# What's up with the hatred of suburbia? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [May 22, 2011, 1:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-up-with-the-hatred-of-suburbia/582742 "2011-05-22T01:57:08Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 9
**Author:** ![John\_Bredin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/96bed5/32.png) [@John\_Bredin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Bredin)\ **Post date:** [May 24, 2011, 8:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-up-with-the-hatred-of-suburbia/582742/161 "2011-05-24T20:09:37Z")
[Jumps into the deep end of the swimming pool. 🆒 And yes, most of my examples are from Chicago and its suburbs, because that’s what I’m familiar with.] I think there’s a lot of talking past each other in this thread, which seems to arise from conflation of concepts, which in turn seems to arise out of understandable defensiveness. First, IMHO we need to take identical houses and chain stores/restaurants off the table as a point of distinction. There are Walgreens on seemingly every major intersection in Chicago, and the bungalow belt neighborhoods were mass-built with row after row of identical houses. We should also take crime off the table: as someone else noted, some of the worst areas in metro Chicago are suburbs, and there are many relatively safe neighborhoods with lots of middle-class families in the city of Chicago (Edison Park, for instance). I heartily agree with the people who have noted that for purposes of criticizing suburban living and supporting urban living that urban doesn’t necessarily mean “the municipality with the central business district for the metro area” and suburban doesn’t necessarily mean “municipalities outside that city”. :rolleyes: There are suburban areas that don’t sprawl, and I imagine there are areas nominally inside city limits, in the Sunbelt for instance, that do sprawl. To me, sprawl or suburban living means fastidiously separated land uses, large residential lots, few if any sidewalks; generally, a zoning and land use pattern that requires one to drive pretty much everywhere. To me, urban living means relatively mixed land uses, consistent sidewalks, and the ability to make a fair chunk of one’s trips (not all, necessarily) on foot or by bicycle. In short, IMHO if you can walk to a grocery store or restaurant or the library without taking your life into your hands, the area is urban/non-sprawl, and if you can’t, it’s suburban sprawl. Or to put it another way, many urban dwellers have a car but they’re not paralyzed without one. I would hazard a guess that a majority of the area of Chicago zoned and used for residences is single-family detached houses, including the aforementioned Bungalow Belt. As others have mentioned, there are similar swaths of Queens, in the City of New York proper, that are mostly single-family houses but with stores, other amenities, and public transit within walking distance. These places aren’t considered suburban merely because everyone isn’t living in high-rises. :rolleyes: I grew up in a house in a suburb bordering Chicago, where the lot sizes are identical to the adjoining city neighborhood with straight streets on a grid pattern and consistent sidewalks on both sides of the street. The town doesn’t have a proper downtown, but commercial uses aren’t kept separate from residential, and when I lived there plenty of people walked to the park, to the library, to school, to the mall – which is enclosed but across a narrow side street from houses. Were it not for the different street signs and lamp-posts, I doubt many people passing by on the main streets would know where the city ended and my suburb began. I live in another Chicago suburb now, and it has some truly suburban portions. But the area where I live is the old downtown around the commuter rail station, with a mix of condo or apartment buildings and houses, with a commercial area around the train station, and consistent sidewalks on both sides of the streets. I have a car and find it useful but not an absolute necessity for daily living. The commuter rail lines leading out of Chicago are lined with old pre-WWII suburbs with a commercial downtown and a surrounding walkable neighborhood of single family houses. Step off a train in Hinsdale, for instance, and there are very few multidwellings and many of the houses are absolutely huge. Nobody’s going to mistake Hinsdale for midtown Manhattan. :rolleyes: And yet one can eat dinner, or buy a cup of coffee, or get a haircut, or go to the library with a brief walk that doesn’t involve walking in mud or crossing eight lanes of flying traffic. Notably, most if not all of these prewar walkable suburbs have truly suburban portions as well. Naperville, to use another example from elsewhere in the thread, has a thriving downtown and residential area walkable from the main train station and mile after mile of sprawling subdivisions where only the desperate or foolhardy walk anywhere. Most people criticizing suburbia don’t want everyone to give up their car or live in apartment buildings. If you live in a house in a suburb and have a car, but you don’t have to drive everywhere – and especially if you’re not kvetching about having to chauffeur your children everywhere – it’s not you we’re criticizing. 😉 ---
