Archive for January, 2007

Am I being too picky?

EDIT: Here’s the original, found what I was looking for.

I am a working professional looking for a long-term (year or more) 1 Bedroom apartment (no studios/efficiencies) in Arlington or Alexandria within walking distance of a Metro stop (< 0.5 mi). The most I am willing to spend is $1350, exclusive of utilities. I would like to move in February 24th.

Jeremy Lott recently wrote an article on the virtues of renting:

Besides, it’s hard to know what to do with a house. I am not the fixer-upper type, so remodeling it for resale would be out of the question even if the housing market were still roaring. Living in it all alone might be somebody’s idea of bliss, but not mine, and I am not a dog person.

This highlights a problem I frequently run into. While it is true that a decisive majority of Americans do want single-family detached homes, a substantial number of us do not. “Why is this is a problem?” you ask.

Because most of our suburbs are now designed on the assumption that absolutely everyone wants a house. Current zoning regulations do a good job of keeping houses houses, but that’s about it. Since the assumption is that everyone is living in a house, there’s also the assumption that everyone lives too far away to walk to anything, which drastically influences our road and sidewalk design.

To be clear, I have no problems with people owning and enjoying houses. However, I don’t see why we can’t design our neighborhoods in such a way that smaller housing units are scattered throughout instead of being clumped together in a boring, single-use complex. If we could design our suburbs with apartments above stores, those desiring houses would ultimately benefit. There would be fewer cars clogging the road, as apartment dwellers would be able to walk to stores. Consequently, parking lots wouldn’t have to be as large. Multiple story buildings would result in a smaller land footprint. By saving all of this land, more of it would be available for single family homes. Since the stores would be designed for walkers as well as drivers, some of the houses could placed within walking distance, which would cut down on still more parking and traffic.

When Metro gets crowded during rush hour, the train operators attempt to discourage riders from boarding already full cars by saying “another train is directly behind me.” Instead of saying “directly”, they should say “immediately.” Except for the last train of the day, there is always another train directly behind the one you’re on; it may just be 15 minutes away.

In yet another chapter of other uses for Katrina Cottages, schools in North Carolina are thinking of using them for permanent expansions. This would make it possible to add a classroom quickly without keeping students in trailers. Although they’re claiming that this is more expensive than the mobile classrooms, they’re dramatically less expensive than conventional school construction. Aside from the lower construction cost, the Katrina Cottage Classrooms would also look much nicer than current schools.