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October 05, 2007
Multifamily Living
To be sure, my vision for multifamily living is, architecturally speaking, arranged much more along Big Love lines than flophouse rules. You probably wouldn't want a bunch of families under one roof. But a set of friendly families living in adjacent homes, with a shared backyard? That seems quite reasonable. Better, in fact, on quite a few measures than the single family arrangements we currently advantage.
There's this strange acceptance of the idea that as we move into adulthood, we should radically de-emphasize our community and connectedness in order to purchase a big house near a good school with a large lawn. But even if you accept the implicit prioritization of children as right and good and natural, it's not clear that this is the best way to help your kids. The multiplication of invested, engaged adults in my imagined communities would allow for much more supervision, flexibility, social capital, community, and even financial support. By sacrificing so much of our social networks for raising a family, it seems likely that we're also harming our families. Community is good for everyone.
Also, read Reihan. Turns out my crusade isn't so lonely after all.
October 5, 2007 | Permalink
Comments
Just! reading 'Deep Economy' which I'm pretty sure you
long since put on our reading list.
He'd certainly find this post a good one.
The whole construct of community and ecology
'Fits' in a systems sense.
Posted by: has_te | Oct 5, 2007 10:38:13 AM
We did move into a suburb of Kansas City, but that's where my wife's job is, and KC's school district isn't even accredited. But every time we go to mid- or downtown we both feel pangs of regret, especially now that Kansas City is doing so much to revitalize those areas.
What we refused to do, though, was look at a new housing tract. Our house is about 44 years old. It's smaller than what we could have purchased on the edges of the metro, but we didn't want that for exactly the reasons you mention.
Aside from the environmental footprint of new housing developments, there's also how most new houses - at least in KC - are shitholes, no matter how much you spend on them. Our old house still has all the original hardwood floors, original windows - storm windows were added - original doors, original wood paneling in the family room and kitchen, original plumbing. When we bought it, the inspector was ooohing and ahhing about all the copper. And the goobers that buy "more house" out in nowheresville spend years fixing basic stuff like foundations and plumbing, taking the builder to court to get them to honor the freaking warranty.
Posted by: Stephen | Oct 5, 2007 10:38:55 AM
Why even bother proposing a plan whose actual chance of passage in the United States is essentially zero?
Posted by: Josh G. | Oct 5, 2007 10:41:46 AM
Stephen: Aside from the environmental footprint of new housing developments, there's also how most new houses - at least in KC - are shitholes, no matter how much you spend on them. Our old house still has all the original hardwood floors, original windows - storm windows were added - original doors, original wood paneling in the family room and kitchen, original plumbing.
That's because most housing today is built by illegal immigrants. Your 44-year-old house was probably built by well-trained, well-paid American union workers.
Posted by: Josh G. | Oct 5, 2007 10:43:08 AM
That's because most housing today is built by illegal immigrants. Your 44-year-old house was probably built by well-trained, well-paid American union workers.
Hiring illegal immigrants isn't the problem with quality. Hiring unqualified people is a problem whether they're illegal immigrants or not.
But the biggest issue is using crappy materials to save money, up to and including replacing the quality stuff called for in the house plans with shit because people won't see it and/or know the difference.
Posted by: Stephen | Oct 5, 2007 10:48:26 AM
Those communities are out there under the name of "co-housing," which have architecture similar to what you describe and various shared community responibility arrangements. I know some people who live them. It'd drive me nuts. I suspect that living with non-related extended family groups is some how evolutionarily contra-indicated.
But it's out there if you and Matt Y. want to be pioneers.
Posted by: AJ | Oct 5, 2007 10:50:32 AM
The "many families in one house" model is quite common in cultures where extended families live in together.
The "many similar families close together" is common in heavily religious areas--think of the Orthodox towns in NJ. It was more common before the 60's revolution required towns acting as towns to be as non-discriminatory as the national government.
Posted by: SamChevre | Oct 5, 2007 10:56:19 AM
Wow how conservative this is:
"There's this strange acceptance of the idea that as we move into adulthood, we should radically de-emphasize our community and connectedness in order to purchase a big house near a good school with a large lawn. But even if you accept the implicit prioritization of children as right and good and natural, it's not clear that this is the best way to help your kids. The multiplication of invested, engaged adults in my imagined communities would allow for much more supervision, flexibility, social capital, community, and even financial support. By sacrificing so much of our social networks for raising a family, it seems likely that we're also harming our families. Community is good for everyone. "
Ezra, are you swtiching to teh Ron Paul camp?
Posted by: Floccina | Oct 5, 2007 10:58:44 AM
Hey! I already do this. My inlaws, myself, my husband, our two boys, and my brother-in-law and sister-in-law and their 3 girls all bought a house together.
It started with a, we are all too poor to live in a good school district alone, but together, we could buy a beautiful house in a good district. And we could - a large Victorian in just the nicest little neighborhood full of old sprawling trees and with a little park tucked into a center lot.
