Anybody here hate the mills as much as me? (Pittsburgh: transporting, appliances)

[Stagger Lee]

Originally Posted by kpoeppel

What's up with West Coast types thinking they are so "foreward minded" and superior to the rest of the nation? Why do they get to define what kind of growth is "smart" and what kind of growth is "not smart"? If architecture is important to consumers when they pick up a loaf of bread, they will choose to pay the extra money to go to the fancier store. For most people, they just want the bread, not the "experience."

One other thing, It isn't western people that define smart growth. It is environmentalist, the seirra club, and LEED building professionals that do. Smart growth is growth that helps benefit the environment, the community, and personal habits. For instance, being able to walk for a loaf of bread, uses no gas, uses no extra land for parking, allows you to know your neighbors more, get excersize, etc. I loved the experience of this once I moved out of the burbs and lived in city neighborhoods after college. It is something a suburbinte honestly never gets to experience.

[kpoeppel]

Originally Posted by Stagger Lee

One other thing, It isn't western people that define smart growth. It is environmentalist, the seirra club, and LEED building professionals that do. Smart growth is growth that helps benefit the environment, the community, and personal habits. For instance, being able to walk for a loaf of bread, uses no gas, uses no extra land for parking, allows you to know your neighbors more, get excersize, etc. I loved the experience of this once I moved out of the burbs and lived in city neighborhoods after college. It is something a suburbinte honestly never gets to experience.

But apparently people don't think it benefits themselves enough to pay the extra money, walk through the rain/snow/wind/cold/heat, spend the extra time, etc. If people thought it benefited them, they would just do it, right? That's what I mean by "smug:" Environmentalists, ivory-tower academics, clubs, etc. thinking that they know what is better for the average person than the average person. It is especially "smug" to use terms like "smart growth" to imply that people who don't believe in it must therefore support "dumb growth." The very term "smart growth" reeks of arrogance.

I don't mean to pick on you personally, Stagger Lee. It's just the mindset, so prevelent in some circles, that gets to me.

[claremarie]

However, if you lived in a small old town and walk down the street to get your bread, and see your neighbors along the way, and live as they do in Europe or in some traditional American towns; you would see the difference between that and parking in a parking lot everyday with big box retail.



People DO see the difference. And if they have a choice between driving to the giant 24 hour supermarket with plenty of well-designed parking spaces, a huge selection of grocery/drugstore/prepared food/deli items, low prices, and someone to load their groceries into the car OR trudging in all kinds of weather several times a week to an old-fashioned independent grocery store with an extremely limited selection, higher prices, and limited hours, what do you suppose they'll choose?

[kpoeppel]

If the river towns are dying, it is because the mode of transportation today is completely different than when those towns were first founded. When rivers were the only "highways", the development grew along the rivers. Now the development grows along highways. It's only natural.

Rivers, however, do have an allure that highways don't...recreational use. Boating, fishing, sightseeing, etc. Perhaps the old river towns will see some new development related to these activities. I think I read somewhere that Allegheny County has one of the highest per-capita boat ownership rates in the nation. During the fourth-of-July fireworks, the rivers are PACKED with pleasure boats, etc.

Another possibility would be commuting by boat! Pittsburgh is one of the few cities where that might be possible, since the rivers snake through all sorts of suburban areas. I could definitely see river towns becoming "Chic" among "yuppie" types if Pittsburgh could attract enough of them. I lived briefly near Petaluma, CA just north of San Franciso. There are lots of new condos going up along their river front, which was once an industrial area...just like the Pittsburgh river towns.

Just think...ferry service along the rivers connecting river towns with condos close to the water. Could it work? I know commuting by ferry in Seattle is considered trendy...perhaps in Pittsburgh some day?

Guylocke...any thoughts on this idea?

[claremarie]

For instance, being able to walk for a loaf of bread, uses no gas, uses no extra land for parking, allows you to know your neighbors more, get excersize, etc. I loved the experience of this once I moved out of the burbs and lived in city neighborhoods after college. It is something a suburbinte honestly never gets to experience.

Many suburbanites have already done the life in the city thing. They've had the fun of being 25, walking down the street for a coffee or a bagel or the proverbial quart of milk, and stopping in at the bar where everybody knows your name. But now they're married, with two jobs and three kids. They need to buy diapers, and milk by the gallon, and big boxes of cereal, and sacks of dog food, and all the other boring but essential stuff that families buy. Why is that so hard to understand?

[guylocke]

I think I read somewhere that Allegheny County has one of the highest per-capita boat ownership rates in the nation.

I think we are only second to Miami.

