On Friday, October 18, 2002, at 01:04 AM, Rafal Smigrodzki wrote:
> Christopher Whipple wrote:
>> On Thursday, October 17, 2002, at 12:57 PM, Rafal Smigrodzki wrote:
>
>>>
>>> ### Gee, I really, really hate urban planning. It's the enemy of the
>>> past, present, and future.
>>>
>>
>> Care to elaborate a bit more on this, Rafal? I had never given much
>> thought to urban planning before reading a few of Jane Jacobs' short
>> books - and a book called Emergence: The Connected Lives of Ants,
>> Brains, Cities and Software - which, curiously enough, seems to draw a
>> lot from Jacobs' work.
>>
>
> ### I might be guilty of some hyperbole there. I agree that it is
> reasonable
> and proper to try to predict the urban future and offer the citizens
> plans
> they might use to shape their decisions.
Ah, but you backed it up with the elaboration I requested. :)
> I am quite upset, however, with the way specific urban planning
> features
> (including zoning laws, and building codes) are forced on citizens by
> municipal, and other governments. Basically, owners of land can be at
> any
> time assailed by an edict saying their garden shed cannot be bigger
> than 100
> sq.ft., or that the wiring in their house must be armored. Such laws
> in most
> cases serve mainly to increase the relative influence and power of the
> petty
> bureaucrats administering them, often with an arbitrary *esthetic*
> basis,
> and restrict the owner's ability to quietly use and enjoy his property.
Agreed. The question of aesthetics is an interesting one - I recall on
third avenue a balcony with a large number of pink flamingos, garden
gnomes, and other assorted lawn decorations. What an eye-sore! This
is a person's self-expression, but does it take away from the value of
the surrounding property? Does it matter if it does? If your neighbor
keeps broken down cars and major appliances on his or her front lawn,
do you have the right to complain? I grew up in a relatively isolated
area, where neighbor interactions were few and far between, so I'm
biased to just ignore the things that bother me.
As for zoning laws, they can go both ways. "Sorry, you can't live in
that gorgeous loft, it's zoned for industrial use - go try living in a
nice cookie-cutter apartment building." But on the other hand...
"We're sorry, you can't build your power/chemical plant or install
high-tension power lines near that school."
> I could go on and on. Municipal governments are just as destructive as
> the
> federal and state entities. Their power should be drastically curbed,
> and
> replaced with landowners and tenant's associations, where civil
> contract law
> would be the way of dealing with your neighbors, instead of the
> expropriation of everybody by everybody else that is going on now.
Indeed. And as I'm feeling particularly pessimistic this
morning/afternoon, I'll just go ahead and say it - who has the time to
wait around for an AI to craft the unbiased rules of the Sysop? Power
on *any* level lends itself to abuse. But this allows us to bridge
into the "transparency" thread, in that "knowledge is power". As the
mechanic knows what's really wrong with my car and I do not, it gives
him the opportunity to swindle me. Which just turns the transparency
thread into a suggestion for self-improvement. Governments can be
watched, automotive engineering can be learned - if things aren't
suitably transparent, don't let that stop you.
-crw.
Received on Sun Oct 20 11:05:59 2002
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