From the article: Stop Sprawl: How to Design a Walkable Neighborhood
New Urbanist thinker James Howard Kunstler wrote that America has become a "national automobile slum" with a landscape dominated by parking lots and highways. Do you agree? What's your vision for America's cities and towns?
Ugly America
- It's sad to say "Ugly America," but unfortunately it's true. It seems our senses are underestimated in American cities: sense of smell, touch, vision, and even our hearing. All one is surrounded with are highways, parking lots, and cars. No people on the sidewalks, no smell of bakeries or coffee shops on the sidewalks. Even though we have many rules for pedestrians' safety, we don't care about their real needs - which might be social correlation. Our designers never ask what people really want, instead they dictate what they think would be good for people...
- —maryami
Ugly America
- Yes, I'd have to agree, but I'd want to qualify it to say that most suburbs are ugly -- strip malls and boring houses, or worse, McMansions dominated by garages. Despite the beauty and diversity of the landscape, there's a dreadful sameness in contemporary America. There may be a few nods to traditional local building styles, but in general, you could scoop up a suburb in North Carolina and transport it to the suburbs of New York and it would fit right in.
- —Guest Alice
