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I dislike most noise control laws; I feel they are applied a bit overzealously. I remember we were afraid to have people out on the balcony late in the evening because one very picky neighbor would make a noise complaint.
I'm not sure if I want to live above a store, though I have before. Living above a restaurant would be one of the less appealing shops to live above, as it's busy when I'm likely to be home. A road with shops on it usually has traffic, a side street would be nicer. I'd prefer to live off of the mixed use street rather than on it. My old housemate had no objection to living above a store on a main street; and the rents for some of these places are relatively high for the area so some people don't mind.
Yeah living in the 'burbs is practically all I know . It's the way of life for like at least 70% of Australians. Even most people my age, many of them live with their parents and save up for their own house in the suburbs. See we don't have a culture of going to college, so it's becoming more common for kids to just live at home through university and then actually buy a place and move out and settle down.
Are you of driving age? The situation is doubly worse for young people who can't drive. You have to nag your mom to chauffer you around everywhere. Which sucks for you and your mom. You can't visit your friends in school because they live too far away. So kids spend much of their time rotting in front of the TV, playing video games, getting obese. Probably explains why millions of kids in America are on Ritalin and other psychoactive drugs.
Location: The western periphery of Terra Australis
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Quote:
Originally Posted by cisco kid
Are you of driving age? The situation is doubly worse for young people who can't drive. You have to nag your mom to chauffer you around everywhere. Which sucks for you and your mom. You can't visit your friends in school because they live too far away. So kids spend much of their time rotting in front of the TV, playing video games, getting obese. Probably explains why millions of kids in America are on Ritalin and other psychoactive drugs.
Yes, thankfully, but it's still annoying how you have to drive everywhere. I'd prefer to live in a place that had all the amenities and I didn't have to drive.
I don't like living in single-use suburbs. I hate being absolutely dependent on my car for everything. I like watching other people walking outside. I like getting exercise. I like having access to good public transit.
When in a modern suburban neighborhood, you might as well be living alone in the woods. You rarely see people walking outside. Everyone likes to keep to themselves. The suburbs are too ugly anyway. Better to keep yourself locked up indoors, vegetating in front of the TV. There's a great sense of mind-numbing boredom, isolation and alienation. You might as well be living on Mars. Ever wonder why half the commercials on TV are for anti-depression medication?
ITA. I absolutely hate the concept of American suburbs, and can't understand why we can't have more mixed-use neighbourhoods here like they do in
Europe. Before having kids we lived in an apartment in a residential area of downtown, and absolutely ADORED it. Our street and the few around it was mostly residential, mainly apartments, but one block away you had all of your stores, restaurants, services etc. And even in the residential blocks you'd have the occasional little cafe or grocery tucked away somewhere. I could pick up fresh ingredients or great take out every day, get around by walking or transit, and didn't have to drive anywhere. It was totally safe and quiet too - in fact quieter than being around larger suburb streets cause people didn't drive every.where all.the.time., and had more greenery, wider sidewalks, etc., and there were people out walking around at all times of day, it was just amazing. Unfortunately the prohibitive cost of living there with kids, aka need for larger place and lack of schools drove us out to the 'burbs, and I literally cried and was depressed for the first few weeks every time I looked out on the empty streets without a single person and the huge parking lots everywhere. Ugh . Still miss living in the city every day.
Does that mean actual residential buildings like apartments sharing buildings with shops or other functions etc. (from what some people are talking here, it seems about buildings sharing uses like a living space above an office or a cafe, and others are just talking mixed use of these buildings of various functions close by in the same neighbourhood so that's confusing me) or just residential buildings mixed in roughly the same area as shops or offices or other uses?
Are you of driving age? The situation is doubly worse for young people who can't drive. You have to nag your mom to chauffer you around everywhere. Which sucks for you and your mom. You can't visit your friends in school because they live too far away. So kids spend much of their time rotting in front of the TV, playing video games, getting obese. Probably explains why millions of kids in America are on Ritalin and other psychoactive drugs.
Aw, that must really suck.
Just my two cents, but I never understood why people said suburbs in the style you mention (not suburbs that are mixed use or walkable etc.) are better for kids' development. If kids can't drive, they can't go places without being dependent on parents. They have less independence to see things for themselves or even get to "go around the block" or two in the city/area they living in. Kids, of reasonable age, that can walk/bike to shops, malls etc. and all around the city can get a feel for the city they call home and appreciate all the streets and neighbourhoods even before they learn to drive. By the time they do learn to drive, they've already gotten a feel to the lay of their town (I wonder if urban kids have more attachment/emotional feeling towards the city they grew up than suburban ones ).
