructure nationwide without accounting for the cost of maintenance. Now after decades of neglect, the cost of fixing all of our infrastructure is astronomical, far worse than if we had been doing it correctly from the beginning. [1]…
If it is indeed that much cheaper to start from scratch, we have the open land to do so. Housing prices might fall in the areas that are chosen for divestment, but if we can't afford it, it's unclear what other paths remain. I largely believe in Strong Town's thesis, but we can't make everything a 5+1 because there is too much underdeveloped land use to justify that level of density everywhere given the total populat…
What? We can't do 5+1 everywhere because first we need to litter every last bit of countryside with failed sprawling towns that were swallowed by their own maintenance costs?
That doesn't seem workable.
Re: Nearly six in 10 US young adults live within 10 miles of where they grew up
#153Earlier quoted context omitted.
See the Strong Towns article "The Growth Ponzi Scheme" [1] and the ASCE Infrastructure Report Card for more concrete data [2]. The gist is that we've funded the construction of our infrastructure nationwide without accounting for the cost of maintenance. Now after decades of neglect, the cost of fixing all of our infrastructure is astronomical, far worse than if we had been doing it correctly from the beginning. [1]…
If it is indeed that much cheaper to start from scratch, we have the open land to do so. Housing prices might fall in the areas that are chosen for divestment, but if we can't afford it, it's unclear what other paths remain. I largely believe in Strong Town's thesis, but we can't make everything a 5+1 because there is too much underdeveloped land use to justify that level of density everywhere given the total populat…
You just have to densify existing towns and smaller cities, and go back to something more like the traditional model of small-scale urbanization. Density is more efficient than suburban sprawl.
Re: Nearly six in 10 US young adults live within 10 miles of where they grew up
#154So my family has long described ourselves as nomadic. We just seem to get the wanderlust and want to pick up and move after some years in some place. I myself have lived in 5 different countries so far. My great-grandfather (who died long before I was born) was a fairly extreme example of this. Shortly before WWI he decided to jump on a boat in Germany and immigrate to Australia (coming originally from the Baltic sta…
> what is it about some people who seem to be constantly restless while others seem content to staying pretty much exactly where they were born IMO the main factors would be your economic situation and your relationship with your family. People with little money and tight family ties probably wouldn't be keen to move very far, whereas someone with a bad or indifferent relationship to family and the means to head else…
I feel like relationship to family isn't as big of a limiter these days. I'm pretty close with my family and do miss them (they being on the other side of the world), but being able to video call them essentially whenever our waking times line up takes care of a lot of the issues. As a result of which I can still share any problems I have and get advice or similarly help them in dealing with their problems.
The few years my siblings spent half the world away from us prior to the proliferation of smartphones (and thus the ability for video calls to just happen whenever instead of being specifically organized) did seem to strongly weaken their relationship with the rest of the family though. They seemed to feel abandoned due to essentially having to grow up on their own (ie finish up college and start working) due to not being able to as easily share their issues.
Re: Nearly six in 10 US young adults live within 10 miles of where they grew up
#155Earlier quoted context omitted.
If it is indeed that much cheaper to start from scratch, we have the open land to do so. Housing prices might fall in the areas that are chosen for divestment, but if we can't afford it, it's unclear what other paths remain. I largely believe in Strong Town's thesis, but we can't make everything a 5+1 because there is too much underdeveloped land use to justify that level of density everywhere given the total populat…
What? We can't do 5+1 everywhere because first we need to litter every last bit of countryside with failed sprawling towns that were swallowed by their own maintenance costs? That doesn't seem workable.
You can't do 5+1 on the current total land area occupied by low-density because you'd end up with far more housing than 330 million or so people need. You add that level of density to the core of small towns, then you have enough for everyone. That leaves a long tail of abandoned infrastructure in the areas that you're describing (rural/exurbs not picked for 5+1 upzoning).
The suburbs take a huge amount of land. If everyone lived in NYC-level of density, we could all fit in New Jersey. If we all lived in middle-missing housing level density, that amount of land is still far less than the total area of all the suburbs.
Re: Nearly six in 10 US young adults live within 10 miles of where they grew up
#156Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Many suburbs are not sustainable, and are degrading. Genuinely curious: what is the basis for that claim? Even if you don't cite a source. Edit: these responses are very insightful. Thank you all for the responses.
See the Strong Towns article "The Growth Ponzi Scheme" [1] and the ASCE Infrastructure Report Card for more concrete data [2]. The gist is that we've funded the construction of our infrastructure nationwide without accounting for the cost of maintenance. Now after decades of neglect, the cost of fixing all of our infrastructure is astronomical, far worse than if we had been doing it correctly from the beginning. [1]…
And yet, the entire cost of FDRs New Deal was $1-Trillion (2022 dollars) compared to $5-6 Trillion in COVID stimulus...
Re: Nearly six in 10 US young adults live within 10 miles of where they grew up
#157Earlier quoted context omitted.
