I Want A Big Yard In A Walkable Community
But you can't have it! Or, more specifically, if everyone has a big yard the community ceases to be especially walkable. That isn't to say that you can't have developments with yards relatively near to retail, so that there is stuff within walking distance. You can still have corner shops or similar, but having sufficient residential density to support significant neighborhood-serving retail isn't really compatible with everyone has a big yard.
Keep your yard! Just understand the tradeoff.
Because I've always lived in cities, I don't even understand the utility of the big yards I see in the suburbs. I get the purpose of a yard for children and dogs to play in, and summers on the patio. But I don't get the point of the vast expanses of lawn that lie fallow in the more upscale suburbs. They require vast upkeep for the benefit of . . . looking at green, empty space. And the tradeoff seems to be a world where you can't get anywhere without driving and your neighbors are distant apparitions. Am I missing something? Or do others perceive features where I see bugs?
Incidentally, there was a most interesting article on lawn culture in The New Yorker the other day
http://www.newyorker.com/arts/critics/books/2008/07/21/080721crbo_books_kolbert
Tidbit: Lawns (admittedly including golf courses) occupy an area the size of New York State.
Yes, feature in many cases. Good fences and a certain amount of distance make good neighbors. As for having to drive everywhere, you get that in practically every suburb, anyway. It's not the difference between a lawn and a really big lawn that puts you in your car; it's the difference between having a lawn at all, or not.
The other big thing you've not mentioned about really big suburban lawns is their function as conspicuous consumption. Whiterpeople have ruthlessly squelched most displays of wealth, because to be wealthy is to be unequal, and lord knows we cannot have that because we are all literally equal in all ways, except where we're not. But, since a lawn and garden is something you can work on yourself (at least in theory), it's exempted from the normal egalitarian logic, and it is still a domain in which the rich can strut without attracting censure from their whiter acquaintances.
The yard's a great plus for children. We bought in the city a few years back, and assumed a rowhouse and parks would be enough for kids. But really - they're not.
Your neighbors are cheek-by-jowel, and you can often hear the progress of energetic fights or lovemaking through the walls. The parks are less useful than I thought they might be, because they're often populated by gang types, and trash is pervasive: my toddlers are perpetually trying to pick up discarded bottles and fast food bags. A large, fenced-in yard gives the kids space to run, and they don't need to be watched quite so rigorously. And frankly, when you're dealing with small children, public transit is as much of a hassle as a convenience: it consumes a lot of time, and screws up nap schedules. And that's before you get to the brutal reality of the schooling situation: you get to pay high property taxes for unusable schools AND you get to shell out private school tuition. Fortunately, there's a perpetual influx of single transplants to keep real estate prices up.
People moved out to the suburbs when they could afford it for a reason, and that reason wasn't simply love of consumption. DC in particular is well-adapted for single twentysomethings, but it's just not a great place to raise kids.
I'd say you're missing kids and gardening.
Having a huge yard where your kids can run out back and play sports, build forts/treehouses, sand boxes etc.
Gardening is pretty relaxing and productive. Growing your own fresh cut flowers or even better veggies...2 thigns money can't buy: true love and home-grown tomatoes.
but as far as the vast, manicured estates...It's the same thing as a 10 bedroom house...signaling of massive success. It's also makes your house extremely private which is nice.
To me there is a difference between No yard, A Small yard (1/3-1/5 acre), and a Big Yard (1/2 acre plus).
I really can't understand why anyone needs a Big Yard. I have less than 1/5 acre and it is enough for a fenced in backyard for my daughter and dog to play in and a nice garden if the front. If we need bigger space we can walk to the park a couple of blocks away. Much more space than this usually ends up being just big expanses of grass to mow.
I really think at the end of the day it comes down mainly to privacy. With smaller yards you are close to your neighbors. In my house I can see into the neighbors kitchen if the shades are up and have a conversation without yelling if the widows are open. This is not a big problem for me but I can see how some might want a little more privacy.
It seems to me a neighborhood of dense single family houses on small lots with small parks is about perfect. There are plenty of these type neighborhoods just outside of DC but still inside the beltway.
Of course I guess it make sense that I think it is perfect since that is where I live. To each his own.
