Sprawled Out: The Search for Community in the American Suburb

Tomah Journal - "Unsustainable exurban development exposed by mortgage meltdown"

I was led to this excellent article via The Political Environment blog:

From the Tomah Journal:

Thursday, April 10, 2008

Editorial:
Unsustainable exurban development exposed by mortgage meltdown

One of many realities exposed by the recent mortgage meltdown is the economic and environmental unsustainability of exurban development.

So, what did the U.S. Senate do in response? It passed a bill to subsidize more exurban development.

The Senate passed an awful bill last week that would create $6 billion in new tax subsidies for homebuilders. It also includes $10 billion in tax-exempt bonds for local housing agencies to refinance subprime loans and provide new mortgages for first-time home buyers, $4 billion in grants for local governments to buy foreclosed properties and $100 million to expand counseling for homeowners at risk of defaulting on their loans.

In an overbuilt housing environment, the last thing the federal government should do is encourage another building binge. While the government can’t stop anyone who can afford it from scraping off a piece of farmland and erecting a 2,500 square foot home, the government has no obligation to subsidize it. If the government is going to be an active player in the housing market, it should pursue policies that:

• Encourage people to live closer to where they work. A family may have every right to choose an exurban subdivision, but the government is under no obligation to pave a convenient commuter road or provide preferable tax treatment. Such funds are better spent on mass transit and refurbishing existing neighborhoods.

• Encourage the purchase and renovation of existing housing stock. While there will always be a need for new residential housing construction, much of the recent boom is driven by families who scoff at the idea of a used house. There’s nothing wrong with that, but the government is under no obligation to subsidize that preference. It’s difficult to imagine a circumstance in which the Federal Housing Administration (federal) or Wisconsin Housing Economic Development Authority (Wisconsin) should issue a loan for new residential construction.

The explosion of residential development in the countryside has environmental and economic consequences that have finally come home to roost. It’s more sustainable to live in a city or village and consume less gasoline driving to work. It’s time for government taxing and spending policies to reflect that truth.

All stories copyright 2006 Tomah Journal and other attributed sources.

Strange roads, and "Why do Conservatives become Socialists when it comes to highway spending?"

This week I took my inaugural drive down 31st Street, which now connects Drexel and Rawson - - a few hundred feet from 27th Street, which does the same; brilliant. Other than its use as a back-way out for Northwestern Mutual's new parking ramp, the road is fairly useless at this point (it'll undoubtedly help once the YMCA gets built, though; the road will seem much less superfluous at that point).

And it's wiiiiide. On a positive note: sidewalks begin at the Northwestern Mutual entrance and run to Rawson.

(Click the picture below to go to a collection of 31st Street photos on Flickr)

31st Street, Franklin WI, originally uploaded by johnruexp.

Meanwhile, the very next north-south connection from Drexel to Rawson doesn't come for another mile west on 51st street, reinforcing Drexel's status as an overused collector road with no gridwork connections to tame traffic.

GoogleMaps is a bit out of date; 31st goes all the way through. But nothing else does.

Poor planning. And expensive; 31st street comes out of the city budget as part of the incentive package to Northwestern Mutual when they - - evidently - - hinted that they were getting offers from other cities as they were contemplating building their addition and might just vacate that big building.

Weird roads like 31st Street make this quote all the more relevant (and makes you almost sure that this guy has been to Franklin):

A city's internal transportation system - the layout of its streets and roads, the layout of streetcar systems and subways - determines the character of the city, how its citizens live and work. It has less to do with the direct engines of wealth creation. Build subways and people will live in dense neighborhoods and walk to corner stores; build broad suburban streets and they will live in subdivisions and drive to the Wal-Mart.
-Alex Marshall (How Cities Work)

Recently, Marshall asked the nonmusical question: Why Do Conservatives Become Socialists When It Comes To Highway Spending? at Governing.com.

(Via The Political Environment.)

See also this perspective on the question from the UK (hence the spelling): "Why are roads favoured by the right and trains by socialists?"

