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Considering how much of the country is suburbs with large streets or freeways separating housing tracts from shopping centers, is your proposal really to close those freeways and arterial streets down? Or just demolish all the homes that are there and move those people to higher density areas?

I'm sympathetic to the idea of building new large developments in a non car centric fashion, but how do you do this with the majority of existing areas.




To be honest, the majority of existing areas will probably go bankrupt as densification happens, plunging the value of cookie cutter, match stick homes to be bulldozed and hopefully re-wilded. Most of suburbia is already going bankrupt. The roads, sewers, pipes, and electrical wires are falling apart because they are too expensive to maintain. All it takes is one company to move out or the land to run out before they start to spiral. San Bernardino CA is a good example.

https://www.strongtowns.org/journal/2020/5/14/americas-growt...

https://www.businessinsider.com/10-american-cities-that-are-...


I’m highly skeptical of the core thesis of the “strong towns” link, and cherry picking a few examples certainly doesn’t convince me.

I can cite plenty of small suburban areas that had an influx of demand without “growth” and the subsequent increase in tax revenue.

Even if you are correct, what time frame do you think this will happen? Will hundred of millions of Americans living in the suburbs be in bankrupted cities in 20 years? 40? 60?


It is already happening, with the pending commercial real estate crash I expect a lot of the big ones will be looking down the barrel soon. Most cities are propped up by short term gains. Foreign investment, capital firms, large business offices, etc.... It won't take much to tip them over. We're sitting on a ticking time bomb trying to add seconds to the clock instead of disarm it.

https://www.wmtxlaw.com/cities-declared-bankruptcy/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qxCVUpaelHw




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