Unless you assume that folks are being rounded up and forced to move to the suburbs against their will, I think you need to allow for the possibility that some people consider a personally-owned expanse of green to be a feature, even if most committed urbanites would see it as a bug (presumably one of the mosquitoes that are ruining the evening deck experience these days!).
Two points:
Really, beyond a certain point of size, a "big yard" of more than a few acres actually requires less ongoing upkeep than a "small yard." Unless your vanity is such that additional vehicles are required to carry it around with you, there's really no point trying to keep 2-3 acres "manicured." Just have a meadow, and enjoy it.
Second, the point of the space isn't for it to be directly useful, but rather for it to act as a buffer zone against other people moving in next to you. No, I don't use every inch of my nine acres every day, but that isn't the point. Nobody else can use it at all -- that's the point.
Distant apparitions.
I really can't understand why anyone needs a Big Yard
Well, I don't "need" a flat-screen HD TV, either, unless we're defining "need" pretty far up the Maslow hierarchy, but I want one, so I'm buying one. Speaking as an unabashed pro-consumerist, I also argue that a life in which one acquires and consumes only what one "needs" is a life I'd rather not live (YMMV). And elmo has it right: For lots of people, big yards are about buffer zones and privacy. And for parents of small children, most yards > most public parks and playgrounds.
LCL
Your right "needs" is the wrong word.
I can't understand why anyone wants a really big yard. And I think that is what Meagan was asking as well.
She was trying to understand why someone would want it. Seems to me the answer is privacy, Which is reasonable.
Luckily we live in a country where we can both have what we want.
I just moved last year from a dense walkable area with a .1 acre fenced in yard (and a big park a 2 minute walk away) to a house with a ~1 acre yard. No question, the Big Yard is much better! Why? I have a 2, 4 and 6 year old. The park didn't work well because of all the big kids using it, and because of the difficulty of keeping an eye on all three kids. The small yard didn't work because the kids couldn't throw a ball or frisbee without it going over the fence.
As for driving, even in the more densely populated town the kids friends were scattered over about 3 miles meaning that my wife was always driving to playgroups and friends houses anyway. Her median drive has increased from 5 minutes to ~12 minutes, but that's a tiny price to pay for the advantages of the big yard.
And, oh yeah, the big yard gave us room for a swimming pool, which averages 2 hours a use a day when it is >80 degrees. And the privacy advantages noted above. And the ability to plant lots of raspberries, blueberries and strawberries. And the quiet from being set back from the street.
All in all, I can see the argument for living somewhere truly walkable like Manhattan, but once you have to drive at all you are better off (if you have kids) with a nice big yard.
That title should be- "Huge....Tracts of Land".
Distant neighbors really is the point. Not wanting to share walls with neighbors is one of the big reasons I bought a real house in the first place. If the neighbors share a wall, or their exterior wall is just 5 feet away from mine like it is in many newer suburban developments, what's the point of owning at all?
Lets rephrase the question. Why would any one WANT a big yard?
I must confess that I myself have no interest in one at all. I live in a city of about 175,000 people in an apartment with my wife and 4 children. We live a 5 minute walk from a school with a large playground, and 10 minutes from a large park with public concerts, bridges that stretch over the ponds, etc. When my wife and I take the kids outside to play, we go to the schoolyard or the park. Then we go for a walk around the neighborhood, stop in a shop for an ice cream, and maybe at the grocery store before walking home. A yard would just be a source of extra work, expense, and upkeep, to no particular benefit.
But not everyone would agree with me.
Well a big yard gives my dogs a place to play while I'm away. Sure you could argue that I dont need dogs, but hey, they are my buddies.
What I dont understand is what a "walkable" community gives me.
If one is buying a house with a big yard "for the kids," and the tradeoff is living in an area where its not safe to bike or walk outside of the immediate subdivision, then said kids will cease to appreciate the big yard after about age 7 or so. They will describe the suburbs as "boring"-- and they'll be right! Then they will grow up to be 20-something urbanites in DC or wherever.
Of course, the tradeoff is not inevitable. There are plenty of city neighborhoods and close-in suburbs, with connected streets that make for safe biking/walking off of main thoroughfares, and enough things to do within that distance.
