The Way I Feel About You: "In praise of streetcar suburbs."

Two photos from 13th Street in New Albany, just around the corner from our house.

Those parallel lines follow 13th Street north to Spring, then take a long westward curve. As a side note, with each passing day, I detest automobile supremacy more and more.

In Praise of Streetcar Suburbs, Defined and Illustrated, by Pete Saunders (The Corner Side Yard)

... Personally I love streetcar suburbs because they often have a mixed use character that places built after them lack. There's also often a community or neighborhood connectivity within them that I find appealing; many streetcar suburb communities are full of proud, organized and vocal residents who advocate strongly on behalf of their community's values. But I find three reasons that highlight why the streetcar suburb was -- and is -- a superior development type, and why it will make a comeback as American suburbs mature.

They are adaptable.
Streetcar suburbs were often built along grid networks, but not exclusively so; variations in block sizes and topographical adjustments can create differences in them. Streetcar suburbs were built and designed with streetcar systems in mind, but they generally have been able to succeed far longer than the streetcars themselves.

They are efficient.
Streetcar suburbs can accommodate a broad range of residential types and sizes, from large-lot single-family homes to midrise and high-rise multifamily developments. This is largely due to the kind of street networks given to them by the initial streetcars that created them. Another key efficiency: streetcar suburbs are well-suited to the "missing middle" of multifamily residential development, the townhouses, duplexes and small (2-12 units) multifamily buildings that create housing diversity and improve housing affordability.

They are inherently multi-modal.
As perhaps the original transit oriented development type, they are quite able to accommodate public transit; it's in their DNA. However, even if streetcar networks never come back, they usually have transit supportive densities that make other modes, like buses or bikes, quite useful.

Campaign Diary, Chapter 7: Economic development, quality of life and New Albanian inner rings.

In New Albany geographical context, we're speaking broadly of the post-WWII inner ring suburbs between the historic city center and I-265. It applies to commercial strips like the Colonial Manor center on Charlestown Road. Previously we referenced Sanphillippo's essay here: Impure thoughts about suburbia" and New Albanian corridors.

More recently, we looked at an argument for adaptability for these areas: Securing inner ring suburbs by "moving away from the traditional suburban standards and making them adaptable."

All these ideas address two common misperceptions: That (a) the city of New Albany devotes disproportionate attention to downtown, and (b) that a downtowner like me cares only for my immediate vicinity.

In fact, sprawl (of which inner ring suburbs were the earliest example) always has cost more, dollar for dollar, than efforts to utilize denser urban centers. Moreover, looking back over the past decade, it can be seen that city spending on downtown has indeed been disproportionate -- but only in the sense that time and money has not gone to further private investment during the same time.

Furthermore, when the city has spent money downtown, it invariably has been justified on errant premises, as with the Main Street beautification project. If anything, reigning city decision-makers continue to think and spend downtown according to suburban precepts, which is senseless on multiple levels, though useful when explaining $9 million water parks.

Besides that, for 25 years I've owned a business off Grant Line Road and University Woods Drive, and for ten years I lived a block away from it.

What's true is this: We need development and maintenance strategies for the inner ring as well as downtown. These have been more slow to evolve, but suggestions are emerging in American experiences elsewhere.

DR. STRANGELOVE: OR HOW I LEARNED TO STOP WORRYING AND LOVE SPRAWL (SORT OF), by John Sanphillippo (New Geography)

I’m a longtime advocate of walkable, mixed-use, mixed-income, transit-served neighborhoods. But lately I’ve been having impure thoughts about suburbia. Let me explain.

What often passes for a neighborhood in America is a low grade assemblage of chain convenience stores, big box outlets, franchise muffler shops, multi-lane highways, and isolated cul-de-sacs. Even when it’s physically possible to walk or bike from Point A to Point B it’s not pleasant, safe, or convenient.

Or, those landscapes along our roadway corridors between downtown and I-265. Among them, State Street, Grant Line Road and Charlestown Road are the primary commercial zones.

I always assumed that these neighborhoods would all devolve into the new slums – and many certainly are doing that. Ferguson, Missouri anyone? But it doesn’t have to go that way. These forgotten suburban neighborhoods can just as easily be the new sweet spots for small enterprise and a renewed middle class.

The author proceeds to explain, and later in the article, he makes a handy point about bicycle aptitude.

The primary factor in their favor is that highway expansion and car-oriented improvements are fantastically expensive, while bike infrastructure is ridiculously cheap.

Indeed, the distances are short. With proper bicycle infrastructure, a person living near Silver Street Park could bike to IU Southeast or downtown in a very short time -- a far more "millennial" response than the mayor's luxury apartments. Because ...

