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St. Louis has a lot of ugly suburban development, I'll admit that. There's some tacky development in the city also. I love the Historic Downtown, though. And a lot of the neighborhoods have unique architectural styles (though all mostly brick).
The concept of the fully detached single family ranch home was developed in Los Angeles, along with the starter bungalow but the concept of suburbia itself was around way before then (it started in Great Britain as weekend villas for wealthy merchants). The other large cities of the sun belt have indeed started copying LA's model and plastering the landscape with endless concrete seas of cookie-sutter McMansion subdivisions and look alike strip malls with their PetSmarts and Bed Bath & Beyonds (the architecture of the strip mall is the same regardless of whether you're in Portland, OR or Jackson, MS). I believe that this is a subconscious rendering of a general blandness in contemporary society-no one is doing anything differently, everything is the same. Where is the originality, the character? Did it all die the moment the Super Wal-Mart/Super Target moved in? I used to be excited about traveling to different places, but when every place off the interstate has a Wal-Mart with a parking lot full of Camrys, I just focus on the road ahead.
Phoenix. Houston. SoCal. Raleigh/Durham. Charlotte. Atlanta. Basically ANY Sunbelt city where architectural variety and taste has gone by the wayside in order to cater quickly to the teeming masses.
Phoenix. Houston. SoCal. Raleigh/Durham. Charlotte. Atlanta. Basically ANY Sunbelt city where architectural variety and taste has gone by the wayside in order to cater quickly to the teeming masses.
Hmm, this trend is not unique to the sunbelt. basically all expanding metros sacrifice architectural variety and taste for an easier and cheaper way of living.
I love to travel cross country by car but recently I have been saddened how many cities and towns have been spoiled by over development that is not architecturally or environmentally pleasing. There are some really ugly developments out there. I remember when the area was a beautiful meadow or forest, but it was built with no concern about appearances.
There can be development that is both economically healthy but still environmentally sound and attractive but some communities do not have much of this.
What city or metro area has the most development that does not have any redeeming qualities architecturally or visually?
Atlanta has some suburban very ugly "strips" of over-development, without any regard or thought to the future, the past, just making money *now*, in the present. It's sad and pathetic.
The same can be said for Houston, Dallas, northern New Jersey, portions of Long Island, NY, Orlando/Tampa/Jacksonville, FL, Phoenix, Los Angeles, and Las Vegas, of course.
phoenix metro - i agree with this. It's monochrome: the buildings (with the exception of the small downtown area), houses, mountains, land. Everything looks the same. You get a large concentrated dose of this driving on I-17 in/out of the city.
Think what you want, but Phoenix is probably one of the cleanest looking cities in the country (you can include the freeways w/ that as well).
Think what you want, but Phoenix is probably one of the cleanest looking cities in the country (you can include the freeways w/ that as well).
i guess your definition of clean is monochrome?
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