
Costs of Sprawl: The Speed Burden (2014) - Doctor_Fegg
http://www.originalgreen.org/blog/costs-of-sprawl---the-speed.html
======
mseebach
It could also fit inside a decent-sized airport. Several large factories are
bigger than this. Heck, so are single farms.

The idea that there's a trade-off between centres of high culture and highway
interchanges is entirely absurd.

~~~
willvarfar
Can you have "high culture" and cars?

Empirically, all the towns and cities _I_ like to visit are the non-high-rise
pedestrian ones. They don't have to be old, but it helps.

My visits to the US have given me a very jaded view of what constitutes
culture in the US. Small towns with small roads can be nice in the evenings,
and that's about it.

~~~
pif
> all the towns and cities I like to visit ...

Warning: "like to visit" != "like to live in"

~~~
smcl
We can clarify with the person who said that, but the two are one-and-the same
for me. I'd guess that it's pretty rare for someone to like visiting
pedestrian-friendly, compact old cities (Paris, Prague, Edinburgh) but prefer
to live in modern car-dependent ones (Atlanta, Dubai etc)...

~~~
randallsquared
Given tourism rates and where those tourists are from, I think it's super-
common to like visiting pedestrian-friendly, compact old cities but prefer to
live in modern car-friendly ones. I'm such a person myself: visiting those
places is fun, sort of like visiting a Humanity & Crowds theme park, but where
I live I want to relax and have some separation.

~~~
madcaptenor
Me too. When I moved from San Francisco to Atlanta I traded a public transit
commute for a car commute. I still spend the same amount of time getting to
and from work but I don't have to spend it physically crammed in with other
human beings.

~~~
icebraining
To me that reads as "I no longer can use that time to read or do something
productive". Each to their own, though. Though it depends on the conditions of
the public transportation - being crammed in a bus is very different from
having a seat on a train or ferry, as I usually do.

~~~
madcaptenor
When I had a public transit commute, I rarely read, even though I read a lot
in general. Even if I had a seat concentrating on anything was too difficult.
I listened to a lot of podcasts, which I still do in my driving commute, and
those had the side benefit of drowning out the noise of humanity.

My favorite commutes have been walking commutes, but I haven't had a job where
I could do that in years, and I bought a house which isn't within walking
distance of any jobs I'd want so that won't happen for the foreseeable future.
Unless the walk from my bedroom to my home office counts as a "commute".

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aaron695
Unless there are people living on the interchange it's a little pointless.

We need very high density around where people live. This is the most important
thing ever.

Low energy costs for transport which I would say equals better communities and
a better way of life for a large proportion of the population.

Of course acknowledging there exists at any time a smaller proportion of the
population for who this doesn't work, but this also allows them an easier
access to their lifestyle.

Allowing/encouraging high density building is whats it's about, not roads
which are just the side effect.

~~~
lettergram
> We need very high density around where people live. This is the most
> important thing ever.

Strongly disagree, why? In the suburbs you spend 10x less time in traffic, and
have access to 10x more because it takes 15 minutes to go 10 miles vs the 1
hour I spend every day traveling 7 miles to work in the bay area.

Significantly, less energy and time is lost in the suburbs. Plus, cities have
ridiculous pricing for less space, hence people with families dislike cities
(on average).

~~~
julespitt
You do not have access to 10x more things, because the suburbs have less
things spread out over much more area. There's no free lunch.

~~~
lettergram
Are you kidding? It depends where you are in the suburbs I'm sure. However, in
general because of the ease of transit with a car you have access to far more.

For example, in NYC I wouldn't have access to a soccer field, a place to go
horse back ridding, a place to go off roading, fishing, a Macy's, an Steak
house, McDonalds, a Red Lobster, etc. all within 10-15 minutes. All at the
same time, having a 4 bedroom, 2 bathroom house with a yard at $1500/month.

