New Cities • Hacker News Board

Re: New Cities

#521

Post by davidw » Mon, Jun 27, 2016, 10:39 PM UTC

st3v3r wrote: post #451

davidw wrote: post #255

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Central planning has been a colossal failure both in terms of the economy at large, and in terms of urban planning. If someone can make money by building a store, that's great, what's wrong with it? Zoning should be about keeping truly noxious activities away from residential areas, not about keeping a corner store away from where people could possibly walk to it.

"If someone can make money by building a store, that's great, what's wrong with it?" There can be plenty of things wrong with it. I don't subscribe to the idea that whatever makes money is instantly the best thing. And I never said that I want to keep corner stores away from where people could walk to it. I said that leaving everything up to the "free market" doesn't always yield the best solution for everyone. It on…

> And I never said that I want to keep corner stores away from where people could walk to it.

That's currently what we have; nothing at all resembling a free market where you can buy a piece of property and more or less do what you want with it. The rules and regulations in place are absolutely about enshrining the car-centric city.

With a more market-oriented solution, some people could have their "burbs" and others could have other kinds of housing and neighborhoods.

Re: New Cities

#522

Post by [deleted] » Mon, Jun 27, 2016, 10:40 PM UTC

zephjc wrote: post #94

ars wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> built for people, rather than cars I wish people would stop with this drivel. There are PEOPLE in the cars. The cities are built for people. A car is a human amplifier - it takes human transportation and carrying ability and amplifies it. A lot of people find this amplification very very useful (parents with children, elderly, people who buy in bulk, etc, etc). Taking it away would be like removing computers becaus…

Cars are also super space-wasters. They do nothing but sit for 80-90% of the time (which is one reason why car sharing is making more sense to people). In a lot of cities, especially newer ones built out since WW2, you will find a large percentage of space dedicated to parking lots. Not even necessarily parking structures (which cost a lot more per car) but just free to park flat lots, with nothing going on there.

[deleted]

Re: New Cities

#523

Post by brett40324 » Mon, Jun 27, 2016, 10:42 PM UTC

This research is a waste of resources unless most basic needs of citizens becomes free as in freedom and price. For that to happen, global retail franchises, as well as the major players in countless other service industries are going to have to be rejected by our newly realized cities. They should be rejected unless they are willing to donate extremely large proceeds and services to the city. If they comply, they still arent allowed to come to our city, but we as citizens will purchase from them online. We will purchase the things we want from them and have them delivered. We wont have to purchase basic needs. They will be provided to us by the corporations who want us as customers. One of endless examples: Im definitely ordering my mega awesome television from walmart, best buy, costco, etc. because they pay for our electricity and daycare.

This is what they should provide us in order to do business with our city:

Energy, water, trash, recycling, food centers, construction materials, police, fire, EDUCATION, housing, healthcare, EDUCATION, farm and agriculture equipment, construction equipment, manufacturing equipment, internet and basic mobile phone service, and housing for newer citizens who dont yet own their residence. Note: everyone should own their place, tax free without the lifelong cruft of mortgage and property value flux. Im serious. If you want us to buy from you, you buy from us, or you give to us. The people will own and run such a new city. Not the corporations that are ruining human values, health, and economies for cities all over this earth. The people will have to have the best hand, and the buy-in to our game is extremely high.

In addition to this concept, we wouldnt have a mayor, chief of police, or other forms of a single person running any one show. Even schools shouldnt have a single Principal, but more like 3 to 5 awesome 'lead educators'.

Totally aside, how do you keep out the drug cartels? How do you instill an attitude of giving a shit about your neighbor? How do you create resources that eliminate the need for acts of crime and violence for less privelaged to 'make it'?

Re: New Cities

#524

Post by robohamburger » Mon, Jun 27, 2016, 10:43 PM UTC

koolba wrote: post #67

From the footnotes: > [1] Two out of three people will live in cities by 2050 - an influx of 2.5 billion new urbanites. How much of that is by choice? I know quite a few people that wouldn't give up their rural lives willingly.

Reluctantly moved away from the city to a rural college town while my wife is going to vet school and I have come to appreciate the benefits from living in a smaller town and teleworking.

It does seem like a lot of thinking about cities is very one sided. People clearly have an axe to grind with car culture, suburbs and endless commutes which I don't blame them for.

I think to fix how live we have to think beyond cities.

