Comment by shados | Hacker News Reader

Comment by shados | Hacker News Reader

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> and that requires changing peoples' minds

Yup, and that is straightforward, if time and money consuming. Changing zoning isn't enough: making an area denser without appropriate matching infrastructure investment isn't going to go well. If you want the next Tokyo or Paris (or even something significantly smaller), you need Tokyo or Paris' infra.

Then the next problem is that people can't stand each other. People don't want neighbors because neighbors are a pain. It's a problem everywhere, but in the west, the US has it particularly bad. I don't know about Cali, but in a lot of cities the building code is a total joke, and Americans are known to be LOUD. City rules are rarely enforced properly, either. So the only option you have is to prevent neighbors from moving in in the first place. That's easily fixed: better construction quality and clearer, enforced rules that make coexisting easier and nicer, alongside investments to keep the area from going down the shitter.

Do that for a while, and people just won't mind. Having moved from a dense city in another country to a medium sized American metro made me "appreciate" why NIMBYs are such a problem here. Living near people can become a nightmare real quick if you're not lucky.

I cannot agree with this enough. The building code is wildly out of whack with reality.

Noise: All of my neighbors should be able to have active, stomping, marching band in each of their units, and I not hear a single peep. Contrast with reality: In every apartment I've ever lived in normal /quiet/ walking, sink use, and even bathroom fans were audible in other units.

Air quality: Smokers, "Marry Jane" users I think all who don't smoke can agree with; but I also dislike vaping, perfumes, and dryer scents. They make it hard for me to breath and irritate me (I think in both the medical and psychological sense). Scrubbed, negative draw exhausts are required for all of those things. Have a designated smoking room. Also have designated clean air intakes that supply positive pressure to the hallways and units (in that order) and proper door seals.

Also, yes, build a TOKYO grade subway that connects to parking silos in the outskirts. Then go ahead and ban (most) cars from the city. But ONLY in that order. Don't ban the cars first.

Lots of people agreeing, so I just want to say this: if people don't want neighbors, then they should buy the land surrounding them for the FMV. Abusing various laws to get the benefits of purchasing the property/land without having done so is a complete jerk move. And there's no debating that.

Source: from the Midwest in a very rural area. Someone moved in right next to my parents. They aren't happy, but nothing they could do about it (while remaining a responsible human, a productive member of society, and not a worthless mooch) - they didn't have the money to buy the lot, so it is what it is.

Before people start talking about strip clubs next to schools or factories dumping waste into the aquifers. These neighbors are well within their by-right zoning regulations. They just have a house, and they just happened to buy the lot right next to my parents'. In California, it would have been perfectly acceptable for my parents to tie that development up for 20+ years with all sorts of ridiculousness. But in by-right zoning states, you just get housing built and move on because that's how the real world works.

> People don't want neighbors because neighbors are a pain.

> LOUD

Sound is very much the problem. I don't want a huge amount of land, I don't want lawn, I don't want landscaping, I definitely don't want a neighborhood association, but what I do want is good soundproofing and no shared walls (or worse, floors/ceilings). In practice, there's no soundproofing that can substitute for an air gap.

In practice there are a lot of soundproofings that can substitute for an air-gap, but the cheapest soundproofing to meet code (resilient channels) is useless:

Resilient channels basically work by fixing horizontal metal strips to the studs, and then hanging the drywall on the strips with clips. Because there is purposefully play in the connection, vibrations cannot easily transfer from drywall to stud to drywall.

Why doesn't it work? As soon as anyone nails or screws or otherwise attaches something into the stud through the drywall (say a shelf), the drywall is now mechanically connected to the stud again.

The proper fix is to have a separate frame for each dwelling unit, preferably with fiberglass insulation. This essentially doubles the cost of inter-unit walls, so it is less popular. My parents live in a townhouse constructed in this manner, and if they dial up the volumes on the movie to 11, the subwoofer can cause pictures to rattle on the neighbor's walls, but audible sound is nearly zero.

> In practice there are a lot of soundproofings that can substitute for an air-gap

To clarify, I did indeed mean "no soundproofing in widespread common use", rather than "no physically possible soundproofing". And thanks for the great explanation!

