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Location: East of Seattle since 1992, 615' Elevation, Zone 8b - originally from SF Bay Area
44,585 posts, read 81,186,228 times
Reputation: 57820
Quote:
Originally Posted by Gaylord_Focker
Live in downtown Bellevue. I can walk to everything. I still have a car to take into Seattle though. I don't like to wait on the bus, but I would. I can live here without a car.
Get ready for a lot more congestion in the near future:
I had a business in Bellevue for 16 years, and even back then (1992-2008) it could take 1/2 hour to go from one part of Bellevue to another, a 5 minute drive made much longer by all of the cars and signal lights.
Currently I work in Seattle, and have 4 employees that live in Seattle, and all of them drive. Their neighborhoods are classified as very walkable, but they all prefer driving to taking the bus to the office even with the traffic. I can actually get to work faster from Sammamish than my employee that lives in the Wedgewood part of the city.
I live in Toronto. Two blocks from my house is one of the main streets in the west side of the city. Its got many retail stores, cafes, social clubs, medical clinics, and just about everything that we need, all in a safe and clean neighborhood. With 24 hour street car and bus service, at least 5 city parks and recreation centers and a swimming pool and outdoor hockey rink and 3 soccer fields. Our Grand Daughter walks the 3 miles to her middle school , along that main street.
Our street is made up of single detached 2 story brick homes, most of which were built 100 years ago. Ours was built in 1907, by my Grand Father. Our family has owned it ever since. The street has a designated city bike lane, and its well used by the residents, and bike commuters, every day. To my knowledge there are no rental houses on the street, its all owner occupied.
Toronto calls it's self.. a city of 145 neighborhoods . Ours is called Via Italia, because of the large percentage of people who have Italian ancestry . Of course we also have neighbors who come from Russia, Portugal, Jamaica, France, Germany, Britain, Honduras, South Africa, China and India. And that is just in one block of our street
Yep, we are a real polyglot bunch around here. What do we all have in common ? . We walk around the area, and talk to each other. We live together. We are a community.
It makes no sense to place a high priority on walkability and in the mean time nobody is walking. I see most people in these areas sitting on their phones and laptops in their apartment or in a sitting area like at starbucks etc. If they need something they order from Amazon or wherever and have it delivered. If they need a ride they call an Uber etc.
In many of these new uptown and midtown areas or suburban walkable developments I only see people actually outside walking during rush hour or on the weekend. Even then I only see maybe 2 people walking on every block.
I say that they are "Walkable" but no one is actually "Walking" so what is the point? I compare this to buying a nice Nick-Nack just to sit it on a shelf and stare at it. Or maybe people want to be cool and live in a "Walkable" area even though they don't live a walkable lifestyle.
I see many urban style mixed use developments where the Garage is almost as big as the Residential building. WHAT IS THE POINT? IS it all just hype?
I see people paying $3000/mo. to live in a super cool apartment tower in uptown or wherever. I checked one out and NOBODY was in the rec room, pool, bar, TV room or anywhere else. EVERYONE was in their apartment on their computer?
I am getting in line here to explain to you the hype on walkability, since it unfortunately doesn't appear to be a relevant thing in Houston, a car dependent city. I now live in a train line suburb of Chicago where I paid a premium on the price of my house so I would be able to walk to the train each morning ( a quick 5 minutes) to go to work (a ten minute walk from the train station). I also am able to walk to the downtown of my small suburban town that has coffee shops, restaurants and other things like holiday gatherings and parades. My kids are also able to walk to their schools, without a bus. I just leave my car in my garage and use it on weekends or in the evening if I have to. I have saved thousands on gas, parking ($60 a month at the train station) and headaches. If I drove to downtown Chicago without the benefit of a train, I would waste an hour of my life to and an hour from work in traffic, and have to pay at least $18 a day (outer parking lot with a 15 minute walk to work) up to $50 a day ( well located parking 2 minutes to work). I am sure that this is true in cities like New York, Washington, Boston and San Francisco, among others.