But now we soooo love living together, I doubt anyone will move out even if they have the money.
I mean, it's not just that we now have money to do things like travel, or put in a solar power system, or have broadband internet, that before all went into housing - it's having 6 adults in the house. Which means that you only have to cook dinner twice a week at most, and not that often does that even happen. If I have a really hellish week, the housework doesn't build up, cause there are extra people to take over.
It's having back up childcare, and getting to see my nieces grow up, and also just having someone to talk to when otherwise I would have been alone.
I think it works for us, because the house we bought is well suited for this - it's 3 stories. We put the kids up top, the three girls in one room, the three boys in the other. They share a bathroom. The second floor has 3 bedrooms, each with a bathroom. And the first floor is basically one big open room, except the library and half-bath. (The library was supposed to be a dining room, but someone had wisely filled the entire thing with shelves. We added a center stack and a card catalogue. We luvs our books.)
I can honestly say that I now have 50% more leisure time, plus extra discretionary income. On top of getting to live in an area that I NEVER could have afforded to otherwise. And the sense of community.
I don't know why everyone doesn't do this!
Posted by: magikmama | Oct 5, 2007 11:06:58 AM
My sister fantasizes about a family compound situation, because no one in our family is foolish enough to want to live under the same roof again (and our brother, when he finally escaped darkest Mississippi, went to Austin because he decided that living in the same town as his sibs would be problematic). Being nearer her kidlets would be nice, and having pet care close by when I travel would be less stressful, but I wouldn't live as far out in the 'burbs as she prefers to. The differences in basic housing preferences are just too great to make it feasible, even if finances allowed it.
Posted by: latts | Oct 5, 2007 11:08:20 AM
"Fine Homebuilding" had an article a few years about about a development of 20 or so houses arranged around a rectangular shared parklike space. The houses were detached but close together, and the shared 'front yard' allowed the traffic/parking patterns in the back (around the exterior perimeter) to be quite efficient. There was a community-room type structure that could be reserved but no shared facilities otherwise. The houses were of different sizes and price points so it was not homogeneous. Quite a nice recycling of a historical concept.
I think this was the article: Planning a Deliberate Neighborhood but it requires a paid subscription to see.
Cranky
Posted by: Cranky Observer | Oct 5, 2007 11:11:49 AM
I don't understand why Ezra and others would champion this arragement. Little is offered up as evidence to it's benefit with anyone, including the children.
I believe there is a subconscious tendency of left leaning liberals toward collectivism....and this is just another iteration of that tendency.
Posted by: El Viajero | Oct 5, 2007 11:32:33 AM
when i grew up in newark, new jersey, in the "weequahic section" of phillip roth fame, almost all of the homes were wood and brick, three and four story houses. only the wealthier people had single family homes.
there were many families living out their lives under one roof.
those homes are still there.
....there were long flights of wooden steps, little porches, a small garden, a basement and stoops for talking with neighbors or watching people wash their cars on sunday mornings.
lots of children and mothers shouting and grandmas sitting with knee high stockings on nylon-strip chairs with knitting bags or wrinkled hands resting in laps, with ancient wedding bands.
....every family had a story. every floor would have aromatic cooking smells. there were human sounds of screen doors shutting, children in the hall...often, the grandparents would be on the first floor, and the rest of the families on the upper floors, but not always.
...in the winter, there were rows of galoshes by the door, and each season had its neighborly connections.
....the houses are still there.
at the jersey seashore, in areas, like bradley beach, there were even wood homes with sweeping, old porches where families would come to stay in the rooms, and everyone shared a communal dining room and kitchen.
...the connections were earthy and warm.
there were many beautiful days in the neighborhood.
Posted by: jacqueline | Oct 5, 2007 11:38:15 AM
I grew up in such a place. There was a square of garden apartments with a shared, large back yard. The result: NO ONE tended that yard. It was a bedraggled playground, communal, yes, but not kept up. You are one hell of a naive communist if you don't see the connection between privately owned property and maintenance. Really. How old are you?
Posted by: klein's normal nut | Oct 5, 2007 11:51:45 AM
I grew up in such a place. There was a square of garden apartments with a shared, large back yard. The result: NO ONE tended that yard.
So you're a conservative because the people who raised you and around whom you grew up were a bunch of lazy jerks?
Sounds about right.
Posted by: Stephen | Oct 5, 2007 11:54:30 AM
El Viajero, that has got to be one of the most vacuous things you've ever written. And that's really saying something.
Personally, I'm pretty down on co-housing where I've seen it-- the people who opt for it are a bit too communal and focused on organizzed cohousing activities, rather than the informal, natural community connections formed by neighbors' proximity.
What Ezra's proposing works as a means of maintaining families with children in cities... this sort of architecture of a small home with shared yard space can be seen in denser parts of Brooklyn, NY and Amsterdam. It's also a variation on some inner-ring suburban rental complexes.
