The Show Horse and the Work Horse
granolashotgun.com
granolashotgun.com
You’ll see things like the “Sunday Farmers Market” that closes a block of a street somewhere because temporary event permits are much easier to get and harder to block, but the kind of semi-permanent marketplace described in the article remains rare.
And he’s right, cities don’t have a lot of incentive to try and make space for these sorts of entry level incubator environments because in most cases they can’t skim any tax off it - the underlying property is still just a parking lot and they usually can’t reassess the value for impermanent activities happening on top.
Putting flea markets in walking distant of everyone is a terrible logistical model.
If you've ever lived in a town where shops, parks, living quarters, and government buildings are cheek-by-jowl within walking distance, a "zoned" area feels like a desert - unable to sustain life.
This is intentional. You shred the fabric of society, then you can let companies sell all of it back to people and tax the value.
No tax revenue when your Auntie cools lunch for the neighborhood kids.
Often, when they do, it is either:
(1) Because of state funding specifically for rural counties, which amounts to a revenue transfer from urban counties, or
(2) Because the rural town is in a county with, and deriving revenue from, a city, funding county libraries in the rural town as well as the city.
Even more often, tiny rural towns don't have public libraries, and you have to go to a neighboring town or the nearest city.
I think your bias is showing.
I have lived in rural, suburban, and dense urban areas in my life (currently high density urban), and there is a bias on HN toward the idea that rural communities are unsustainable on their own and mere leeches on the city dwellers. That's likely true in some places, but not universally. Sustainable rural communities have exports of resources, housing, and/or tourism, that outweigh their cost.
As the parent comment describes, one model for remote communities is volunteers who work at the library because they care. The cost of everything is lower -- labor, food, matetials -- so what looks too expensive for a town might actually be fully sustainable.
The sustainable rural community is exceedingly rare - most are propped up by ag subsidies and state aid. For much of the central part of America, there's no housing benefit or tourism to speak of, just resources (corn/soy in general, maybe livestock).
You then counter by saying that's wrong and actually small towns have a small library that has a crappy selection but they can get you any book you want if you can wait.
Pop quiz hotshot: Where do you think there is enough built up infrastructure, wealth, and surplus labor capacity to have a large centralized store of books and to organize and distribute said books?
Probably just another small town, am I right?
Cities cost money. Lots of it.
The problem with direct democracy is that the people who have the most time to waste (or the most money at stake) on playing politics are the ones who show up. It's also why your HOA is probably governed by a hand-picked selection of devils from the Fifth Circle of Hell.
Tons of perfectly fine things that don't really bother anyone are not allowed because wealthy people don't like the aesthetics.
That's not inherent though. A nice French brocante sale basically sells tat, but its nice and acceptable.
I don't think its impossible that this flea market could become a hipster hang out. One of the eateries starts making a name for itself, and people start seeking it out. It isn't just poor people that want a functioning high st.
Edit: Spelling
Reminds me of Camden market
Isn't TFA a wealthy guy raving about how great the flea market is? Clearly a lot of wealthy folk do like the aesthetics.
Parking lot flea markets are exactly 'tactical urbanism' in the same mode as pop-up bike and bus lanes -- the repurposing of car storage for more economically valuable and human-centric use, and (us) urbanist types should talk about them more often!
Why would someone make counter tops from permeable stone? That's idiotic. There are stone materials like granite that are impermeable. Besides, why is marble high-status? You can get that stuff at Home Depot.
My own countertops are inch thick glazed fired ceramic tiles, from the 1960s. Same material as those indestructible walls schools and gyms used to use. Fifty years of use have not marked them, they can be cleaned with strong cleaners, and they are unaffected by contact with hot pans.
I'm coming around to the opinion that modern mid-quality laminate is actually the best all-around countertop material. Cheap, easy to self-install (making it yet cheaper). No maintenance. Softish, which I consider a bonus. I hate granite and other stones, having to always take great care placing anything breakable (glass, ceramic) on them. Only downside to laminate is that it signals cheap/poor, which does kinda matter when, say, selling a house. And you can't put hot stuff on it, I guess. That's about it.
Nice problem to have I guess!
[1] https://www.housebeautiful.com/uk/decorate/kitchen/news/a134...
We know how to build more and more of these "town centres" - we used to find them at the centre of almost all towns. The problem is it's not something governments can do or force - it's something they allow, and don't strangle.
It's waaaaay harder.
It is what evolves naturally until it is stretched out of existence by roads and car journeys, or bored to death by same-old franchises that suck revenue back to HQ
It involves ending the nice suburban compromise ( ala StrongTowns) and that is probably a bigger change to modern Western lifestyles than almost anything.
How could we all move back into city-level densities?
> So why don’t local governments embrace more of this sort of pop up grass roots mom and pop enterprise? Officials are in a trap that requires them to boost tax revenue to pay for all the attenuated infrastructure and municipal overhead that’s accumulated for decades. Highly functional flea markets don’t generate enough cash surplus to skim. So municipalities are obliged to search for show horses with all the associated prestige, complexity, and expense. ...
Those local governments probably bought into the Growth Ponzi Scheme and are now trapped in an endless cycle of megacorp courthship that with each iteration further destroys the means for the area to survive independently:
https://www.mrmoneymustache.com/2015/04/28/what-does-your-wo...
But yeah, unfortunately theres only so many ways you can get tell someone to not spend money.
You still have the same stigma attached with them, and being honest they are sometimes not for the faint hearted. A lot of them are similar in they are hosted in old car parks or industrial brown sites.
However a bargain can always be had; 24 pack of just expired Duracell AA batteries, mahogony furniture from a house clearance, old style lightbulbs etc.
It's almost funny how any plaintext/simple web page like this one is the same way.
How many really well laid out kitchens have you been in, where you have adequate prep space, and the fridge, cooker and sink are in sensible positions?
Kitchens are generally designed to look nice, not be practical unfortunately.
Right, but anything involving substantial marble surfaces in a ktichen, as in the article, is both expensive and impractical.
The Cathedral takes decades to build and is fragile , while the Bazaar is quick to assemble and resilient.
I’m flabbergasted by this comment. How can people accept living like this?