**Author:** ![msmith537](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d9b06d/32.png) [@msmith537](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/msmith537)\ **Post date:** [May 24, 2011, 8:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-up-with-the-hatred-of-suburbia/582742/162 "2011-05-24T20:23:34Z")
FWIW, architect Frank Lloyd Wright didn’t much care for cities. His concept of [Broadacre City](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Broadacre_City) is very much a precursor to modern automobile-driven suburban designs. (I learned that at the Guggenheim). ---
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [May 24, 2011, 9:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-up-with-the-hatred-of-suburbia/582742/163 "2011-05-24T21:17:07Z")
> [@msmith537](#): > > If desiring to be educated, cultured, relatively healthy through diet and exercise, professionally and financial successful, and intellectually stimulated is “elitist bullshit”, then guilty as charged. And yet you’ve provided no evidence that people in suburbs are less educated, cultured, financially successfuly or healthy. Your claim that everyone in suburbs - by which I suspect you mean “Who don’t live in New York City” - is the same is, obviously, horseshit. I call them as I see them, and your posts are indisputably full of really stupid crap. If you don’t like it, educate yourself. ---
**Author:** ![MysteryFellow63427](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/a88e4f/32.png) [@MysteryFellow63427](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MysteryFellow63427)\ **Post date:** [May 24, 2011, 9:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-up-with-the-hatred-of-suburbia/582742/164 "2011-05-24T21:50:02Z")
> [@Hypno-Toad](#): > > As a planner, I now “hate” subdivisions because of the sprawl effect. They almost always require new utility lines and capacity to be added to the county budget. They are insular by design nowadays. The love of gated communities is especially bad in this regard. This insularity generates concentrated traffic loads on certain roads instead of spreading loads out the way an integrated road network does. There were three or four ways to get out of my old neighborhood by car. The developers I deal with now had to be dragged kicking and screaming to agree to make even a second entrance to their proposed subdivisions. (I used past tense because the housing bust killed off that industry down here.) So with only one way in and out of a neighborhood, all the traffic is routed onto one road. Incidentally, people REALLY hate it when another, later, neighborhood is connected to theirs by road. “MY CHILDREN WILL BE RUN DOWN IN THE STREET BY THOSE MANIACS!” Even when the road connection was planned from the begining because the new neighborhood is really just a later phase of the same development. The street layout in new housing developments drives me bat\*\*\*\* crazy. What the hell is so wrong with grid streets? They are awesome and logical. Instead, subdivisions insist on these windy rats’ nests that have absolutely no rhyme or reason whatsoever. ---
**Author:** ![monstro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ba9def/32.png) [@monstro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/monstro)\ **Post date:** [May 24, 2011, 11:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-up-with-the-hatred-of-suburbia/582742/165 "2011-05-24T23:10:00Z")
> [@neuroman](#): > > The street layout in new housing developments drives me bat\*\*\*\* crazy. What the hell is so wrong with grid streets? They are awesome and logical. Instead, subdivisions insist on these windy rats’ nests that have absolutely no rhyme or reason whatsoever. When I lived on the outer edge of Miami, I discovered this horribleness. I like to walk a lot, and those windy, non-gridded streets would always turn what could have been a nice pleasant walk into an “OMG! I’m lost and hot and ANGRY!” walk. Bad times, bad times. ---
**Author:** ![Lobot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/ce7236/32.png) [@Lobot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lobot)\ **Post date:** [May 25, 2011, 12:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-up-with-the-hatred-of-suburbia/582742/166 "2011-05-25T00:17:13Z")
Looking at [Wikipedia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suburb#Australia_and_New_Zealand), American usage of “suburb” seems quite distinct from Australian usage. So what’s the U.S. equivalent of an Australian suburb? > [@](#): > > In Australia and New Zealand, suburbs have become formalised as geographic subdivisions of a city and are used by postal services in addressing… In Australia, the terms inner suburb and outer suburb are used to differentiate between the higher-density suburbs in proximity to the city centre, and the lower-density suburbs on the outskirts of the urban area. Inner suburbs, such as… Prahran in Melbourne and Ultimo in Sydney, are usually characterised by higher density apartment housing and greater integration between commercial and residential areas. ---
