Hey, maybe our ancestors were boat-mates? Haha. My first ancestors here came over on the Mayflower and my mom has all the documentation for our lineage back to the 1300s for that part of the family tree. Pretty cool.

 

They came over to get away from the same thing everyone on the Mayflower was trying to get away from.

 

My dad's side came over during the potato famine.

 

Their reasons for immigration were clear. They had nothing to do with density or cities.

It's not genetic. They weren't coming here for "personal space" they were coming for various economic reasons and to escape the oppression and filth of living in Europe at the time. That's not the same thing as some Millennial choosing to live in Downtown Cincinnati vs. Mason.

 

This comparison lacks any actual basis in reality or any relation to what's happening in 2015 at all.

 

Put 100 able bodied people in a dense enclosure, then put a larger open space next to them where they have to climb over a wall to get into it.  A few people will make the effort.  Even if you keep the available space per person about the same on the original side (so it remains the same density), eventually people will remain.  Lower the wall a bit, and a few more may trickle across.  Does this make sense to everyone? 

 

My premise is that in general,  the people that climbed the wall have a lower tolerance for close quarters than the people who remained.  The higher the wall, the greater the difference.

 

The possible reasons are extensive.  My belief is some of them are inheritable.  If that’s the case, well then that wall is a nice metaphor for the Atlantic Ocean, and Americans would have a greater consciousness of personal space than Europeans.

 

Consider the phrase "huddled masses yearning to breathe free".

 

I still think you're just making conjecture based on very little/no real evidence and your whole premise about why people moved here is based on a false presumption. Density had nothing to do with it. Opportunity was why people immigrated. That's it.

 

I also think you're putting far too much weight into personal preferences being genetic. They're not. You might acquire some traits through being raised by someone who has a specific preference, but that's not genetic.

 

How would the mass influx of millennials preferring dense urban areas be explained in your scenario? It can't. And it's because the entire premise is inherently incorrect.

How would the mass influx of millennials preferring dense urban areas be explained in your scenario? It can't.

 

One thing nobody mentions, is that 100 years ago, cities were dirty and hot!  There was little escape for a cool breeze.  Plumbing was bad, coal burning left the air and the buildings black.  For the most part, now they are nice comfortable places to live.

^I actually mentioned that last page haha. The cities back then were absolutely filthy and disgusting places to live. It's not a surprise people wanted out.

 

And E Rocc isn't acknowledging this major difference between cities now and cities then. And it's a huge difference. I wouldn't live in a city from 1875. It would be unbearable. I'd live in that same city in 2015 though. And I do. I wouldn't ever want to live in Cincinnati during its early years. Yeah, the built form was great. But the greatness ends there. It was a miserable place that was polluted and dirty at all times. Not pleasant. And there was no escape. There is now. It's called air conditioning, heat, cleanliness, public parks, etc. Cities today are utopian compared to back then.

I can only speak for Italian-Americans and the situation in Italy, as that is my family background and what I am most familiar with. But the vast, vast majority of people who left Italy came from the poor Southern countryside, not the cities. The countryside was poor, the cities were rich. They weren't  trying to escape population density or dirty European cities, they were escaping poverty and oppression. When they arrived in the US, the cities were unlike anything they had ever experienced in their lives.

 

They settled in large cities that had pretty poor conditions, so it's fair to say that when they got here they missed wide open spaces, yards to grow food in, etc. But those needs can be addressed in an urban environment. They just weren't addressed in poor immigrant neighborhoods in the early 20th century.

 

The issue is not a predisposition to high population densities, it's all kinds of negative things that are lumped in with "urban" environments that are deeply rooted in American attitudes. City=poor, city=dirty, city=dangerous. None of those things have to be true, but they often were/are, due to America having a long history of treating its cities (and really all real estate in general) as disposable. Why take care of a place when you have manifest destiny and so much empty space? You can just trash it and then move somewhere new.

 

Older generations, especially in Ohio, where the cities were in even worse shape than most places, simply can't make the connection that a city would be a pleasurable place to live. My longtime Cleveland family, my parents, aunts, uncles, grandparents, etc, can't wrap their heads around the fact that people with options move to NY, Chicago, etc, and live in the city and not the suburbs. It makes their heads explode.

