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PaperclipPerfector  1yr ago (text post)   29397 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of July 31, 2023

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You need to drop off kids to school because walking and biking are either unsafe or impossible on suburban roads.

I grew up in suburbs and walked to elementary schools and biked to middle school and high school. I was driven to school a single digit number of times K through 12.

Same response to any claim about suburban kids lacking independence. I had a bicycle, my mom wasn't driving me around. I was so self actualized as a suburban kid.

The last three suburban homes I've lived in were an easy walk from grocery stores with bakeries. I'm baffled by the alleged lack of fresh bread availability. I go to Costco, but I don't exclusively go to Costco. I went for a walk with my son last night and he said he wanted to go to the grocery store but I didn't have my wallet on me.

Even in Dallas I remember biking/walking to 7-11 to get a slurpee as a kid. In Fort Worth I regularly walk to the grocery store in good weather, or sometimes to the donut shop or whatever. These were standard suburban sprawl, not particularly walkable neighborhoods. ‘Kids can’t go anywhere without being driven’ is at least as much about parental neuroticism as it is about urban design. Yes there’s a feedback loop, but if Americans were less lazy and neurotic they’d walk/bike to places, and making the neighborhood more suited to walking won’t make them stop being lazy and neurotic unless you just make it impossible to use a car.

How long are / were the distances to closest stores and such?

As a kid? A mile or two to 7-11. I could and did walk in 20 minutes or so; no one else did because they were lazy or had neurotic parents(it involved crossing a busy street). Heck I remember as a younger child walking- with an adult- across the literal busiest non-highway in Dallas to go to the library(a mile ish, I guess). The fact that I was able to do this with my grandparents when they were in their late sixties and early seventies indicates that it's generally doable, but most people just don't want to.

Nowadays closer, but with more busy street crossings. I do see people walking or biking more often in my current neighborhood, but I live in a much poorer area than I grew up in- class differences might be a major factor both because gas is expensive and because poor people let their kids walk to QT or the donut shop or whatever on their own if they want something(to be clear, I'm an adult, but see lots of tweens/early teens walking off to things in my not-particularly-walkable neighborhood).

Can you share the general region you grew up in ? Super interested. I am trying to build my own list of good neighborhoods in the US.

Various west coast towns.

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