**Author:** ![Hello\_Again](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/85e7bf/32.png) [@Hello\_Again](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hello_Again)\ **Post date:** [May 25, 2011, 12:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-up-with-the-hatred-of-suburbia/582742/167 "2011-05-25T00:46:43Z")
> [@Lobot](#): > > Looking at [Wikipedia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suburb#Australia_and_New_Zealand), American usage of “suburb” seems quite distinct from Australian usage. > > So what’s the U.S. equivalent of an Australian suburb? “Section of an Incorporated City with a distinct postal code” = “neighborhood.” In many areas, the names of the neighborhoods are not used for mailing addresses, as the ZIP code tells all you need to know. In other areas, for essentially historical reasons, the neighborhood names are used in addressing. For example, I live in the neighborhood of Forest Hills,and my mailing address ends in “Forest Hills, NY 11375.” My parents live in the neighborhood of Park Slope, and their Mailing address ends in the more-generic “Brooklyn, NY 11215” without reference to the neighborhood. Both neighborhoods lie within the incorporated limits of New York City, and outside of Manhattan (which is entirely designated “New York, NY”). As far as a specific terms for areas of higher or lower density outside the city center proper but within the city limits – as far as I know, no terms are in regular use for this phenomenon in the US. ---
**Author:** ![BorgHunter](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7c8e57/32.png) [@BorgHunter](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BorgHunter)\ **Post date:** [May 25, 2011, 12:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-up-with-the-hatred-of-suburbia/582742/168 "2011-05-25T00:48:53Z")
> [@Lobot](#): > > Looking at [Wikipedia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suburb#Australia_and_New_Zealand), American usage of “suburb” seems quite distinct from Australian usage. > > So what’s the U.S. equivalent of an Australian suburb? Looks somewhat like Chicago’s [community areas](https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/Community_areas_of_Chicago), although it looks like Australian suburbs are somewhat larger than that. ---
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [May 25, 2011, 1:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-up-with-the-hatred-of-suburbia/582742/169 "2011-05-25T01:11:41Z")
> [@Lobot](#): > > So what’s the U.S. equivalent of an Australian suburb? It depends on the city. There’s no consistency and a big reason for that is that postal code boundaries and names are determined by the U.S. Postal Service and municipal boundaries are determined by municipal governments, and neither of them pays any attention to what the other is doing. Many cities – possibly most – have no formal subdivisions smaller than the city for general purposes. They will draw ward lines for elections and other lines for other specific purposes, such as neighbourhood advisory committees. The names of residential neighborhoods for the most part are ad hoc and mutable. People say they live in “South Rockville” until they decide that “North Bethesda” sounds better, and all of a sudden, the name of the neighbourhood has changed. Other cities have taken the time to divide the city up into neighbourhoods, but the actual residents have no idea what these “official” neighbourhoods are, and just use whatever names they happen to hear from their fellow residents. If a transit system uses names of locales for stations, then over time, those station names will “spread” as people identify their locales with the nearest station. The Postal Service doesn’t care anything about this. Postal code boundaries don’t even follow major state-defined political boundaries, such as county, city, village, town, or township boundaries. Take, for example, New York City. The city’s first level of subdivisions is the borough/county: (1) Borough of Manhattan/New York County, (2) Borough of the Bronx/Bronx County, (3) Borough of Queens/Queens County, (4) Borough of Brooklyn/Kings County, (4) Borough of Staten Island/Richmond County. Below that level is a complex multi-layered system of locality names – differing lines drawn for differing purposes. The Postal Service considers the Borough of Manhattan/New York County to be a single city – New York – for postal delivery purposes. However, it divides up the Borough of Queens/Queens County into numerous cities, many of them based on pre-consolidation locality names, but not really strictly following the actual pre-1898 boundaries of the former municipalities. ---
**Author:** ![Lobot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/ce7236/32.png) [@Lobot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lobot)\ **Post date:** [May 25, 2011, 1:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-up-with-the-hatred-of-suburbia/582742/170 "2011-05-25T01:46:45Z")
Well, that’s educational. So neighbourhoods are the closest analogue to Australian suburbs, but mostly unofficial and _ad hoc_. ---
