Stop the Plague of Sprawl!

[Thoresby]

Without wanting to cause offence to phx1138 and the other non-Brits trying to understand the London situation imagine a continuum going from low density, car-centric sprawl to high density, public transport dependent compactness. I have no idea which major metropolis would best represent the centre but if Los Angeles is one end of the scale London (or Tokyo) is the other.
Despite what I've said above I don't think unlimited US style sprawl is the answer, it undoubtedly has lots of problems but the "London solution" is terrible, there has to be some middle way where you have medium density (terraced houses) suburban growth with both public transport and cars and semi-sane house prices and taxes.

 

[phx1138]

they were just visitors, they didn't stay there. Except for the bunnies... one of them gave birth under my garden shed, and I had baby bunnies running around the yard for a while. But they all left eventually.

The fact they were around at all suggests encroachment... If they'd been skunks, it would make sense; skunks have a real way of making a living at environmental edges, & we humans make edges everywhere. Other critters, tho, we really shouldn't see if we aren't actually in "their space".

 

[Thoresby]

The fact they were around at all suggests encroachment... If they'd been skunks, it would make sense; skunks have a real way of making a living at environmental edges, & we humans make edges everywhere. Other critters, tho, we really shouldn't see if we aren't actually in "their space".

You should tell that to London foxes.

 

[phx1138]

You should tell that to London foxes.

They, like coyotes, are adaptable & smart. It doesn't mean we're not pushing them out: they were, after all, there first.

 

[Dave Howery]

The fact they were around at all suggests encroachment... If they'd been skunks, it would make sense; skunks have a real way of making a living at environmental edges, & we humans make edges everywhere. Other critters, tho, we really shouldn't see if we aren't actually in "their space".

well, all the houses at this end of town were built in the 60's or earlier... most of the encroachment/new house construction is on the north and west sides of town, on former farm sites. The open areas to the south have been agricultural for a long time. When you have a sharp division between suburbia and open agricultural land like we have here, there are bound to be some wildlife wandering around. At least we don't have bears and deer wandering the streets, which does happen in other towns in the USA...

 

[history nerd]

Why does everyone want to end suburban sprawl by making bigger cities to move suburbanites into? sounds awful! what we need to do is find away to get more people involved in agriculture again and have more small towns and farms!

 

[TxCoatl1970]

@ History nerd--
I see your point about dispersing people so they can live on a more human scale.
Unfortunately, cities attract people b/c they offer concentrations of opportunities to live a lot easier than you can in small towns.
There situations where the reverse apply too.

Agriculture's a tough game to be in. It requires work, savvy about what crops work best in what soil raised at what time of the year as well as what fertilizer/pest control/crop rotation/irrigation scheme works best that amateurs can learn, but need a lot of coaching and practice before they're able to succeed at it, if weather, pests, and markets will allow.

I think Michelle Obama had a good idea in showing kids how to grow fruits and vegetables so they get an appreciation of what healthy food is and how it comes to be, some sense of participation in making it happen.

Whether it leads to an explosion of urban 4-H chapters OR exodus to small towns so everyone can be the truck farmer f their dreams, IDK.

 

[Beedok]

Why does everyone want to end suburban sprawl by making bigger cities to move suburbanites into? sounds awful! what we need to do is find away to get more people involved in agriculture again and have more small towns and farms!

Farmers don't generate that much wealth for the global economy though, so if we want to maintain living standards we don't want too big of a chunk of the population farming.

 

[Thoresby]

Why does everyone want to end suburban sprawl by making bigger cities to move suburbanites into? sounds awful! what we need to do is find away to get more people involved in agriculture again and have more small towns and farms!

Because New Zealand is the only country in the history of the world to achieve 1st World Status on the back of it's agricultural sector.

 

[phx1138]

Why does everyone want to end suburban sprawl by making bigger cities to move suburbanites into? sounds awful! what we need to do is find away to get more people involved in agriculture again and have more small towns and farms!

Not going to happen. The new tech, like tractors, helps make farming more expensive. Small farms simply can't make a profit; a lot of smaller farms already can't stay afloat. Commodity prices don't allow much margin. What you're suggesting is what the greens are proposing, & it's a fail. (Ironically, it's also what the Nazis proposed...)

BTW, if there was a wholesale shift away from mechanized farming, production is liable to drop quite dramatically--& that means people on foreign aid, who are now getting a subsidy, starve. Which would actually be a good thing in the long run...since we've spent the last 60yr or more artificially capping the death rate, while doing nothing to bring down the birth rate (by allowing, by enabling, countries in Africa to raise their standards of living).

And it's not "bigger cities": the whole idea is to develop smaller cities that are, at the same time, more pleasant to live in but able to support larger populations. (Or is that what you meant by "bigger"?)

 

[TxCoatl1970]

phx, I think you're dead-on re: agriculture being too capital-intensive a game
for small farmers to play profitably.
I don't want to derail the thread discussing agricultural subsidies.

You brought up the most notorious sponsors of de-urbanization but I'll add Pol Pot to that pile of folks into de-urbanized utopia at all costs. *Shudder*

The key point I'd like to address that cities can be made more pleasant and healthy places to live with enough social will, planning, and citizen involvement.
To me, the whole suburbanization of America has led to a sense of "Screw you, I've got mine!" selfishness that sapped any sense of common ground.
A little selfishness is a good thing.
We want the best for ourselves and loved ones. We just need to expand the loved ones beyond just the folks we see IMO.

 

[AndyC]

I think that while London as it currently is provides a warning to those aiming to control sprawl by use of such blunt instruments as Green Belts, its historical evolution provides a decent model on how to form urban landscapes that are more in balance with nature and pleasant to be in: have a certain level of parklands, woodlands and city farms/market gardens embedded within a city as it grows.

