It is also bad for kids to grow up where you can’t go anywhere unless Mom drives you. Young George Bailey could walk to school, walk to his job at the drugstore, walk to other stores to run errands for Mom, walk anyplace in Bedford Falls without bothering anyone for a lift. It helps a kid grow up faster and better. A suburban kid can only walk to close neighbors’ houses, and perhaps to a playground.
Tomato, tomah-to. I guess that distinction would matter to people using public transportation. But I don’t see how that makes any more sense. It’s way too low.
Anyone taking the train to Boston has to factor in at least 25 minutes just for getting from the commuter rail to their stop on the T to their building. So, for Boston commuters 25 minutes would be more of a fixed minimum and then add on time for how long you are on the train itself. If you live inside 128 it might be under an hour but outside of 495 it’s more like 90 minutes. But the housing prices reflect this.
The only way that 25 minutes is an average is if it’s not factoring out stay at home moms, work from home people or something.
Read for comprehension. I said I’d rather go on a hike than spend my time walking to the store to get light bulbs.
Cite that city dwellers are more fit than suburbanites?
Thanks. I saw that, but after I posted. 
This is a problem, but most suburbs are heading in the right direction in this area. Rail trails are all the rage now. A typical suburban town gets very bike and walking friendly when you put a couple rail trails running the length of it.
They are building whole planned communities in places like Research Triangle Park that are built around the ideal of towns in that narrow window of time when cars existed, but not everyone had a car. Think “Main Street” at Disney World. Those towns are suburbs, and a selling point is “car free living” for your kids.
Sorry for the not understanding your point.
Here is a link to an article about one such study: http://articles.sun-sentinel.com/2003-08-29/news/0308281211_1_sprawl-index-researchers-study
It’s also fun to walk to the store. I stop and say hello to my neighbor up the street, sometimes I take my dog, the guy at the shop knows me by name, we talk about the Nats and how much they suck (well that part is really sad) walk back to the house, talk to another neighbor, etc.
ETA: In my experience a lot of things that are PITA chores in all that sprawl can be kind of enjoyable in a walkable community.
No worries.
It’s funny to me that you consider a walk to the grocery store in the city a “hike”. For me a “hike” has to have trees along the way, and preferably a view at the end. Walking in the city can be fun, but I wouldn’t call it “hiking”.
No, don’t think Disney’s “Main Street,” that’s an ornamental anachronism built to 3:5 scale. Think Disney’s Celebration. It is a real neighborhood with residents. It differs from most PUDs in being New Urbanist, meaning it is not only walkable in scale but built around a definite commercial center anyone can walk to. (The late Walt’s notion of an ideal community was very different, BTW.)
I read a book once that asked the question: Kissimmee is a much older town not far from Celebration, that always was what Celebration attempts to revive or imitate. And its downtown and main street are mostly abandoned and boarded-up, like most old small towns’ of that kind. Why are the property values so much lower and the local economy so dismal compared to Celebration’s? If the New Urbanism is emerging, why is the perfectly adequate and already-built Old Urbanism dying? I forget the title of the book, or whether or how the question was answered.
My city is new and shiny. After work, I can pop in to the museum for a few minutes before I go to the bar, then check out another bar or stop in some place and grab dinner and see some live music (for free), and stop at the grocery store on the way home to grab breakfast for the next day if I feel like it. I can do all of this without drinking and drivving. And when I want to go to a football game, I walk there.
I just want to say, as a liberal, I think this is great. Cities aren’t for everyone, and that’s ok. They can be expensive. I think you get more out of it than you pay, but that’s also a decision based on really personal stuff. But I think it’s fairly indisputable that we need to cut back on car use, as a nation (heck, as a species) so I’m glad they are improving the less walkable suburbs and planning the new ones with this in mind. It’s good for everyone.
And I don’t hate the suburbs at all. I wanted to live in the city for my own reasons, and I moved. I’m happy here. But that doesn’t mean I hate the suburbs, it just means I like the city.
I don’t think this divide really exists outside of a few extremely partisan imaginations.
I live in the burbs, and am hoping to sell to move into the city. I find the idea of being able to walk out to a restaurant, the grocery store, or similar neighborhood location a real advantage. I hate, in my current 'burb, that every single activity/errand starts with getting in the car. I’ve already decided where I’m buying a condo, and within a 4 block walk are 2 grocery stores, 3 drugstores, at least 20 restaurants, a downtown green-space where they hold free concerts and events, and a subway stop less than a block away. I can honestly see my car not moving for a week at a time. I like this lifestyle.
I find some of the comments a few posts up about suburbs planning around a central shopping or dining hub so that people can have more a city-like experience amusing. So, somehow the burbs are better if we can make it more like the city, just without that pesky inter-city uh, you know, uh, uh, uh thing to it.
I had forgotten about this, but yes, this is a perfect example of what I’m talking about.
I don’t consider a walk to a grocery store a hike, it was a play on words when I thought you considered it a hike. It was a misunderstanding wrapped in confusion.
I agree, especially when you are young being able to drink and walk home is nice. When I was in my twenties I lived in a loft style condo in the heart of a city downtown. I could open my floor to ceiling windows and hear the live music from the bar at the corner.
That’s nice when you’re 23. It’s annoying when you’re 43.
The young/old divide I’m sure is another factor in suburbs = conservative and city = liberal. Young people prefer cities and as you get older suburbs make sense, especially for raising children. People get more conservative as they get older. I suspect much of the difference between politics of cities vs suburbs can be explained by these demographics.
Out of curiosity, which city do you live that is new and shiny? I’ve never seen a city that isn’t dirty and grimy.
Fair enough.
I’m 46 and love the city. Also, there isn’t a lot of proof that people get more conservative as they get older, in fact it looks like they become more liberal: http://news.discovery.com/human/psychology/voter-conservative-aging-liberal-120119.htm
There are a lot of Kissimmees in America. Arkansas City, KS, where my mother grew up, is like that now; it was still a vibrant town 30 years ago.
Used to be that (a) we were once more of an agrarian nation, so more people than now were more spread out on farms and stuff, and the nearest small town was the local commercial center, in effect. The economic activity of all those people supported the town. And (b) even after that, for a long time we were a manufacturing nation, and the manufacturing used to be more dispersed than it is now too.
Both of these things have taken their toll on Arkansas City. Fewer people are needed now than were once needed to grow wheat and raise cattle in the county, and the local oil refinery closed. So there are fewer jobs, and fewer people, to keep the economy of the town going.
There’s a lot of that in small towns across the country.
The difference between Celebration and all those other small towns, is that there’s a concrete reason for people, and employers, to move to Celebration. It’s got something to offer that all those other thousands of small towns can’t. It’s new and shiny, and has the Disney cachet.
I can’t speak to the specifics of Kissimmee, but the question isn’t so much about Kissimmee in particular, as about old small towns like Kissimmee.
Interesting article, but it admits that older people are more conservative than younger people. It just argues that’s due to differences in times when they grew up. It also equates basically everything good from “open to new ideas” and “tolerant” with being liberal, which is hardly true.
If we stopped letting everyone under 30 vote, who would that have hurt more: Obama or Romney? The answer is obvious.