 

The great irony with my family is they never stop romanticizing how great life in the "old neighborhood" was with all the aunts and uncles and cousins down the street and all the wonderful delis and food down the street.... But then they keep moving farther and farther out to exurbs and cul-de-sacs and commenting about how it's a shame we never see each other as much as we used to.

The issue is not a predisposition to high population densities, it's all kinds of negative things that are lumped in with "urban" environments that are deeply rooted in American attitudes. City=poor, city=dirty, city=dangerous. None of those things have to be true, but they often were/are, due to America having a long history of treating its cities (and really all real estate in general) as disposable. Why take care of a place when you have manifest destiny and so much empty space? You can just trash it and then move somewhere new.

 

Older generations, especially in Ohio, where the cities were in even worse shape than most places, simply can't make the connection that a city would be a pleasurable place to live. My longtime Cleveland family, my parents, aunts, uncles, grandparents, etc, can't wrap their heads around the fact that people with options move to NY, Chicago, etc, and live in the city and not the suburbs. It makes their heads explode.

 

 

What's motivating some sprawl is the phenomenon of "downsizing".  Over and over again I'm seeing people's parents "downsize" from a 2,500 sq foot house in a subdivision to a...2,100 sq foot landominium or even house in newer subdivision not unlike the one they left.  Over and over again we see that people are paying for guest bedrooms with full attached bathrooms, 3-car garages, etc. in "downsized" homes.  There can seemingly never be enough bathrooms in these new houses.   

 

What it comes down to is that people wrap a ton of their personal identity up into their residence, leaving reason floating somewhere out there in deep space.  When you start looking for houses, everyone you talk to wants you to move to their neighborhood and buy a house just like theirs.  They take it as a personal affront when you choose to do something different. 

I can only speak for Italian-Americans and the situation in Italy, as that is my family background and what I am most familiar with. But the vast, vast majority of people who left Italy came from the poor Southern countryside, not the cities. The countryside was poor, the cities were rich. They weren't  trying to escape population density or dirty European cities, they were escaping poverty and oppression. When they arrived in the US, the cities were unlike anything they had ever experienced in their lives.

 

This is actually pretty accurate for most of the European immigrants that came to America, not just Italians.  They were rural "peasants", not middle class townspeople.

I can only speak for Italian-Americans and the situation in Italy, as that is my family background and what I am most familiar with. But the vast, vast majority of people who left Italy came from the poor Southern countryside, not the cities. The countryside was poor, the cities were rich. They weren't  trying to escape population density or dirty European cities, they were escaping poverty and oppression. When they arrived in the US, the cities were unlike anything they had ever experienced in their lives.

 

This is actually pretty accurate for most of the European immigrants that came to America, not just Italians.  They were rural "peasants", not middle class townspeople.

 

Actually a lot of Germans who moved to Cincinnati were middle-class or at least not tenant farmers.  What is now called Germany had a somewhat different history in this regard as compared to England, Ireland, Poland, and everything east to Russia. 

 

 

I can only speak for Italian-Americans and the situation in Italy, as that is my family background and what I am most familiar with. But the vast, vast majority of people who left Italy came from the poor Southern countryside, not the cities. The countryside was poor, the cities were rich. They weren't  trying to escape population density or dirty European cities, they were escaping poverty and oppression. When they arrived in the US, the cities were unlike anything they had ever experienced in their lives.

 

This is actually pretty accurate for most of the European immigrants that came to America, not just Italians.  They were rural "peasants", not middle class townspeople.

 

Actually, on my list of the things that triggered postwar sprawl, the movement of rural people towards the cities was prominent.  So if the immigrants were primarily rural, they would want to spread out when they could.

 

Remember the same industrializing trends that happened in the US were happening in Europe, and immigration peaked decades later.

 

I understand the point you're trying to make, but this is a common argumentative trap that urbanists fall into: the "you don't need X" arguments.  You also don't need walkable mixed-use neighborhoods. 