I never would have understood this "walkability" concept if I had stayed in Southern California where I grew up, with all sidewalks leading to nowhere except through subdivisions of tract homes. I am thinking that from what you have written, where you are in Houston is the same way, car dependent. You just have to leave Houston and visit some of the more established cities to get " the point " and then understand what the hype is all about.
Being in a walkable environment is almost life changing; it adds fitness, convenience and an appreciation of the outside to the day, as well as saving money on parking, car costs and maybe doctor's bills if exercise is not a part of your routine.
People who walk want cars; people who have cars want to walk.
One size does not fit all. What matters is a good quality of life wherever you live.
City-data people romanticize public transportation and density. Not everyone wants to live on top of their neighbors or commute like a sardine in a dirty subway. Let them be happy!
People who walk want cars; people who have cars want to walk.
One size does not fit all. What matters is a good quality of life wherever you live.
City-data people romanticize public transportation and density. Not everyone wants to live on top of their neighbors or commute like a sardine in a dirty subway. Let them be happy!
A to the MEN! I got over that living on college campus!
I had a business in Bellevue for 16 years, and even back then (1992-2008) it could take 1/2 hour to go from one part of Bellevue to another, a 5 minute drive made much longer by all of the cars and signal lights.
Currently I work in Seattle, and have 4 employees that live in Seattle, and all of them drive. Their neighborhoods are classified as very walkable, but they all prefer driving to taking the bus to the office even with the traffic. I can actually get to work faster from Sammamish than my employee that lives in the Wedgewood part of the city.
So far so good. Everything i need is in a half mile radius.
To answer the OPs question, I don't understand why it's not working in Houston, in my experience Texans love their cars. It's working elsewhere though.
This is EXACTLY why people from places like Chicago, DC, Boston, NYC, San Francisco give Houston a ton of flack. It sprawls, the neighborhoods often feel lifeless, and you can go blocks without seeing a pedestrian walking or biking on the sidewalk. The luxury buildings I've been to in Houston mirror what you said.. A few people at the pool, nobody in the common areas, very little saturation in the way of bars/restaurants/public transportation that would pull people outside. I'm very sincere when I say there are more people on the streets of Chicago, in January, at 1:00 AM than there are in Houston's hottest neighborhoods at any point in time. It's why folks that stay up North like urban, dense, and "walkable".
Texas cities, much like the majority of southern cities, are car-oriented. Blame it on the built-form, or the lack of transportation, or the culture. I'd assume it's all three. "Walkability" is no more than a sales term in Houston from what I've seen. Maybe it's a marketing campaign for the northern transplants?
Thank you. There's such a difference between desnity and walkability. Throwing up a bunch of new urbanist villages spread throughout a metro region is not the same as an organic, gridded urban core. Cities like Houston and other Sun Belt hotspots are trying to urbanize by building some new urbanist villages, or have a couple stretches of high rises in a neighborhood. This is not authentic urban city living. Many cities/neighborhoods are just building tall, but there is nothing to walk to.
If you really think people walking all over is just a hype or to get people to pay more for urban living, I beg you to take a walk around the most urban parts of Boston, NYC, Philly, DC, Chicago at varying times of day/night. You will ALWAYS see pedestrians on the streets of those cities' urban neighborhoods. Maybe not out in Staten Island, Forest Hills, Mt. Airy, Torresdale, Norwood Park, Chevy Chase, etc. But in Dupont Circle, Rittenhouse Sq, most of Manhattan, Near North Side, and whatever an equivalent in Boston is (lol sorry idk), you will definitely see people walking at all times of day/night.
People who walk want cars; people who have cars want to walk.
One size does not fit all. What matters is a good quality of life wherever you live.
City-data people romanticize public transportation and density. Not everyone wants to live on top of their neighbors or commute like a sardine in a dirty subway. Let them be happy!
I live in a walkable area with single family homes and clean busses. Not uncommon at all.
Some problems with OP’s Houston:
1. never was built to be walkable
2. culturally, the idea of walking somewhere is lost on them perhaps because:
3. the humid weather is awful for walking if you plan on being clean and dry when you arrive to your destination.
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