frogman

This post should have ended this thread.................

sdmc530

I just noticed this thread was still going on. Holy crap I thought to myself this has to be a new low for some. They were clearly riding properly....Lock this bad boy and move on.

making

I was kinda surprised this thread was still going.

sdmc530

RIGHT!!

2 weeks and over 150 posts..insane. Legit threads don't get this much action.

Daniel4

Ironically, it's posts like this that keep these threads alive.

Paul Barnard

No thank you. Nothing sounds more miserable to me than being jam packed into densely populated housing areas.

curbtender

Right, it works for some but I'm not one for crowds. Being a garbage man, I sure didn't want to live where I worked, lol.

rydabent

This is a legit thread. It addresses what is right and wrong, about where you can ride. Way too many people are misinformed about this subject.

I-Like-To-Bike

Since a few posters have segued this thread into P&R land might as well close it out with another look back at those good old days of dense housing, close by shopping and working at home. It wasn't all wine and roses in trendy renovated/gentrified single family brownstone neighborhoods as fondly "remembered" by some A&S urban planner wannabes.

UniChris

If that's your mental picture of living in a walkable environment, no wonder you wouldn't want to.

But think about your classic small lot "in town" neighborhood; think of townhouse type condos - these are walkably dense housing themselves, the problem is that when they get newly built in previously undeveloped land they're too far from anything, which no matter how innovative their own design, makes them fundamentally car-dependent.

When people in the US think of density, a lot of the negatives they think of aren't the actual density, but expressions of economic desperation that tend to be concentrated in an area's least expensive housing. The same density, marketed as upscale housing, is a completely different experience.

livedarklions

That's not really the issue. The big issue is zoning laws that artificially discourage density. If you want to keep your big lot, you can. You shouldn't be allowed to prevent your neighbor from making other choices. We can talk around this all day, but we're living with housing patterns enforced by many decades of laws that enable keeping the riffraff out.

livedarklions

So you don't think there's anything between that and today's sprawling BosWash megalopolis?

I'm pretty sure those photos of the Lower East Side are even prior to the expansion of the city that the subways allowed.

I-Like-To-Bike

Boosters for high density upscale (i.e "gentrified") older housing and/or expensive new garden plot size townhouses also ignore that this housing seldom attracts families with school age children or anyone who may be interested in that in the future. Or people who will remain in urban upscale housing when their children reach school age if they can afford to move to a more suitable location. Presumably quality of schools and/or school districts and recreation opportunities for children, let alone the lifestyle of urban neighbors are no longer a consideration in the home buying advice about location, location, location.

The manifest social problems of contemporary U.S. urban housing and concurrent demographic shifts will not be solved by ranting about "car culture." Nor by by making references to living conditions and bike lanes in Amsterdam or Copenhagen.

Troul 

it just slows the inevitable, doesn't keep it out. The mind wonders how America would be if such law/ordinance manipulation didn't happen as [likely] often as it does.
I would expect the "move" to the burbs might just be hindered by an artificially inflated & reformed property tax structure to limit affordability.

UniChris

You're making two huge oversights.

First, you're extending from troubled cities to all dense sectors of all cities. A lot of the actual appeal of walkable areas is precisely what they offer for families with children.

Next, you're equating "walkable" and "dense" only with "urban" and "city" rather than also the denser parts of what most people would refer to as a "town" (even if in some cases technically its government calls it a city).

livedarklions

It doesn't just happen, it's all-pervasive.
It's basic things like zoning minimum lot size and banning multiple units. Local control is ideal for "I got mine" interest group NIMBY stuff. Really way too involved of a subject for this forum, but it really shapes neighborhoods, suburbs, cities and the entire residential real estate market.

I-Like-To-Bike

Got many examples of some dense sectors of any significant size or population of towns (with numerous "townhouses" and/or multi-family housing units or the equivalent) that have a history of appealing to families with school age children and having the means to make a choice?

I'd be especially surprised if many ( or any) examples can be found in the U.S. that is not associated with a large university campus enclave, especially since as you have already posted in this thread, the walkability opportunities to much shopping nearby appears to be extremely limited.

UniChris

That you even has to ask demonstrates you've never really thought about this, but just assumed it doesn't exist.

Try for example, the central traditional neighborhoods of pretty much any town. The decent condo complexes that many middle class families call home. Huge swaths of Brooklyn.

These things really aren't unique - you've probably passed through many of them - you've seen the families and kids - you're just not used to thinking of those housing areas for what they are.

And BTW density can mean multifamily but it does not always - that's your assumption alone. I specifically mentioned both small lots and townhouses.

livedarklions

Do you ever get out of Iowa? What a silly question.

genec

Yeah... in Europe.

I-Like-To-Bike

Note: Europe is not in the U.S.

genec

Exactly. Maybe we need to change a few things. How'd you like a real "Autobahn" here? How about real baguettes. Maybe some local markets beyond a 7-11 near some nicely designed housing? Maybe some local roads that are not trying to be highways. Oh and public transit... real, effective public transit.

livedarklions

Arlington, VA is. Actually, so are many such cities in VA.

A massive number of inner-ring suburbs in major metropolitan areas throughout the country which are densely populated. A lot of those are functionally neighborhoods of the major city with boundary lines drawn to separate their school systems and zoning.

They don't look anything like the Lower East Side circa 1900.

I-Like-To-Bike

Presumably the residents don't look much like the current residents of the "separate" inner major cities that they surround.

sdmc530

this would be amazing wouldn't it.....wouldn't mind retiring to this some day.