It started out that better off people get conveniently located nice houses with a yard. That became “the American dream”, and so when the middle class was suddenly strengthened it was very in demand… So they kept building them, further and further out, until distance became insane
A lot of them were originally planned communities, so it wasn’t too insane. You might’ve had a walk to get out of the neighborhood, but nothing like it is today.
The car centic infrastructure came in later - the sprawl kept growing, people had to travel further, and so they keep making faster roads with more lanes. Which are the opposite of walkable
Add in the death of mom and pop shops… You can’t have a warehouse in every neighborhood. Corporations want to go big, a Walmart replaces 100 other shops. And add in the parking requirements, which are like full fire code maximums minus employee count (which is basically arbitrary nonsense) , and your land requirements become insane
This wasn’t designed like hoa’s and redlining, this was organic, like cancer. They played hand in hand, but this was a natural development…a very bad one, but one that emerged indirectly
It started out that better off people get conveniently located nice houses with a yard. That became “the American dream”, and so when the middle class was suddenly strengthened it was very in demand… So they kept building them, further and further out, until distance became insane
A lot of them were originally planned communities, so it wasn’t too insane. You might’ve had a walk to get out of the neighborhood, but nothing like it is today.
The car centic infrastructure came in later - the sprawl kept growing, people had to travel further, and so they keep making faster roads with more lanes. Which are the opposite of walkable
Add in the death of mom and pop shops… You can’t have a warehouse in every neighborhood. Corporations want to go big, a Walmart replaces 100 other shops. And add in the parking requirements, which are like full fire code maximums minus employee count (which is basically arbitrary nonsense) , and your land requirements become insane
This wasn’t designed like hoa’s and redlining, this was organic, like cancer. They played hand in hand, but this was a natural development…a very bad one, but one that emerged indirectly
Because of when they were built, the sheer scale, and the commodification of housing
In Europe, do developers buy several acres of land to build on all at once? Do they do that continuously, for decades on end?
People never want inconvenience, they want quiet “safe” neighborhoods where their children can play and their house goes up in value. Developers want to continuously build the most valuable ROI, which right now is a neighborhood of hastily thrown together McMansions, and they’d rather build stuff at the fringes of an already built community so they can mooch off existing infrastructure
The overstuffed communities grow in a decade, and all these people now have to commute further to do anything, so they want bigger faster roads. The original layout is now cut into segments by more and more 4 lane 35-45mph roads to alleviate traffic
I’ve seen it happen in real time, and I’ve also experienced what the planned European communities are like. This is what happens when you don’t force better designs, when you don’t regulate growth. It’s cancer
America looks this way because it was precisely regulated to be this way. You got some knowledge gaps or you are naive how this really went down.
A few pointers:
Car lobby: dismantling of public transit system in major urban centers while along with obstruction of any public transit construction
Classism with a super heavy dose of American racism: People did not want to live among the “crime” and “undesirables” and government was more happy than codify racism into zoning laws
Financial institutions enabling all of this with their “informal” (aka) racist under writing requirements.
Again, EU has suburbs and their not nearly as bad as whatever US cooked and a lot of EU has to be rebuilt after WW2 and but they managed to maintain some sort of social cohesion in their infrastructure and urban design.
This isn’t even fuck cars material, its a big, overarching fuck US zoning and bureaucracy.
Decent points, nonetheless.
Because focusing on cars is looking it pedon up perspective… But it just one tool used yo oppress us
The entire economy right down how our houses are build are designed to oppress us
From a foreigner perspective they don’t under why would accept it with a riot
I mean, yes and no
It started out that better off people get conveniently located nice houses with a yard. That became “the American dream”, and so when the middle class was suddenly strengthened it was very in demand… So they kept building them, further and further out, until distance became insane
A lot of them were originally planned communities, so it wasn’t too insane. You might’ve had a walk to get out of the neighborhood, but nothing like it is today.
The car centic infrastructure came in later - the sprawl kept growing, people had to travel further, and so they keep making faster roads with more lanes. Which are the opposite of walkable
Add in the death of mom and pop shops… You can’t have a warehouse in every neighborhood. Corporations want to go big, a Walmart replaces 100 other shops. And add in the parking requirements, which are like full fire code maximums minus employee count (which is basically arbitrary nonsense) , and your land requirements become insane
This wasn’t designed like hoa’s and redlining, this was organic, like cancer. They played hand in hand, but this was a natural development…a very bad one, but one that emerged indirectly
I mean, yes and no
It started out that better off people get conveniently located nice houses with a yard. That became “the American dream”, and so when the middle class was suddenly strengthened it was very in demand… So they kept building them, further and further out, until distance became insane
A lot of them were originally planned communities, so it wasn’t too insane. You might’ve had a walk to get out of the neighborhood, but nothing like it is today.
The car centic infrastructure came in later - the sprawl kept growing, people had to travel further, and so they keep making faster roads with more lanes. Which are the opposite of walkable
Add in the death of mom and pop shops… You can’t have a warehouse in every neighborhood. Corporations want to go big, a Walmart replaces 100 other shops. And add in the parking requirements, which are like full fire code maximums minus employee count (which is basically arbitrary nonsense) , and your land requirements become insane
This wasn’t designed like hoa’s and redlining, this was organic, like cancer. They played hand in hand, but this was a natural development…a very bad one, but one that emerged indirectly
This is the most generous interpretation of the fact I have seen short of being. a bootlicker…
I not big advocate… Nobody could see this coming, nobody is really at fault.
Suburbs existed ever wince the city existed technically.
EU has suburbans but nothing comes close to the disgusted shit we have in Us and Canada. Why is that?
Because of when they were built, the sheer scale, and the commodification of housing
In Europe, do developers buy several acres of land to build on all at once? Do they do that continuously, for decades on end?
People never want inconvenience, they want quiet “safe” neighborhoods where their children can play and their house goes up in value. Developers want to continuously build the most valuable ROI, which right now is a neighborhood of hastily thrown together McMansions, and they’d rather build stuff at the fringes of an already built community so they can mooch off existing infrastructure
The overstuffed communities grow in a decade, and all these people now have to commute further to do anything, so they want bigger faster roads. The original layout is now cut into segments by more and more 4 lane 35-45mph roads to alleviate traffic
I’ve seen it happen in real time, and I’ve also experienced what the planned European communities are like. This is what happens when you don’t force better designs, when you don’t regulate growth. It’s cancer
America looks this way because it was precisely regulated to be this way. You got some knowledge gaps or you are naive how this really went down.
A few pointers:
Again, EU has suburbs and their not nearly as bad as whatever US cooked and a lot of EU has to be rebuilt after WW2 and but they managed to maintain some sort of social cohesion in their infrastructure and urban design.
spoiler
(Shh… you’ve discovered the secret: !fuckcars is actually about zoning!)