Posted on 01/29/2006 8:10:14 AM PST by SmithL
As California's first large urbanized region, the Bay Area has a long and compelling history as a center of city life. When Fresno was little more than a couple of shacks and Los Angeles a gunslinger's cow town, San Francisco already saw itself as a sophisticated, cosmopolitan city. Yet today, this cherished ideal of the Bay Area as a neatly organized, dense urban center is increasingly archaic. The suburbs are starting to take over. Long anxious to see itself as a Pacific version of Gotham, the Bay Area increasingly resembles more and more its hated rival to the south, Los Angeles.
The health of this suburban configuration, so widely detested in planning and policy circles, may hold the key to the Bay Area's future health. Facing a European-like demographic decline, and losing economic vitality, the Bay Area will need to look to its hinterland for its future growth, if it still has the will to do so, and to house and nurture the next generation of its middle class.
The primacy of suburbia, in California or elsewhere, should really not be very debatable. Roughly 51 percent of Americans, according to one recent survey, prefer to live in the suburbs, while only 13 percent opt for life in a dense urban place. A third would opt for an even more low-density existence in the countryside. The preference for suburban-style living continues to be particularly strong among younger families.
Market trends parallel these opinions. Despite widespread media exposure about a supposed return to the city, the most recent demographic data suggest that the tide continues to go out toward suburbia.
(Excerpt) Read more at sfgate.com ...
Not one mention of the infill high density transportation hub projects that are partially funded by the feds. They promise to be the slums of the future. Imagine being able to step onto a BART train from your front door, mug somebody and then make it home before your crack dealer even misses you.
Many states also divert highway funds to mass transit fiascos instead of building roads.
I have no desire to live in the "traditional suburb." That whole plastic "white picket fence" culture makes my teeth ache. I either want to live in a small town, or in the country.
Actually, the development model gaining the most traction lately is the "urban center." Basically, this is an attempt to recreate the classic American small town by clustering medium-density mixed commercial and residential development around a transportation hub. In theory, this creates areas with the advantages of the suburbs (low crime, good tax base) without the evils of sprawl and the automobile culture.
Unfortunately for my family, the suburbs are creeping up the hill towards us every year, thanks to us being rezoned from Rural Residential/Agricultural to R1 ("suburbia.")
Somehow, all this development just means more taxes (to pay for the infrastructure and services) yet all must be sacrificed in the almighty name of Growth.
There is no escaping this cancer - we need to fight it.
Sometimes you have to laugh to keep from crying.
Lucky us- all we see are trees to the N, E and S, and we only have a view of the neighbor's property uphill across the road, which has been clearcut and bulldozed in preparation for cookie-cutter development. (I wanted to buy him out, but the developers have deeper pockets.)
Now the folks down the road, with panoramic views of the Mohawk Valley- they would get hammered by a view tax. Never mind that those houses sell for more, thus paying more taxes already.
Sounds like NIMBY groaning to me...
What people want is the FACADE of urban life mixed with a FACADE of country life. They want the convenience of urbania, but the solitude of the country. The problem is most of suburbanites are ignorant of how a society works, esp where their food comes from. This pisses me off that they move to country-side, then whine whine whine about the lack of services, then try to change rules and the lifestyle of the country with no regard for the people who are already there, and in the end, create the same mess they ran away from. Fools.
The NC triangle (Raleigh-Durham-Chapel Hill) is doing this idiocy now. High speed rail is the phrase of the day! There simply is not enough population density to keep it operational, and anyone with common sense can see this. But the planner and funders will get paid, so who cares?
Am I actually being a NIMBY if I liked the old zoning laws?
Of course my neighbor can do what he wants with his property, within the law.
I don't want close neighbors- that's why I pay taxes on fortysomething acres, and offered to buy the neighbor's place when he sold out. I don't like it getting bulldozed- but I'm not filing petitions or lawsuits to try to stop it.
My beef is when politically connected developers are able to get sensible (as much as any zoning makes sense) zoning laws changed to their personal benefit rather than to the benefit of the community. In my experience a "zoning plan" only lasts until the campaign contributions (bribes) start rolling in. I bought based on the rural zoning, and the developers got it changed to suit their interests.
NIMBYs were the folks who opposed construction of a power plant in "my backyard" in an existing, already polluted industrial zone. I supported it.
I think "as govt. dependency grows" might be more accurate. It just so happens that the dependent people live in close to the city.
True. There is plenty of blame to spread, however.
Leeches couldn't exist without leftist enablers transferring our wealth and resources to them, and to tolerate their crime, non-ambition, lacking vision, destructive drug habits, moral inferiority, and other animal traits.
See, here is what is disgusting about the above picture picture: all of the houses are so jammed together that there is no room for any thing but cluttered boxes kicked across a landscape. In no way whatsoever will that parcel of land ever look attractive.
What these places could really learn is from the examples of the old Atlanta suburbs (and what Atlanta should really learn about its past). Where you have a whole city canopied in pines. Suburban, yes, but on larger lots with lots of landscaping. It really makes all of the difference in the world. Very quiet, beautiful residential streets as opposed to pulling into a cubicle maze.
Or then you have places like some of the newer suburbs in southern Calfornia that require 50% of the land to be green space. You have many a home with a few in that case, you create places to go mountan biking, hiking, jogging, etc... Lots of rooms for parks or natural environments. It's really a nice mix of urbanization/preservation.
Not perfect, but certainly an improvement over the Boxland you see in so many suburbs.
""Somehow, all this development just means more taxes (to pay for the infrastructure and services) yet all must be sacrificed in the almighty name of Growth.""
Poor you, your home's value is probably about to skyrocket.
I don't think you understand. It's not the money, it's the solitude. People move to the country to get away from the criminal masses and be able to breathe clean air and be mostly free of liberal influence. Now he faces a whole new nest of liberal idiots (and all liberals are idiots) just across the property line because the land was rezoned (probably due to bribery as there's really no other reason for it.
And why are they facing a demographic collapse? Perhaps because they glorify sexual perversion that can not produce children and no sane people want to be surrounded by that much sodomy?
The middle class will never move back into San Fran until the homosexuals die out entirely. Too costly and far too perverse an environemnet to raise children in. Why risk having the kids molested by living in the city when you can commute if you insist on even working there?
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