However, for standard neighborhoods, homes with a porch on a street with a sidewalk that are a 10-minute walk from a main street works just fine.
Posted by: Tyro | Oct 5, 2007 11:57:18 AM
klein, i would assume that the way this would be handled would be the same as any home-owners/Condo/Co-op association handles it-- everyone pays a monthly fee for upkeep of the common space, and it gets taken care of.
Seriously, if what you're claiming is valid, then liveable condos and co-ops could not possibly exist.
Posted by: Tyro | Oct 5, 2007 12:00:18 PM
There's this strange acceptance of the idea that as we move into adulthood, we should radically de-emphasize our community and connectedness in order to purchase a big house near a good school with a large lawn.
People drop by my place waaay less often ever since I got married. I'm not sure what private stuff they think we must be doing 24/7, but doesn't everyone believe that married people don't have sex anyway? Why not drop by for a cup of coffee?
Posted by: Sara | Oct 5, 2007 12:25:13 PM
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cohousing
We looked into this - but decided that we weren't suited to it - that we get busy at work and fly by the seat of our pants and out co-neighbors would hate us.
But sometimes I wonder and have fantasies about what I'd make on our families dinner night in the big kitchen.
But then I worry if I wouldn't like someone and it would suck...
Posted by: Jodi Davis | Oct 5, 2007 12:40:36 PM
Several of my friends have a pretty elaborate long-term plan for what they call an "intentional community." They wouldn't necessarily share a backyard, but they'd share things like a lawnmower, child care, etc. Plus it just makes life nicer if you can have a social structure that you can be in touch with by, say, walking a block every day or so, rather than driving nine hours twice a year.
Posted by: SDM | Oct 5, 2007 12:42:19 PM
I suppose I should add that I also live in a sort-of "intentional community." It's what I'd call a "one-family group house," populated by a shifting cast of 3-5 adults and one dog. The owner is a resident herself, and bought the house with the encouragement of her then-roommates and now-tenants, with the intention of having it be a place where she could live with friends to help pay the mortgage for a good long time.
Also, nearly everybody I socialize with lives within six blocks, but that's more a coincidence than anything else.
Posted by: SDM | Oct 5, 2007 1:09:37 PM
“There's this strange acceptance of the idea that as we move into adulthood, we should radically de-emphasize our community and connectedness in order to purchase a big house near a good school with a large lawn.”
Really? I wonder were this mythical place is, because it sure doesn’t reflect anyplace I’ve lived since the wife and I had kids.
Posted by: DM | Oct 5, 2007 1:10:50 PM
But a set of friendly families living in adjacent homes, with a shared backyard? That seems quite reasonable. Better, in fact, on quite a few measures than the single family arrangements we currently advantage.
In my neighborhood in San Francisco, the standard pattern for each block is a bunch of (mostly 2-3 unit) buildings around the outside (no or minimimal front yards), and a bunch of postage-stamp backyards in the center. It's always seemed to me that there would be substantial benefit to everyone on a given block to get rid of the fences and turn that central open space into a single semi-private park, with vastly more space (and potentially better amenities) than any individual backyard could afford. I don't have any idea how we would get there, but the benefits seem so obvious to me that it seems worth a try.
Posted by: Tom Hilton | Oct 5, 2007 1:44:32 PM
The late 20th century American "dream" of a suburban house with one nuclear family on a large lot is an historical anomaly, a place society will probably never go again. Kinda like when you were a teenager and got all surly and uncommunicative and didn't want to be told what to do.
Part of the dream was working for a large corporation and being regularly transferred around the country, regularly losing touch with family and community.
Well into the 20th century lots of people lived in extended families, boarding houses, single-room occupancies (SROs), dormitories, and work camps.
The "dream" of suburbia was not the dream of the homebuyer, it was the dream of the paving industry, the building industry, the land developers, the car makers, and the rural legislators who saw the chance to cut the cities down to size while their farmer constituents got rich selling farmland to homebuilders. With tax breaks and outright subsidies lavished on these people in the grandest scale, the poor average Joe was sucked along in the undertow, battered day and night by propaganda barrages extolling suburbia and condemning and legislating against any alternative.
When I lived on a houseboat we lived ten feet from our neighbor's houses. We shared parking, gardens, and the tasks of keeping the docks, electricity, sewage and water systems working.
This didn't turn out to be hard at all to do, but maybe it's because we were adults, not teenagers.
Posted by: serial catowner | Oct 5, 2007 1:57:07 PM
Two adults is not enough to work, raise children, keep a house and yard. It isn't. The ones who manage it work all the time at the tasks that they aren't hiring out. There are huge ecomonies of scale, though, in lots of those chores. Communal living requires interpersonal skills, but it is a way to get more adults carrying the workload. So if you can work it, you get leisure and company. Pretty powerful draw.
Posted by: Megan | Oct 5, 2007 2:16:17 PM
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