It amazes some of my friends that my brother and I as kids got ourselves to the store, the community pool, to get our hair cut, all on our own without a chauffer. And it was in a suburb of Cleveland. The thing is, we had a yard that we spent little time in--it was the places we could get to on bikes that made it a nice place to grow up.
There are lots of places like this across the country...recently neglected but due for a revival of sorts.
"What I dont understand is what a "walkable" community gives me."
The ability to not be in your car all the time. Within walking distance to my house are a pharmacy, 3 convienience stores, a coffee shop, 5 or 6 restraunts/bars, 6 churches, 3 parks, a greenway with woods and a creek, 2 schools a dry cleaner, post office and several shops.
Exercise, so you are healthier
Usually a shorter comute since many walkable neighborhoods are closer to work
A sense of community with your neighbors since you see them out walking their dogs, sitting on their porches, walking to eat/shop/play etc instead of just blowing by them in your car.
Now to get that you give up some privacy and big expanses of grass and probably pay more for less space.
For some people it is worth it for other it is not.
"What I dont understand is what a "walkable" community gives me."
The ability to not be in your car all the time. Within walking distance to my house are a pharmacy, 3 convienience stores, a coffee shop, 5 or 6 restraunts/bars, 6 churches, 3 parks, a greenway with woods and a creek, 2 schools a dry cleaner, post office and several shops.
Exercise, so you are healthier
Usually a shorter comute since many walkable neighborhoods are closer to work
A sense of community with your neighbors since you see them out walking their dogs, sitting on their porches, walking to eat/shop/play etc instead of just blowing by them in your car.
Now to get that you give up some privacy and big expanses of grass and probably pay more for less space.
For some people it is worth it for other it is not.
I'm shopping for a half-acre or above yard right now, as it happens. I want a place where the kids can run around without supervision, where I can break out the bow for a half-hour of target practice on a summer evening when they're in bed, and where I can teach them to shoot air guns or fly little toy model airplanes. In other words, I don't want a "walkable" community, I want enough property that I can do what I want without having to drive anywhere. And I'd like my neighbors to be distant apparitions if at all possible. If I'm ever rich enough, I'll probably buy a couple sections of wilderness to use as a private hunting ground.
And I don't much care for public spaces because the public uses them.
Also, I want a monstrous garage for the machine tools I plan to buy and the ludicrously large model airplanes I'll be building with my sons.
It's amazing how many of these comments boil down to "I don't want it, so why would anyone else?"
Some people really, really like to garden. My parents have been trying to find a place in Portland with enough space to do some serious gardening, but anywhere with a lot larger than 50 X 100 was either outrageously expensive or had some major issue. In the end, they're going to settle in Vancouver, WA instead, where they can get a larger property for less astronomical sums, even if it means giving up the walking lifestyle they were hoping for.
This is clearly a non gustibus issue, but I'm with eccdogg about small and large yards. I recently bought a townhouse to go with my infant daughter. It has a small enclosed back yard: big enough for a small garden, and in a couple of years a swing set. It is also on a side street with no through traffic, with lots of families with kids. The front yards serve as a collective play area. And yes, it is a five minute walk from my town's Main Street.
The other property we seriously considered is out in the country, with a much bigger back yard. It would have allowed me to put in a much bigger garden, and would have more room for the kid to play. But it also would have been much more work to keep up, and we would have had to drive pretty much everywhere.
Commenters have written about the point of a large yard being separation from your neighbors. Part of the issue seems to be quality of construction. I share common walls with neighbors on both sides, but it is a solidly built structure. The only time I hear noise from next door is when actual hammering on the walls is occurring. Beyond that, a solid fence around the back yard gives privacy. So my neighbors and I are aware of each other pretty much to the degree we want to be. I can see how with crappy construction in a crappy neighborhood there would be problems, but I have had absolutely none.
This is clearly a non gustibus issue, but I'm with eccdogg about small and large yards. I recently bought a townhouse to go with my infant daughter. It has a small enclosed back yard: big enough for a small garden, and in a couple of years a swing set. It is also on a side street with no through traffic, with lots of families with kids. The front yards serve as a collective play area. And yes, it is a five minute walk from my town's Main Street.
