Suburbia is dumb and New Urbanism is better, we know this.

“I think the whole place looks like a creepy movie set and way too sterile.” When I first saw the pics of New Town, I immediately thought of Edward Scissorhands. Anywho, I grew up in Glendale, a podunk bedroom ‘burb wedged between Webster Groves and Kirkwood. Parking on the streets at night would get you a ticket. Of course, there was (and is) virtually no crime. At all. Except for the incident in which a mentally ill man murdered his parents, about ten years ago.

have you seen this book Steve?
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1884829988/ref=nosim/0sil8

And from Casselberry, Florida, “City officials say the ordinance is part of an ongoing effort to ‘revitalize’ the city, improve a downtrodden image and increase property values. The language of the ordinance calls [commercial] vehicles ‘visual blight.’ The mayor’s term: ‘commercial intrusion.’ ‘We’re just trying to make ourselves look a little better,’ Mayor Charlene Glancy, who is a Realtor, said last week.
http://www.tampabay.com/news/humaninterest/article1017802.ece

“Are people selecting the suburban subdivision because they is what they want or are people buying in them because they are the current perception of the ideal living environment? Has anyone given it much thought?” Unfortunately, the answers are yes, yes and yes. Developers may be “evil money grubbers”, but they have figured out that people want 3-car garages and are willing to pay for them. If most buyers wanted purple lawn ornaments, guess what, we’d see a lot more purple lawn ornaments. People are buying into a combination of “better” schools, more “security”, more rules to “protect” the value of their investment and the ability to both store and show off their vehicular toys.

We urbanistas are a true minority, willing to walk over driving, to use public transit, to live in areas with fewer guarantees, to live in homes that need constant maintenance and repairs, and to live with both the upsides and the downsides that true, urban living brings, including, horrors, on-street parking. Does that make us “better” or more “right” than people who choose the suburbs? I dunno – I believe that life is full of choices and that we each choose what we think is best for us at whatever stage of life we might be in.

The only “valid” argument I’ve heard over the years, for both parking restrictions and wider streets, is that too many parked vehicles can obstruct access by fire trucks. In a few areas, the solution has been the purchase of smaller fire trucks (duh!), but in most, the answer remains this . . .

they cant have street trees because it would obstruct the sight of a repetitive streetscape of identical 3 car garages

Charley–when we were trying to get rid of a problem property on the corner, I think I recall it was commercial pick up trucks (and then, only, if the owner didn’t live on the block–enforcement seems spotty). I could be wrong. But I remember fighting over whether cabs counted as commercial vehicles or not.

This post is so depressing. My sister in law lives in a similar suburban place, except it’s a “suburb” of a town of 2500 in southern Illinois. She’s not actually a suburb–it’s just a neighborhood set up to look that way. I don’t know–maybe people do want that. But I think people want that because, for the most part, they’ve been told they want that. I like bucking that, but not everyone does.

I think Jimmy Z has a valid point. Developers and city planners don’t sit around trying to find ways to sabatoge walkable neighborhoods. Most regulations/building codes are the result of some perceived conflict or hazard.

A couple practical reasons for the no street trees and no on-street parking:
1. the space between the street and sidewalk may be a utility easement with various underground utility lines – not compatible with tree roots.
2. On street parking can reduce visibility and increase the risk of kids darting out from between cars and being hit. Ideally, narrow streets/parked cars help slow traffic, but not always.

So the task is not to judge one style as ‘better’ than another, but to find a way to balance the desire for a more walkable/less sterile neighborhood with the practical concerns above – this obvioulsy requires open communication and education.

Just my opinion.

[slp -- on-street parking is allowed during the day when kids might be playing, just not overnight. Utilities are often in the back or under the road surface.]

Perhaps the prohibition against overnight street parking is to serve as a deterrent from residents parking clunkers/project cars/non-running vehicles there for extended periods of time. This would also lend itself to the mandatory three car garage, to have enough space to keep all household vehicles off of the street (mom, pop, and son/daughter/spare car). Alternate reasoning could also be that since the streets are owned by the subdivision, anything happening to the cars overnight could be a potential lawsuit, either from the vehicle owner (someone broke into my car while it was on subdivision property…I’m suing!) or from another motorist (there was a car parked right in the street in the middle of the night! I couldn’t see it, and ran right into it! I’m suing!) As a ninja, I’ve stubbed my toe on many street parked cars while skulking around in the dead of night, and I can tell you firsthand, it’s no laughing matter…

The overnight parking ban is probably for aesthetics, and also to keep people from having guests over too late. The lack of street trees is first an attempt to keep people from driving into trees, second shows their lack of concern about people using the sidewalks (wait, people use sidewalks?), and third perhaps a concern about who would rake up the leaves should they fall onto the street.

As for the “just as ridiculous” rules in New Town, I’m pretty sure that the gated community has the exact same ridiculous rules — and more, as we’ve found.