Post: #1

There seems to be a decent amount of discussion on here about town planning. I thought it would be a good idea to start a thread to put our thoughts, opinions and ideas on the subject in one place.

Personally, living in Britain, I can see that unplanned cities are the norm, but this wasnt the case throughout human history. Human settlements are meant to be planned and designed. Every so often they need to be redesigned, the more often this happens the more efficient the settlement.

In the Anglosphere atleast, every city and town is basically the same, unplanned sprawl, chaotic and disorganised and difficult to get around and enjoy.

For this reason, I think cities are better if organised something like a grid. Main roads can take cars across the cities, but large 1kmx1km squares of residential areas would be car-free with more green spaces.

Anyway, the above is my two-cents. Feel free to add your own.

Post: #2

Posted about the blight of unplanned cities in this thread a while back:

https://www.rooshvforum.com/thread-73612.html

The biggest problem with modern day towns/cities is the omnipresence of cars. There's a great book called Geography of Nowhere that details how cars lower quality of life for everyone in the area. Most of the time they're completely unnecessary if urban planning was carried out, as public transport should cover 99% of one's travel needs. The fact that individuals need cars is pretty much absurd - unless you live in the middle of nowhere a car is simply not necessary.

My solution would be that in dense residential areas, personal cars are banned, the only traffic being allowed from public transport buses and commercial vehicles (i.e supermarket trucks/electrician vans). The net effect is that everyone is happier, walks more, and has more spontaneous interactions with their fellow villagers. All critical businesses would be located in the center of town (market), with manufacturing and other large-scale industries relegated to the outer fringes/countryside. Everything would be accessible by public transport.

Let me know what else would be important to include in planning, curious what you guys think.

Post: #3

Interesting points JiggyLordJr but what about groceries? People prefer to load their groceries in their car after shopping. Then drive to their home to unload the groceries from the car preferably in their personal garage or on the driveway in their front yard.

Post: #4

(08-29-2019 06:11 AM)Meliorare93 Wrote:  Interesting points JiggyLordJr but what about groceries? People prefer to load their groceries in their car after shopping. Then drive to their home to unload the groceries from the car preferably in their personal garage or on the driveway in their front yard.

That is purely from the standpoint of not wanting to carry groceries - if you live close enough to the market, or if accessible by public transport, this should really be a non-issue. How hard is it to carry two tote bags worth of food home? Where I'm living, personal vehicles aren't allowed in the city center, and no one seems to have a problem bringing groceries back to their place. A week's grocery trip for me (a single guy) takes up less than one large tote bag, mostly because I eat clean and don't stuff my bag with trash food. In the rare case that you really have a huge order (say for an event your hosting/BBQ/holiday), you can pay for delivery, have people help you carry, or make multiple spaced-out trips. But other than that, l"oading groceries into your car" is just a American-basedbconvenience that is seldom practiced in any well-planned city. I think it's somewhat of a Walmart phenomenon, as people would be reluctant to carry their 12 pack of poison soda several miles back to their place; hell - many of these communities don't even have sidewalks to do so.

At the end of the day, this issue boils down to poor planning - grocery stores too far away from most people's residence - and a majority shit diet - people buying way too much garbage that they would be unable to carry. These are both highly solvable problems.

Post: #5

Relevant videos from Black Pigeon Speaks:

Post: #6

Britain has a long tradition of town planning, OP. It was the birthplace of the Garden City movement, an effort to create small, self-sufficient satellite towns of a pre-determined population and land use mix to accommodate overflow from big cities.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Garden_city_movement

In their ideal form, Garden Cities included nature preserves, agriculture, an employment base and affordable housing. Unfortunately, the market doesn't care about ideals, and the first prototypes became unaffordable to the lower and middle classes they were designed for. Many modified towns vaguely inspired by the Garden Cities movement were built all over the world, but they usually morphed into bedroom suburbs without the employment base and nature preserves originally designed by Ebenezer Howard.

As the automobile became popular, the need to plan cities well became less of a priority because people driving in cars don't really care about quality urban design. They care about getting from A to B as quickly as possible - and in fact, small, unique blocks and people-oriented places (like Boston) tend to slow traffic down, annoying residents and giving traffic engineers heartburn.

In general, European cities are far superior to their American counterparts because they were designed before the automobile. Great places are designed for people, not for automobiles, and most of the charming narrow alleys, pedestrian courtyards and narrow hilly streets of Europe are outright illegal to build in America due to land use regulations and traffic engineering requirements.