I am glad you were able to have such a positive impact on the trajectory of your life by moving. But you shouldn't generalize your experiences with your home town with everyone else's. Sometimes moving is necessary for growth, but it could also be completely orthogonal. It depends on the place and also the person. I grew up 30 minutes from a respected state college, about 15 miles, and about an hour away from both Ph…
Not ever feeling any kind of culture shock is itself limiting.
There is a lot of value in learning about different cultures by physically travelling, but I think there are other options now. I believe the hyper-globalization of society due to technology allows many more people to experience other cultures without needing to travel. It's up to individuals to take advantage of it and lean into certain discomforts.
I don't believe it's possible to integrate with modern society successfully without having to go through some kind of culture shock. It's not limited to culture defined by regions, older generations feel culture shock constantly when trying to stay integrated or understand the culture of new generations. But things like YouTube have allowed me to experience culture in a way that wasn't possible 20+ years ago.
I have been loving the relatively recent trend of older people, parents and grandparents making cooking videos. I recently found De mi Rancho a Tu Cocina, a channel where Doña Ángela, a 72 year old grandma teaches Mexican recipes. The channel has 4.2 million subscribers and the first video was uploaded in August 2019 and hit 2M subscribers by December 2019. Very simple production value, except the wood fire cooking which is probably out of necessity as she lives on a ranch. A similar channel with more production value, but still very homey is Cowboy Kent Rollins, 2.32M subs, who is verified on YouTube and has built a brand and a merch shop related to outdoor cooking. I grew up in the suburbs in the tristate area, but love making myself traditional style Mexican and TexMex food, homemade refried beans is a favorite.
https://www.youtube.com/@DemiRanchoaTuCocina
Best Authentic Refried Bean Recipe - Cowboy Kent Rollins https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iC5mR5s70bE
Re: Nearly six in 10 US young adults live within 10 miles of where they grew up
#158Earlier quoted context omitted.
What? We can't do 5+1 everywhere because first we need to litter every last bit of countryside with failed sprawling towns that were swallowed by their own maintenance costs? That doesn't seem workable.
You can't do 5+1 on the current total land area occupied by low-density because you'd end up with far more housing than 330 million or so people need. You add that level of density to the core of small towns, then you have enough for everyone. That leaves a long tail of abandoned infrastructure in the areas that you're describing (rural/exurbs not picked for 5+1 upzoning). The suburbs take a huge amount of land. If e…
Oh... it sounds like you're saying the proposal is to actually convert all existing developed land to 5+1. I don't think that's anyone's proposal?
Upzoning does not mean you automatically get a building at maximum allowed density, it means you increase what is allowed and let the market decide what makes sense where. It would play out exactly as you describe.
Re: Nearly six in 10 US young adults live within 10 miles of where they grew up
#159Earlier quoted context omitted.
I feel like those strong ties are more likely to be fetters than supports but who am I to tell other people what they're feeling, I suppose.
I used to feel this way but have since realized that it is a WEIRD (western, educated, industrialized, democratic) perspective. For the majority of human history, we needed our birth community in a very direct way simply to eat, keep ourselves housed, find a mate, etc. Many of those needs can now be taken care of by the market but IMO it pays to be careful about committing completely to such a course.
Sure, I don't imagine I can somehow totally divorce my own thinking from the culture I live in or my education. That doesn't mean it is necessarily wrong (the germ theory of disease is also WEIRD, or was at one point). I think it is telling that most people in the modern world who continue to live this way do not have the resources to do otherwise.
Re: Nearly six in 10 US young adults live within 10 miles of where they grew up
#160A lot of upperwardly mobile, ambitious people don't realize this, or they generally understand it only in terms of chastising their high school peers who stayed home. If you build a society based on the assumption everyone will simply move and re-skill to the regions with economic opportunity, you get a lot of regions of bitter people who stayed behind somewhere and watched their local economy get destroyed by trade…
Two sets of assumptions, though:
* The "stay behind" terminology is both evocative and biased. I didn't "stay behind". I moved away several times, thousands of miles, and lived in other places that ambitious people live, and then moved back to within 10 miles of where I grew up because the quality of life is better here. I can afford more, I have cultural amenities like world-class music and art, I'm near family and old friends as well as new friends, and people aren't all totally consumed by their work. The "upwardly mobile ambitious" set can frankly get stultifyingly boring and disconnected. I like having friends in construction, non-profits, pet services, etc.
* Like many Americans who really do "stay behind", I contribute to elder care in my family. A lot of people stay put because they need to care for someone, and America does not make it easy to get vulnerable or ill people services. This is part of what contributes to what you call the "bitterness" -- lack of support for child care, elder care, care for the mentally ill or those struggling with addiction, and in many cases it's a vicious circle: gotta stay in Podunkville to take care of grandma and your cousin 'cause you can't afford to get grandma other help and your cousin doesn't qualify for anything but SSI so he can't afford to move either, but staying in Podunkville you tank your own educational and job prospects, therefore keeping you in Podunkville forever. Sometimes it seems you can only truly be upwardly mobile if you can avoid caregiving responsibilities.