Socorocks

Disneyland. NOT. hahaa.

other than the fact that you've conveniently chosen to disregard most of my main points, I suppose the best thing to do for L.A. would be, in an "ideal" low-density fashion, re-designate developed land with an FAR ration of greater than 3.0 to "parking lot" or "landscaped easement", so then we can go about getting rid of those pesky, cramped office towers and apartments. In fact, why don't we just tear out all the side walks and mercilessly 8-lane every road we can? Everyone should live in a single-family home, and no buildings should exceed 35 feet in height. Low density LA sounds like a dream come true. L.A. is not crowded, not by world standards. Tons of room for improvement.

regardless of how far back the little spat about the merits of density was, I can't resist but comment. clearly, people don't get it. Density is WHAT MAKES A CITY A CITY. once a city reaches a critical mass of people within a given area, it is able to support a far greater variety of organizations, services, businesses, lifestyles, and uses than your now-typical low-density wastelands. Crowding is part of city life. Being compact is not necessarily detrimental, it's just that our typical American "bigger-is-better" thought paradigm has clearly indoctrinated most of you into believing that being emptier makes a place better. If Los Angeles wants to reaffirm its footing as a global city, increased density within a defined area is absolutely requisite. Without that, the world will continue to look down its collective nose at LA as a vacuous, sprawling nowhere.

I know what gentrification is, thank you. Anyway, Duke87, you (and so many other Americans) look at this as an aesthetic issue and a preferential issue, rather than what it really is. Gentrifying older, urban neighborhoods does add to problems, correct, while it does do a lot to stem the flood of McMansions that devour our countryside as wealthy people tire of suburbia in increasing numbers. But the problems that both neighborhood renewal and reversal as well as unchecked sprawl present are rooted deeper. The reasons why attempts at revisiting the design of the places in which we live are superficial at best is because they are aimed at changing the format of said locale, and not the lifestyles of the people their in. People want to be urban and green and modern and yet they want to keep their auto-oriented lifestyle. They still want to drive to work. This is not a perception issue. People would use transit if they were educated properly, not if the system was the newest cleanest shiniest brightest most extensive in the country. It's been shown by poor ridership of new, well-planned systems that it doens't matter the quality if the stigma is still there. It's a teaching challenge as well as an infrastructural one. The cultural problem you speak of is not resistance based on cold hard preference and division; moreover, it's not because people are unchangeably predisposed to avoid transit and urban contexts; rather, it is an ignorance. If the horrid unsustainabilities, ineffeciencies, impracticalities, and unhealthinesses of the suburban, car-oriented lifestyle could be adequately, rigorously, and effectively presented, then the sea change would begin in earnest. We see the the beginnings of this right now, with the wealthy returning to the city (despite the negative effects of gentrification). But the middle class is largely unmoved, and therein lies the next greatest challenge to correcting the sprawl issue. Put simply, I don't think people would fight so hard for their sprawl if they knew just how bad it is for everyone and everything, especially themselves.

[ In many parts of the country, this type of sprawl-like development is the only legal way to build, so developers actively eliminate the feasibility of mass transit (before it even has a chance) in order to maintain the automobile as the only practical means of travel.quote> This is a terrible and unfortunate truth of our time, one that, unfortunately, most people are not familiar enough with the principles of place to understand the implications of. Thank you for contributing this.

Originally posted by: britishdude1192 I honestly don't see why this is such a problem. I live in a New York City suburb in New Jersey and I like it, there's still parks and trees and wildlife (to a certain extent) and if you want to talk urban spraw the suburbs go straight acrosss the state of NJ and even into Pensylvaniaquote> People who say things like this have clearly not endeavored to educate themselves, on anything. Please try to find me one credible consortium of planners that still supports reckless, uncontrolled, wasteful and vacuous sprawl that is taken seriously. No one takes statements like that seriously.

I would definitely like to see more of this. Very cool.

Is there a sort of population threshold that must be attained before a city can support a light-rail investment with ridership?