> suburbs have less things spread out over much more area

Again, it is spread out over a larger area, but the accessibility of those
regions is much greater (i.e. far less traffic, 45+ mph speed limit, and
cheaper fuel costs). If you want stuff within walking distance, or public
transit it will not be as accessible and thus you'll have access to less.

Living in the Bay Area (even with a car) it'll take me 25 minutes to get to
the Costco 4 miles from my apartment which costs me 5x what it would in the
suburbs of say Chicago, Austin, or countless other locations.

~~~
alonmower
If you're comparing the accessibility and cost of chain stores in and out of
cities I'm going to assert that you're missing a lot of what cities have to
offer (museums, interesting restaurants, live music, parks with lots of people
in them, etc...). Also some people truly enjoy not needing to get into a car
to accomplish even the most basic task

Cost of living and accessibility to nature and open space are the big
compromises though

~~~
cableshaft
There's interesting restaurants in the (Chicago) suburbs too. They might not
be as gimmicky (no "say the secret password to get in" types), but you can
find just about every cuisine and the food is usually just as good.

Museums are great, but they're something I only get the urge to see a couple
of times per year.

Live music (and you should have said shows/theatre also) is definitely
lacking, but if I want to see that, I can drive an hour to go downtown or take
the train to see them. Even when I was super gung-ho about going to those, I
didn't go to more than a show per month. And several of those were in the
suburbs (Ravinia, Oddball Comedy Festival, Chicago Improv, etc).

And parks? Except for the beach at Lake Michigan, the suburbs has the city
beat in parks by a huge margin. Tons of forest preserves and parks out here,
plenty to explore.

There's a lot more smaller but still enjoyable things in the suburbs too,
community theatre, smaller concerts, sports events that don't cost a minimum
of $80 per ticket, and town festivals which I prefer to big city events
because you can actually walk without being constantly smushed by everyone
else (literally true in Taste of Chicago).

But yeah, those don't want to use cars need not apply. And granted, there will
be people who want to see a show 2 or 3 times per week and visit a museum at
lunch every other day, who would of course prefer living in a big city. But
it's not for everyone.

------
wmeredith
The opening statement of this piece about "how much we've given up" to
accommodate cars in the US leaves me pretty cold. This isn't Italy and we
aren't bound by how far we can travel by foot. The US still has huge swaths of
undeveloped land. Drive from Kansas City to Denver sometime, it's a mind-
numbing exercise in endurance. Energy usage concerns (which are very real) not
withstanding the actual physical footprint of all this infrastructure is a
drop in the ocean. The US is huge.

~~~
bitslayer
The US is huge, and we could build anything we want. The problem is that we
don't see what we have given up by not living closer together. The dream of
car culture is that we as individuals can live in a huge area, with vast
potential for interaction. But the truth of what we have built is that we are
cut off from one another. The "square" that I pass through every morning is a
massive intersection of two suburban highways. Behind our tinted windows, we
wait in long lines for out turn signal. We drive to the gym and fight for that
close up parking space so we won't have to walk. Why? Because the exterior
environment we have built is horrific. This is not the life I want to live. I
reject the idea that we can't live in nicer places. Americans learn the wrong
lesson from visiting Europe. They think that a place has to be hundreds of
years old to be livable. But we can build anything we want. Politics need to
get out in front and not drag us back. Moneyed interests need to take a
chance. Because when given a choice, people will choose a walkable, livable
world.

~~~
xienze
> The dream of car culture is that we as individuals can live in a huge area,
> with vast potential for interaction. But the truth of what we have built is
> that we are cut off from one another.

No, the dream of car culture is that regular people can afford to live in
their own detached house on a nice-sized plot of land. Which is what we have.

You can build dense cities in the US all you want, but there will always be a
sizable portion of the population that says "I can pay $X to live in a small
apartment in the city or a big house with a yard in the suburbs. Hmm..." It's
an obvious choice for many people.

~~~
hx87
> No, the dream of car culture is that regular people can afford to live in
> their own detached house on a nice-sized plot of land.

Implicit in that dream is a reasonable (<1 hr) commute, which is increasingly
out of reach.

