Bulldozing to avoid Bankruptsy

[Xelebes]

Coming from Western Canada, a small town is around 1,000 people. A town is 2,500 people and a city is 5,000 people. So definitions do vary.

 

[voluptuary_manque]

http://i264.photobucket.com/albums/ii177/1volupturary_manque/lol.gif

I would guess so! Here, 1,000 people is a shopping mall. Small towns run 8-10,000 and you aren't in a city until the population goes over 75,000.

 

[SlickTony]

I grew up in a small town on the east coast of Florida. Life wasn't idillic, but it was pleasant. You knew a bunch of people and vice versa. When the snowbirds arrived we helped them spend their money and were relieved when they went back North. When I left home to live with my Uncle Sam, the pseudopods of the Miami and Ft. Lauderdale amoebas were already engulfing it. Now it's gentility and easy lifestyle exist only in memory.

What was the name of this small town?

I love the thing about the pseudopods of Miami and Ft. Lauderdale! I came up in Harris County. The city of Houston reached out and engulfed, um, I mean annexed a lot of smaller communities. Years after the annexation of Clear Lake, you saw cars bearing the bumper sticker "Free the Clear Lake 25,000."

 

[DeeZire]

I'm surprised there was no mention of urban farming in the article. If they're going to grow vegetables on rooftops, you'd think they could do it in empty lots too.

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

DEEZIRE

I've proposed that entire areas be razed to create space for planned communities where public transportation is the optimal means of conveyance, and jobs, commerce, schools, recreation, etc. are in close proximity but adequately segregated.

Imagine a mid-rise mall where lite-rail and industry/utilities are restricted to the 1st level, commerce is restricted to the 2nd level, hospitals-schools-courts are located on the 3rd level, the 4th & 5th levels are for residences, and the top level is for recreation.

Automoibiles would become almost unnecessary in a community where you ride escalators and lite-rail.

The county adjacent to mine is entirely urban; I estimate you could increase the population 5 times, with half of the land area green space, using my scheme.

 

[Lauren Hynde]

DEEZIRE

I've proposed that entire areas be razed to create space for planned communities where public transportation is the optimal means of conveyance, and jobs, commerce, schools, recreation, etc. are in close proximity but adequately segregated.

Imagine a mid-rise mall where lite-rail and industry/utilities are restricted to the 1st level, commerce is restricted to the 2nd level, hospitals-schools-courts are located on the 3rd level, the 4th & 5th levels are for residences, and the top level is for recreation.

Automoibiles would become almost unnecessary in a community where you ride escalators and lite-rail.

The county adjacent to mine is entirely urban; I estimate you could increase the population 5 times, with half of the land area green space, using my scheme.

"The one thing no one would have is a place to bump into each other, walk the dog, strut, one of the hundred random things that people do." -- Robert Hughes, about Le Corbusier's 1922 unrealised project Ville Contemporaine (or Contemporary City)

 

[voluptuary_manque]

"The one thing no one would have is a place to bump into each other, walk the dog, strut, one of the hundred random things that people do." -- Robert Hughes, about Le Corbusier's 1922 unrealised project Ville Contemporaine (or Contemporary City)

And Hughes was right. Every attempt that I am aware of to create that sort of community has been an abject failure. People seem to object to being "planned upon".

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

"The one thing no one would have is a place to bump into each other, walk the dog, strut, one of the hundred random things that people do." -- Robert Hughes, about Le Corbusier's 1922 unrealised project Ville Contemporaine (or Contemporary City)

No. The recreational level would be the place for it.

 

[DeeZire]

.. People seem to object to being "planned upon".

I think it depends on how it's presented. For the last couple of decades, people have been perfectly happy buying into the suburb myth, which was planned by developers in conjunction with municipal governments. It was only when the variables changed and gas went through the roof that they noticed the downside of having to drive 20 miles to get to a food store, or 80 miles to get to work.

 

[voluptuary_manque]

I think it depends on how it's presented. For the last couple of decades, people have been perfectly happy buying into the suburb myth, which was planned by developers in conjunction with municipal governments. It was only when the variables changed and gas went through the roof that they noticed the downside of having to drive 20 miles to get to a food store, or 80 miles to get to work.

Uh, the L.A. suburb layout was the result of the Red Car lines. It wasn't until post-WWII that everyone demanded their own cocoon of a car. And most places have plenty of shopping within bicycle or electric golf carting distance. Suburbs are too superior a place to raise children for anyone to fall for the New Urbanist propaganda. However, there is no excuse for living in Moreno Valley when your job is in L.A.