When I was a kid, I went over to friends' places all the time. Good memories of waiting for summer to arrive, and me and my 8-year-old buddy biking over all around the block, stopping to get a Jamaican patty at a convenience store at the bottom of an apartment complex near his neighbourhood (I checked recently -- it's no longer there and that was one of the few I've seen growing up!). I walked to school and took the bus alone since I was really young (it seems like 8-year-olds taking the bus home for even like 20 minutes or something freaks out some parents now, but regularly got around the city by myself all the time; I can even vividly remember how the childrens' bus/subway tickets looked like with little printed designs/images on them back in the 90s in Toronto).
I haven't really lived in enough places to compare (some time in Alberta but Calgary etc., which is obviously smaller/less dense) but I have a feeling that I wouldn't trade being an urban (not "really urban" but urban by the standards many posting in the forum would say) kid for being a suburban kid.
The irony is though I was one of the least extraverted or liked-going-out-with-people person I knew as a kid (preferred stuff like reading, going to the library, taking a walk by the river by myself) yet I would feel so lonely if I was the kind of kid who spent time in front of TV, video games all day and confined by suburbia (having to bother to ask family to take you places, which sucks if you didn't get along with your family ).
Location: The western periphery of Terra Australis
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I grew up in the suburbs and had a pretty 'idyllic' childhood. We'd play video games but also spend tons of time outdoors, kicking the footy, riding our bikes...at least we could ride to the local shops/deli and stuff. Going into the city was such an adventure in those days...
Does that mean actual residential buildings like apartments sharing buildings with shops or other functions etc. (from what some people are talking here, it seems about buildings sharing uses like a living space above an office or a cafe, and others are just talking mixed use of these buildings of various functions close by in the same neighbourhood so that's confusing me) or just residential buildings mixed in roughly the same area as shops or offices or other uses?
Either, and both. Mixed-use neighborhoods can include both mixed-use buildings (buildings with residential units above ground-floor retail or commercial), live-work spaces (single-family homes also zoned for commercial activity) and buildings that are either residential or commercial in close proximity to each other. It can also mean a mixture of densities: not just single-family homes or just apartments, but a mixture of both in the same neighborhood, in close proximity to each other.
I grew up in the suburbs and had a pretty 'idyllic' childhood. We'd play video games but also spend tons of time outdoors, kicking the footy, riding our bikes...at least we could ride to the local shops/deli and stuff. Going into the city was such an adventure in those days...
Well, as you say earlier most kids like what they grew up with. I think most kids would say they had an idyllic childhood unless it's terribly bad (like they had no friends for a long time and was bullied a lot or had family problems). We're pretty good at looking in hindsight. I'm sure I had bad experiences too like "my enemies" (bit silly for a third grader) who were bullies roughing it up with me after school and one time even following (stalking) me home and throwing rocks at the second floor window of the apartment unit I lived in and running away , but I and most people remember the good parts of the childhood more than the bad parts. It's human psychology but that's off-topic in urban planning.
Otherwise, kids usually find good use of their time through whatever means they can have, whether it means taking advantage of their neighbourhood or yard etc. to play games, play sports, ride a bike etc. Suburban kids and urban kids all find ways to pass the time (except that perhaps I noticed some of the "helicopter parents" signing up their kids for extracurricular stuff like violin lessons at 4 and then blah blah at 6 , and trying to micromanage their kids' lives... oops, again off-topic! )
Last edited by Stumbler.; 03-16-2012 at 11:05 PM..
Actually they are kind of connected: if kids' mobility is governed entirely by parents' ability to transport them, you're going to end up with a much more governed and structured child's lifestyle than you would otherwise--if the kids could get around on their own, on foot or bikes. Many of us grew up in suburbs where we could walk to nearby stores, or bike there, but some suburbs are so remote (especially walled/gated suburbs) and retail areas so concentrated in "power centers" that the self-transporting kid is becoming more of a rarity--there aren't as many corner stores as there used to be! And when grown-ups get into the mix, they tend to want to schedule things, make "play dates," introduce more structured activity so it fits into their own social calendar--vs. kids' more natural tendency towards unstructured play and random exploration. City kids grow up observing adult behavior and can model it, instead of being sheltered in artificial environments.
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. It's the way of life for like at least 70% of Australians. Even most people my age, many of them live with their parents and save up for their own house in the suburbs. See we don't have a culture of going to college, so it's becoming more common for kids to just live at home through university and then actually buy a place and move out and settle down.
. Still miss living in the city every day.
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