 

Yes and no. It's an old talking point, but what about Peak Oil? What about sustainable living, using our natural resources carefully, and ethical sourcing (so higher cost good produced without child/slave labor, bad working conditions, etc.)?

 

Food prices are (or were, at least) going up in comparison to inflation. Other commodities are too. And more and more consumers are demanding ethically created products, from fair trade clothing to organic locally grown fruits and vegetables. More individuals and families are putting their money towards experiences, like a brew at the new craft brewery down the street, rather than items, like a new Escalade. And products now are built with higher quality and last longer than they ever have (homebuilding being a notable difference from this trend, where quality has declined significantly over time). Standards concerning workplace conditions, environmental regulations, and diversity are stronger than they ever have been before. And are becoming more and more reflective of how society works every day. And consumers are demanding more service and better value from the products they purchase - an excellent case in point being the rise of fast-casual dining establishments over fast food.

 

So in short, costs on every aspect of our lives are going up. And where costs aren't going up, they are being decimated by the internet (who needs a real lawyer when you can get a will on LegalZoom? Who needs a copy editor when spell check can do the work? Who needs to buy a CD or a movie when we can just rent it or view it for free with Netflix or Youtube? Who needs to buy a book when you have a Kindle? - me for the last one, but that's beside the point haha).

 

Two factors are at play, the first being increasing commodity costs and the second being decreasing information costs. Every day we are learning how to rent, share, and get by with less while achieving the same result - a la the Ubers, Youtubes, and Amazons of our world are finding ways to better utilize resources. To put it simply, our world is getting lean.

 

Suburban housing is bloated. As a YP, even if I had a family (which gottaplan correctly called that I do not) I wouldn't want a big yard. Instead, I would want to live in a community that could serve as my yard - imagine the Shaker Squares, Lakwoods, Grandview Heights', Oakwoods, Hyde Parks, etc. of our world. Or even a cool small town like Troy, OH or Columbus, IN would be great too. In essence, I would "rent" my "real" yard by living in a walkable community that takes care of all of the maintenance and upkeep, etc. of all of those spaces. And I know I'm not the only one who feels this way. It's a leaner, smarter, more efficient way to live.

 

And if we really want to get serious about solving peak oil and excessive resource consumption, creating sustainable communities desirable communities for generations to come, limiting our local environmental impact, and allow ourselves to have the ability to better connect to one another, we need to promote living in communities that foster these qualities. Cities do an excellent job of this, but then again cities can only target a narrow population. Solutions are needed for all people, and gottaplan and others point out a lot of good points the average skeptical suburban parent would be thinking. But even then what frustrates me is the fact that the demand is there but yet developers refuse to do anything about it.

 

As has been pointed out, while the demand is certainly there and is probably increasing, it's not as big as some may think or wish it was.  There's still a lot of neighborhoods in the inner ring (for example, Bedford on the streets off downtown) that have that potential.  If the demand really existed beyond that, at least some developers would be all over it.

 

"Walkability" can often be determined by where you live in a neighborhood as much as the neighborhood itself.  My house is quite walkable, at least when it hasn't snowed. At the end of my street, it isn't.

 

True. The key is converting already existing property.... I assume a lot of this demand is deflected by outdated housing stock (note that I'm not saying "old", which can be a selling point, but  housing product with 20+ year old kitchens, loads of wallpaper, old carpet, even paneling haha). Many people don't want to commit to doing a house reno, even if it is cosmetic.

 

Also, there are a ton of people that can't even commit to a city for longer than a year or two. The majority of jobs being offered out of college to Miami grads now, at least, are on two-year rotational programs. Often someone in one of these programs is only in a location for six months. No way they can commit to buying a house, so they're stuck with whatever apartment they can find that will do a 6-month lease. And the rental mentality often doesn't go away until after marriage, and even them more times than not people rent right up until they start having children.

 

Considering the earlier comments about raising children in the city, this severely compounds the issues with renovating old housing stock. It needs to be done, and it can be profitable, and core cities and inner ring suburbs can definitely profit and do well (case in point - Kettering OH and Oakley in Cincinnati) but right now suburban apartment communities are winning this demographic. Which all circles back to building places people want to live.