Re: New Cities

#525

Post by kuschku » Mon, Jun 27, 2016, 10:44 PM UTC

thaumasiotes wrote: post #289

hammock wrote: post #237

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Spoken like someone who has never lived in a city. If the store is a 10min walk away, you go a few times a week. And/or you use one of those old lady carts.

Seriously, read my comment. I've lived exactly like that . It's awful.

Then you did something wrong. Don’t you pass on the way from school/uni/work to home by a store anyway? just hop out of the bus, buy stuff, and walk the rest.

Re: New Cities

#526

Post by Spooky23 » Mon, Jun 27, 2016, 10:45 PM UTC

justinator wrote: post #475

Kalium wrote: post #401

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Have you considered that with infrastructure in place, cars enable an immense amount of individual flexibility? To my mind, it seems somewhat plausible that cars rose to dominance because they enabled individual flexibility for the masses atop pre-existing and extensible infrastructure.

Flexibility? I don't own a car, and haven't for the last decade (and only had a car for maybe a year of my life). This year, I've been driven in a car about four times in > 170 days. So let me talk about flexibility. Think about how much a car costs to buy and own (purchasing, upkeep, insurance, gas, parking, storage) - then put a price on that in hours you work a year. I bet it's a lot! Maybe weeks out of every year…

I live a 10 minute drive, 45 minute walk, 75 minute bus from work. 30-60 minutes of my life = 125-250 hours a year.

Re: New Cities

#527

Post by rando18423 » Mon, Jun 27, 2016, 10:48 PM UTC

davidw wrote: post #485

Kalium wrote: post #478

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Friend, I live a life not so different from yours. I'm suggesting that other people choose to have cars now - and historically as well - because they find that the advantages for them outweigh the disadvantages for them. You may want to consider that other people may make their choices for reasons they personally find compelling in the context of their individual lives.

I think very few people are saying "no cars, ever!". We have one and find it very useful, like you say. What many people are realizing is that cars should not be the be-all and end-all of urban design in the US.

Hong Kong is fucking awesome to get around. Why not moving sidewalks like they have there with the Midlevels Escalators? I used that to walk from Midlevels to Central every day and loved it.

Re: New Cities

#528

Post by DorintheFlora » Mon, Jun 27, 2016, 10:49 PM UTC

Kalium wrote: post #401

justinator wrote: post #381

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Cars are on a pedestal not only because of convenience and speed, but because they're the lowest common denominator. The lowest common denominator? I don't own a car, and I'm sure many other people in my city don't either, so no: it's not the lowest common denominator for us: walking is. Cars are themselves very expensive and require a massive amount of infrastructure to function. Look around a city and think of al…

Have you considered that with infrastructure in place, cars enable an immense amount of individual flexibility? To my mind, it seems somewhat plausible that cars rose to dominance because they enabled individual flexibility for the masses atop pre-existing and extensible infrastructure.

Perhaps you should read some history. IIRC, at some point, car companies bought up public transit infrastructure and shut it down because less public transit was good for sales.

#canyousayconflictofinterest?

Linky: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Motors_streetcar_con...

Re: New Cities

#529

Post by dragonwriter » Mon, Jun 27, 2016, 10:52 PM UTC

ismail wrote: post #343

superuser2 wrote: post #281

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In San Francisco and Chicago, I experienced no shortage of tiny, expensive corner stores, restaurants, boutiques, etc. That's the kind of stuff that seems to go into the ground floors of residential towers. The hassle was accessing (the local equivalents of) Target, Kroger, Best Buy, etc.

What are the problems with the small stores that you describe? - expensive? - few products? Something else? If pricing is an issue the question becomes, How do you assist small retailers compete with massive chains? A problem I have thought about quite a bit as my dad once owned a small corner shop He had to close it as the chains make it impossible to compete on price with bulk buying discounts. I believe what happe…

> If pricing is an issue the question becomes,

> How do you assist small retailers compete with massive chains?

Is the problem that they can't compete, or that they don't have to? When driving isn't the main method of getting around, but instead walking augmented by potentially high-latency public transit is the main method, the cost to the consumer of small distance differences between notionally "competing" institutions becomes quite high, which means that they have less need to actually compete with one another: they have captive hyper-local markets with effective moats.

Re: New Cities

#530

Post by DorintheFlora » Mon, Jun 27, 2016, 10:55 PM UTC

The world would be better served if you studied how to tweak existing cities to make them more pedestrian-friendly and people focused. They are too car focused.

You should start by reading "How buildings learn." Old buildings that work extremely well typically did not start off as superior. They typically gained value over time as residents added improvements that worked well because they lived there and understood the problem space.