The other property we seriously considered is out in the country, with a much bigger back yard. It would have allowed me to put in a much bigger garden, and would have more room for the kid to play. But it also would have been much more work to keep up, and we would have had to drive pretty much everywhere.
Commenters have written about the point of a large yard being separation from your neighbors. Part of the issue seems to be quality of construction. I share common walls with neighbors on both sides, but it is a solidly built structure. The only time I hear noise from next door is when actual hammering on the walls is occurring. Beyond that, a solid fence around the back yard gives privacy. So my neighbors and I are aware of each other pretty much to the degree we want to be. I can see how with crappy construction in a crappy neighborhood there would be problems, but I have had absolutely none.
The massive yards (grassed, but hardly manicured) that my parents and my friends' parents all had growing up were great. You just can't get a decent size football/soccer field into a small yard, particularly if there are trees and such in the middle of the lawn.
Thinking back to the games we played, mostly sports, but a lot of hide-and-go-seek type stuff as well, much of it relied on having more space than we could possibly use. And we were outside all the time, and ran a lot.
Sure you can take your kids to the park, but it seems like they're going to be outside a lot more--and you're going to be willing to leave them to their own devices at a younger age--n a large yard.
I have lived (1) in an apartment/condo (a) in small buildings and (b) in large towers, (2) in a townhouse in DC, (3) in a detached house in a rural DC community and in Pittsburgh, (4) in a detached house in a close-in DC suburb, (5) on a (a) ship and (b) a boat; and currently (6) in an old house on 1.25 acres that has high ground maintenance issues.
Close-in living was nice for amenities, but the noise of the neighbors can be an issue, especially if they are a band, or they like one another "a LOT". And then there is the matter of having other people decide when YOU have to pay money to do something that THEY think needs to be done right away. Life in a condo can be micro-politics at its worst.
The bigger the property you own, the more you have to work to own and keep it. That is the simple tradeoff. Some people like to live by themselves, and we should leave them alone. We are not willing to build the infrastructure that is necessary to make a dense city really livable, like NYC or Paris currently are. No one is willing to have their streets torn up to install subways, and everyone wants access to sunlight and some open space. I really don't like the idea of someone telling me that I have to conform to THEIR morally correct way of living.
And, BTW, if you have a balcony, you are likely NOT allowed to barbeque on it - it annoys the neighbors. So, if you like to cook things that need the outdoors, you need something bigger than an apartment, or you have to share a communal BBQ - not my idea of good cooking.
Finally, I would note that living on 1.25 acres with two wineries as neighbors(I can walk there, and back, in 2 minutes) does have its benefits...
I agree with many of the reasons given above for wanting a yard.
Let me add one more reason in favor of the yard: parents bonding with children and a good way to teach children to take pride in something they own.
Growing up and doing work on the yard with my dad, I learned gardening and other basic handy skills, but the main thing I learned was how to take care of something you own. My dad was always big on going above and beyond (ex: sweeping the street in front of the house to make it look extra clean), because he figured "I own this house, it reflects on me". I'm proud of him for this attitude and hope to do the same when I own one day, though I realize this sort of thing may not be for everyone.
As for having to drive everywhere, you get that in practically every suburb, anyway. It's not the difference between a lawn and a really big lawn that puts you in your car; it's the difference between having a lawn at all, or not.
People keep on saying this, but I simply do not understand it. Unless the city you are talking about is Manhattan, it just is not that difficult to find a house with a yard in a walkable urban environment. We've lived in two places in the past ten years. In the first, Chicago, we had a three-story, 2500 sq. ft. house on a standard Chicago lot (25 x 125) in a blue collar -- but safe -- neighborhood about 4 miles south of downtown. Our 25 x 40 or so yard was small by non-Chicago standards, but big enough to play catch with the dog and hang out outside for hours on end. We walked to restaurants, church, bars, shops -- the only thing we drove to was the grocery store, and that only because we didn't want to limit ourselves to 2 bags of groceries per person. The price (mid 300s) was expensive, but certainly doable for two white collar Chicago incomes. The schools were crappy, but that was the tradeoff -- not yard vs. walkability.
