Is America's suburban dream collapsing into a nightmare?

[jfre81]

I'm looking at homeschool myself when that time comes. Then it won't matter where I live. I could live with a kid in a highrise downtown if I felt so inclined. I don't see much sense in splitting hairs over what school's better than the other when they're going to be putting too much emphasis on standardized testing anyway.

[EasilyAmused]

Originally Posted by jfre81

I don't see much sense in splitting hairs over what school's better than the other when they're going to be putting too much emphasis on standardized testing anyway.

Isn't this the truth. Good education has been ruined by TAKS. The fact that schools are ranked by attendance,numbers of free lunch and making a 70% on a stadardized test is laughable. You get the Golden Star of Exemplary if you jump through required the hoops.

[Kenpar]

Originally Posted by jfre81

The Long Emergency - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Of course this is assuming everything they say about peak oil and climate change is true, right?

Okay, I know no one is going to believe me, but I have been telling people some of the the things he said in that for years. And I have never even heard The Long Emergency. It just seemed like common sense to me. I thought I was the only person that thought those things. I think I have to read this book now.

[Zhang Fei]

The amusing thing about the posted article is this - to someone living in New York City, Houstonians (i.e. people living in the city of Houston) are living in a suburb.

[Kenpar]

^True.

But, if the Long Emergency ever happens I would think we would be able to break up into more local communities here.

"Keep Houston Long Emergency Prepared"

Kidding

[feufoma]

I'm not advocating a blind adherence to everything in "The Long Emergency." However, it really is a fascinating read that goes into some detail on the interplay betwen how people (Americans in particular) have been shepherded into being one thing, consumers, and how that has essentially brain washed our society into engaging in activities that are stripping us of hope for as successful a future for our children as we have had (I'm 40).

A thinking person cannot deny that we have some very serious issues confronting us in the 21st Century that our parents and grandparents for that matter just didn't have. One conclusion of the book that I do fully agree with is that there is not an easy fix and we're deluding ourselves into thinking that there is. It's time to stop the mindless consumerism and try to fix our local communities. Suburbia is directly inapposite to this ideal.

[jfre81]

Oh, I can agree with that. The "consumer culture" is doomed, global warming and peak oil or not. It's simply not sustainable. Our only hope is we run China broke before the credit line runs out.

[Kenpar]

I personally don't think American Consumerism is talked about enough. It seems that most people avoid the conversation at some point. I think that it is doomed also. I have been think that since I was 22! I can't see how you can advance as a nation when all you do is buy things, haha. I was pretty freaking shocked when I found out America doesn't make much of anything anymore.

Man people are spoiled.

Also, I like your status JFRE81. It's made me LOL. The IPAD is at the top of my list when it comes to talking about consumerism.

[KerrTown]

Originally Posted by AK123

FYI to those who didn't read the article -- the example given in the article was a little suburb of Sacramento, CA. 70+ mile commute to the big business metro (Bay Area/SF).

Another article I saw talked about the devastation in a "suburb" of Los Angeles, but this "suburb" was something like 90 miles east in the middle of nowhere... much of the problem.

Let me guess Vacaville/Fairfield, CA for the little suburb of Sacramento and Victorville/Apple Valley, CA for the "suburb" 90 miles east of Los Angeles.

If you knew a little about the topography out west and how it affects urbanization/suburbanization, those distances would make sense. Both cities are defined by their mountains. The Bay Area is hemmed in by mountains around SF, Oakland, and San Jose. The next flat areas (Walnut Creek/Plesanton) are a mountain pass away, behind the mountain, which adds up to the mileage.

Lets say you lived in Palmdale, a 70 mile drive to Los Angeles but still in L.A. County. The first 30 miles was going down the 14 along the Santa Clara River gorge (a hilly pass with tall mountains on either side) to the 5 in Santa Clarita and after passing through the Newhall Pass, you have entered the City of Los Angeles in the San Fernando Valley.

These mountains have given rise to the phenomenon of "dense sprawl". This tends to take place in the Southwest where the topography is just right and there are no already established major cities to interfere with. Right now, the California cities are only the ones populous enough to carry out this phenomenon. Las Vegas, Phoenix, and Albuquerque haven't grown to the point where suburban sprawl maxed out the main basin/valley of the city and then new suburbs sprout in the next valley after a mountain pass.

The reasons why these new suburbs are popular: the densely sprawled older suburbs closest to the city have become too expensive for middle class families trying to maintain a somewhat decent standard of living caused by gentrification (ex. Corona, Riverside, San Bernardino vs. Orange County and the San Gabriel Valley). Concentrated auto and other urban pollution in the valley bowl also is a concern for adults raising children and then pushes them into the next "cleaner" valley or the desert (which then gets polluted again as it gets built out and then the process begins all over again).

So if there were mountains surrounding Houston and there were 10 million people living in the city and the immediate suburbs (Cypress, Katy, et al.), commuting from Bryan in the next valley wouldn't be a stretch after all since it's in the next flat area outside the Houston Basin.