Upcoming Elections in Atlanta

I have found this article on Atlanta Journal Constitution Online about suburban sprawl in Atlanta. It argues that contrary to its vast size, Atlanta still has politics and policies of a small town. With the upcoming elections, candidates are not offering anything new but raising taxes, both liberals and conservatives to lower urban sprawl. Another interesting point that the author makes is that the commercial and residential downtown of Metro Atlanta is somewhere between Cumberland and Perimeter Malls, which means that what is called uptown today is the very center of commercial activity and residences, which is pretty apalling.

Can Amado

Gentrification

Having talked anout Urban Decay, I felt the necessity of mentioning gentrification in the blog. Gentrification is defined as the process of renewal and rebuilding accompanying the influx of middle class or affluent people into deteriorating areas that often displaces earlier usually poorer residents.

Gentrification generally raises the property values and general look of a neighborhood, generally in urban centers. It is generally thought that with the rise in property values, the lower-income residents leave so there is a loss of the greater community compare to the gain in property value. However, it is argued is a Usa Today article that gentrification makes everyone better off. This is true simply because old residents dont get to move as it is said to and new residents that coem in bring wealth and liveliness to the neighborhood.

Can Amado

Urban Decay in Atlanta

According to Wikipedia, urban decay is the sociological process whereby a city, or part of a city, falls into disrepair and decrepitude, with depopulation or changing population, economic restructuring, abandoned buildings, high local unemployment, fragmented families, political disenfranchisement, crime, and a desolate, inhospitable city landscape.

Although it is said to become better, I have observed some terrible examples of urban decay in Downtown Atlanta. Most streets around Underground Atlanta are barren and desolate with creepy buildings around. Buildings on those streets look like ghost town buildings that we see on movies. I felt bad for the city of Atlanta because although it is developing rapidly, all the wealth is flowing to the suburbs and no urban culture like in Europe or in San Francisco can be created where artist and wealthy communities reside downtown.

Below is a photograph of the abandoned Medical Arts Buliding just south of I-20 in downtown Atlanta, in a very central location but left alone for decades.

Can Amado

New York Mania

Although I have been to NYC once before, I have fallen in love with New York on thanksgiving break. So I decided to look for blogs about New York. While I was looking for blogs, I found http://www.nycbloggers.com/, a site dedicated to hosting blogs of New Yorkers. Blogs were sort out according to where the authors live and were shown on the subway map. The subway is of utmost importance to New Yorkers, and this map proves how people are categorized by which subways stop they are living near.

Can Amado

Can cemeteries be good, ever?

On thanksgiving break I travelled to New York City to visit a friend of mine who moved there. While I was planning for the trip, I was looking for interesting places to visit, different than the usuak tourist spots like Fifth Avenue, Soho and Statue of Liberty. I found a very interesting blog called Forgotten NY. In relation to our blog adn how it may relate to Forgotten Ny, I found an interesting post about suburban sprawl in Staten Island borough of NYC. According to this article, the old cemeteries of Staten Island are very valuable green spots due to rising suburban sprawl and dimininsihing green spaces. I personally have never liked cemeteries nor enjoyed being in them. However, looking from this perspective, cemeteries are public green spaces that are open to everyone, a serene oasis in the middle of suburbia or in dense urban centres, just like the Trinity Church Cemetery in the Financial District at Manhattan.

Can Amado

Smart Growth

For the final post, I found a site that reviews a plan to make urban areas more compact and densely populated, called "Smart Growth". Following is the summary of some arguments and counterarguments of "Smart Growth".

• Farmland is being lost due to urbanization. However, most of the farmland lost is due to productivity rather than urbanization and there is no real threat to the food supply.

• Green spaces are being threatened by urban expansion. However more land is preserved in parks than is destroyed by urbanization.

• Densely populated urban areas reduce traffic, yet data shows that congestion is less common in areas where the population is less dense.

• Densely populated urban areas provide alternate methods of transportation thus limiting the dependence on cars. However for the alternate method of transit to be efficient more than for a small portion, it would require a more extensive network and cover a larger area for most cities.
  

• Dense urban areas reduce travel times, yet data shows that travel times are shorter in areas that aren't as densely populated.

• Dense urban areas reduce air pollution, yet data shows that air pollution is less where urban areas aren't as densely populated.

I guess this goes to show that compacting urban areas is not necessarily a good thing and data supports the exact opposite and actually having less densely populated areas is better.

P.S. Have a great Thanksgiving break!

Vincent Louis

Carthago delenda est!