We moved to Denver a year or so ago so my wife could take advantage of a good career opportunity. We bought a 2500 sq. ft. house on a 100 x 100 lot in a nice neighborhood with good schools through middle school. Our backyard takes up about 50% of the property -- what I would consider to be big. Because the neighborhood was a lot nicer we paid a bit more (low 400s), but that's still affordable with a decent down payment on our low-to-mid 100s combined income. It's about 5 miles south of downtown, just north of a big university. There are great restaurants (including the best sushi place in the country -- Sushi Den) and shops within a 15 minute walk in three different directions. Our church is on our block, and our daughter's preschool is walking distance (though we don't because it's hard to get a preschooler to walk more than a few hundred yards), and the elementary, middle and high schools are all within easy walking distance. The only places we drive are the grocery store and downtown when we want to take the kid out (I usually run, bike or take public to work).
Though I will say this about McMegan not getting the appeal of big yards when a park is nearby. One thing that childless people do not understand is the scheduling constraints inherent in having (especially young) children. Wakeup, snack, nap, meal, and bedtimes are very, very rigid. With our daughter, she's probably not going to be ready to go anywhere until 8:30 or so, she has to have a snack around 10:00, lunch better be served at or before noon, and she will melt down if she's not napping by 1:00. It is difficult to schedule outings around that, and packing up all the necessary stuff is a huge hassle. I can't tell you how many times we've walked to the park, only to turn around and walk right home because we forgot a water cup, or the right size hat, or a spare set of clothes in crummy weather.
Apartment complexes (especially cheap ones) are a great argument for either 1) buying better neighbors or 2) getting away from them altogether. When one neighbor smokes (a right I support!), all neighbors in an apartment complex smoke. When one neighbor listens to music or cheers loudly for a basketball team, we all do.
Such is not the case in suburbia.
Whatever levels of civility allowed rather nice lives in tenements in Brooklyn in the 1950's no longer exist. We're all poorer for it.
I suppose it's a matter of priorities and the way you were brought up. I was raised in a city where we didn't have a yard (although we had both a roof-deck on which to play, a room in the basement filled with toys and a plethora of other children to play with) and I've never felt the loss because of that. In fact, I wouldn't change my childhood for the world.
My husband grew up on 50 wooded acres and had his own swimming pond and baseball field and hated it. I think he was very lonely growing up because everything and everybody was so far away. What good is your own baseball diamond without 8+ other kids to play on it?
That doesn't mean that having a lot of land for a kid to play on is bad, it just means it's not the end-all be-all of childhood.
And those parents I know who have large yards don't seem to let their kids out to play by themselves. My friends who live on 3 acres don't let their nine-year-old out the door because "something might happen to her". I've heard this from other parents as well, which just makes me wonder what the point of the big yard is in the first place.
Finally, yard-e, I think it's great if you're using your yard to garden and bond with your kids, but gardening is certainly not the only way to bond. I used to bond with my Dad, just as an example, by walking to the grocery store with him to do the family's marketing for the week. We used to walk to the hardware store and get materials for the home-improvement projects I would help him with, we would walk to the museum to see a nice exhibit we were both interested in, we would walk to the movie theater to see the latest action movie crap we both liked...
Hmmm...all my bonding experiences seem to have a theme...
I really don't understand why people are so interested in living in a "walkable community".
If I want exercise, I'll go biking or to the gym or spend a few minutes on my elliptical. So exercise is clearly not a good reason to live in a "walkable community".
If I want to go shopping, I'd much rather have a car - who wants to lug around 13 grocery bags full of milk and orange juice and canned tomatoes, all while strolling your 2-year old, when you could instead just put everything in your car to take home? So shopping and the like are clearly not good reasons to live in a "walkable community".
So could someone please explain to me the upside of a "walkable community"? I don't see it.
Note that I've lived both in the suburbs as well as in Manhattan. I enjoyed Manhattan because there were lots of things to do for a single person, which was good when I was single. Now, many of those things are pretty useless.
I understand why Megan overvalues urban density - her life experience is such that values highly the options that urban living permits. If/when she has a couple of toddlers around, her priorities may change.
