Home prices in Hayes Barton & Cameron Park

[uncletupelo]

well said.

[rnc2mbfl]

Originally Posted by Charlton Dude

Sounds like the purpose of the Five Points area is similar to the purpose of where I live now. Everything is walkable and/or bikeable. I think that is why mixed use communities are becoming the rage. Sort of like what's old is new again.

Wait 80 years and find out.

That said, I think that there's some significant differences in play.
For one, the site planning is more about the automobile today than it was when 5 points and Cameron Village were developed. Roads are wider, Parking lots are larger and traffic patterns favor the automobile over the pedestrian. Deep parking lots are almost always out front which puts the pedestrian further from goods and services. Buildings and signs are larger as they are intended to capture the attention of people zipping by in their automobiles. Sure one can walk wherever one chooses. But, our landscape sends us signals about what's preferred. This is why DT Cary is going to be a more comfortable place to walk than, say, Crossroads. Simply put, scale and site planning matter.
An example of a develpment that has attempted to swing the pendulum back toward the pedestrian is North Hills. While parking is still a significant factor in its success, they buried much of it below the development. Narrow streets within the development and more human scale facades address the walking public. At its center, it's obvious that pedestrians dominate the car. On it's periphery, it's obvious that cars dominate the pedestrian.
As we redevelop our older suburban areas in the Triangle, we have a unique oppty to tweak the more human scaled parts of the area to move us away from total automobile dependency. North Hills is but one example of that opportunty. These opportunities exist in places like Cary too!

[tlh1005]

Originally Posted by PDXmom

This is not unique to Raleigh. It's is VERY common in urban areas that neighborhoods of single family homes that were built in 1920s was considered "suburban developments" in the 20s but are now in the urban core. But today's planned suburban developments are a VERY different beasts from the 1920s planned suburban developments, because we as a culture think our needs are bigger or different today than they were in the 20s. In the 20s not everyone owned cars. And the few that did only owned one car and women typically did not drive. So the "planned suburban developments" of the 20s typically centered on the ability to walk places as it's main goal. While some new suburban neighborhoods do factor in walkability, it's not a main goal as we are a car culture here.

PDX, there are so many jokes to be made of this statement, I just can't bring myself to do it!