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This is exactly what we are planning to do, and we are over 50. It just makes so much sense -- you don't have to take care of a lawn if you live in the city, but you're still young enough to enjoy everything the city has to offer.
I have a hard time seeing how this is big news. While some empty nesters stay in their suburban homes after the kids are gone, others have long downsized, whether to move to retirement communities or to more urban environments. It has been very common in the NYC area for a long time. Maybe there is a larger pool of cities and city neighborhoods now considered safe to choose from than in the past, although I think part of this story here is simply the Baby Boomer tendency to think whatever it does is culturally significant and merits attention.
The strength of the local housing market also makes it easier for many to pull off. The number of new residents in both Montgomery and Fairfax Counties,for example, has been greater than the population increase in DC over the past two years, so empty-nesters in the suburbs are often well situated, with the demand for their existing homes, to cash out at a gain and live in the city if they choose. It's something we might consider in the future, although I think we'd probably favor NYC, with its greater range of amenities and wider range of interesting neighborhoods, over DC.
I have a hard time seeing how this is big news. While some empty nesters stay in their suburban homes after the kids are gone, others have long downsized, whether to move to retirement communities or to more urban environments. It has been very common in the NYC area for a long time. Maybe there is a larger pool of cities and city neighborhoods now considered safe to choose from than in the past, although I think part of this story here is simply the Baby Boomer tendency to think whatever it does is culturally significant and merits attention.
The strength of the local housing market also makes it easier for many to pull off. The number of new residents in both Montgomery and Fairfax Counties,for example, has been greater than the population increase in DC over the past two years, so empty-nesters in the suburbs are often well situated, with the demand for their existing homes, to cash out at a gain and live in the city if they choose. It's something we might consider in the future, although I think we'd probably favor NYC, with its greater range of amenities and wider range of interesting neighborhoods, over DC.
I appreciate your continued vigilance in denying this cultural shift, but the articles talk about the increase in desire to live in urban areas, not just the practical reality for a given location. As always with this argument, it's not about raw numbers but rather emerging trends. A shift from 13% of all people desiring to live in a walkable community to 19% since 2004 may not seem like much in aggregate but that's a 50% increase in just a few years and includes all the people who prefer rural and exurban lifestyles, not just metropolitan populations. Reminds me of the huge increase in bicycle use by percentage, even though they remain a small percentage of overall trips.
Both articles get wrong that there's not a county line where one can say an individual is living urban or suburban lifestyle. DC proper has no shortage of auto-dependent classic suburban development while Montgomery and Fairfax have centers like Silver Spring, Bethesda, Rockville, and increasingly Gaithersburg that attract many people seeking an urban lifestyle. Fairfax has places like Reston and Tysons Corner that has been leading the charge for expanded mass transit to redevelop suburban-style office parks into walkable urban centers just so they can keep up with the market.
I appreciate your continued vigilance in denying this cultural shift, but the articles talk about the increase in desire to live in urban areas, not just the practical reality for a given location. As always with this argument, it's not about raw numbers but rather emerging trends. A shift from 13% of all people desiring to live in a walkable community to 19% since 2004 may not seem like much in aggregate but that's a 50% increase in just a few years and includes all the people who prefer rural and exurban lifestyles, not just metropolitan populations. Reminds me of the huge increase in bicycle use by percentage, even though they remain a small percentage of overall trips.
Both articles get wrong that there's not a county line where one can say an individual is living urban or suburban lifestyle. DC proper has no shortage of auto-dependent classic suburban development while Montgomery and Fairfax have centers like Silver Spring, Bethesda, Rockville, and increasingly Gaithersburg that attract many people seeking an urban lifestyle. Fairfax has places like Reston and Tysons Corner that has been leading the charge for expanded mass transit to redevelop suburban-style office parks into walkable urban centers just so they can keep up with the market.
It's amusing that you love to talk about a "cultural shift," but seem to be stuck in a mental rut, where you feel the need to post minor variations on the same comment hundreds of times, and stalking my posts to look for opportunities to repeat yourself.
Sorry, though, that the Post and the WSJ "get [it] wrong." Maybe they'll recognize your brilliance and look to you to write their articles or urban and regional development in the future. I expect Jeff Bezos and Rupert Murdoch are waiting for your call now.
the investors are selling this dream to the whole country,
so they can consolidate the masses into urban areas and
make you more dependant so they can continue to suck
you dry until you die.
It's amusing that you love to talk about a "cultural shift," but seem to be stuck in a mental rut, where you feel the need to post minor variations on the same comment hundreds of times, and stalking my posts to look for opportunities to repeat yourself.
Sorry, though, that the Post and the WSJ "get [it] wrong." Maybe they'll recognize your brilliance and look to you to write their articles or urban and regional development in the future. I expect Jeff Bezos and Rupert Murdoch are waiting for your call now.
Oh my eager little booster, you're the one who stalked my post; please look back at this thread, and pretty much every other time you've harassed me on here, and don't forget that. It's you who lusts after any hint of excessive crime or failure of the educational system in DC proper to reinforce the value of your lifestyle choice after years of urban planning studies that gave you this chip on your shoulder.
Both these articles confirm the cultural shift that you have denied, so don't get the impression I think they're entirely wrong. I was simply correcting your mistaken claim that growth in suburban counties is mutually exclusive to this growing retiree desire for urban living. Just anecdotally, I know many who deeply desire the walkable, urban lifestyle and live in Montgomery, Arlington, Alexandria, Fairfax, and Prince Georges.
Sometimes jobs, family, newer / better housing stock, or a desire for safety and better schools makes them choose that urban lifestyle in an area other than the central city. We live in regional economies now, not urban versus suburban, and as poverty continues to increase in the auto-dependent suburbs and the central core with the most transit becomes increasingly unaffordable it's going to be ever more important to utilize the resources of the region and create a variety of living options and social services throughout the region that serve both the wealthy and poor.
I doubt we'll have people such as you trumpeting one arbitrary political boundary versus another in the not too distant future.
the investors are selling this dream to the whole country,
so they can consolidate the masses into urban areas and
make you more dependant so they can continue to suck
you dry until you die.
So what the heck are YOU smoking?
Gee Whiz.. its a free country. Live where you want to live. But dont complain to me about high gas prices or auto insurance.
Gee Whiz.. its a free country. Live where you want to live. But dont complain to me about high gas prices or auto insurance.
that must be you, because nothing's free out here. who are you trying to fool?
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