It occurs to me that the demographic which writes about Twitter causing social gatherings to balloon uncontrollably and the demographic of people who value big yards rarely, if ever, intersect, and that the difference is largely having kids. The little monsters really do change everything.
Open spaces with grass and big leafy trees are pretty, or in the case of the best gardens I have seen, beautiful. Certainly prettier than looking out on a concrete road.
A big garden is not the only way of getting a beautiful view, but it may well be a sensible trade-off given all the other factors involved in deciding where to buy a house.
Yes, you can do pretty small gardens, but they don't have the depth of field to let your eyes roam across.
The main point of a large yard is so that you and your neighbors aren't (literally) breathing down each others' necks. They can do whatever they want without bothering you, and vice versa.
And, as others have pointed out, some activities require space. Target practicing with a bow & arrow or an air gun needs a minimum of an acre or so. Target practicing with a real firearm needs a minimum of 10 or 15 acres.
I grew up on a hundred acre farm, and anything less than ten acres leaves me feeling claustrophobic.
Al:
Having to drive your children all the time is torture (I am currently enduring it after moving from a walkable place in Israel to the Greater Toronto Area). For a child who cannot drive, life suxxx real hard if they cannot get to their friends' houses, the park, or the mall unless there's an adult at hand to drive them. Ditto for adults who cannot drive or don't want to.
And of course there is a lot of data that driving everywhere makes us fatter and hampers social norms.
So could someone please explain to me the upside of a "walkable community"?
1.) Some -- many -- people don't like to "exercise." They're fine doing physical activity, but they don't want to go do something for the sole purpose of doing physical activity. My wife is like this -- she'll spend all morning hiking up a mountain and enjoying nature and the views, but tell her to go spend 10 minutes on the treadwill or walk briskly in circles around the block and she'll look at you like your crazy. For these people, living in a walkable community is much more healthy than the alternative. This is especially true for kids.
2.) Driving is expensive, and it's a pain. You've got gas, you've got occasional parking issues, you've got accidents, you've got maintenance costs, etc. etc. etc. Sometimes it's just nicer to go walk somewhere and not have to worry about taking the car. Plus, if you are drinking, you don't have to worry about that if you came on foot.
3.) If the weather is nice, walking is fun. Denver weather is typically amazing (sunniest city in America!), and the walkable neighborhood that we live in has great architecture, pretty parks and trails, etc. It's nice to be able to go for a 15 minute walk through a nice neighborhood or park and arrive at a restaurant for lunch.
4.) There are externalities to driving everywhere, and some people feel good if they minimize their own contribution to these externalities.
I am not sure the people who like walkable communities are all childless.
Again I thing there is a differnce between Big yard and no yard. No yard, not great for kids but a small yard gives you most of the benefits.
My inner suburb neighborhod of pre 1950's bungalow's on less than 1/4 acre lots is loaded with kids. So much so that my sister in law calls it "Fertile Acres"
Plus since it is dense the number of kids to play with within walking distance is huge. You can walk to play group with 10 other kids and get back home quickly if your child starts a tantrum. Also since we see other parents and their kids walking, at the neigborhood park, and at the coffee shop everyone can kind of look out for each other. There is a strong sense of community that I don't remember having growing up on the 1 acre lot I had as a kid.
Well, when civilization, my big yard will comfortably support the multitude of serfs necessary to grow my crops, tend my livestock, and form my army. Then I will be able to conquer my neighbors, further expanding my dominion.
Then won't you all be sorry that you laughed at me!
Regarding the advantages of a walkable community, this is of course a matter of taste. The idea of going to a gym for exercise makes me shudder. It is at best a dreary chore. Walking to the store or the library is recreation. Your mileage may vary, of course.
In the broader picture, much of modern America operates on the default assumption that there will be a car for every member of the household old enough to have a license. As a matter of pubic policy, this puts that much more demand on public resources. Better surely to have places to go that don't require driving. It is out of fashion nowadays to let kids out on their own, but I recall going into the neighborhood without supervision from the age of eight or so, routinely making trips to the library, for example, on foot or bike.
As for shopping, I think you would find that people who have cars use them for grocery shopping, even if the market is close, for the reasons you state. The trick if you don't have a car at all is frequent small trips. You stop in the store every day or so on the way home from work and buy two bags of groceries. This actually works really well for fresh produce, but not so well for everything else.
