r/MURICA • u/HoneydewNo9941 • 12d ago

Suburbs

Post image

I can never get over how American suburbs look like. Every time I walk through one I wonder why they cant be accomplished more around the world. The yards, the safe feeling, and the homes. (I think Chile tried to replicate a bit) I just think it’s one of the beauties America has.

591 Upvotes

88% Upvoted

306 comments sorted by

View all comments

42

u/Hon3y_Badger 11d ago

Suburbs (and their single family houses) are a very expensive way of producing housing. Why don't other countries try imitating? Suburbs are a very expensive way of producing housing. Our wealth helps us ignore some of the problems associated with suburb's costs.

9

u/HoneydewNo9941 11d ago

I guess it makes sense why most houses around the world are next to each other. Unless they own land.

1

u/SkippyPurple 11d ago

The energy consumption is also insanely impractical for the amount of people these single family homes support

12

u/lampstax 11d ago

Isn't that why it is the 'American dream' ? To have the financial stability to be able to afford these 'impractical luxuries' ?

0

u/SkippyPurple 11d ago

When I say insanely impractical, I mean ecologically unsustainable. Single family households shouldn’t use the amount of power they do, but we don’t care and design them anyways.

You can have whatever opinion on that you want, but that’s just the fact of the matter.

8

u/lampstax 11d ago

A modern homes with thermal efficiency and multizone cooling and solar arrays with battery storage solves much of the power concern does it not ?

1

u/BlackSquirrel05 11d ago

Sure for 50K-100k on the price tag.

-1

u/SkippyPurple 11d ago

It would help, but you’re not describing the default commonly built housing unit in North American suburbs.

7

u/lampstax 11d ago

You're right about that but perhaps instead of pushing to get rid of SFH and forcing people to entirely change their way of living, you could get more buy if you push instead of increasing existing home's efficiency.

I think most people innately understand that increased efficiency saves them money in the long run. One of the most popular home upgrades is new double or triple pane windows and ROI is a main reason many invest in home solar systems.

2

u/Denalin 11d ago

The paradox here is that more highly regulated housing codes drive up prices, and the cost of housing is already a huge problem. One reason homes in the past were cheaper was they were smaller and had much simpler construction: way fewer outlets and electrical circuits, lower amperage panels, no GFCIs, no thermostatic shower valves, no HVAC, single-story, single-pane windows, possibly not even overhead lighting, possibly no clothes dryer hookup, no coax or Ethernet in wall, little to no insulation.

So the options for most sustainable housing are either pricey single family houses or cheaper attached homes. You can still have family-friendly multi family homes like is common in Asia, but you need to design for three- and four-bedroom apartments which is uncommon in the US due to other regulations around things like wheelchair accessibility.

Another issue is that even if you could strip out most of the bells and whistles of single family homes and make them like you did in the old days, there’s just so much more profit to make a giant ugly box on a tiny plot of land that lists a lot of square footage on Zillow than a nice bungalo on a decent plot of land. So cheap stuff can only exist far away from desirable amenities, which harms livability.

8

u/Genghoul100 11d ago

And yet it has been sustainable for the last 150 years.

4

u/SkippyPurple 11d ago

Yea man, ecologically things are great at the moment what was I thinking

1

u/Genghoul100 11d ago

Notice all those trees and grass in the picture?

0

u/Denalin 11d ago

Most car dependent suburbs are not this pretty.

0

u/Genghoul100 11d ago

Mine is. Most of the ones around here are, well, except the new ones where they cut down all the trees. But they grow back over time.

1

u/Denalin 11d ago

Does yours also have not a single car or person in sight?

I just don’t see why they need to cut down all the trees. They then replace those trees with fast growing non-native species so a lot of them die and cause damage when there are big storms. Places like Reston, VA kept most of their trees when being built and look and feel way better.

→ More replies (0)

0

u/[deleted] 11d ago

[removed] — view removed comment

4

u/Genghoul100 11d ago

Ad hominem attack proves I won the debate. You can see yourself out now.

1

u/MURICA-ModTeam 11d ago

Rule 1: Remain civil towards others. Personal attacks and insults are not allowed.

2

u/No_Cut4338 11d ago

yes, a relative blip in the scheme of things. But man do I consider myself incredibly lucky to have been born during it.

2

u/BlackSquirrel05 11d ago

Define sustainable here...

Also suburbs are a modern thing... They really only started post WW2.

0

u/Any-Seaworthiness186 11d ago

They’re actually not sustainable. American cities are funding the suburbs through tax revenue from denser neighborhoods.

A mixed city is sustainable. Suburbs in itself are not.

2

u/Genghoul100 11d ago

And yet they have been sustainable since the 1880s. Suburban homes are more valuable than inner city homes, and thus pay more in taxes. You are welcome to live like a sardine, but others do not.

1

u/Any-Seaworthiness186 11d ago

Suburbs haven’t been built at a large scale until after WW2. Cities before that had more mixed zoning.

Suburban homes generate significantly less tax revenue than terraced housing or even denser suburbs with smaller lawns. They generate more taxes per house, but not per sqft since there’s less utilized footage. One home with a big lawn is going to generate less revenue than two homes with smaller lawns, and especially much less than terraced housing and apartments. They also require higher infrastructure maintenance costs, spreading out infrastructure over larger areas.

Nobody is saying single family homes are inherently bad. People are just pleading for more diversity because that’s more economically sustainable and has various other benefits such as walkability or the freedom of choice.

1

u/Lower-Task2558 11d ago

My house is in a neighborhood like this. My solar panels cut down on energy use drastically and sometimes I even sell it back to the grid on days I don't use much power.

1

u/SkippyPurple 11d ago

That’s great, it would be awesome to see these systems adopted as more of a standard than individual luxury

1

u/Lower-Task2558 11d ago

We do have big tax incentives for solar in my state .Im also working on setting up a composter to make fertile soil for my garden. This summer I was able to grow a ton of tomatoes and other veggies and I don't even have that much land. This wouldn't have been possible when I lived in the city.

7

u/MsterF 11d ago

Impractical? For who? Not for those who can afford it.

-6

u/Illustrious-Tower849 11d ago

Yes for those who can afford it too

6

u/MsterF 11d ago

Anything’s practical if you can afford it.

2

u/thequestion49 11d ago

I think their poorly constructed argument is that there are non-monetary costs associated with low density housing like we have in the US. I’m not going to argue the merits or take a stance in this thread because I’m too happy being American, but resource depletion and environmental impacts (climate, physical, etc) would be some of the costs. Figured you deserved at least a good faith reply.

-1

u/Illustrious-Tower849 11d ago

No it isn’t

3

u/MsterF 11d ago

Strong argument. Can tell you’ve put a lot deep thought into it

1

u/Illustrious-Tower849 11d ago

Like I can go buy a $30 parka for summer in Death Valley and it would be easily affordable and completely impractical

-3

u/Illustrious-Tower849 11d ago

Individual Affordability≠ Practicality

Not particularly complicated