**Author:** ![Hypno-Toad](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/b2d939/32.png) [@Hypno-Toad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hypno-Toad)\ **Post date:** [May 25, 2011, 11:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-up-with-the-hatred-of-suburbia/582742/171 "2011-05-25T11:59:32Z")
> [@neuroman](#): > > The street layout in new housing developments drives me bat\*\*\*\* crazy. What the hell is so wrong with grid streets? They are awesome and logical. Instead, subdivisions insist on these windy rats’ nests that have absolutely no rhyme or reason whatsoever. We’re trying to bring back the grid in my county for this reason among others. I think the reasons for the winding road layout are: 1. it gives a feeling of privacy to most of the houses if they can see only a few of their neighbors. 2. it is intentionally non-urban in appearance to give the illusion of living in the country. 3. the landscape designers and subdivision planners get bored and want to do something different than a grid. ---
**Author:** ![Balthisar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/balthisar/32/2825_2.png) [@Balthisar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Balthisar)\ **Post date:** [May 25, 2011, 12:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-up-with-the-hatred-of-suburbia/582742/172 "2011-05-25T12:40:11Z")
> [@Hypno-Toad](#): > > We’re trying to bring back the grid in my county for this reason among others. I think the reasons for the winding road layout are: 1. it gives a feeling of privacy to most of the houses if they can see only a few of their neighbors. 2. it is intentionally non-urban in appearance to give the illusion of living in the country. 3. the landscape designers and subdivision planners get bored and want to do something different than a grid. Add: it prevents their quiet, residential streets from becoming shortcuts between major parallel roads, i.e., reduces traffic. I’m very happy that I live on a horseshoe for that reason, and very glad that I don’t live on the road that I use twice every day as a shortcut between two major roads. ---
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [May 25, 2011, 1:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-up-with-the-hatred-of-suburbia/582742/173 "2011-05-25T13:17:42Z")
> [@Balthisar](#): > > Add: it prevents their quiet, residential streets from becoming shortcuts between major parallel roads, i.e., reduces traffic. Which, of course, increases congestion on the few through roads that do exist. ---
**Author:** ![monstro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ba9def/32.png) [@monstro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/monstro)\ **Post date:** [May 25, 2011, 1:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-up-with-the-hatred-of-suburbia/582742/174 "2011-05-25T13:39:53Z")
> [@Balthisar](#): > > Add: it prevents their quiet, residential streets from becoming shortcuts between major parallel roads, i.e., reduces traffic. I’m very happy that I live on a horseshoe for that reason, and very glad that I don’t live on the road that I use twice every day as a shortcut between two major roads. In addition to what **Ascenray** said and I intimated above, it is anti-pedestrian because it makes what could be a five minutes walk to the main road more like a twenty minute walk, or longer. Simply because there are no cross streets that connect anywhere. And if you happen to get lost in such a place? Oh man. You better not try to take any short cuts back to main road by turning down any cross streets. Those streets will just meander away from where you are trying to go, for no logical reason, and you’ll eventually end up in a cul-de-sac. ---
**Author:** ![madmonk28](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/madmonk28/32/20811_2.png) [@madmonk28](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/madmonk28)\ **Post date:** [May 25, 2011, 1:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-up-with-the-hatred-of-suburbia/582742/175 "2011-05-25T13:40:54Z")
Virginia has taken steps to eliminate cul de sac cities, [http://www.autoblog.com/2009/03/24/virginia-outlaws-cul-de-sacs-in-face-of-increased-traffic/](http://www.autoblog.com/2009/03/24/virginia-outlaws-cul-de-sacs-in-face-of-increased-traffic/) > [@](#): > > Virginia lawmakers are taking a metaphorical battering ram to suburban culs-de-sac, those little dead-end roundabouts that are almost all adorned with a yellow sign saying “No Outlet.” Caught out by spiraling maintenance and development costs, the Washington Post reports that legislators are now mandating that the state will only maintain new subdivision roadways that meet its revised requirements for narrower dimensions and increased connectivity. That maintenance includes not only things like pothole patches and striping, but also plowing in winter, meaning that the state’s new laws will carry very real consequences for planners and developers who choose not to comply. About 40 years too late for Prince William and Fairfax counties. ---