I meant to say "When civilization collapses".
Now you are laughing at my proofreading skills! I can tell! Just you wait!
I current live on a fairly small lot 1/5 of a acre grew up on a acre lot, and my grand parents had a farm! Adults don't need a lot of outdoor space, yeah privacy is nice. I wish I had a piece of flat land that I could park a rarely used trailer on. But my desire is not that great, and it all needs mowing.
Kids, emphases on the plural, can use an infinite amount of land, the benefit diminishes of course as land is added. but on my current lot of land, a game of tag for small children is about the limit. As a child the neighborhood kids would play a game of "guns" on about 5 acres, with maybe 8 kids playing. At the farm, I had just my siblings to play with but we had all these places to go and see. check out the "back" see where the cows were, check out reports of nutria in the pond. If you have land that kids are allowed to use, they will find a way to use it. If you add pets then the need for other kids is reduced.
I garden. I love my big yard.
The beautiful thing about the United States is this- any kind of community you want, you can have, but you have to move there if you already haven't.
"They require vast upkeep for the benefit of . . . looking at green, empty space."
Not quite sure why some people have a problem with green, empty space. It is about perception and what people like. For some people - such as my parents - who enjoy lawn and gardens, developing their own green space is the reason for the larger yards. It is not about consumption or privacy, but having their own green space to enjoy.
There are others who want it for their children, the privacy, and showing off their wealth. Not that big of a deal.
I know many people who wonder how those in large urban centres can stand living so close to each other. Many options for different lifestyle choices is what makes life more interesting.
Some of us don't care to live cheek by jowl with half the world. I prefer to sit on my deck and have the loudest noise be the whirr of hummingbird wings as s/he feeds at the flowers and feeder. Each to his/her own.
Distant neighbors really is the point.
Noah Yetter nails it in one. The four sweetest words in the English language are: Get off my land.
Distant neighbors really is the point.
Noah Yetter nails it in one. The four sweetest words in the English language are: Get off my land.
"What I dont understand is what a "walkable" community gives me."
The ability to not be in your car all the time. Within walking distance to my house are a pharmacy, 3 convienience stores, a coffee shop, 5 or 6 restraunts/bars, 6 churches, 3 parks, a greenway with woods and a creek, 2 schools a dry cleaner, post office and several shops.
I really don't go to the pharmacy, convienience store, coffee shop, different churches, dry cleaner, post office, or most other types of stores very often. While I like the idea of living in a walkable area every time I think seriously about it I come to the conclusion that there really aren't that many places I'd like to be able to walk to. I'm not big on having one favorite restraunt/bar so even being near them isn't that interesting as I generally want to try new places.
I agree with Al that walkability is actually a disadvantage with small children. I have two almost-two-year-olds with another on the way, and a pleasant 10-minute walk for me is a major hike for them (and takes 30 minutes). If it's too hot, too wet, or too cold for walking to be pleasant (which together account for about 50/52 of the year in my particular state), it's that much less fun. So, you put the kids in the stroller, and then get the joy of maneuvering *that* around the dry cleaner/grocery store/post office/pharmacy, while limiting your accomplishments to whatever you can carry in one hand or hang off the back of the stroller. And since parking is at a premium in most walkable communities, good luck if you decide to save yourself the hassle and drive (in the minivan or large SUV you need to accommodate three child seats).
At least when I walk on the treadmill, I don't have to do it with sixty pounds of toddlers and the dry cleaning and the library books and the 12-pack of Diet Coke all hanging off me.
There seems to be a direct correlation between property size and libertarian sentiments. It's not uncommon here in NM for people to feel encroached on when you can see you're neighbors house. (I fall into that group.) That in turn breeds the "the government has no business telling me what I can and can not do" sentiment. Something I also subscribe to. City dwellers amuse me. Check out Harding County: 2126 sq/mi for a population of 810.
I see a couple of requirements for a community to be "walkable". One, sufficient density and mixed-use/zoning so that there are things worth walking to. Two, that it's safe to walk. I'm thinking of car drivers, but crime could be a factor too.