An excerpt:

What is it about roads that attracts the Right? Surely they must, by now, realise that the freedom afforded by the car is illusory, since, as usage rises, the extra societal costs of more people getting on to the road outweigh by far the benefits. And the simplistic view that roadbuilding is the answer has been widely discredited. There is a gaping intellectual gap in the Right's thinking which environmentalists and public transport supporters should be more adept at exploiting.

 

 

A New Day begins in Franklin?

According to my stats, this the SPRAWLED OUT's 500th post. Very fitting, given today's news.

At last night's Common Council meeting, two new aldermen were sworn in. Then, one of them (Kristen Wilhelm) nominated the other (Steve Taylor) for council president. Alderman Steve Olson was out of town and could not vote; new alderman Steve Taylor defeated Lyle Sohns, 3-2, and is now Common Council President.

Still think the April 1 election wasn't significant?

It's a sweet coincidence that the council begins it's "rehabilitation" on the very same day that the fringe group Franklin Citizens for Responsible Leadership officially disbanded as required by  a settlement with the state.

As a public service, the small article in todays Journal Sentinel actually lists the members of Franklin's current administration who were associated with the FCRL.

From the article:

Over the next year, the group helped defeat four of the six sitting aldermen - distributing false or exaggerated information in some cases - and replaced them with an FCRL member and supporters of its agenda.

Current city officials affiliated with the group at one time or another include Mayor Tom Taylor, Ald. Steve Olson and Ted Grintjes, who like [fellow FCRL member Jim] Rhiner, sits on three key development committees.

Get the picture?

I met Ted Grintjes and Jim Rhiner on January 4th of last year at 5-Star Coffee; they were evidently there for an informal meeting regarding the city. While both gentlemen were considerate enough to entertain my queries for quite some time when they obviously had other things to discuss that day, I can't say I was inspired by their attitude or rhetoric. They were very much of the "leave the driving to us" school. I left there very pessimistic, thinking, "Are these the guys that I want plotting development in the city where I live?"

Bottom Line: If we truly want to ignite some positive change, look for needed turnover on Franklin's development committees- - unelected positions - - in the very near future to augment the new Common Council.

From The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel:

Franklin citizens group disbands

Action was part of settlement with state

By ANNYSA JOHNSON
[email protected]

Posted: April 15, 2008

Franklin - An early off-shoot of Citizens for Responsible Government, the now-statewide group that has backed recalls in communities throughout Wisconsin, formally disbanded Tuesday, more than a year after agreeing to do so as part of a settlement with the state over campaign finance violations.

James Rhiner, treasurer of Franklin Citizens for Responsible Leadership, which brought down an alderman and helped usher in a more development-friendly Common Council in this Milwaukee County suburb, filed the dissolution papers with the Franklin city clerk around 3:10 p.m., about an hour after being questioned by a reporter about the delay.

"I've been very, very busy with my business," said Rhiner, a commercial lighting consultant who sits on three key development committees in the city.

Rhiner signed a settlement agreement with the Milwaukee County district attorney's office in December 2006, agreeing on behalf of the political action committee to forfeit the balance of its funds, $64.38, and to disband.

The district attorney had filed civil charges a year earlier accusing the group and then-Treasurer James Seymer, son of CRG founding member Orville Seymer of Franklin, of filing a false registration statement and failing to accurately record how much money it collected and spent.

The PAC, which included past and current elected officials and members of influential committees, emerged in 2003 saying it intended to recall then-Ald. Basil Ryan and anyone else members viewed as blocking the city's economic development efforts.

Over the next year, the group helped defeat four of the six sitting aldermen - distributing false or exaggerated information in some cases - and replaced them with an FCRL member and supporters of its agenda.

Current city officials affiliated with the group at one time or another include Mayor Tom Taylor, Ald. Steve Olson and Ted Grintjes, who like Rhiner, sits on three key development committees.

Ryan, who lost to Taylor in the April 1 mayoral race, initiated both the original complaint against the group and the effort to force Rhiner to comply with the agreement, by alerting the district attorney's office.