**Author:** ![lindsaybluth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/90db22/32.png) [@lindsaybluth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lindsaybluth)\ **Post date:** [May 25, 2011, 1:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-up-with-the-hatred-of-suburbia/582742/176 "2011-05-25T13:42:00Z")
> [@John\_Bredin](#): > > [Jumps into the deep end of the swimming pool. 🆒 And yes, most of my examples are from Chicago and its suburbs, because that’s what I’m familiar with.] > > I think there’s a lot of talking past each other in this thread, which seems to arise from conflation of concepts, which in turn seems to arise out of understandable defensiveness. Most of my examples are of Pittsburgh, because that’s what I’m familiar with too. I have no clue what it’s like in NYC or Houston and neither do most people in this thread. > [@Lady\_of\_the\_Lake](#): > > and just try to walk past our **African American neighbors** without stopping for a chat… First, thanks for pointing out the one black family you have. I hear this all the time “oh, our black neighbors are so nice!” Like you’re amazed they mow their lawns _just like you do_ :rolleyes:. Oh, and by the way, you should know that the preferred term now is [black Americans](http://www.scribd.com/doc/2664713/Associated-Press-AP-Style-Guide-the-basics). > [@Lady\_of\_the\_Lake](#): > > These sections of your post stood out for me. > > Wow. Just wow. > > I think dangermom has a point. There is some clear class related disdain going on here. This is actually an attack on their values and their judgments, not at all a disdain for how much they have. For that same 160k (there was just an ad in the paper for starter Ryan homes for 160k, 100k was me lowballing it) you can get a home in a nicer neighborhood in the city and have your kids go to the best city school. The _best_ (not the middling schools in the cheaper suburbs) city school kids end up going to many prestigious schools while also being in a diverse neighborhood (note here that diverse does not mean crime riddled). The kids don’t lifeguard at the local pool, they’re docents at the museum or work at the food bank, all able to get to their summer positions with the bus system. 160k gets you a _lot_ in the city of Pittsburgh - a more quality-built home with original woodwork, the ability to be a 1 car household and a better school district than you’d get in the 'burbs for the same amount of $. And yet pre-recession, people were slurping up those newly chinese-drywalled homes. ---
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [May 25, 2011, 2:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-up-with-the-hatred-of-suburbia/582742/177 "2011-05-25T14:25:15Z")
> [@monstro](#): > > In addition to what **Ascenray** said and I intimated above, it is anti-pedestrian because it makes what could be a five minutes walk to the main road more like a twenty minute walk, or longer. Simply because there are no cross streets that connect anywhere. Subdivisions around here usually have connecting sidewalks if there’s no cross streets. If we’re actually now complaining that not having perfectly straight roads is a bad thing, we’re getting into some pretty absurd complaining. On one hand people are complaining that suburbs are featureless and boring, and now they’re complaining about one of their nicer features; the fact that they AREN’T all grids, and use curved roads, crescents, and cul-de-sacs to preserve green spaces and slow down vehicle traffic. So one one hand they’re bad because they’re car-oriented and featureless, but when a feature is added to help pedestrians and slow cars down, that’s no good. > [@](#): > > And if you happen to get lost in such a place? Oh man. You better not try to take any short cuts back to main road by turning down any cross streets. Do people actually get lost this easily without having Alzheimer’s? Honestly, where are all these confused, lost pedestrians? How hard is it to figure out what direction you’re walking in? ---
**Author:** ![msmith537](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d9b06d/32.png) [@msmith537](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/msmith537)\ **Post date:** [May 25, 2011, 4:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-up-with-the-hatred-of-suburbia/582742/178 "2011-05-25T16:24:37Z")
> [@RickJay](#): > > And yet you’ve provided no evidence that people in suburbs are less educated, cultured, financially successfuly or healthy [than NYC]. New York is a metropolitan city of almost 10 million people. It has top universities, museums, and theaters. It’s the financial capital of the world. It’s a major hub for industries such as tech, fashion, media and many others. I thought it was just understood. > [@RickJay](#): > > Your claim that everyone in suburbs - by which I suspect you mean “Who don’t live in New York City” - is the same is, obviously, horseshit. Did I say every single person? We are speaking in generalities here. [QUOTE=RickJay] I call them as I see them, and your posts are indisputably full of really stupid crap. If you don’t like it, educate yourself. [/QUOTE] [/quote] Fortunately, I have the luxury of not caring what you think. ---
