Man did I get a kick out of this letter and answer on Salon.  It’s an advice column, and the advisor is surprisingly with-it in regards to new urbanism.  The comments section is amusing, most people have little or no sympathy for what they see as a rich dude bitching, but it just illustrates how many people really don’t get it–they don’t think about or understand how much our daily environment affects us.  I of course, also wrote a letter.

Then the infamous Gawker picked up on it, saying the advisor suggested the advisee move to “Fantasy Land“.  Guess what Gawker?  I live there, and it may be a fantasy, but it’s not imgainary.  Look it up–Bradburn Village in Westminster, Colorado–and yeah it rocks, so stick that in your cap and go back to hating everything (which is admittedly why I like you!).

Humans.  We’re an interesting lot.  No other one species in the history of the Earth has dominated it like we have.  Why is this?  Humans are the most socially adept animals in Earth’s history—we combine intelligence, tool-making, the ability to cooperate, and the ability to pass down information from one group or generation to the next.  We survived and prospered because we are social.  As a result, deep down in each one of us is the evolutionary need to belong, to be connected to other people.

The author of a new book, The Geography of Bliss, travelled to different places to see what makes people happy.  The short version?  Other people. Places that have great senses of community are the happiest.  This makes total sense to me of course because it supports my own personal experience.

I was sitting in one of my neighborhood parks the other day, just hanging out.  I’d spoken to, geeze, I don’t know, probably 7 different neighbors I knew in the prior hour on my walk around the neighborhood.  People I knew were everywhere, walking dogs, riding bikes, etc.. I know all these neighbors because the design of Bradburn Village facilitates easy social interaction.  I heaved a big sigh of contentment and I realized why: This is my place. This is where I truly feel I belong, I have a strong connection to this place as a result of my connections to my neighbors. Some of those connections are casual–the “Hi” variety–others are now close friendships.   Do I think this sense of connection can occur in a non new (or old) urbanist neighborhood?  Yes, of course, but I bet it’s harder. 

When I was a researcher at Colorado State University, I worked with a charming and affable gentleman who came from New Orleans.  Around this time one year, he brought a “King cake” into the office.  With all the office members save one–a graduate student who was out working in the field that morning–gathered around, he explained the King cake is a Mardi Gras tradition.  It looked essentially like a round danish with a hole in the middle.  The gentleman explained there was a small, plastic baby Jesus hidden inside, and whoever found it was supposed to bring the King cake next year.  We all had a piece and discussed fun, colorful traditions from our home locations.

Later that day I was working at my desk and I saw a flash go past the doorway–the graduate student who had missed the King cake explanation had returned from the field and was headed for our main office room.   As the little ticker in my head ran across saying “Oh, I should probably go tell him…..” I heard, “SON OF A BITCH!” from the next room followed by “WHY IS THERE A PLASTIC BABY IN THE DANISH!!!??”.   So if your coworker brings in a King cake–you have been warned.

There’s this idea, put forth first by the famous urban commentator, Jane Jacobs, of “eyes on the street”, in other words, lots of people around the neighborhood all the time keeping an eye on things reduces crime.  New urbanist planners promote this as one of the benefits of new urbanist neighborhood design, and I can comment with some authority that in my new urbanist neighborhood at least, it works.  There is one specific example I can think of, but many others have happened.  

We have a central park, called Bradburn Green, which has a large concrete patio and large concrete planters.  This feature attracts skateboarders, and while I think skateboarding is fun and great exercise, we don’t allow skateboarding in our park for liability and damage concerns; there’s a great skate park less than a mile from my neighborhood and the kids can go there.  Last summer there was a small group of idle teenagers that found our neighborhood park, decided to take it upon themselves to remove the “No Skateboarding” sign, and to proceed to grind the edges of our concrete planters causing significant (and expensive) damage. 

This occurred a total of three times.  The reason it didn’t occur more?  They were there in the middle of the day the first day and I saw them and so did other neighbors.  One neighbor went over to speak to them and tell them we don’t allow skateboarding, and they called her a bitch in front of her small children.  So we called the cops, (who showed up in about 10 minutes) but they had left.  The next day they showed up again, same time.  Two other neighbors harangued them about the second they got there.  Next day, they showed up again, same time.  This time one of the neighbors who lives across the park went over to speak with them and said,

“Many people in this neighborhood work at home or are at home during the day.  Everyone knows about you and the damage you are causing and will call the police if you are seen here again. You are never going to be in this park for more than 10 minutes without someone noticing.  I suggest you find somewhere else to skateboard.  We are always watching”.

We’ve never seen them again.

I saw The Golden Compass yesterday and enjoyed it for the most part.  One scene was very good, very creepy.  Little kids are being kidnapped for unknown (but nefarious) purposes by a totalitarian regime called The Magisterium.  The scene takes place where the children are being held, in a Jules Vernish fortress in the middle of freezing fucking nowhere.  The kids are shown in a room writing letters to their parents and a very creepy nurse is instructing one of the boys to write something or his parents won’t get a letter (which the watchers know they are never going to get anyway).  It’s effective, chilling, and doesn’t treat viewers as stupid, showing the nature of the place and the regime holding the kids in an oblique but powerful way. It made the hairs on the back of my neck stand up until…until I saw the chairs. 

