Housing Clusters

I keep thinking that housing trends are changing. I also feel that they must change. When I let my mind range freely over this topic here’s some thought blasts that emerge:

• Neighborhoods will remain a strong concept
• Diversity of residents will grow; age, marital status, kids/no kids, etc.
• Ethnicity diversity welcomed
• Commuting considerations big on site selection
• Convenience shopping nearby
• Transportation issues major component
• Urban/suburban dichotomies merged 

There are other powerful themes to explore but these resonate frequently with me as common focal points. Let’s explore them a bit more.

Neighborhood is a central concept for defining ‘home’. People are social beings. We need connections to feel we belong – to others or to site. Gatherings of people to a site, especially where they nest 24-hours a day, support relationships, friendships, knowledge of private sectors of people’s lives – illness, hopes, dreams, physical desires, marital comity and discord, and so much more. Intimate knowledge of this type gives people reason to help others in time of need. And to celebrate in times of joy and achievement. Want to know what’s going on in the ‘hood? Ask a neighbor. They know. Because they care about each other. This is true in city or town.

Also, neighborhood is where we leave from to further our career and return to at the end of the work day. Same for education. We leave home for school and return after classes, study and research. Some educational forays require leaving home for months or years before returning back to the nest.

Diversity of residents is another measure of health and vitality for a housing area. Whether a small knit neighborhood or a larger region of an urban community, diversity of age, income, singles and marrieds, with kids and none, diversity keeps the fabric of the community interesting and vibrant. It is not a boring ghetto of similar people living lives of cookie cutter sameness. Diversity pulls us out of our own center and opens the world to our mind and senses.

It is valuable to witness life in its many dimensions happening simultaneously with our own experiences. We grow in self awareness, life calling, education, relationships and marriage. We grow through parenthood and all the phases that brings to us. We experience empty nest syndrome as the kids leave the home en route to their own lives. As well we must face our retirement and end years of failing health.

Each person experiences these phases of life in ethnic centers of cultural heritage, age, financial circumstances, illness and other-centeredness. This is diversity. This is multiplicity of perspectives that enrich lives. It is denied to us only if we seek safety in sameness. Diversity ought to be a far ranging goal of housing decisions.

Ethnicity is a broad area of diversity to be added to the pot before stirring! I won’t say much more than what I said in the previous section, but we need to know this: ethnic diversity speaks of world cultures and helps us be sensitive to the self images of those outside our understanding if we are to build commonality and global peace. We must accept and understand ethnicities in the broadest sense.

Commuting to work and education sites is a life-long activity. If we are to build neighborhoods of great interest and value we must also locate them or provide them with transportation grids that make sense getting to and from work and school. Without this support the neighborhood disintegrates as residents seek more cost effective and time saving transportation pathways to and from the daily ‘grind’. It is an elemental consideration for selecting a neighborhood.

Observe urban transportation corridors for work day commutes. I think you will see communities of diversity and rich experiences where commuting support is evident. Other diversity follows and further enriches the community. Now add in education commuting. The neighborhood swells with even more possibility!

Convenient shopping investment should also be evident in successful neighborhoods. I refer here to the everyday marketing needs – food, restaurants, laundry and dry cleaning, convenience marts, service outlets for auto and home (repair shops, etc.) and personal services (medical, hair salons, barbershops and tailor). Clusters of shops with convenient walking patterns in addition to car access and parking will develop in successful neighborhoods. Not all conveniences have to be within a 10 minute drive as in most suburbs! Major shopping outlets and specialty stores ought to be accessible in surrounding regional transportation grids. These are regional assets, not neighborhood ones.

Transportation really means connectivity to other neighborhoods and regions separate from the home neighborhood. If our neighborhood is to be of significant value, we must be able to easily transport ourselves to other areas. The reverse is also true. We want others to be able to connect with us from the outside as well. Especially true for scattered family members and life-long friends. And business associates who might transmute between more than one focal point of our lives.

Regional connectivity is a huge issue. It is also very expensive. If mass transit is to work well in all of our lives we must face the investment of building it. Overworking it by stretching it to far flung areas is unnecessary if we make full use of what we have and maintain sensible networking of existing communities and neighborhoods.

Urban/Suburban dichotomies exist. It is a reality to each of us. Some of us prefer the simpler life of a suburb. Even those differ greatly: some are urban flavored while others have a decided rural taste! Whether a small town or village, or a buoyant urban suburb with colleges and universities, each suburb has a role to play. It is a larger role if the urban area surrounding it also commutes to it for needed access to amenities. Such would include art, concert venues, educational sites and medical specialties.

Urban centers for commerce and industry require a large pool of specialized, talented labor. Those labor pools rely also on educational centers where skills and talents are honed for the labor market. Regional, national and international markets are also served by many bustling urban areas. Chicago is the commodities market of the world. Agricultural commodities are not the only commodities traded in our region, but also steel, iron, aluminum, ores and minerals.

The life of an urban area feeds the suburban areas. Neighborhoods are a part of each. Either in the city or in the suburb or in farther outlying towns and villages, people gather to live their lives. And housing options are broad enough to support each decision maker. Constancy of living patterns – home, housing, transportation, child rearing, education access, arts involvement, shopping and career commuting – are all living patterns that must be addressed. This is best done in stable, meaningful pods.

Housing must address this natural experience and adapt to it rather than pulling communities farther out from core urban areas to agricultural lands. Urban sprawl is ugly, wasteful and unnecessary. If only enough fertile minds would focus on this simple fact.

Might current financial circumstances aid in building this elemental future for America?

Time will tell!

June 25, 2015