Quote:
Originally Posted by wong21fr
I don't give two shits about where people live- it's there choice. But I can deride the development as wasteful suburban shit that's no longer the best way of doing things. Times change and, unfortunately, land use generally doesn't in the built environment thanks to our zoning rules. We move past the old way in different sectors. The 707 was a great platform in the 1960's, now it's shit and no one would think of developing an airliner in the same way. The M-16 was a brilliant service rifle that is now crap that is being gifted off to third world armies as it's no longer the best way of killing things. Levittown was a brilliant (if extremely racist) development model to take advantage of the gifts that our government gave the millions of veterans who secured America's dominance in the world after WW2, today it's a shit way of building housing and is still considered the de facto way of housing the populace. It's time is past, but we aren't tearing it down the building better things in it's place. Instead it hangs around like a festering wound that won't heal.
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Wonderful job of putting into your own words most of what I was trying to communicate. Things do tend to change (a lot) over time. What happened two decades ago may already be 'out of style' but that's life.
That's why Lone Tree is a nice example of an updated suburban approach to density as well as being a walk and bike friendly place. It sounds to me that Lone Tree will better utilize mixed use components than Stapleton did and yes, "urbanism" was well-known when that development began.
One of the issues is that lots of families still prefer single family homes. In fact that is what made Stapleton so popular and successful, no? Most people, (if they're over 30) can't wait to get home after work. It may be for the peace and security, it may be the desire to connect with family, go watch the kids play soccer etc. For neighborhoods that have nice open space and bike/ped trails that's even more desirable.
So far as land use goes there's more than one way to slice a pineapple although one usually starts by slicing off the top and bottom. But from there you have any number of choices.
I wouldn't consider open space to be inefficient and it's often incorporated as a part of drainage and flood control. If people still want single family homes then builders are going to build them. Jurisdictions are going to respond to what people want and since I still believe in free will that's how it should be. I don't think you'll find small homes on larger lots any longer though.
There's no shortage of land out there TBH and if employment clusters are dispersed it's not even inefficient. Even Aurora which is largely a bedroom community has good access to both downtown and the SE business corridor including light rail access to both areas. What's not to like? I know 'urbanists' forget how important the 'nuts and bolts' side of life is but all those (future) warehouses and light industrial developments out near DIA are just as important as cheeky downtown Denver is. Putting more residential development nearby is an efficient use of the land.
All that said everybody is entitled to hold to their own prejudices and dogma.