Here's an interesting article. A strip mall wants to keep buses out.
> They claim safety, liability, etc. But the thought is maybe's its an
> attempt to keep out people from the city (i.e. blacks). In reality,
> it's probably because people who ride buses in suburban Buffalo don't
> buy very much.
>
>
formatting link
I guess that explains why so many strip malls are laid out to make walking unlikely. And people laugh at me when I say we need to stop building in such a way that we force additional gas consumption. I guess when gas prices get so high people won't be able to afford to drive around the mall and shop too, things will change.
When I studied planning at Toronto in the mid 1970s, one of the case studies of "exclusion by transport" was a major mall in North Toronto that had specifically refused to consider a subway link -- even though the line passed close by -- because the developers wanted to actively discourage customers who couldn't afford to own a car.
(I was at UofT just after the 1970s' oil crisis; the mall owners by then were whining that the city wasn't doing enough to extend the subway to the mall... It's been over 30 years, and I've forgotten the name of the mall.)
Men drive to one store when they want to buy something. They seldom go from store to store shopping. Men tend to hate shopping.
Women go to large shopping malls more so that they can walk around and shop at narrow stores. Women of course also shop at strip malls, but I have not seen many women driving from store to store.
You appear to just be fabricating a lie to justify those deadly diesel busses that degrade the health and life span of so many people.
Sort of like your other childish nonsense about gasoline prices. Every car company is developing hybrid cars for alternative fuels and lots of money is going into the development so that rich people can grab a big chunk of the six trillion dollar per year market for fuel. The price of hybrid fuels is expected be far less than gasoline.
I invite you to come to our local strip mall and try to get from Barnes and Noble to PetSmart without driving, and see how much I'm lying. This sort of strip mall is repeated thousands of times across the USA.
There's a picture of one on the cover of this book
formatting link
It's not the one in my town, but the stores and structure are recognizably the same.
I'm really curious, Jack. Why are you so terrified that people might be able to live in an environment where they could drive less?
ISTM developers of suburban retail centers are only focused on customers who arrive by cars or trucks. Customers who ride buses (like pedestrians) are limited to purchase that they can carry -
I am not terrified, its just a far less desirable life pushed by people with the Technology Laggard mental condition. I have a lot of experience with people that are mentally screwed up with this condition in multiple technology areas.
They all act the same way. They lie a lot and have great difficulty dealing with reality. They are not fun and I prefer to avoid these troubled people. All that can be done is to correct them in the futile hope that they can ever become rational in normal society.
"Jack May" wrote in news:8OednT1gxdLyJlzVnZ2dnUVZ snipped-for-privacy@comcast.com:
Hence, WalMart. I usually get most of my produce elsewhere, but I can get just about everything I need in one trip.
Not a lie, just a speculation. And erally, that sort of stpping and starting
*does* wreak havoc with one's gas mileage. WHich is why car mfgr.s have stoppoed citing *city* MPG estimates, and only advertise *highway* mpg estimates.
I suggested electric (solar-ercharged) shuttles (which would be doable) - but regardless of fuel/power-supply, those open air plazas remain, IMO, an annoying pain in the bucket, and I avoid them whenever possible. The exception is the local Lowe's/pool supply store/HEB (big grocery with good produce).
"Jack May" wrote in news:dqSdnScZhuJKmF_VnZ2dnUVZ snipped-for-privacy@comcast.com:
Hmmm. I like all sorts of tech - tech improves medical diagnosis and treatment, improves quality of live, keeps my house insulated and cooler, powers my 4GB of RAM, allows me to ahve a nearly-zero-maintenence pool, and so on.
But I loathe driving, and esp. loathe driving through strip malls trying to find some store (esp. when I can get the same thing online, or when the local stores don't even carry the item I want).
I also prefer a parking garage with areas of trees preserved (esp. when I can walk in shade from the parking, to the store/mall) (which means a lot durint hte SUmmer in the Houston area and other Southern cities/towns), to acres of hot parking lots where you have to make long hikes from the car over a baking black desoalte stretch of tar.
So that prefrence makes me a "liar" and a "technology laggard", too, I suppose?
Pat wrote in news:8a1aad00-5e0a-47c1-abdc- snipped-for-privacy@k30g2000hse.googlegroups.com:
[snip]
OK, that *is* a point. But I think there is a differnce between strip malls, and "open air plazas". A reasonably-local strip mall has a Super Wal-Mart, Lowe's, pool supply place, and large grocery that has good produce - there is a closer WalMArt, which I go to moer often, but I combine trips whwere possible; tHer are otehr things in the mix, but I don't pay attention to them.
But a strip mall is different (or at elast, here is different here) from the local "open-air plazas", which have no large anchors and consist mostly of small "trendy"/"upscale" stores that spell shop as "shoppe".
I don't know, of course, whether that holds true elsewhere...
For both of you, you have to realize that there are different strokes for different folks. You can't impose your views or priorities on other and there is no, single right answer. The best you can do is make alternatives economically feasible.
Look at all of the wonderful things technology has brought. Air travel to go see the grandkids/parents. Fresh fruit all winter. Refrigeration and A/C. Who would want to live without it. Well, the Amish for example. They would. Your arguments are completely lost on them. Okay, granted, the Amish are not the most mainstream group you'll find, but they are a wonder example of the fact that different folks like different things.
Driving. I'm okay with it. I can think, listen to books, and talk on the phone. It's not bid deal. But it's given me the ability to live in a small down in the middle of nowhere. I can work out of my house, have time for the kids, etc. From my perspective, I think both of you are whooped. But again, maybe I'm not the most mainstream guy, either.
