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comment by WanderingEng
WanderingEng  ·  2488 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: Shake it up. Offer up one somewhat unpopular opinion that you hold.

I thought of several but will go with: high density housing only works on paper. When enough random people are put in close proximity, differences will add up. The quiet ones will want isolation from the loud ones. The loud ones will want space to be loud.

People will continue living in high density housing only because they have to (location for work, distance to friends and family, price) but will always seek out distance and space should it become available.





goobster  ·  2487 days ago  ·  link  ·  

    People will continue living in high density housing only because they have to...

The other side of that coin is that cities provide high-density housing because it is the only way to get enough income in tax revenues to provide services to all the people who come in from OUTSIDE the city to work there.

You want to live in a bedroom community and commute into your highrise office building... and still have the fire department come and help you get out of the building in the event of a fire?

Then you need a LOT of people, living very close together, paying their taxes, to fund that service for you. Because your taxes in your bedroom community are not helping the city pay their costs to provide you with a safe environment.

(I think there is also an age factor here... young people are used to being closer together - school, dorms, parties, social activities, etc - and eventually move out to where there is more room and less interaction as they get older. But I'm not really gonna make that case here in this post.)

steve  ·  2486 days ago  ·  link  ·  

    the only way to get enough income in tax revenues to provide services to all the people who come in from OUTSIDE the city to work there.

I worked for a company based in downtown Denver, and regardless of which of the suburbs you lived in, because the office was downtown, we had an additional payroll tax... It wasn't huge, but I think it was to pay for exactly the kind of things you're mentioning.

It's probably no wonder that back in the 90's, "The Tech Center" started developing in one of the suburbs...

snoodog  ·  2488 days ago  ·  link  ·  

I totally agree. The design challenge for high density is to minimize the problems you talk about while maximizing the location and convenience benefit.

user-inactivated  ·  2488 days ago  ·  link  ·  

Preach.