This is supposed to be an alternate Earth (yes, the standard sci fi interpretation of the “many dimensions” aspect of physics, but I like it so don’t care if it’s been used before).  Apparently on this alternate Earth where people’s souls live outside their bodies as animal manifestations that talk, they also have a Design within Reach.  Must be right next door to the Magisterium HQ!  The creepy kid torture factory was filled with Eames plastic molded chairs.  If you’re going to make a fantasy film, DON’T use a well known design object in it, it’s destracting!  For God’s sake people didn’t you have 60 million dollars or something–design your own friggin chairs!  I know you’re busy and all but I didn’t see any Globus chairs in Lord of the Rings.

I got an ITouch for Christmas and it is the most delightful and intuitive piece of hardware joy I’ve ever had.  Thank you Apple.

I have a strong belief in the strength of human ingenuity, so I’m convinced that we will eventually develop a totally green car.  One you can plug into your high efficiency home solar grid every night and charge, or a safe and practical hydrogen car, or etc.. etc.. Once we do this, will that mean people won’t want to live in walkable, mixed-use neighborhoods anymore?  Will they want to go back to sprawling homes on huge lots separated from their neighbors, because as the developers (and libertarians for some reason) have been crowing for the past twenty or so years: this is what the market wants!  People won’t buy anything else, families don’t want walkable neighborhoods they want an acre of grass! (the fact that it’s the cheapest and easiest way to develop neighborhoods of course has nothing to do with it right?).  And if gas prices and pollution aren’t a concern anymore, people will want to drive for every single little thing so they don’t have to see their neighbors. Ever.

The answer to the titular question is without a doubt, no.  The fact is: I hate driving and I hate time sucking traffic jams and so do most other people (at least the traffic jam part).  Green cars won’t solve that problem. When I talk to my neighbors and ask them why they chose to move to our new urbanist neighborhood, most people say they liked the style of homes in here, they wanted to be able to drive less if they wanted to, and they wanted a real community where neighbors are friendly and social.  When I ask most people if they are concerned about their carbon footprint most are after some fashion, but it’s not the reason they bought here.   People like to walk, it’s enjoyable and great exercise and makes the neighborhood energetic and vital all the time.  I don’t think most people walk because it’s greener (although I’m sure some do, or they at least consider that a benefit), they walk because they like to, and new urbanist communities are very pleasant places to do it.  

Me: God I had awful nightmares last night about [our kid] getting lost

My Husband: I had a nightmare too

Me: Really?

My Husband: You got served an undercooked steak in a restaurant

Three years ago when I first moved down to Denver, I went looking for a dentist as I hadn’t been in some time.  I looked up the providers my dental insurance covered and picked a female dentist that practiced close to my home.  I went to this dentist who told me I needed 3 new crowns, and 7 fillings.  She said it would take around 6 hours to do all that work and said she could offer me sedation for the long time it would take.  I was upset when I came home from that appointment, but I was also something else: skeptical. 

One of the crowns this dentist said I needed was a replacement for a crown I’d had put in two years prior,  so I looked it up (which I do with EVERYTHING).  Dr. Google said crowns usually last at least 10 years, and can last a lifetime.  This got me thinking: how do I know anything she told me is actually the case?  She could make up whatever she wanted about my teeth and just assume I would trust it since she was the trained dentist and I wasn’t.  With me of course, this is dead, dead wrong–I require proof for everything.  So I made an appointment with my old, trusted dentist in Fort Collins and drove up there to have him take a look at my teeth.  Guess what he said?  I didn’t need any work.  None. At. All.

This turn of events deeply shocked and depressed me.  What was more concerning however, was the fact that this dishonest dentist had her wall lined with pictures of the Medicaid kids she treated: how many of those kids got dental work they didn’t need so she could make a buck?  I reported her to the American Dental Association, but I’m sure they didn’t do anything about it.  I haven’t been back to a dentist since.

Recently a new dentist opened in my neighborhood.  Their office is a 5 minute walk from my home.  Multiple neighbors have gone and all have spoken highly of this dentist, so I decided to make an appointment.  When I was on the phone with the receptionist, I gave her my name and we were working out the details of the appointment when she said “Oh, hold on a second, he wants to speak to you”.  The dentist then got on the line. “Hi, I’m Dr. “X” and I recognized your name from [my neighborhood’s] internet board, I just wanted to introduce myself”.  I thought this was really nice and thoughtful, but I also realized something else: this person knows I know everyone in my neighborhood.  They also therefore know if they try to pull any crap like the last dentist I visited that I will tell everyone in my neighborhood and they will lose significant business.  I currently don’t have dental insurance so will be paying cash, but the social capital in my neighborhood is covering something much more important to me: piece of mind.

One of my neighbors, her house is a black hole for pets.  They go in but they don’t come out (alive anyway, or they are brought there for burial already dead).  Apprently she had some friends visiting with their two rather boisterous canines.  I’m unsure how (I was afraid to ask for the details-yeach), but the dogs somehow got to her daughter’s new pet guinea pig, and dogs, well being predators….lets just say Piggies’ stay in my friend’s household was shortened. So Piggie went into the garden, buried in a dog treat box (the final insult I’d imagine), next to my friend’s friend’s boa constrictor.  Piggie did however, get the benefit of another recitation of the Clark Griswold’s eulogy for Aunt Edna.

I don’t think my friend ever plans on moving, but if she does, I hope the next people to buy her house aren’t gardeners. If they are, they are surely going to wonder about the former residents once they starting tilling the new perennial bed.