 

The housing market is not a fair and dynamic market, and current supply most certainly doesn't meet current demand.

 

 

 

 

It may well be that the rural roots of the industrial-era immigration wave did influence the comparatively open designs of Great Lakes cities.  That's an interesting theory.  I might suggest that the industries themselves also played a role, i.e. maximum density isn't advisable when there are so many factories in play. 

 

But particularly in Cleveland's case, the city those immigrants originally built was extremely dense compared to what it's being replaced with now, so I don't believe either of those points comes close to telling the whole story.  Look at before and after pics of the League Park area.  And the postwar sprawl trends in question here are nationwide, not limited to this region.  De-urbanization is still happening throughout America, while the counter-trends favored on UO are still in their infancy. 

 

One could even say those trends have yet to fully reach Cleveland.  The majority of large-scale redevelopment in the city tends to be single-use and notably suburban in style, while historical preservation remains a very low priority outside of downtown-- even within downtown, if we include CSU.  Basic concepts of TOD are largely ignored, even in developments branded as TOD. 

 

I don't attribute these issues to evil forces of suburbia, and I don't believe it's helpful to do so.  Instead I look to misguided leadership in the city itself, which needs to do a better job of encouraging density and mixed use, while discouraging cookie-cutter sprawl designs where they don't belong.  There are vast areas around this metro where those designs do belong, which I see as a good thing, because it strengthens Greater Cleveland by offering people in that market segment what they want.  Cleveland itself should focus not on enmity with the suburbs, but rather on providing a fully realized alternative for a different market segment, the one most likely to drive its own future growth.

It may well be that the rural roots of the industrial-era immigration wave did influence the comparatively open designs of Great Lakes cities.  That's an interesting theory.  I might suggest that the industries themselves also played a role, i.e. maximum density isn't advisable when there are so many factories in play. 

 

But particularly in Cleveland's case, the city those immigrants originally built was extremely dense compared to what it's being replaced with now, so I don't believe either of those points comes close to telling the whole story.  Look at before and after pics of the League Park area.  And the postwar sprawl trends in question here are nationwide, not limited to this region.  De-urbanization is still happening throughout America, while the counter-trends favored on UO are still in their infancy. 

 

One could even say those trends have yet to fully reach Cleveland.  The majority of large-scale redevelopment in the city tends to be single-use and notably suburban in style, while historical preservation remains a very low priority outside of downtown-- even within downtown, if we include CSU.  Basic concepts of TOD are largely ignored, even in developments branded as TOD. 

 

I don't attribute these issues to evil forces of suburbia, and I don't believe it's helpful to do so.  Instead I look to misguided leadership in the city itself, which needs to do a better job of encouraging density and mixed use, while discouraging cookie-cutter sprawl designs where they don't belong.  There are vast areas around this metro where those designs do belong, which I see as a good thing, because it strengthens Greater Cleveland by offering people in that market segment what they want.  Cleveland itself should focus not on enmity with the suburbs, but rather on providing a fully realized alternative for a different market segment, the one most likely to drive its own future growth.

 

As I've mentioned on the main sprawl thread, my paternal grandfather came to Cleveland (from near Portsmouth) to work at Cleveland Pneumatic during World War II, going home every other weekend or so IIRC.  He moved his family up in 1951, though not to Cleveland.  He bought a farm in Macedonia, the current site of Fun -n - Stuff as it turns out.  I'd say he was typical of the rural "immigrant" to the city, he wanted them closer but not in dense surroundings.

 

A few years later, my maternal grandparents (he was born in rural Poland but grew up here, she was born here but grew up there) moved from E. 65th near Francis to a house they built on three acres in Walton Hills.

 

Both my grandpas kept working, at CP and Alcoa respectively, after they moved.

 

It absolutely had something to do with it.  But sprawl did not happen in earnest until after World War II because that's when it became practical, or perhaps even inevitable.

 

Your last paragraph sounds partially like what I've been saying for awhile:  the key to being a great city/urban area is embracing and working with sprawl, integrating it with the dense and busy areas as much as possible.