The city of Carthage, modern day Tunisia, was a great and powerful city that rivaled the might of the Roman Empire in ancient times. The navy was the largest and most remarkable aspect of Carthage and is also what made them so great a force to be reckoned with. The ports of Carthage were designed to be very efficient and was sheltered so that there was very little wake in the harbor.There were two harbors: one to house the navy ships and one to house the trade vessels. There were a multitude of docks which made trade easy and efficient with other nations which in turn created a large sum of wealth which funded the vast armies. The city was built around a high citadel and contained a necropolis, theatres, marketplaces, and religious areas which show that Carthage was very cultured and advanced.

Vincent Louis

Like an Egyptian

For this post I'll talk about how the ancient Egyptians planned some of their cities. Of course, living in a desert, the cities were all built next to the nearest body of water, which most of the time, was the Nile River. They didn't have aqueduct systems like the Romans so it was very important to live close enough so that they didn't have to travel far for their water supply. Their city structure was grid-like with the temples dispersed throughout the city. The grid layout made moving goods throughout the city easy and efficient. As the temples were so important to daily life for the Egyptians, they were built around them. Here's a picture of an excavated site.



Vincent Louis

Can Sprawl be......Good?

This post is about another post, written by Wayne A. Lemmon, about some ways that sprawl can actually be good. The author makes the point that sprawl can be bad and have negative consequences, but not necessarily in all cases. He then goes on to offer examples such as how homes with yards are more spread out and are really inefficient, yet they become premium products with older residents and "This means substantial real estate taxes are generated, with very little demand per household on social services, public recreation amenities, or public safety operations. The road which provides access to this house is a two-lane road with very low traffic volume and thus low frequency of repair needs." Another point Lemmon made was that everyone driving their own cars over a longer distance with less traffic may be better than public transit in a concentrated area with lots of stop-and-go traffic. So while sprawl isn't really great, there are some nice benefits with proper planning and good policies are in place.

Vincent Louis

SB 375

For this post, I'm blogging about a blog I read about a law that was passed in California called SB 375. It was made into law this September and it should make quite a difference in the way neighborhoods in California are designed. "Senate Bill 375 will use carrots (permit expediting, special funding) and sticks (withholding federal transit funding) to make sure local government and developers build closer to existing or planned transit and take into account how much people will have to drive as a result of proposed projects." The blog goes on to talk about AB 32 which was passed in 2006 and aimed to lower emissions 70% from 1990 levels by 2050. The bill should help contribute to making California into a less sprawlly and more ecologically friendly place to live.

Vincent Louis

The End of Suburbia

This post will talk about another video talking about the sustainability of sprawl. It starts out showing old clips from what looks like the 60s and 70s and comparing them to more recent footage or sprawl and the new American "way of life" we've adopted. The video makes a point of saying that this system is not sustainable and we cannot keep it up for much longer.



Vincent Louis

And then...

For this post, I watched this video on youtube that talked about suburban sprawl. The video started out with happy upbeat music playing while it showed pictures of nature. Then it showed pictures of sprawl with heavy depressing music obviously contrasting the two. A man representing "sprawl" started talking to the state of "California". The point was to make suburban sprawl sound terrible and sway people's opinions against it and to be more friendly towards nature due to the visual appeals in the video.



Vincent Louis

Tallest Cities in the World !?!

According to an article called, "The World's Tallest Cities" from Forbes, New York City remains the tallest city in the world with 35 high towers. However, the article also says that the ranking of the tallest buildings will change after the year 2020. This is due to the fact that various countries in the world are starting to build high rise towers. Hong Kong holds the second place in being the second tallest city in the world with 30 towers. The third place belongs to Shanghai. As we can see, the "hight of city" reflects the economy of the place in some ways. China is stepping up to be one of the leaders in the world's economy.



Where are the tallest buildings in the world? Dubai, the capital of United Arab Emirates, presently has the highest building in the World. The building is called Burj Dubai. This building is approximately 2000 ft tall. Apparently, UAE is trying to invest their money from petroleum export into other industries. This is a wise investment as their petroleum resources are bound to run out. While the tallest building in the world is in the Middle East, the second tallest is in Asia. This building is called Taipei 101, located in Taiwan. For a list of tallest buildings, click on this link. However, please note that this list only includes skysrapers, but not structures. Apparently, it is interesting to see how the current economy will affect the building of the new skyscrapers.

If you want to read the full Forbes article, click here.

