Comment by overkill28 | Hacker News Reader

Comment by overkill28 | Hacker News Reader

> "For years, urban developers have been talking about “15-minute cities”—accessible downtown neighborhoods where residents can satisfy just about every food, drink, beauty, entertainment, and fitness need with a short walk or bike ride. Logically, as more 30-somethings relocate to the suburbs, real-estate developers will chase their needs by pouring money into a constellation of 15-minute suburban town centers. The downtown office building’s loss will be the suburban developer’s gain."

Nobody I know who's moving to the suburbs is doing it to buy a loft apartment and bike everywhere. They're all entering or already in child rearing years and buying houses with yards and cars. As much as people talk about wanting to live in dense walkable neighborhoods, and as much as I wish we could build denser suburbs, the American dream of a lush lawn and big comfortable car is very much alive with millennials.

And more practically, where are you going to build these walkable suburbs? All the prime space of of the inner ring is already built out, and existing "street car suburbs" have already been popular, affluent and expensive for years.

Yup. Most of our cities continue to be terrible for walkability despite significant progress in the past decade. Pedestrians are still killed on side streets due to vehicles travelling well beyond 40km/h, for instance.

Living in the city with children can be very desirable. You may have a small (or no backyard), but the city is your playground. Public parks, pools, trails, and so much more.

But the lack of people-focused planning for generations has put us in a long tail of catchup, leaving the burbs as a preferred choice for many.

Yup, Walkability doesn’t appear from one or two single developer projects, I think the city has to shape projects for decades.

Though in my region, a couple of small classic downtown areas are hoping to a keep some permanent pedestrian streets that were turned that way during the pandemic..

The main issue is schools. In places like SF it's very challenging.

> Living in the city with children can be very desirable. You may have a small (or no backyard), but the city is your playground. Public parks, pools, trails, and so much more.

Have you been to the cities lately? We just left Seattle; the public parks and trails were overrun with tents and needles. The school district is allowing homeless drug addicts to live on school property. The city council appears to have no interest in the quality of life of children and their families.

This sums up inner Portland as well. It wasn't the case before 2020, though. I like to think it's a temporary state of affairs. The things that make the city an attractive place for families are still there, structurally. They're just covered with a lot of garbage at the moment.

>And more practically, where are you going to build these walkable suburbs? All the prime space of of the inner ring is already built out, and existing "street car suburbs" have already been popular, affluent and expensive for years.

How about you retrofit existing suburbs? Fill in large spaces with mixed development, construct new public transportation, etc.

Downtown Melbourne Florida is seeing luxury development, food, shopping, nightlife, etc. It's a 100k town with a redeveloped historic downtown. These cities/towns are the sweet spot for WFH right now.

That’s interesting, do you have any other cities like that in mind?

I would look at any city with around 100k population and a historic revitalized downtown, I found mine so I don't really need to look for others, but it should not be too hard. We have aerospace industry here which helps, so also see if there is a commercial backbone. Good luck!

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