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Originally Posted by Restless 1
Yeah, you chopped that up quite a bit.
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Cevallos definitely had retail on the first floor but it was converted to residential after the small grocery store concept went bust.
As for residential wanting to be on the first floor, I would be open to it, depending on the street its on.... There could be some benefits too, fewer stairs, potentially opening up to a small yard that I could let the dog out to.
We were walking around downtown yesterday and noticed how many vacant buildings there were (sometimes the first floor is occupied but upper floors are vacant) and I was thinking about how they could be turned into residential. I think one of the things we suck in the US with mixed use is not being obnoxious. We live next to a convenience store and people love to have the bass bumping at all hours of the night. People walk around downtown and in walkable areas with bars yelling in the middle of the night. People love riding bikes with extremely loud sound systems through downtown. I won't say that doesn't happen in Europe, but people seem to be a lot more respectful of the fact that other people live next to the bar, restaurant or shop you're leaving at 1 in the morning. I guess part of it is most people in the US grow up in environments where they have there own space, whether that be a large lot in the suburbs or a single occupancy vehicle commuting to work and, as a culture, we aren't very good at sharing space respectfully.