What about all those tragic little post war ranch homes? Well, it turns out that they’re radically less expensive than either a condo downtown or a McMansion in the newer suburbs.

The conclusion isn't unexpected.

So far what I’m seeing is that a dead downtown contributes to even deader close in neighborhoods. A thriving downtown attracts more people to the city and creates an economic incentive for people to get creative with the reinvention of not-so-fabulous nearby areas. So if you want your struggling suburb to succeed, support your downtown.

There is one inescapable element to this conversation. Whether living in the inner ring or operating a business there, stakeholders simply must communicate and work together. New Albany's traditional tolerance of political fixing and one-party dominance has tended to mute grassroots organizing.

If there is to be a renewal of quality of life in the inner ring and prospects for business, as described in the article linked here, cooperation of this sort is absolutely necessary.

Securing inner ring suburbs by "moving away from the traditional suburban standards and making them adaptable."

This article is an excellent and timely introduction to the topic of inner ring suburban neighborhoods. In New Albany's case, many (probably most) such areas lie inside the beltway (I-265). It is an informative overview, and there are numerous points herein for initiating the discussion.

The author begins by contrasting modes of metropolitan development.

The Perils of Inner Ring Suburbs, by Pete Saunders (The Corner Side Yard)

Our metropolitan areas are finding themselves in some pretty interesting times. The force that shaped metropolitan development since World War II, namely the outward push of conventional suburban development usually characterized as "sprawl", has been tempered as a renewed focus on inner city redevelopment has risen over the last 20-25 years or so. This is creating greater recognition of and concern for what's been left behind -- the inner ring suburban type, mostly built between the 1950's and 1970's. Their future will tell us much about what our nation values and how we will move forward socially and economically.

He offers a few potential solutions.

There are ways that inner ring suburbs can combat the potential rot that could plague them. Interestingly, the solutions involve moving away from the traditional suburban standards and making them adaptable. Here are four ideas:

• Contemporize your housing stock. Many communities fall out of favor with homebuyers and renters because they don't offer the amenities that are built in to newer places in city centers or suburban fringes. Inner ring suburbs will have to find ways to make their housing stock attractive to rehabbers interested in adding space and features to older structures.
• Diversify your housing stock. The days of bedroom communities exclusively consisting of single family homes may be slowly coming to an end. More of today's homebuyers -- and renters -- are seeking more diverse environments. This means more multifamily development, more mixed use development, and even the inclusion of accessory units on single family home lots.
• Make walkability a priority. As residents of a community age, the ability to access places via the automobile may decrease. However, they deserve a chance to remain mobile. Communities can aid this by adding the sidewalks, crosswalks, trails, streetscapes, signage and other features that can connect people to places. An added side benefit is that these changes can make your community more attractive to new residents as well.
• Coordinate social services. It's likely that changing suburban demographics means changing demands from residents, and inner ring suburbs must prepare for the change. This could mean greater reliance on assistance programs that aid low-income residents, as well as programs to physically and socially engage senior residents.

For a very long time, we've been saying that New Albany's inner ring neighborhoods cannot be allowed to become the next "doughnut holes" in the urban fabric, and that in many ways, policies useful for downtown also are viable for the inner ring.

Walkability is a fine example of this, as anyone living on or near Slate Run Road will tell you.

"Impure thoughts about suburbia" and New Albanian corridors.

It's interesting reading about "the virtues of America's aging inner ring suburbs."

The topic was raised by Diane Benedetti at Thursday's council meeting, pertaining to the area around the Colonial Manor shopping center on Charlestown Road. It's also something Scott Blair and I have discussed, given that we're both property and business owners on Plaza Drive off Grant Line Road.

These are not far-flung suburban areas, but they're the oldest suburbs within the enveloping ring of I-265. Often I've decried the absence of economic development planning closer to the historic city core, but there are no plans for these corridors, either.

My business has a footprint in both, and I am interested in improving both. With downtown as a reference point, State Street is the Hospital Corridor, Grant Line Road the IU Southeast Corridor, and Charlestown Road the Purdue Center Corridor. In the real world, the first step in making sense of these categories would be consistent public transit options.

We live in New Albany, though. Plan B, anyone?

DR. STRANGELOVE: OR HOW I LEARNED TO STOP WORRYING AND LOVE SPRAWL (SORT OF), by John Sanphillippo (New Geography)

I’m a longtime advocate of walkable, mixed-use, mixed-income, transit-served neighborhoods. But lately I’ve been having impure thoughts about suburbia. Let me explain.