If I were raising my kids in the house where I was raised, they wouldn't be going more than a block without two tons of steel around them. But 25 years ago, I would ride my bike a couple of miles to go to the pool, parks, library, etc.
We've got a wonderful park within walking distance of our house. But we're considering building a playground in our back yard because the 2-minute drive (or 10-minute walk) is too much of a hassle. It seems ridiculous, but so does everything about small children until you actually have some of your own.
I haven't read all the comments yet but I haven't run across the "wildlife habitat" theme yet.
In my community, nice large parks are not friendly to native birds and squirrels. My oversized yard is planted with native trees and shrubs, food for birds and squirrels. I have, on a regular basis, 10 species of birds flying through my yard and hitting my feeders. I have two species of squirrels, the southern gray and the southern flying squirrel. I have had raccoons and possums traipse through mine and my neighbors' greenbelts too.
In fact, right now, I'm on the back porch watching a sharp shinned hawk soar over, while a redbellied woodpecker hops around my pecan tree. Cardinals are gorging on the black oil sunflower seed under the oak tree. And the finches, wrens, titmice and chickadees are singing from somewhere in the camellia bushes.
I'm not into "lawn", but I love my little woods. My pets do too.
L
Walkability is highly dependent on weather. Live in Denver or Portland? Walking is great.
Live in Houston or Dallas or Phoenix? Walking 10 minutes to the pharmacy or the grocery store is a good way to get heat stroke.
Yeah, grass...who's the genius that invented that useless crap? And trees? Don't even get me started on trees. I mean, who needs 'em? They only get in my way when I'm trying to walk to the store to buy some useful man-made plastic products.
Re: It's not the difference between a lawn and a really big lawn that puts you in your car; it's the difference between having a lawn at all, or not.
This is not true. I grew up in a late 50s built subdivision which was eminently walkable. We had modest sized yards which were perfectly adequete for a garden, a swimming pool, play space for kids and pets. Within a mile's radius one could walk or bike to my grade school, my middle school, five churches, two parks, a grocery store, a Kmart, a convenience store, two banks, a pharmacy, a hardware, a pizzeria, a beauty shop, a dental clinic, a medical clinic, and several other businesses. Nowadays that's less true of the place: the houses and yards haven't changed but some of the businesses are no longer there, driven out by competition from large mega-stores.
By the way, I live in a fairly dense part of Baltimore, though we do have a big enough yard for a small garden, but that neighborhood isn't very walkable either, and for the same reason: retail and commercial outlets still cluster in large strip malls and one must drive to them.
I've read all the comments in this post and its followup. It's like people from different planets talking:
Group A: )*&(*^%^$)*^&$)*
Group B: FBMFGBN flBKNFBL KFNBOIf@@@@!!!!
Lips are moving (keyboards, but you get my point), sounds are coming out but no one understands at all what the other person is saying. And really, some people on both sides of the issue are acting like jerks. Grow up, agree to disagree and move on.
I've lived in and loved several walkable neighborhoods, but no matter how great they were, the retail didn't cover all our needs, even supplemented with on-line orders. Even as childless marrieds in a great Pittsburgh neighborhood, we needed periodic treks out to IKEA for bookcases or to the suburban mall for clothes. Later on as DC folk with kids, trips out to the big box stores became a necessity: Toys R Us, Buy Buy Baby, etc. Itty bitty children's boutiques are really expensive, and the selection is small. Now that we're in Texas, we're currently in a stage where we don't need the big stores so much, but it's nice to know that they're out there if we should need them.
I've lived in and loved several walkable neighborhoods, but no matter how great they were, the retail didn't cover all our needs, even supplemented with on-line orders.
I live in a very walkable neighborhood in Boston (two supermarkets, several hundred shops and restaurants, a bus stop and a subway station all within easy walking distance), but I nonetheless agree with this statement. It's not not just shopping and dining either, it's also visiting friends and family, heading out of town to go to the beach, etc, that require a car. With the advent of car sharing, though, owning a car really isn't (thankfully) the necessity it used to be (I own one myself for professional purposes, but would gladly jettison it if I could).
Its a signal of wealth - no more, no less. The times that a very large yard is useful are few and far between. Things like playing volleyball in your back yard for the yearly family reunion.