~~~
ghaff
It's really not in general outside of a relatively small number of in-vogue
cities. Yes, there are places that have bad commutes (that don't even
necessarily involve driving into or out of a city core) but it's actually the
exception in the US generally.

------
SteveMouzon
I'm the author of the original post on originalgreen.org. While the images are
sensational and actually went viral a couple years ago, the real message is to
point out that the need for speed necessitates massive waste of land and
resources. At speeds experienced in Florence, the curb radii of the streets
are essentially invisible, whereas the expressway radii each take up much of
the Atlanta image. Yet which place provides wonderful experiences? Isn't it
time to slow down?

~~~
blendo
The need for speed also leads to urban pedestrians having to see and avoid
vehicles that are optimized for Atlanta-sized interchanges. And the trendiest
"green" cars are the worst: the Tesla Model S P85D weighs about 5,000 lbs and
accelerates from 0 to 60 mph in 3.2 seconds in "Insane Mode".

Really hoping something like the Toyota i-ROAD takes off:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lgygLfbzLqM](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lgygLfbzLqM)

------
johngalt
Interchanges have a beauty of their own. Maybe just to an engineerish person.
Tons of steel reinforced concrete arching through the air in smooth curves.
Grade separated to allow the constant flow of traffic zipping through without
stopping. Roads and highways that connect your driveway with an entire
continent, and interchanges are at the heart of it.

Trumpet interchange is beautiful in it's simplicity:

[https://www.flickr.com/photos/shanta/2220012922/in/set-72157...](https://www.flickr.com/photos/shanta/2220012922/in/set-72157603793833860/)

Or the Dallas High 5 stack interchange in it's complexity:

[http://googlesightseeing.com/wp-
content/uploads/2011/02/HF1-...](http://googlesightseeing.com/wp-
content/uploads/2011/02/HF1-atrb.jpg)

~~~
madcaptenor
You might like Nicholas Rougeux's "Interchange choreography":
[http://www.c82.net/work/?id=350](http://www.c82.net/work/?id=350)

~~~
legodt
Or Sufjan Steven's The BQE!

[https://vimeo.com/100146540](https://vimeo.com/100146540)

------
athenot
One nitpick: this is not "a nameless interchange", this is known to us in
Atlanta as "Spaghetti Junction"[1]. The side-view[2] shows that a bit better.

[1] Yes there's an official name but almost nobody uses it.

[2]
[http://media.cmgdigital.com/shared/img/photos/2014/01/17/a7/...](http://media.cmgdigital.com/shared/img/photos/2014/01/17/a7/56/TSPOST_focal.jpg)

~~~
szarecor
Actually, I don't think that's spaghetti junction (Tom Moreland interchange)
at 285/85\. I think it's the 285/75 interchange at Cumberland.

~~~
athenot
It's I-85 southbound at mile post 95.8 (see the sign on the median). ;)

But I agree that 285/75 is comparable in size.

------
quantumhobbit
I've always suspected that one of the driving forces of the expolsion of the
suburbs in post war america was due to atomic weapons. This picture, if true
to scale, reminds me of that. Older cities could be easily wiped out in ww3.
Atlanta, which saw a huge amount of growth in the second half of the twentieth
century, would be harder to completely destroy.

I've never really seen evidence that there was a real effort to spread out
cities due to the cold war. Most histories of suburbia focus on white flight
and yhe automobile.

~~~
merraksh
I would suspect atomic weapons scale much more easily than cities. Even if
that wasn't the case, assuming the target is the commercial center of a city
you don't even have to use more powerful warheads.

I see a much less scary, but still ignoble, incentive behind this: the
cementification of cities and the money it brings to all people involved.

------
oldmanjay
I don't want to flag this because it's not offensive, but this is pretty
stupid on a lot of levels. I don't see the point in emotionally charged
inapplicable comparisons.

