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Comment by martneumann | Hacker News Reader

The first few are single family villas, the last four are multi family housing complexes.

For some │ │ │ │ │ │ │ │ │ │ │ │ │ │ │ │ │ │ │ │ │ xxx │ │ │ │ │ │ │ │ │ │ │ │ │ │ │ │ │ │ │ │ └─── reason, people in Europe back in the 60s believed that creating dense housing only units with no sense of scale, long commutes and walks and 100% car dependence was the way forward.

That experiment backfired almost everywhere. Some of these homes, both in Eastern and Western Europe are well connected via public transport, integrate commercial and residential zones and are fairly nice to live in. Most, however, are simply unhealthy for both the planet and the residents.

It's great to live in dense places; but its benefits are countered by huge, empty plazas that take 15 minutes to cross if I just want to walk to the next corner store.

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> For some reason, people in Europe back in the 60s believed that creating dense housing only units with no sense of scale, long commutes and walks and 100% car dependence was the way forward.

I saw a documentary about one of these projects. It was contemporary footage with interviews of regular people, asking what they thought about them. A woman gave an answer which I felt was very profound: "Who wants to live where you can't see your kids when they're playing outside?"

It just seems so jarringly obvious, how disconnected it is to sit up in a tower block, coming from someone who is probably used to be able to open the front door and be outside. Also it struck me how these areas are always associated in my mind with delinquency (having grown up around them). Perhaps it's just because the parents can't see their kids, duh.

I grew up in a courtyard style (but much larger, super-block style) area for much of my childhood. The outer box is one section of the compound. The inner boxes are tall apartment blocks. If you look out your front balcony you'll see your kids play with other kids and the older kids will watch out for the younger ones. The box with the 'x's in it is a massive courtyard (think a couple of your football fields) with trees and playgrounds and space for sports. It is encircled by a road that leaves at that top right area.

      ┌──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐ │ │ ┌────────────────────┐         ┌────────────────────────┐                │ │         │                        │                │ │         │                        │                │ │         │                        │                │ └────────────────────┘         └────────────────────────┘                │ │ ┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┬────────────   │ │               │ xxxx       xx           │               │ │     xxxxxx                      xxx       xxx          │   ┌───────┐   │ │    x     x                                 xx          │   │       │   │ │    x  xxxx                                             │   │       │   │ xx                        xxxxx    │   │       │   │ xxxx  xx             xxx     xxxx x    │   │       │   │ xx     xx             xxx       xxxx    │   │       │   │ xxxxxxx               xx               │   └───────┘   │ │               │ └────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘   ┌───────┐   │ │       │   │ ┌─────────────────────┐     ┌──────────────────────┐       │       │   │ │     │                      │       │       │   │ │     │                      │       │       │   │ │     │                      │       │       │   │ └─────────────────────┘     └──────────────────────┘       │       │   │ └───────┘   │ │ ───────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘

> For some reason, people in Europe back in the 60s believed that creating dense housing only units with no sense of scale, long commutes and walks and 100% car dependence was the way forward.

To be fair, there were pressing issues with large slums all across Europe at that time, and they needed to build lots of homes very quickly. I am not sure there were many alternative to blocks of flats back in the day. The problem is also not really high densities, because it also means that there is a local market for shops, restaurants, etc, which can make the neighbourhoods very walkable and nice. Most large projects had plans for things like cinemas, swimming pools, gyms, shops, and stuff. Often these were not built and instead there were these rows after rows of blocks of concrete.

Transport is a real problem, because these places became less and less attractive as they aged and became more and more isolated.

But smaller population densities would not have helped one bit with that. It would just have encouraged urban sprawl which is even worse in terms of public transport and walkability.

What you said is underappreciated in options on architecture. I'm as much of a critic of some themes as anyone, but it's fundamentally about designing within constraints.

One can dislike the result, but proposing alternatives that ignore the design constraints is disingenuous.

If countries need massive amount of housing but don't have time or money to build it... you're going to get a certain type of solution.

And it can be the best solution given those constraints and still an objectively bad solution.

Depends how it is executed.

I consider my neighbourhood in Western Europe a great modernist success:

Blocks are mostly around 7 floors high, with access organized vertically - each floor landing has typically 3 apartments around the lift/stairwell, so no 'streets in the sky'.

Plenty of shops (and entrances!) at ground level of each block.

Lots of parks, schools, trams, etc interspersed amongst the blocks.

Private balconies for all.

You're missing how some of those places were built with, or without, the necessary secondary support architecture that was specified in the original ideas.

For example, Communist-era housing blocks in Poland had standardised requirements for availability of grocery shops, healthcare, transportation, sport and recreation areas, etc. for each community built this way, and generally you never had to walk far to get to a grocery store in my experience. What was problematic is that due to worse processes at the time, it took years for green areas to get, well, green.

Corbusier and many places inspired by him seemed to have put the requirements, but often for various reasons those were stripped out - either due to subpar followers, or costs, or even outright malfeasance (one place I lived in had the design changed by builders while architects were on vacation, resulting in much maligned building)

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