The allegation was part of an unrelated complaint Ryan filed in March accusing Taylor of using city personnel to gather information for his mayoral campaign.

Taylor denied the allegation, and Assistant District Attorney Bruce Langdorf said a review is pending.

History of Sprawl

'Since 1945, our physical landscape has been molded by business interests, working hand in hand with government, to promote a sprawled way of life dominated by automobile usage. Tax laws were changed, zoning laws implemented, and our elected representatives blatantly supported one form of transportation over another. All so that sprawl and automobile dependence would occur. The American people did not choose to live this way. On the contrary, since the end of World War II, sprawl is the only option we have been given.'

From Douglas Morris's, It’s A Sprawl World After All

(Via Slow Home.)

So little soul ...

Post_card_03, originally uploaded by michellesmith105.

Sorry for two bummers in a row. but is Tax Day, after all ...

"So many houses, so big with so little soul. Our suburbs are filled with houses that are bigger than ever. But are bigger houses really better? Are the dreams that build them bigger, or is it simply that there seems to be no alternative? Americans are searching for home in unprecedented numbers. Yet, when we look, the only tools we seem to have are those we find in the real estate listings. But a house is more than square footage and the number of beds and baths. In of the wealthiest societies ever, many people are deeply dissatisfied with their most expensive purchase."

Source: Sarah Susanka, The Not So Big House

(Via Slow Home.)

Garageland

Garage:

'garage' by rendezvous_avec_spyvspy

View the rest of the images or add your own to the Project Outrage Flickr group.

(Via Slow Home.)

KunstlerCast #8: The Glossary of Nowhere

If I had to point to the single event (non-terroristic, non-family-related) that most significantly affected my current world view, it would be the day I stood at Border's Books and offhandedly grabbed James Howard Kunstler's The Geography of Nowhere from a shelf and consumed the first three-or-so chapters without moving an inch from where I stood. My eyes were opened for the first time to the fact that our built environment does not have to be so crapulent.

Kunstler now has a podcast called "The Kunstlercast" that I'll regularly post here. You can also subscribe to his podcast via iTunes (see his site for easy "subscribe" click-thru).

Take a few minutes to listen, and you'll probably want to order the book ASAP. Read the book, and you'll surely start showing up at Plan Commission and Common Council meetings.

From the site:

When James Howard Kunstler wrote The Geography of Nowhere, it was to give people "the vocabulary to understand what's wrong with the places they ought to know best." In this installment we run down a few choice Kunstlerisms, like "parking lagoons" , "nature Band-Aides" and "patriotic totems." Kunstler also tells us why the depressing topic of suburban sprawl is also really funny.

KunstlerCast #8: The Glossary of Nowhere:

(Info about program and theme music at KunstlerCast.com)

Direct Download (7 MB):
KunstlerCast_08.mp3

(Via KunstlerCast.)

Living in Sprawlanta...

This NPR story examines one Atlanta family and the monetary and time costs they've incurred since moving to Sprawlanta:

Outside metropolitan Atlanta, one of the nation's most congested cities, Michelle Carvalho's dreamhouse is 3,000 square feet. It has five bedrooms, a two-car garage and a big yard.

Her 16-month-old son's day care is 10 minutes away. But Carvalho's real commute, to her job as a cancer prevention researcher at Emory University, can take anywhere from an hour to an hour and a half, depending on traffic.

Meanwhile, this companion NPR story shows how another Atlanta family is living in a much more sustainable way:

The Taylors live in Atlantic Station, a new community in mid-town Atlanta designed to put jobs, homes and shopping all in one place, close to public transportation. Developments like Atlantic Station are springing up around the country, and proponents say they help cut car pollution, including the carbon dioxide that contributes to climate change.

(Via Daily Sprawl.)

Third place coffeehouses and coworking sites as economic development tools

Ray Oldenburg, an urban sociologist from Florida (and author of the book The Great Good Place: Cafes, Coffee Shops, Bookstores, Bars, Hair Salons, and Other Hangouts at the Heart of a Community) writes about the importance of informal public gathering places: "Houses alone do not a community make, and the typical subdivision proved hostile to the emergence of any structure or space utilization beyond the uniform houses and streets that characterized it." Oldenberg argues that "third places" are central to local democracy and community vitality.