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return0
Thats the reason why most american cities lack a city center culture.

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ProfChronos
"Because of the need for speed, Atlanta has a great big expensive hole the
size of Florence that does very little beside getting a small fraction of
Atlanta workers to their jobs a bit sooner, barring any accidents." => how can
you compare a city in a country like Italy (60M people, 116K sq miles) with an
interchange in the US (323M people, 3.8M sq miles) and conclude that? Of
course the US have enormous transport infrastructures, simply because it was a
need during the 19th century to have a full "colonization" of the land instead
of only large cities with high density (just think about agriculture) and it
is now a need for a competitive economy to have low costs of transports per
km. Sure we have to improve the energetic efficiency of our transports, but
that won't be done my taking comparisons that make absolutely no sense

~~~
sgnelson
No, it's a thousand times worse than that. They're comparing a city from the
1400's to a tiny piece of a city of the 21st century. It's such a bad
comparison, it blows my mind.

------
ctdonath
That interchange is on the outskirts of Atlanta, a sprawling region with no
geographically limiting factors. Move the camera 15 miles away from Florence
and you'll likely find similarly sparse areas. Move the camera to downtown
Atlanta, and you'll find high rises and other features similarly spectacular,
populated, and dense.

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arbuge
From that graphic, it looks like this argument is being made to work by
stretching the definition of interchange. Most people would think of the area
right around the clover loops. What is being discussed here is actually an
extent defined by the furthest service road entrances and exits connected to
that interchange.

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peterwwillis
Of all the densely populated metropolitan cities in Italy, I don't know of any
of them that are located right next to each other.

Sure, we have sprawl. We also have some of the most densely populated cities
in the world, and we're one of the biggest countries in the world. There's
going to be some wasted space.

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g8oz
Also relevant "Why suburbia sucks" [https://likewise.am/2016/05/08/why-
suburbia-sucks/](https://likewise.am/2016/05/08/why-suburbia-sucks/)

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grb423
How many Walden Ponds would fit in the Moscone Center?

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gmazza
On a plus side, you don't have this in Atlanta Interchange:

[http://www.lanazione.it/firenze/voragine-lungarno-
torrigiani...](http://www.lanazione.it/firenze/voragine-lungarno-
torrigiani-1.2193570)

------
chasing
This is blogspam, by the way. If you click through to the Treehugger article
you'll get a link here -- [http://www.originalgreen.org/blog/costs-of-sprawl
---the-spee...](http://www.originalgreen.org/blog/costs-of-sprawl---the-
speed.html) \-- which appears to be the original article.

It has more to say, as well, than just some sort of dopey "Atlanta should
replace its highways with Duomos" argument.

~~~
honkhonkpants
It is not "blogspam". Streetsblog is a well-known and valuable site that
rounds up links from related sites into a once-daily post.

~~~
chasing
Someone posted a blog post to Hacker News which summarized _another summary_
of an original article -- and neither summary adds any thought to the original
idea. In fact, they strip the original article down to a single idea and
attempt to make it as outrageous as possible.

Blogspam?

------
pacala
Historical Florence is a great place to visit for a few days. Not so sure it's
that great to live in long term, especially with kids.

~~~
quantumhobbit
This. Maybe I'm just an uncouth American but the idea of living with so many
other people in such a small places makes me claustrophobic.

~~~
Doctor_Fegg
I don't know Florence, but compact settlements aren't necessarily
claustrophobic or cramped. They can and do have green space and open areas.
The difference is that this space is public, not private.

I live in the densest part of a little English town. We have hardly any
garden; our house is three storeys high, narrow and terraced. But it isn't
claustrophobic. We can go to the town park/playing field, or the water meadow
in the valley, or the walk through the grounds of the big house, or half a
dozen other places. Yet the town is still compact and walkable, because this
open space is shared between everyone, not walled off.

~~~
quantumhobbit
The existence of all that greenspace in a dense area implies a degree of city
planning that is sadly lacking in many parts of America.