Legislation requiring a certain level of parklands and woodlands and providing a certain number of subsidised licenses for city farms per unit of built-up area cold make for an urban landscape where no-one is too far from nature and where some "natural lungs" are found within every area of the city.

As further statistical evidence against the Green Belt effects, the 2011 census was published today. In inner London, 28.6% of households suffer from overcrowding (having too few rooms for their size of family).

 

[AndyC]

Oh, supplemental and related to the discussion on driving in London:
42% of households in London do not possess a car or van (up from 37% in 2001)

 

[phx1138]

Without wanting to cause offence to phx1138

None taken at all.

trying to understand the London situation...the "London solution" is terrible

I do agree, it's far from optimal...but it also looks like it's the most likely, since that's the kind of approach taken in Seattle, as I understand it. Plus, restrictions on heights & demolition of historics are common. So something like it seems very likely to recur.

It also appears, as said, there's a cultural imperative at play: Tokyo & Hong Kong, IIRC, both have higher pop densities, & nobody complains...

I have no idea which major metropolis would best represent the centre but if Los Angeles is one end of the scale London (or Tokyo) is the other.
Despite what I've said above I don't think unlimited US style sprawl is the answer, it undoubtedly has lots of problems but there has to be some middle way where you have medium density (terraced houses) suburban growth with both public transport and cars and semi-sane house prices and taxes.

With this, I entirely agree. IMO, we do need a "re-education" campaign, to show people, especially politicians, what's wrong with sprawl. Changing attitudes to things like the mortgage deduction is a start...

I think that while London as it currently is provides a warning to those aiming to control sprawl by use of such blunt instruments as Green Belts, its historical evolution provides a decent model on how to form urban landscapes that are more in balance with nature and pleasant to be in: have a certain level of parklands, woodlands and city farms/market gardens embedded within a city as it grows.

Admitting I know nothing about London, this sounds like a good sign for elsewhere.

We should also bear in mind, London is an old, old city, so these problems have been coming a long time. It does make me wonder why, frex, Rome & Paris aren't suffering the same way.

Oh, supplemental and related to the discussion on driving in London:
42% of households in London do not possess a car or van (up from 37% in 2001)

Sounds like a good start. I'm reminded of something said in Spiderman once: "I'm a New Yorker. Who learns to drive in Manhattan?" If that can become the prevailing attitude, & if we can get public transit good enough in all major cities to make it workable...

To me, the whole suburbanization of America has led to a sense of "Screw you, I've got mine!" selfishness that sapped any sense of common ground.
A little selfishness is a good thing.
We want the best for ourselves and loved ones. We just need to expand the loved ones beyond just the folks we see IMO.

I do agree. I think that's deeply-rooted culture: we're clannish going back probably millions of years. It's a real change to accept "nation" as "us", & when it comes to "home", we're deeply territorial. Which comes back to the cultural aspect...& the need to educate.

However, that said, let me resate: interesting as the discussion has been, I wanted ways to prevent it, not cure it...

So, any thoughts in that direction are appreciated.

 

[history nerd]

well... im not pol pot... not by a long ways guys... jeez thanks for suggesting that!

I like things more spread out but concentrated in towns as opposed to suburbs so instead of having one big city with suburbs why not have lots of small towns. Also the issue with agriculture has more to do with subsidization than mechinization... the biggest issue is insisting on growing corn all the time even on land where it can only be marginally effective, see this alot out here in SD.

 

[history nerd]

oh and that build up and into the earth idea... i would rather die I hate giant cities they are miserable

 

[history nerd]

Farmers don't generate that much wealth for the global economy though, so if we want to maintain living standards we don't want too big of a chunk of the population farming.

the only industry that "creates wealth" is speculation and banking... and it usually comes with giant crashes... when everything falls apart I'll take carrots over credit

 

[Beedok]

the only industry that "creates wealth" is speculation and banking... and it usually comes with giant crashes... when everything falls apart I'll take carrots over credit

Refining, manufacturing, and processesing tend to create wealth by increasing the value of the things they are working on, and they don't crash quite so much.

 

[Expat]

You don't have to get rid of the suburbs to end sprawl. Merely as a thought experiment, let's look at the grandaddy of American suburbs, William Levitt's Levittown.

According to Wikipedia, Levittown has a density of 7,500 people per square mile.
If the population of the United States is 300,000,000 and they all lived at the density of suburban Levittown, you could fit the entire population into 40,000 square miles- an area slightly smaller than the state of Kentucky.

England is already much denser of course, but you could still fit the whole population into the South East region with room to spare at this density (that's just England.)

At this point it becomes a question of arrangement of space. Levittown houses are small but they have front and back yards and 2-3 bedrooms; enough space for a garden and a kid or two. If some percentage of the population chooses to live in apartments or rowhouses, we've just opened up more space for you low density types to expand into (you're welcome.) And if you really need to be alone, you've got the entire country outside of Kentucky (or the South East) as virgin territory to live in- all with the starting density of a model suburb.

And of course within Kentucky (or SE) we don't necessarily have to have rows of tract housing going on forever. There are other ways of organizing communities, I would say better ways. This is where discussions of zoning come in and I would point to south Portland, OR as a good example of how to manage the space in an interesting way. You have detached houses next to small (2-4 unit) apartments next to small stores next to a short line of rowhouses, usually running perpendicular to a commercial high street, and all served by an increasingly legendary transportation package.

As I said, this is a thought experiment. We're not all relocating to Kentucky. But density doesn't have to be scary. And detached housing doesn't have to lead to sprawl.

 

[history nerd]

Refining, manufacturing, and processesing tend to create wealth by increasing the value of the things they are working on, and they don't crash quite so much.

and those are all things that can take place in small towns in a predominant rural setting... so i win?