Retrofitting Suburbia

I've only seen the first few minutes of Ellen Dunham-Jones' Ted Talk Retrofitting Suburbia, so I can't comment on it too much. My first reaction to the concept of trying to urbanize suburban settings is that the result would be pretty compromised. The idea is to make existing suburbs into more complete communities instead of separate working and living zones. I fear though, is that it is really hard to reclaim land set aside for cars. I would guess that it's nearly impossible to reduce the number of car lanes on most roads to put in sidewalks and a bike path.

One of the saving graces, it seems, might be that suburban office parks and retail areas are notoriously inefficient users of space. The roads may be set in stone, so to speak, but when one of these facilities gets repurposed, there is lots of space for adding walking paths, green spaces, and run-off management features.

Right now, I need to get back to work, but I plan to watch the full talk next chance I get.

CBS News: The Decline Of Suburbia?

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2008/08/07/eveningnews/main4329746.shtml?source=RSSattr=HOME_4329746

This is not news to a lot of people, but the combined effects of
expensive gas, a weak economy, and increased environmental awareness
have started to put the squeeze on suburbs.

This doesn't mean that everyone is going to move into big cities, but
it does mean that future developments will look more like towns than
bizarre orchards of five bedroom ranches.

Much of the country developed backwards. Cities arose in isolation and
then people started flowing out to the burbs recently. Much of the
east coast, though, developed more slowly with many towns, a few of
which later swelled into major metropoli. The other towns remained and
were affected by suburbanization, but retained some character and
density.

With luck, the current forces will reshape population distributions
into something more sustainable.

Decentralized Density

Advocates of sustainability often sound like they are pushing for either of two extremes. You can get a plot of land way off in the hills and do everything yourself, or you can move into a dense urban center so you can walk to everything. Each has its own issues based primarily due to reality.

There's just not enough arable land on the planet for 7 billion people to carve out individual plots of land. Also, you're not going to get everyone in the developed world to give up modern life.

As for moving to the cities, there are many hurdles in getting people to move to dense centers, but I think most of these could be overcome. Many are afraid of higher crime. Many people (like me) who care about sustainability also care about the environment. It's hard for us to leave it all behind. This is the real issue with moving everyone to the city. How do you get subsequence generations, raised in the urban jungles, too care about these issues? Ironically, it doesn't seem sustainable socially.

My solution is to focus on many, small dense centers. Economics will continue to support the large urban hubs, but we need to shift satellite developments from sprawling subdivisions to dense, centralized communities surrounded by a combination of conservation and farm land. These centers could be linked by mass transit to the big hubs. They'd provide all the green benefits of living in a city while still allowing residents easy access to open areas.

I'm sure this is not an original idea, but it never occurred to me in California. Having been back in Massachusetts for a while, where the country side is dotted with town centers that developed before the automobile, it's clear to me now. I'm not sure how we get there, but I think it's possible. It should almost be easy in this area.

MBTA

The Boston commuter rail stops in Franklin. It's about 15-20 minutes from here and takes a little over an hour to get to South Station. I like taking the train, because I can sit an work for most of my commute. Taking the train nearly doubles the time it takes to get to work, though, so it doesn't buy me any extra productivity beyond the fact that I often just work well on the train some days. I think there are fewer distractions.

The big north east cities seem to all have a commuter rail system that is separate from the subway lines. I can only speak of Boston, NY, and Philly from experience. Meanwhile, Washington, D.C. and the San Francisco Bay Area do not. The rail systems there double as commuter rail and subway, and do neither particularly well. The difference, I'm told, is that there used to be factories in the towns surrounding Boston which built railways to carry goods into the city and the port. Years later, the MBTA uses some of these lines to ferry workers from the same little towns into Boston.

We're pretty far out here in Hopedale, by Boston commuter standards, but not absurdly so. My drive time is under an hour if I avoid peak times. It's not something I'd want to do more that half the time, but it's nothing compared to hat people in the Bay Area endure.

What annoys me is that the MBTA doesn't come here. Hopedale and Milford (about 100yds from here) both had factories back in the day and the rail right of ways and most of the track still exists. It would be an easy thing (relative to laying new track somewhere) to extend the Franklin line into downtown Milford or Hopedale.

They did a feasibility survey a few years back and concluded that there are not enough riders. Come on! Have a little foresight, please. Milford is one of the bigger towns around and already has a pretty dense downtown just blocks from the old depot. Hopedale is tiny, but the regional hospital is about a 1/2 mile from the old depot and the Draper Factory is standing vacant looking for a reason to be re-purposed.

An MBTA stop may be too much for Hopedale, but it would be great for Milford. The way things are right now, it's hard to live in this area without a car for every adult. There aren't tons of jobs downtown. Most companies are in office parks off of 495. The same is true of most retail. In contrast, the residences downtown are pretty dense. So residents there get all the claustrophobia of a downtown with few of the conveniences.

If Milford gets a rail line, it can take advantage of its density. If not, it will likely continue to grow just in the suburban areas. There are the areas that are being hardest hit by the housing crunch. Meanwhile stuff near downtowns has not crashed the same way. Even in Hopedale, the downtown duplexes are still holding most of their value.