But can a community MONETIZE this vitality?

One major commercial development here in Franklin,  Shops at Wyndham Village, has already cynically sold out the promise of a true community space - - in what is supposed to be Franklin's City Civic Center District - - as illustrated in restrictions listed in this document, which the City of Franklin had no knowledge of until I brought it to their attention. (Wyndham Village's poor design is compounded by the inclusion of a DRIVE-THRU Starbucks!)

Missed opportunity, to say the least.

As I've noted here before: Why not encourage, through subsidies and other incentives, LOCAL cafes and coffee houses that support a growing population of entrepreneurs and telecommuters as coworking sites while at the same time provide commercial and community vitality in our public spaces? The area surrounding City Hall and the Library is crying out for amenities that would take advantage of the popularity of the Library, proximity to Legend Park, and connections to new commercial developments at Wyndham Village and Legend Creek.

Time to think CREATIVELY.

From Neil Takemoto at CoolTown Studios (emphasis added):

I first profiled Tryst back in 2003 as a popular coffeehouse third place in Adams Morgan, Washington DC. But five years later, ten years after it first opened, it's not only become a neighborhood institution, but it really should be seen as a contemporary model for job creation.

Here's the big picture:

1. A majority of big businesses come from small businesses, and small businesses are started by entrepreneurs... from their homes.

2. Many (not all) entrepreneurs who tried working exclusively from home will tell you one thing - it sucks. No human interaction, no place for meetings, no escape from spending most of your life stuck at home.

3. Coworking sites are ideal, but are often too pricey for the budding entrepreneur.

4. Thus, enter coffeehouses with free wifi and staff trained not to bug you too often if you've decided to park there for most of the workday. The good news is they're packed with entrepreneurs all day. The bad news is that they're not very profitable until they leave.

In the meantime cities are investing tons of capital in contrived business incubators that often fail. Why not redirect that capital into economic development tax breaks for coffeehouses that provide evidence of effectively acting as free workplaces for entrepreneurs?

On the one hand, Tryst makes no money before 6 pm. On the other hand one can't get a seat during the day. It seems to be an economic travesty not to have enough workplaces for the neighborhood entrepreneurs. Proactive cities will overcome this, but it obviously hasn't happened in Adams Morgan yet.

See also:

- Milwaukee's Bucketworks coworker site

- Wausau's CitizenDesk coworker site

- the Coworking Community Blog.

- Coworking wiki

- BusinessWeek: "Where the Coffee Shop Meets the Cubicle" and photo profiles

- Sprawled Out: The "Paradox of Sociability" and "The Third Place"

- Sprawled Out: "Are we turning into self-absorbed silos with little to no time to care about others?" Getting back "the third place"

 

The danger of rail

(From The Transportationist.)

The danger of rail:        

A wonderful quote turned up on the website: The Ponderings of Woodrow: on a blog post about bad predictions:

"Dear Mr. President: The canal system of this country is being threatened by a new form of transportation known as 'railroads' ... As you may well know, Mr. President, 'railroad' carriages are pulled at the enormous speed of 15 miles per hour by 'engines' which, in addition to endangering life and limb of passengers, roar and snort their way through the countryside, setting fire to crops, scaring the livestock and frightening women and children. The Almighty certainly never intended that people should travel at such breakneck speed." -- Martin Van Buren, Governor of New York, 1830

Another from a page: Famous Authoritative Pronouncements

"Rail travel at high speeds is not possible because passengers, unable to breathe, would die of asphyxia."
Dionysius Lardner, Professor of Natural Philosophy and Astronomy at University College, London, and author of The Steam Engine Explained and Illustrated

Finally:
Great Quotes from Great Skeptics

"What can be more palpably absurd than the prospect held out of locomotives traveling twice as fast as stagecoaches?"
- The Quarterly Review, England (March 1825)