So Amy likes walkable communities. Good for her. Jack recognized that most people don't give a d**n about planning -- they just want to live their lives, work their jobs, eat their TV dinners, and watch American Idol. Good for Jack and good for them.
People will make their decisions based on their likes, dislikes, and economics. So the more option we have available, the better. Everyone is out making good choices, from their own perspective.
Except that some choices preserve the environment for future generations in better shape than others, and by the way, help the current generation maintain its shape better than others. I guess if you don't give a flying flip about current health or future environmental quality, yes, all choices are great.
For both of you, you have to realize that there are different strokes for different folks. You can't impose your views or priorities on other and there is no, single right answer. The best you can do is make alternatives economically feasible.
------------------------- Also note that Jack couldn't answer why it is more desirable to waste time and money.
It is obvious that the owner of the mall wants to attract as many people as possible to make a lot of money. Why would that be surprising? People that become rich tend to be very good at their job.
I would not expect a planning commission to do anything significant. Most Government planners that I have experience with are far too incompetent to do anything that will turn out to be attractive to consumers.
Pat wrote in news:6e0b6982-3d9f-4743-9721- snipped-for-privacy@d77g2000hsb.googlegroups.com:
THat's a consideration.
I don';t think it's "governemtn" alone - that's too dangerous.
What the originally-posted artice didn't talk about was how much business the place actualyl does.
Personally, I don't like the open plazas I've seen. Again, not the same in this areas as strip malls. Strip malls here are pretty much exactly that - almost linear in layout. THey usually have at least one large "anchor" store, and often more (like teh one complex that cosists mainly of the Super WalMart and the Lowe's, with some space on th eopposite side fo the parking lot devoted to a fast food restaurant and some small stores, one fo which is the pool supply store).
In all fairness, I was the one, not AMy, who mentioned "shoppe", because locally, yes, the open-air plazas (where the clusters of stores are spread out and you have ot drive around between them) *DO* tend to have trendy upscale "shoppes". (I don't think I said "uppity", IIRC I said "upscale"...) I also said that I think it's goofy to have that sort of thing here, because a significant part of the year is *so* hot and humid that it's nasty to have to go back and forth to the car - and that the local one I know of has never, that I've seen, had a full parking lot. I also was the one who said that parking garages with covered walkways to stores are preferable in a hotclimte (and prob. also a very cold one) to making people go back and forth to their cars to get from store to store.
I *do* think that open plazas with widely-separates closters fo stores are IMo not practical (hence, "goofy") and yup, I do hate them and don't use them. Again, tho', locally, not the same thing as a strip mall, whcih *do* tend to cluster stores together (and have smaller parkling lots in between) such that one *can* walk between smaller stores - so, if you have to get a Father's Day card and tehn develop some film, i'ts not all that far to walk from the card shop to the place that develops film (and tehn to a couple good restaurants).
THat being said, I do think that AMy tends to rely too heavily upon teh concept of governemnt regulation - on the very surface of it, it can sound good, but in practice, gov.t all too often does *not* encourage creative thinking, innovation, or, really, honesty and ethical behavior.
Do I think that planning could be done better? You betcha! But putting it into the hands of gov.t is *not* an answer. If it were, we'd already have better planning. WHat is the answer? Well, I don't really know, other than that people need to look at situations and see what works well, and what works poorly, eliminate the latter, and concentrate on the evolution of what works well. Unfortunately, gov.t tends to do more of teh same as has already been done, meaning that what works poorly is generally *not* eliminated. ANd the only way to change *that* is to get better people in office - but you can't get better people in office if voters prefer quippy (or snarky) sound-bites to actual information, and prefer candidates who trell them what they want to hear, rather than those who tell them what they need to hear. SO, in essence, as with everythign else in a republic/democracy, it has to start with We The People. If peole don;t vote intelligent folks into office, and if people don't want to exert themselves to put pressure on their elected offocials to come up with better ways of doing things, then they've only themselves to blame when things get done poorly - because simply voting for some schlepp, and then leaving everything in the hands of said schlepp with Zero oversight, only
*encourages* inefficiancy, unintelligent choices, and even lack of ethics.
Pat wrote in news:9f01ba28-562f-41c8-b30c- snipped-for-privacy@79g2000hsk.googlegroups.com:
[snip]
The point was not about any/all driving, the point was about driving short distances (that are nevertheless too long to walk esp., as I had very specifically noted, in very hot, humid weather, or in bitterly cold weather) to go from one cluster of small shops, to another, and questioning whether it is efficient, and whetehrit's desireable to build more of them, especially when that sort of stop-and-go short-distance driving is known to both stress a car's engine, and make gas mileage plummet.
(BTW, both of whom.....?)
That is where reliance upon the gov.t to "fix things" is extremely naive, because gov.t only changes when people demand that it change, pressure it to do so.
OTOH, it's conversely extremely cynical to say that people simply do not give a damn. Maybe I've just know weird people, but most of the people I've known, and lived near, *do* give a damn - they just have no idea what they *can* do, and they also have limited time (due to working and family and so on) to devote to doing it. Hell, *I* don't know exactly what I, as one person, can do. So folks end up frustrated, concentrate on work, family, and friends, and just cope as best they can with situations they don't like but feel they can't change. And yes, unscrupulous politicians and business people *do* take advantage of that, and therefore can get away with claiming that poorly-working situations are "efficient", when in reality, they aren't, but people find ways to cope with the situations.
What appears to be "apathy" can all too often be frustration that "you can't fight city hall", and what appears to be "efficiency" is all too often just the fact that people can adapt to cope with all sorts of situations.
HomeOwnersHub website is not affiliated with any of the manufacturers or service providers discussed here.
All logos and trade names are the property of their respective owners.