Reply To: Why Do You Hate New Urbanism?

[nca]

What about a TND that is 60 miles plus from the nearest major urban center?

I agree. I think the planning principles of NU are going in a very good direction. Asked the same question, architects tend to respond more to the architectural styling which they mostly detest rather than the planning.

With regard to greenfield development I’ll give you a Duany quote which I tend to agree with-

“The loss of a forest or a farm is justified only if it is replaced by a village. To replace them with a subdivision or a shopping center is not an even trade. – Andres Duany

The constant in my mind is that development WILL happen until the market will no longer support it. Environmentalism has it’s merits in the political sphere, but what can WE do as both designers and client reps to grow intelligently?

Is it realistic to rely on government subsidized commueter rail in the near future or should we look at alternatives and plan accordingly?

I’ll cross-post my reply from another forum on this topic as I think it’s appropriate again here-

The difficulty in that which I can see its that in places where new development is rampant you would need a’town center’ every 1/4 mile, or transit station, which isnt going to happen where there is true sprawl. I would consider the notion that low density is as appropriate as higher density depending on the context. This isn’t a urban site scale issue, but a regional planning issue, in which case I’d go out on a limb and say a lot of the regional planning being done in areas of rampant sprawl is 10+ years behind or totally politically charged.

The bottom line is ‘choice’ and variety’ is good. The problem with suburban sprawl isn’t the pattern itself, but the overabundance of a single pattern, which is inherently innefficient at the scale.

Thoughts?