Best of both worlds
Surburbia is an attempt to bring together the benefits of the city and countryside. This at best creates a compromise between the city and rural life. It tries to be free of the dirt, noise and unhealthiness of the city as well as the toil, strife and boredom associated with rural life. It tries to provide the luxuries and excitement of the city and the peace and repose of the countryside.
The suburbs become this place of no place (utopia?). It has a feeling of neither here nor there. It is the larger manifestation of junkspace, being born of a commercial origin. It is a mythology developed to sell houses and create a commodity out of land, posing as an idyllic landscape for an idealized life.
This compromise is at best a compromise. Suburbia has been done poorly. It is a beautiful idea, but it is not satisfying to the human spirit, because it creates an artificial isolation. But what are the alternatives? Should it go back to the peaceful landscape it once was or does it need to gain density until the city is omnipresent?
Maybe the real question is whether suburbia can be done well? There are many examples of how it has been done badly, especially the cookie cutter homes that get built overnight. What if the same pattern of development was used, but could offer more variance and possibilities within that landscape? Isn't this what all the suburban retrofits aim to do?
The suburbs become this place of no place (utopia?). It has a feeling of neither here nor there. It is the larger manifestation of junkspace, being born of a commercial origin. It is a mythology developed to sell houses and create a commodity out of land, posing as an idyllic landscape for an idealized life.
This compromise is at best a compromise. Suburbia has been done poorly. It is a beautiful idea, but it is not satisfying to the human spirit, because it creates an artificial isolation. But what are the alternatives? Should it go back to the peaceful landscape it once was or does it need to gain density until the city is omnipresent?
Maybe the real question is whether suburbia can be done well? There are many examples of how it has been done badly, especially the cookie cutter homes that get built overnight. What if the same pattern of development was used, but could offer more variance and possibilities within that landscape? Isn't this what all the suburban retrofits aim to do?
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