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I've heard Denver is a national leader in this sort of development, but I called it pseudo New Urbanist for a reason.
I almost don't mind the Belmar development. The grid is nice, and I think the townhouses are well done for what they are. It looks fairly walkable in some areas. That said, there's still far too much surface parking, despite having a few garages as well. I can understand the sea of parking on the northern street - it faces a major commercial thoroughfare, and is for the people passing by, not the residents. They hide it pretty well from the inward facing streets. But it was a bad idea to set the Target back and have the lot in front of it. Worse, it looks like there's no way to access the Whole Foods from Alaska Drive, meaning someone walking from one of the townhouses has to walk all the way around it. Not pedestrian-friendly at all.
It is actually hard to tell from the satellite view, but the parking lot by Target is not for Target. The Target store actually sits above its parking lot -- you park underneath the store, enter it and take an escalator or elevator to the shopping floor.
A lot of the surface parking is intended for future expansion.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Katiana
^^I'm no fan of Belmar myself. It's mostly just a shopping center with apartments around it. The grid was already there; most of the Denver metro is on the grid. The housing around it is immediate post-war style.
Since the entire area was formerly a shopping center, the grid had to be put back in. Belmar did it; Southglenn did not.
It is actually hard to tell from the satellite view, but the parking lot by Target is not for Target. The Target store actually sits above its parking lot -- you park underneath the store, enter it and take an escalator or elevator to the shopping floor.
A lot of the surface parking is intended for future expansion.
Since the entire area was formerly a shopping center, the grid had to be put back in. Belmar did it; Southglenn did not.
OK, put back in. But the grid concept is pretty solid in metro Denver. It's not like some eastern areas, where the suburbs have all these short little streets called "Drive" that are off a main road.
This is roughly the path I see some American suburbs going down if real efforts are made towards the goal. This wouldn't have happened in greater Vancouver without a measure of political unity and consensus.
In most of the US where deep suburban-city divides are present ... ideas like these are dead in the water, which is unfortunate.
Why would someone from Chicago care how dense the suburbs are?
Keep living your life in Chicago, and let those in the suburbs live their life how they want....
...sort of a pix tour of how suburban commercial development stalled, with some repurposing, a lot of vacancy, with demolition and return to open space.
(this is one form of evolving)
Another is watchin suburbs become more intensly developed
In most of the US where deep suburban-city divides are present ... ideas like these are dead in the water, which is unfortunate.
Part of that I think is that in many US regions the suburbs have historically been considered the nice parts and cities have been considered undesirable. In Vancouver, the rich live in the city centre and the poor live on the outskirts, so it's more natural for the suburbs to want to urbanize and raise property values for their residence through proximity to such destinations.
Tyson's Corner, VA is a prime example. 40 years ago it was an auto centric, small town like suburb that has transformed/ing to something completely different. Four metro station will open in Tyson's Corner this year and the goal is to rebuilt it into an city.
In most of the US where deep suburban-city divides are present ... ideas like these are dead in the water, which is unfortunate.
It's pretty interesting - I guess it's about 9 years ago at this point but I was working on a revitalization project for Route 130 in Burlington Co., NJ. There's a fairly busy express bus route that runs from Philadelphia up Route 130, parallel to the RiverLINE light rail (which is now running near capacity). Anyway, there are a lot of abandoned and semi-abandoned strip malls and motels for a good 10-15 mile stretch running through about 7 towns (at least in our study area) It's a pretty big economic problem to have the main commercial corridor for a county of 500,000 people in such terrible shape. Not only does it make a commercial revival more difficult the further the corridor sinks but it also starts to drag down housing values and you get where they were in this larger pattern of disinvestment. It was also turning into a transportation problem as a lot of people (and offices) were heading south to Route 73 or Route 38 for their shopping.
We held a series of public charrettes and we were trying to get people to think big, sky's the limit type of stuff. In going over the possibilities we threw everything at them from something resembling a Parisian Blvd. to changing nothing at all. The majority of people said, over and over again, that all they wanted was to bury the utility lines and put up some fancy new lamp posts. They wanted no other design changes. The more economically depressed their town was the more likely they were to advocate very small changes.
You don't really have to twist the state's arm when it comes to that stuff. "Oh, you don't want us to spend any money here? Not a problem! See you later."
It's pretty interesting - I guess it's about 9 years ago at this point but I was working on a revitalization project for Route 130 in Burlington Co., NJ. There's a fairly busy express bus route that runs from Philadelphia up Route 130, parallel to the RiverLINE light rail (which is now running near capacity). Anyway, there are a lot of abandoned and semi-abandoned strip malls and motels for a good 10-15 mile stretch running through about 7 towns (at least in our study area) It's a pretty big economic problem to have the main commercial corridor for a county of 500,000 people in such terrible shape. Not only does it make a commercial revival more difficult the further the corridor sinks but it also starts to drag down housing values and you get where they were in this larger pattern of disinvestment. It was also turning into a transportation problem as a lot of people (and offices) were heading south to Route 73 or Route 38 for their shopping. ."
I know this corridor well. While I still drive a sort of antiquated auto I had some really old and slow stuff before; avoiding the turnpike is advisable if your top speed is 62. So 295 -Rt 130- Rt 1 was my way to get to NY. It is pretty depressed around that area of south Jersey; I suppose the decline of industrial and manufacturing areas therein and in Trenton and Camden contributed significantly to this area's decline?
Once one of those antiquated autos broke down conveniently near to the River Line in Bordentown. I parked it, hopped on the train (first diesel light rail I'd ever seen), got on Amtrak in Trenton, and returned a week later to fix it and return south.
Quote:
Originally Posted by drive carephilly
You don't really have to twist the state's arm when it comes to that stuff. "Oh, you don't want us to spend any money here? Not a problem! See you later."
Tell me about it. Myopia is a problem in depressed communities of all types.
I know this corridor well. While I still drive a sort of antiquated auto I had some really old and slow stuff before; avoiding the turnpike is advisable if your top speed is 62. So 295 -Rt 130- Rt 1 was my way to get to NY. It is pretty depressed around that area of south Jersey; I suppose the decline of industrial and manufacturing areas therein and in Trenton and Camden contributed significantly to this area's decline?
What kind of car is that?
Quote:
Once one of those antiquated autos broke down conveniently near to the River Line in Bordentown. I parked it, hopped on the train (first diesel light rail I'd ever seen), got on Amtrak in Trenton, and returned a week later to fix it and return south.
Never been on the RiverLine, but I've been on similar train stock in Liverpool's CityLine. Like the RiverLine, it has DMUs (no locomotive, an engine on each car). It seemed noisier with a harsher ride than diesel locomotive trains since you could feel the engine below. A bit like a bus. Not the same location, but similar train stock:
The CityLine has frequent stops, a size more similar to light rail, but uses mainline railroad tracks (never street runs). Most similar to commuter rail, but there's no local rail, so a bit of a hybrid system. Some other electrified lines reach near rapid transit frequencies (a train every 15 minutes, stops with multiple lines more).
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