Originally posted by: DFire870 The main reason why people live in the suburbs is the high desnsity areas aren't so good for raising a family. And sprawl doesn't always take away farmland. Sure, it might eat up ranches and woodlands, but to say it just eats up farmland is stupid. Also, not every new development bulldozes all the trees and plants new ones. This might be the exception, but in my subdivision they left many of the trees, so there are maybe 2 or 3 houses that have young trees. (Hell, my backyard has about 10 trees and it's tiny!). And if you really want to complain about this, go back 50 years and complain to Eisenhower. Because honestly, suburban sprawl is only going to get worse, not better. (BTW, I'm not saying sprawl is good, but there's really nothing you can do about it)quote> This is absolutely, utterly untrue. Try SmartGrowth principles. Try traditional neighborhoods. Try New Urbanism. Try Mass Transit. Consider that family-friendly neighborhoods of houses can exist within a walkable, viable, communicable, and still maintain a density that is suitable for children and pets and whatnot. Look at any pre-WWII suburb of any major American city. Very walkable, very accessible to the rest of the city, transitions nicely into more urban zones, and is still quaint, tree-lined streets fronted by beautiful old houses. There's no reason why we have to continue to exacerbate our automobile addiction by persisting to build the types of nonplaces that Charleston, Greenville, Los Angeles, Miami, Houston, Las Vegas, or any American city is currently suffering from.

Pictures don't tell us much as to why you feel a city is poorly planned - and that goes for this entire thread. Every place has a special circumstance that is the reason why things are the way they are, so when you post pictures of traffic and say that that means a place is poorly planned, you really haven't made an argument at all. Big cities are crowded. That's how they are. For traffic to be a breeze all of the time in a big city you'd have to demolish most of the city to accomodate that. Just because traffic is unpleasant doesn't mean that a place is unpleasant to live in. Imagine the streets of New York or Paris or Chicago or London or Tokyo, empty. They'd make for great driving, but what kind of large city could call itself important when its streets are devoid of life?

xxbydesign and DARKO: Thank you for your insight. It's funny because it seems like this thread is rather intellectually one-sided; those of us who try to make compelling arguments as to why suburban sprawl is soulless and unhealthy end up laughing at responses like "I lIkE SprAwL bEkUZ I lIvE ClosE tO BunNIeS anD I lIke CaRZ LOL RoTfL LMAO hahah"

There is nothing spiritually, emotionally, or physically fulfilling about sprawl. Suburbs, on the other hand, can be quite beautiful when integrated well with their surroundings - tree-lined grid of streets, quaint white-washed houses, corner markets, a wholesome, fulfilling way of life. But American sprawl is all walls, divisions, berms and buffers, strips, lanes, just division after division after division. Uses are divided. What? Put commercial services that people need within walking distance of homes? Preposterous! The nerve! If we did that, some might even have the gall to leave their cars in the driveway for once! If suburbanites could for one second look past all the pretty landscaping and river rock siding and ample traffic provisions, they would see that they live in a place of utter void. I grew up 60 miles outside of Los Angeles - essentially the mother of suburban sprawl. There is nothing pleasant about driving down a road and seeing nothing but cinder-block wall and the backs of cheaply constructed houses. There is nothing pleasant, in fact, about being absolutely forced to drive anywhere. I should not have to get in my car when I need a quart of milk, but with the endless barriers and walls and divisions and vast, wasted concrete-and-planter expanses, I have no choice. People were initially drawn to the suburbs because they felt trapped in the close quarters of the city. But now, nothing feels more trapping than sprawl. Los Angeles, Pheonix, Houston, Atlanta, Sacramento, Las Vegas - largest prisons on earth. Sprawl is not good, lovable, healthy, useful. It is destructive, wasteful, and demoralizing.

Originally posted by: belfastuniguy I just want to take some of the points and expand on them. 6. Australia is a possible potential Presidential republic, Canada less so quote> Why is that? [i don't know much about either country's government, so I genuinely am curious]