Just think...ferry service along the rivers connecting river towns with condos close to the water. Could it work? I know commuting by ferry in Seattle is considered trendy...perhaps in Pittsburgh some day?

Guylocke...any thoughts on this idea?

I've actually not heard about those trends. I think it's a pretty neat idea. Seattle is extremely environmental friendly and if studies showed that commuting by ferry in large groups saved people from driving, using less resources, and it proved to be less of a pollutant, it would become trendy.

I'm sort of a hypocrite, though, because my dream is to live and work in a large downtown city where I wouldn't need a car and everything was at my fingertips... but then when I spend a week or two in NYC in a row, I start chomping at the bit at being able to come home and actually hop in my car and drive to Target, or Giant Eagle, or Best Buy.

LOL.

[kpoeppel]

I went to Shanghai, China about a year ago, and they DO have "Big Box" type stores in downtown/high density areas. But instead of being one story, they are many stories with escalator ramps that move you and your cart between levels. My brother went to Germany, and he said they have that kind of thing there too.

[Tallysmom]

Originally Posted by kpoeppel

If the river towns are dying, it is because the mode of transportation today is completely different than when those towns were first founded. When rivers were the only "highways", the development grew along the rivers. Now the development grows along highways. It's only natural.

Rivers, however, do have an allure that highways don't...recreational use. Boating, fishing, sightseeing, etc. Perhaps the old river towns will see some new development related to these activities. I think I read somewhere that Allegheny County has one of the highest per-capita boat ownership rates in the nation. During the fourth-of-July fireworks, the rivers are PACKED with pleasure boats, etc.

Another possibility would be commuting by boat! Pittsburgh is one of the few cities where that might be possible, since the rivers snake through all sorts of suburban areas. I could definitely see river towns becoming "Chic" among "yuppie" types if Pittsburgh could attract enough of them. I lived briefly near Petaluma, CA just north of San Franciso. There are lots of new condos going up along their river front, which was once an industrial area...just like the Pittsburgh river towns.

Just think...ferry service along the rivers connecting river towns with condos close to the water. Could it work? I know commuting by ferry in Seattle is considered trendy...perhaps in Pittsburgh some day?

Guylocke...any thoughts on this idea?

I think ferries would be a HUGE hassle on the Pittsburgh rivers because of the locks system they use. Awfully time consuming to channel in, close off, lower the water, open up to channel in to the next lock to do this all over again.... although I don't know where they have them -- I only know that those sort are there on the Ohio. (So frankly, I could 100% off base on this, and shouldn't be talking about it all -- but does that ever stop me? )

But I've said it before -- America isn't Europe. We aren't set up in small villages with small shops and walkable venues. They had hundreds of years to evolve into what they have today. Our country is less than 250 years old, and with our expanse of land and basically our teenagehood as a country has evolved around the car culture, people don't think about getting into their cars and going to a big box development and shopping.

Heck -- a hundred some years ago we shopped because we had to, now we shop for entertainment. And we shop for entertainment at places that are easy to get to and park.

It's like the song says -- "Video killed the radio star"... no matter how people tout the whole walkable stuff and big boxes are killing the small businesses -- times marches on. The people have voted, with their dollars and their SUV's...

[guylocke]

I think ferries would be a HUGE hassle on the Pittsburgh rivers because of the locks system they use.

I think he meant more along the lines of using ferries to cross the river, not necessarily move up and down the river.

[beemajabee]

I'm from Germany and have to say that what I miss the most is this: Walking to the butcher and baker individually for fresh foods. We have large grocery stores where you buy bulk items, too, where you fill your trunk once a week or so and save money. But there is nothing like walking to the baker (whose owners your father married, and whose children he baptized, who catered your own wedding, etc) and get fresh rolls in the morning.

Yes, they also have the department stores with escalators over several stories. But the department store shopping evokes memories of stress, because their hours of operations are so much shorter than here that you barely have time to get your stuff. Add to that that real estate is obviously very expensive, that makes all the aisles less open, stores more packed, and people at 'shopping rush hour' very cranky... I think I'd rather go back to the baker memory...

I think it was clairemarie who said it well when she described the working parent who doesn't have time or nerve to get in and out of the car (unbuckle the child population umpteen times, ugh!) to get things that you can get done in one fell swoop by going to Target et al. The romantized version of small stores daily isn't really feasible in the vast stretched out American layout of the land... I can't stand the mills type of malls, either, I think they lack character, but they sure come in handy when you need it all at once. (here in NO VA I have Potomac Mills Mall 5 minutes from my house...)