chargirlgenius: (Bike Commute)
Heh. No pun intended.

http://www.carfreediet.com/

I don’t think we could ever be a car free family, but it’s interesting to think about going car-lite. If Jeff and/or I worked in Crystal City (not at all out of the question), and we lived in Arlington or someplace central, I could see dropping down to one car. Sure, Arlington is expensive to live in, but owning that second and third car is expensive too.

http://www.bikesatwork.com/carfree/cost-of-car-ownership.html

This link has a calculator that estimates the monthly cost of car ownership*. If I leave in their defaults, but cut the gas and oil way down (since I live close to work), and the repairs and maintenance (since Jeff does most of it), we could still afford almost $100k more worth of house. Which, handy enough, makes living in Arlington *almost* within reach.

Illuminating.

I’d keep the minivan. It’s handy for almost all of our needs – hauling my new wood floor home from Lowes, going to events, carrying the boys and another person, whatever we need. I like that the Jetta gets 50 mpg, but if we were car-lite, the goal would be to drive as little as possible anyway.

*Yep, it’s from a pro-bike site, and therefore suspect. But the numbers correspond well to info that I’ve seen elsewhere.
chargirlgenius: (Default)
Sorry to have two "living" posts in one day, but hey, things come in bunches!

Watching House Hunters International tonight, and it's a British couple looking in Italy. (Hey, [livejournal.com profile] reabhecc, there was an Edinburgh episode on the DVR that we just watched!) My favorite episodes are the European ones, so I was excited to see Italy again. They've done this area before, Liguria, near the coast. Within Liguria, is a nifty little restored 13th century village called Coletta.

Coletta, at first glance, looks amazing. There's a public square, the flats are all appointed out perfectly, completely restored, and the entire town is wired for broadband. The entire village has been restored and converted to these high end flats, all with incredible views.

But... it's odd. Turns out it's like one big 13th century apartment building on a hillside. The public square is fronted by just one restaurant and coffee shop, it appears, but no shops, nothing else. This village has been in two episodes so far, and there hasn't been a single other person visible in any of the shots.

I'm a little surprised this second couple ended up going for it. It's stunning and gorgeous, but sterile, in an odd way that you'd never expect a 13th century town to be.
chargirlgenius: (Default)
On the Kojo Naamdi show right now, they’re discussing a new law in Virginia. The Commonwealth will apparently no longer maintain cul-de-sacs that are built after July 1st.

I think this is brilliant. Callers are upset about this, because their kids play in the streets, and they feel that they’d lose the play space. Well, frankly, if a cul-de-sac is your own private play space and not actually a public thoroughfare, it should be treated like a driveway. Once people are responsible for plowing and maintaining their own playspaces, they might think twice about it being the best place to live. Why should the rest of the community subsidize plowing what is essentially private space? Never mind that when I was a kid I was taught not to play in the street…

I wanted Kojo to ask these callers if their kids could walk to school, a library, a park, or to a store. I moved from a grid street to a cul de sac when I was 10 years old. When I was living on a grid street, I was walking all around town when I was seven years old. After we moved, I couldn't walk or ride anywhere, partially because it was too far, and partially because the connecter roads were too dangerous.

Now, I live in a town where kids who live within sight of schools have to be bussed, because the connector roads in between are too dangerous to walk on, they don’t even have sidewalks.

I wrote an email to the show, but of course it never got read. Alas!
chargirlgenius: (Default)
At the doctor’s office yesterday, I picked up a copy of Ideal Living magazine and started flipping through. A couple of headlines had caught my eye: Great Walkable Cities and American Small Towns. Wow! Was this a magazine that actually got it? After a little research later, I learned that it was a magazine for “the second half of life.” Great! Living in a walkable community means that seniors still have the freedom of mobility even after they stop driving.

A nice place to visit, but you wouldn’t want to live there )
chargirlgenius: (Default)
Not about people who don’t buy a house because of the paint colors, this time…

This isn’t particularly a kvetch about the show itself, but about a mind set.

The couple last night was living in Austin, and *needed* a bigger new house for their four member family. They were living in only 3200 square feet, and their poor kids had to share a bathroom!

Aw. Hear me cry for them.

Actually, I *am* sad for them. The whole episode, they kept talking about making sure that everybody had enough separate space. “We want a main floor master so we can be separate from the kids.” “The kids need space to be separate from each other.” They were looking for a house with a room that could be used as a second TV room for the kids. At the end, with the ruckus of kids in the background, they joked "I thought we had soundproofing in here!" I got the sense that they weren't really joking.

Now, Househunters International is my new favorite show. Tonight was a guy moving to Cognac, France, and I could die from how wonderful the houses were. He ended up with the place in town, with a view of people, and (as the realtor put it) of life!

Watching these homebuying shows, I’ve got to wonder if we’ve all gotten too engrossed with the idea of getting our own space, and shutting ourselves off. Families want places with a bathroom for everybody, where nobody has to spit in the same sink. They want a big yard for the kids to play in. Really, what’s better for kids? A big yard to play in, or a little yard, and a neighborhood with other diverse areas to explore? [livejournal.com profile] reabhecc once gave the boys a book called The Do Something Day, about a boy who runs away from home and visits all of the people in his neighborhood. As I read it, I keep wondering about his neighborhood, and the fruit seller, the baker, the car repairman, etc.

The most important parts of my yard were the swingset, which attracted all of the neighbors, and the bushes, which we hid under. The bushes were on the edges. I don’t remember the wide expanses of lawn vividly. I *do* remember the fences and bushes and hidden edges in my friend’s yard.

[livejournal.com profile] ren_flora pointed me towards the discipline of childhood geographies. I found some info through the wonders of Google, but very little (so far) about how childhood geographies are affected by suburbia. Too bad I'm thinking Masters and not PhD. I could have found my thesis subject (what a "family oriented" neighborhood should *really* look like).

Too late to think much more. I need Jeff here to nag me when it's time to go to bed. Anyway, that’s what I’ve been pondering today. That, and a stone house in France. *sigh*
chargirlgenius: (Default)
Right now, I'm reading Last Harvest: From Cornfield to New Town: Real Estate Development from George Washington to the Builders of the Twenty-First Century, and Why We Live in Houses Anyway

It's the story depicting the process of building New Daleville, a new Traditional Neighborhood Development (TND) community in southern Chester County, PA. It's interesting - the community is small, yet they're aiming at TND standards. The community is so small, that it doesn't support any commercial activity, so it's only going part of the way.

Anyway, the author also mentions another new TND community being built in Berks County, PA. Bryn Eyre is much bigger than New Daleville, with three elementary schools planned, lots of commercial and business, and some five square miles of new town development. It will have a Main Street.

A paragraph on their first page describes their goals:

As was done in Pennsylvania’s historic towns, Bryn Eyre will offer homes on smaller lots with gathering places like neighborhood greens, parks, town squares, and playgrounds. Shops and restaurants will be within walking distance of most residences, workplaces will be close to housing and the town will enjoy the sense of close community that was once the defining characteristic of American small town life.

Yes, I'm sure that it's part truth, part sales pitch, but it sure is exciting!

Since a good portion of my f-list is in PA, has anybody heard of either of these projects? Opinions from the Gallery? Is anybody aware of any other TND community projects in the mid-Atlantic? I'm interested in anything from VA to NJ. (I know of Kentlands and South Riding - driven through them both.)


On a more personal level, I wonder about the culture of the urban planning degree programs. Are they cutthroat and nasty, or do they have a more "we have to work together to accomplish stuff" attitude?

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