**Author:** ![SciFiSam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/47e85d/32.png) [@SciFiSam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SciFiSam)\ **Post date:** [May 25, 2011, 4:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-up-with-the-hatred-of-suburbia/582742/179 "2011-05-25T16:43:02Z")
I think some of the hatred for the suburbs is simply that most of us are familiar with them. We always have the strongest feelings about the situations most familiar to us. Lots of people even grew up in them. There’s quite a lot of hatred for cities, too, but not much for the countryside, because so few people have experience of living there. FWIW, I can’t drive, and probably never will be able to (you wouldn’t want me fainting as I drive along in front of you), so anywhere that’s car-dependant is a no-no for me. ---
**Author:** ![Lady\_of\_the\_Lake](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e19adc/32.png) [@Lady\_of\_the\_Lake](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lady_of_the_Lake)\ **Post date:** [May 25, 2011, 5:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-up-with-the-hatred-of-suburbia/582742/180 "2011-05-25T17:21:58Z")
> [@lindsaybluth](#): > > First, thanks for pointing out the one black family you have. I hear this all the time “oh, our black neighbors are so nice!” Like you’re amazed they mow their lawns _just like you do_ :rolleyes:. Oh, and by the way, you should know that the preferred term now is [black Americans](http://www.scribd.com/doc/2664713/Associated-Press-AP-Style-Guide-the-basics). What? Your really projecting a lot here. I only mentioned the fact that – hey we live right near brown people so I don’t see how we moved here to get away from ‘scary brown people’ - directly spurred by your comment: “In short, there is no intellectual curiosity, there is no drive to succeed nor authenticity of food or culture. The only interests are in maintaining the status quo in a “new” house and living paycheck to paycheck in a bland suburb away from the city (and scary brown people).” There is a lot of assumption on your part of the motives of people, that doesn’t match up with the suburb I live in at all. If you look out at the school bus pick up across from my house half the kids are black. My nephew is the only Caucasian kid in his class at the local school a few blocks over. Exactly how then was our interest in moving to the suburb to stay away from ‘scary brown people’? But hey, whatever, it must be fun to know so much about a persons motives just by the house a person lives in. > [@lindsaybluth](#): > > This is actually an attack on their values and their judgments, not at all a disdain for how much they have. For that same 160k (there was just an ad in the paper for starter Ryan homes for 160k, 100k was me lowballing it) you can get a home in a nicer neighborhood in the city and have your kids go to the best city school. The _best_ (not the middling schools in the cheaper suburbs) city school kids end up going to many prestigious schools while also being in a diverse neighborhood (note here that diverse does not mean crime riddled). The kids don’t lifeguard at the local pool, they’re docents at the museum or work at the food bank, all able to get to their summer positions with the bus system. > > 160k gets you a _lot_ in the city of Pittsburgh - a more quality-built home with original woodwork, the ability to be a 1 car household and a better school district than you’d get in the 'burbs for the same amount of $. And yet pre-recession, people were slurping up those newly chinese-drywalled homes. So, this type of home is not okay, but affluent suburbs in your opinion are fine then…because? Affluent suburbs also would fit into your theory ‘moved because scared of brown people’ and others comments of ‘cultural wasteland. They just look nicer on the outside and the people who live in them are rich. The kids of people in affluent suburbs just a few blocks away from your 160k Ryan starter homes also do not have the option to be docents at the museum or ride the bus to the food bank any more than the kids in the cheaper suburban homes so how,\* if you are not judging solely by how rich a person is,\* are they any different? In all honesty, I dislike the types of housing complexes most here are railing against. I personally I would never live in that type of house. Nor would I live in a HOA. Everything the same – no side walks for walkers – no yards – no trees. But sometimes people just want a home that’s near their job, and don’t want to have to pack up to move into the city just so that people like you won’t look down their noses at them. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-up-with-the-hatred-of-suburbia/582742.md?page=8) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-up-with-the-hatred-of-suburbia/582742.md?page=10)