Beautiful pictures. They're even more impressive once you see the illusion. Even the fake greenery and curb and gutter seams are still hard to pick out even when you know they're there. And the lighting is excellent.
But the look -- aside from car styling -- isn't a matter of charm and innocence. It's a way of life that has been outlawed in America.
The mix of residential and commercial land use is illegal in almost all American communities, especially at the scale pictured. A few big cities still permit residential over commercial but whatever is left in most of America is grandfathered. If it's taken down, you can't rebuild it. In fact, my whole neighborhood is like that; if an earthquake hit, not one 1920s American railroad suburb bungalow on my block would meet zoning to be rebuilt.
Also, almost none of those commercial establishments has parking in front and surrounding it. The minimum requirements in almost all of America is about double as much space for parking as for all building interior space. Floor area ratios and landscape buffers usually require even more space around parking lots because they're so ugly. Today, even the shots with parking wouldn't have nearly enough and almost all the commercial buildings would be illegal. I don't see any of the residential buildings with the 2-3 independent parking spots usually required, either. Most of them -- for the sake of charm -- don't have any off street parking. Also, driveways usually can't abut the property line, so the garage has to dominate the front of the house, creating a snout house effect and eliminating the friendly front porches.
Part of the appeal of these scenes is evoking an America that has been outlawed in pursuit of faster roads and free parking. The grace and community of neighborhoods, the diversity of age and social class, and affordability have been part of the cost. Certainly this is not the first time reversing those mistakes has made a scene prettier. [0]
Here in Seattle, new buildings are required to be mixed-use in many areas. But there seems to be a glut of commercial tenants for the locations. About 3 out of 5 of these buildings seem to fill up quickly with residential tenants (and rising rents!), condo owners or even offices, but with their ground-floor commercial facilities lying empty for years.
Most of these buildings have parking around and in front of them, and are in convenient areas, but they still seem to lie empty, while the big-box stores and mega-lots still persist. Even with favourable zoning, it seems like there may be other economic or selection factors at play.
I do wish the spaces could be used more creatively in the meantime, it'd be great to have some pop-up galleries for example.
But there seems to be a glut* of commercial tenants for the locations.* [emphasis added]
Did you, perhaps, mean the opposite of "glut," maybe "shortage" or "paucity?" The subsequent sentence seems to suggest that there aren't enough commercial tenants.
Many small cities (including Jersey City, my home) will not allow commercial businesses to be built without residential above it, at least in downtown commercial districts.
What interests me about this is the difference between the parking situation in the US and Europe. We don't have enough space for the kind of parking regulations the US requires. I know urban supermarkets that have no parking whatsoever.
And then I think of Vietnam. 92 million people, 70 million scooters. 2-300% tax on cars. The Vietnese I know have a desire to buy a car but they don't seem to think of where they will park it. Imagine if everyone here suddenly had a car :
What's awful about where in live in Poland is that people don't care that they don't have a place to park. They second they buy a car, they feel they are entitled to get a parking space. Illegal parking is a massive problem here and the only place I've seen it worse was in Rome.
But the look -- aside from car styling -- isn't a matter of charm and innocence. It's a way of life that has been outlawed in America.
The mix of residential and commercial land use is illegal in almost all American communities, especially at the scale pictured. A few big cities still permit residential over commercial but whatever is left in most of America is grandfathered. If it's taken down, you can't rebuild it. In fact, my whole neighborhood is like that; if an earthquake hit, not one 1920s American railroad suburb bungalow on my block would meet zoning to be rebuilt.
Also, almost none of those commercial establishments has parking in front and surrounding it. The minimum requirements in almost all of America is about double as much space for parking as for all building interior space. Floor area ratios and landscape buffers usually require even more space around parking lots because they're so ugly. Today, even the shots with parking wouldn't have nearly enough and almost all the commercial buildings would be illegal. I don't see any of the residential buildings with the 2-3 independent parking spots usually required, either. Most of them -- for the sake of charm -- don't have any off street parking. Also, driveways usually can't abut the property line, so the garage has to dominate the front of the house, creating a snout house effect and eliminating the friendly front porches.
Part of the appeal of these scenes is evoking an America that has been outlawed in pursuit of faster roads and free parking. The grace and community of neighborhoods, the diversity of age and social class, and affordability have been part of the cost. Certainly this is not the first time reversing those mistakes has made a scene prettier. [0]
[0]http://www.humantransit.org/2013/05/how-sim-city-greenwashes...