General Discussion
Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsPocket neighborhoods - I think this could change the U.S.
People would once again be sociable, look out for one another, and not be the isolated, helpless creatures that brought us to our current helplessness against corporations.
http://pocket-neighborhoods.net/
See if you agree with me.
Laurian
(2,593 posts)I find the concept very appealing.
Sarah Ibarruri
(21,043 posts)not just expensive. To have neighborhoods and neighbors again!!!
BeHereNow
(17,162 posts)I would relish living in such a place.
BHN
Sarah Ibarruri
(21,043 posts)rucky
(35,211 posts)Google "defensible space" for related studies...
Baitball Blogger
(46,776 posts)People don't always buy housing based on the community concept that was originally established for the development. The Declarations have to be written in an ironcast manner, so that homeowners can challenge rogue board members who try to take it in another direction.
Other than that, I think it's a commonsensical approach. It's like facing an open green. It's worth a try.
Sarah Ibarruri
(21,043 posts)We now fear others around us, relying on them, and having to live with them. Living in proximity of others is no longer the norm.
While nothing on this planet is perfect, this is by far more ideal than the suburban isolation we're living in nowadays.
Baitball Blogger
(46,776 posts)Old homeowners undermined the Association's purpose and resources. They formed a cabal that made life pretty miserable for anyone who tried to tell them differently. It's a big problem in Florida.
However, I've lived here long enough to see that young families with children are the saving's grace. Unfortunately, they walk in and face an established group of older residents who are not only hostile to them, but hostile to their children. I am really praying that communities like the one you discuss take off, so that these young families can recover the playground areas (common grounds) that were taken from them, in order to develop into a pocket like society.
I like the idea.
FarCenter
(19,429 posts)Condo boards and associations work so well....
In a village, everybody knows everybody's business...
Sarah Ibarruri
(21,043 posts)Neighbors in close proximity, everything within walking distance. The condo aspect of it is a new development too, as we know. The layout doesn't necessarily have to require condos. Builders can (and should) build individual little homes this way.
silverweb
(16,402 posts)[font color="navy" face="Verdana"]There's one in Davis, California, that I looked into when I knew I was going to move to the area. The starting group expanded over time and bought up a number of adjoining homes on one street. They eliminated backyard fences and created one massive, gorgeous, and productive garden environment shared by everyone. Some of the homeowners rent out rooms to compatible people. I'd have been interested except for the fact that my cats would not be welcome.
Pocket neighborhoods are a kind of "intentional community" and there are many varieties of those. Privacy levels can vary greatly, and I imagine that the key to success is making the goals of the community crystal clear and looking for people who share all of those goals, whether it's shared child care, eco-management or a kind of homesteading, or just a very safe and child-friendly environment.
randome
(34,845 posts)There is always some new paradigm to be pushed into the open but when have any of them actually worked?
FarCenter
(19,429 posts)Last week I was also visiting a high-density neighborhood in a small town. It is the kind of place where the houses are maybe 20 feet apart with small front and adjoining back yards. On one side is the crazy woman with the slutty daughter. On the other side is the family with the out-of-work son that just got released on probation...
Sarah Ibarruri
(21,043 posts)fathom dealing with all kinds of people close by.
FarCenter
(19,429 posts)So even in the city, (perhaps especially in the city), people associate with others that they find congenial and not with people who live in the immediate vicinity. Communications networks have even made this more pronounced, since it is more possible to keep close relations with people who are more distant.
Sarah Ibarruri
(21,043 posts)We have grown to think (erroneously) that living among others means we must get along with each and every one of those others. It doesn't. It means we live among others. That's all. Of course we'll have affinities. We're not robots. But living in true social environments (which the U.S. lifestyle is not), is healthy in so many ways. The American Sprawl is not healthy.
Edweird
(8,570 posts)bhikkhu
(10,726 posts)One of the problems of current age of smaller families is the isolation of people in their homes; bringing more homes, families and people in closer contact is the most natural way to reduce that.
Of course, this requires better behavior as well. One thing that you might note if you study how extended families living under the same roof get along in other cultures is that there is less individual freedom, more conformity, and more intensive social expectations. There is also more happiness and sense of belonging, and less loneliness, so the trade-off might be well worthwhile for some, depending on age and temperament (I'd enjoy it now, but as a teenager I don't think I'd have lasted a week).
HiPointDem
(20,729 posts)talk to each other less, etc. is because they don't have the proper neighborhood design to facilitate it. But that's not the reason. The reason is the entire economic structure, which typically means we have few ties to our neighbors other than being (temporarily) neighbors.
When I was young neighbors were connected in the following ways:
1. They usually worked in the same general field, or even the same plant. i.e. they shared a lot of their lives and had a common world view because of it. Also, employers used to be more locally based, rather than franchises of big corporations with interchangeable employees and managers.
2. They usually shared labor (i.e. neighbors would help each other with big projects like haying, building a school, building fence, canning, etc.) I.e. neighbors *needed* each other in a very concrete way.
3. Women were typically in the neighborhood during the day, and that involved sharing childcare experiences and some of the old-fashioned "housework" experiences (like getting together to quilt, sew, etc.)
Working women today come home tired & do double duty = less time/energy to socialize, help others, etc. Women's work also used to make a "free space" for men when they got off work, so they could for example just join in with the neighborhood party that women had already prepared rather than helping to prepare it and helping to clean it up.
4. Less mobility = more kin close by, more intermarriage or other kinship connections with neighbors = less suspiciousness. Also more time to spend with neighbors at holidays, etc, because you're not flying/driving to see your kids halfway across the country.
5. Locus of more activities was at the local level. For example, I remember my family helping with local voting when I was young, & I mean setting up the polling places. Now most people vote by mail, & the party organizations are shops that set up only during elections and have no presence otherwise.
6. A lot of entertainment was homemade. People used to get together to make music, do crafts, etc. as a routine thing -- often during shared work. Now it's TV, video games... All the kids in my neighborhood used to take mayday baskets around. Haven't seen that forever. I can also remember carolers in my early christmases. haven't seen that either. trick-or-treat is about all that's left, and even that is disappearing.
Which is why I think things like "pocket neighorhoods" will never be more than isolated projects within the larger morass of anomie. People don't become sociable by acts of will.