Phumthep Bunnak

Sim City - The Sprawling Game

For this week's post, I would like to talk about one of the most popular city planning game, Sim City 4. In this game, the player fills the role of a city's mayor. The main point of the game is to create a city. However, I feel that this game is not an easy game to play. It requires planning. After I have played this game for a while, I feel that sprawl is the only way to create a city in this game. There are three main zoning areas in the game: residential, commercial, and industrial. In order to create a profitable community ( the city gets more money than it spends) player will have to rely on the creation of a sprawl community. Many blocks of residential area surrounding an elementary school, a clinic, and a fire department. The commercial and industrial area will be mainly built away from the residential area. Public transportation is really hard to implement in a city as its maintenance cost is pretty high. If anyone is wondering what the game look like, this is the gameplay video from Youtube. This video is titled, "Sim City 4 Tutorial Your first city." This video teaches new player on how to create the first city, which is usually the hardest.



For more information about this game, you can click on this link.

Phumthep Bunnak

Hippodamus - A True Genius

I have found this article online which talks about how Hippodamus of Miletus, an ancient Greek Architect, Urban Planner, Physician, Mathematician, Meteorologist and Philosopher has designed the cities of Priene and Miletus in Western Turkey in 5th Century B.C. and how his principles were applied in 20th century. The city plan of Miletus is very organized and effective with all its bridges and grid structure, despite the natural obstacles of water and topography.

It is pretty interesting to see how such ancient plans were applied to the Island of Manhattan when New York City was first planned. As a matter of fact, Hippodamus was a native of Miletus, a port city in southern Turkey. While planning the city, he even had to change the path of the river to maintain a perfect grid structure.

Can Amado

Narlidere-Pomegranate Creek

Narlidere is perhaps one of the few places in my hometown, Izmir that grew to be a suburb in American standards. However, american standards should not be misleading, the houses are not McMansions and most do not have gigantic lawns, though some have pools and other amenities. Most importantly, there is a grid system that is far better and efficient than cul-de-sacs but is in no way similar to traditional city grids. As seen in in the picture, the area is very green and has low-rise, luxurious residences with high walls and secure gates. However, the highway connecting the port and beach towns to the city crosses right through the heart of Narlider, creating two different yet similar worlds. Giant malls with giant parking lots occupy the other side of the highway. Transportation to either sides is provided with bridges and tunnels designed exclusively for cars, all of which are not suitable for pedestrians. Although the area is about eight miles to downtown, public transportation is limited to only buses and residents are dependent on cars.

Starting from a distant fishermen's village, Narlidere became a populous suburb which attracts people from every corner of town to its shopping malls and seaside attractions. The traditional texture of the neighborhood does not exist anymore due to dependence on cars and traffic congestions.

Can Amado

Lexington vs. Los Angeles

I found a fairly interesting article that is pretty disturbing for me, having lived in Lexington my whole life. This article talks about the incredibly large carbon footprint compared to Los Angeles with one of the smallest carbon footprints in the country. This sounds really messed up to me since Lexington has a much smaller city area than Los Angeles. However, the carbon footprint is due to the lack of efficient public transportation and road system. The majority of Lexington is comprised of subdivisions surrounding the downtown area. Another factor is that Lexington relies mostly on coal for power which increases the carbon footprint a lot.

Vincent Louis

Response to the Message from the President

From the editorial "Get off campus and get to know the rest of Atlanta" by Dr. Peterson, I agree that we as the students should embrace this opportunity to explore the area around this city. Georgia Tech has played an important role in the surrounding community as we have been a part of Atlanta for a long period of time. One of the things that a student can contribute to this area is to get off campus and spend time exploring the area. The students will be able to get a hand on experience of a city life, while supporting the community's economy. There are many places for students to visit:

The city of Atlanta, according to the message, is one of the most important cities in the Southern United States. It has also been the focus on the national and the world's stage. Atlanta is like a free commodity that comes with Georgia Tech. We should take this chance to do at least a little exploration of the city.

Phumthep Bunnak

Future Tallest Building in Bangkok !

For this week's post, I want to talk about a construction project in the middle of Thailand's capital city, Bangkok. The construction of MahaNakohn, a 77 storey-building, is set to begin in the third quarter of 2009 and completed in 2012. The cost of construction is estimated to be 515 million dollars. This building is going to be the tallest building in Bangkok. I believe that this building will be one of the best representation of urbanism. It will contain apartments, a hotel, and a restaurant at the top of the building. The restaurant at the top will definitely provide the diners with uncomparable view of the city. This to be tallest building in Thailand will also include a retail section at the base of the building. The parking will be provided for the residents offsite. MahaNakhon is located in the middle of the city. Therefore there will be a lot of activities for the residents to do. I would say this place is perfect for anyone who seeks an urban experience.

