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Comment by sfjailbird | Hacker News Reader

I first assumed these were concept photoshops of what suburban concrete could be made to look like. Never seen anything like it before.

https://img.washingtonpost.com/wp-apps/imrs.php?src=https://...

Beautiful, scenic, futuristic. But it does not look like a place I would ever want to live in. It really does look brutal, it almost has a fascist vibe.

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I personally think it's gorgeous, but it stands and falls with the people who live there.

It's just like I sometimes see pictures of what in the US are ghetto suburbs and I think: this could actually be a lovely neighbourhood. (As a European who has lived all his live in densely populated urban environments it baffles me how people can't turn a neighbourhood where everyone has a free standing house with a yard into a pleasant place to live.)

As a European, I must assume you're familiar with the ghettos of Eastern Europe, and those in Paris as well. The question applies equally to those locations, as it might to Rio, Manila, Mexico City, Delhi, Jakarta or Detroit.

> It really does look brutal, it almost has a fascist vibe.

Reminds me of a documentary I saw once on the plans for Germania, Hitler's proposed capital: everything out of human scope, sending the message that men are the mites of the state.

Yet, I look at some recent buildings, I don't see why they are succeeding while these did not. Maybe its a question of location and not just the looks, or the quality of the individual units or just the nature of the inhabitants.

Of course you wouldn't, judging by your nickname you pay >$2K for a small bedroom in a shared apartment. Pictured in the article are public housing, rent is couple hundred euros per whole flat.

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