> The proper fix is to have a separate frame for each dwelling unit, preferably with fiberglass insulation. This essentially doubles the cost of inter-unit walls, so it is less popular. My parents live in a townhouse constructed in this manner, and if they dial up the volumes on the movie to 11, the subwoofer can cause pictures to rattle on the neighbor's walls, but audible sound is nearly zero.

That does indeed sound like the correct fix. How would you know if a potential apartment has such construction? How would it be advertised? What would it take to promote a standard/certification for that?

I think that level of soundproofing would make a substantial difference in people's willingness to live in anything more efficient than a standalone building.

No clue how that would be advertised. My parents own rather than rent, and they specifically checked for that before purchasing.

There are standards for sound-proofing, but they are construction standards, they require a particular amount of sound isolation, and resilient channel passes the current standards (since it gives "okay" levels of soundproofing at construction time, even though later modifications are almost certain to nullify that).

Sounds like those standards need to be improved, then. What would it take to do that, in a major geographical area, for new construction? I think that would make a major difference in the acceptability of new high-density housing.

One thing that has bugged me is why don't they use concrete construction in US, like we have in India and most of Europe? Concrete construction would definitely eliminate the noisy neighbor problem to a very high degree (unless they are drilling into the concrete wall, you cannot hear them).

Or good old bricks. But the answer is simply because the industry is set up to build two very distinct kinds of building in the US. Big, multi-story, high-margin, safe skyscraper stuff (high rises, or other big commercial buildings, with fancy pre/post stressed concrete, full of artisanal rebar - I mean really, some column specialist civil engineer calculated the stuff) and the complete opposite, which is relatively low-cost low-margin single-family houses.

Sure, there are others, it's always a continuum. But this is probably a significant factor.

I disagree on "unless they are drilling into the concrete wall you cannot hear them" A solid concrete wall better than drywall/stud/drywall for sound but still conducts sound relatively well.

Now usually a fascia of some sort is applied to the concrete and what is used affects the sound transmission. If you plaster over the concrete, for example, you get much better sound insulation than if you just paint the bare concrete.

Sometimes drywall is placed over furring strips to leave room for electrical work and this even better.

Another child comment mentioned brick, and all of the above is true for brick as well, though I believe mortared brick conducts sound better than poured masonry, and AAC conducts sound better than either.

As a further hiccup, I live in california, and the earthquake regulations greatly slow the innovation in building. In order for a new construction technique to be approved, someone has to pay the money to demonstrate that it is seismically sound.

> If you want the next Tokyo or Paris (or even something significantly smaller), you need Tokyo or Paris' infra.

But for that infra to make sense, you also need the zoning. Running a subway line through predominately single-family home neighborhoods makes no sense.

Realistically though, you don't need a lot of new infra for going from SFH-only zoning to moderate density housing like fourplexes and townhomes. Better options for walking and biking, maybe more bus routes (bus-only lanes?) would suffice.

Electric buses and bus lanes are probably able to solve 90% of the problems with public transportation. Bus stops/routes are easy to plop down, and move if demand is changing.

Lot of people complain about crazy people on buses, but this might be a US thing, but anyhow, it's not like it's impossible to introduce a simple way to manage this problem. (From simple disturbance fines to simply giving the right to the driver to suspend anyone from travel. Of course watch out for overzealous/racist/anti-whatever drivers.)

> the right to the driver to suspend anyone from travel

That wouldn't fly in the US. The moment you ban someone from anything, someone will find a way to push why it was wrong to do. But yeah, I haven't that issue in other countries.

Another issue with buses are cities with streets that are too small. In some US cities, drivers already have to do miracles to get buses through.

I lived in an apartment in London and couldn't hear my neighbours if I shut my windows. It was all steel and concrete, though, not the flimsy shit that passes for American new build.

Yup absolutely. My dinky shitty rent controlled poor neighborhood apartment in Canada was better built (by a LOT) than my expensive new construction in the US. Im so sick of being involved in all my neighbors private conversations.

Interesting, I haven't had this issue really in a dense US city, even near enough to an airport to also hear every plane. Neighbors aren't bad, guess it just depends on the city.

It will depend on what you're used to, but AFAIK, virtually every city in the US has a noise complain/non-emergency police number/311/whatever where these type of complains are some of the most reported issues.

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