To read more about the construction project, visit click here

Phumthep Bunnak

A new perspective

Just image searching "Urban Sprawl" will bring up a ton of lovely pictures. I found this particular one of "generating a cityscape with images of roads and other city things around the Twin Cities taken from NASA terra server." on Flickr. While living in the subdivisions may be attractive, from this angle it just looks like a horribly tangled road structure clustered together and intertwined with the surroundings. I found it to be a very interesting new perspective from a design angle which gives some insight into some things that we would normally not get a chance to view.


Vincent Louis

A Song about Sprawl !

For this week's post, I want to introduce the song "My City was Gone." This is a song by the group called, The Pretenders. This song's message is about a person coming back home in Ohio. However, the city was changed from what he had remembered. His pictures of his childhood memories are replace by shopping malls, and parking lots.

Phumthep Bunnak

Daily Sprawl's Ideal Community

Today I looked at a blog called Daily Sprawl. The blog content's is about health, real estate industry, current economy crisis, and neighborhoods. In this blog, we can find links to articles from sources as New York Times, and links to videos in the "What Daily Sprawl Is Watching" section. By looking at this blog, we will be able to find implicit evidences on what the blog's position on an ideal community should be.
The author of this blog calls for a community and neighborhoods much like the book, Suburban Nation. From the blog's link to a video in the CNU short film contest, we can see a video that advocates against sprawl. In this video, a picture of a good neighborhood is depicted. This community is made up of mixed used zone. The people in the film are able to go to work, school, and grocery stores by foot in five minutes. No cars are needed for transportation. From another post titled "A Green Commute", there are pictures of several European rail lines. The trams look like they are gliding on grass. This implies that an ideal community not only be independent from cars, but it should be environment friendly as well.

This is the link to the blog: http://dailysprawl.blogspot.com/

Phumthep Bunnak

A solution to sprawl?

Just searching for "urban sprawl" in the library article database gave me 12,354 results, but displayed the top 150. On the very top of the list was an article that jumped out at me, "A (Radical) Way to Fix Suburban Sprawl." The author of the article wrote about Tysons Corner, VA, a city with "more parking spaces than jobs or residents." The solution provided was to actually build on to the area instead of cutting down on construction. The plan is to add many more housing units surrounding a new public train system to cut down on traffic as well as bring more people closer to the area. This would, over time, create a pedestrian-friendly environment and eliminate the sprawl.

The link: http://gtsearch.library.gatech.edu/search/metasearch/record?group=001099&resultSet=006733&startRecord=1


Vincent Louis

The Other side of the Coin

A compact, high rise community as mentioned in "Prove it"

The library database is a great place to find interesting articles. When I was searching the database, I found an article that criticizes anti-sprawl arguments. In Suburban Nation, we only get one side of the argument which is the arguments against sprawl. The authors of the book did well trying to convince us about the dark side of neighborhoods development by providing examples from daily lives. However, we do not really get to see what other people think about the issue. Reading this book is like listening to only one side of the argument.

The article I want to introduce is called “Prove It.” This article challenges the credibility of the arguments from Suburban Nation. As we have read from the book, sprawl is associated with more land usage and less farm land. However, in our modern time, we can reap more products from less farmland than decades ago due to better technology, and more efficient farming techniques. This is one of the many issues from the article that raises our skeptics about the validity of the arguments from the book.




Link to the article: http://web.ebscohost.com.www.library.gatech.edu:2048/ehost/detail?vid=2&hid=113&sid=1b1927f6-b934-41c4-9faf-fa600ff505c3@replicon103&bdata=JnNpdGU9ZWhvc3QtbGl2ZQ%3d%3d#toc

Phumthep Bunnak

Buckhead

I visited the neighborhood of Buckhead for this evaluation. It's a really nice expensive neighborhood with a lot of older houses. It seems like a fantastic place to raise a family. Nearby, there are parks where people can go to relax or exercise. There are a lot of eat-in restaurants as opposed to mainstream fast food places. The district of Buckhead is also home to Phipps Plaza Mall and the Lenox Square Mall. Overall, it isn't very sprawlly and looks like a really beautiful place to live.

Vincent Louis

Atlantic Station, A city Within a City

Every weekends, students a Geogia Tech will be able to take the "Grocery Shuttle" to Target in Atlantic Station. The Target there has most of the things every college students need to survive. This includes pencils, notebooks, and power drinks. But besides from Target, Atlantic Station has a lot of other things to offer too. If you walk around, you will see many restaurants, and shopping places. There is also a movie theatre. I chose this neighborhood to observe because the place is easy to get to, and there are lots of stuffs to see other than the rows and rows of houses. Before I went there, I made a list which is used to define a good place to live. In the list I put in environment, interesting places, transportation, and commercial places. However, after I went there, I have to put in another criteria, living expenses. Living in a big city like Atlanta can be expensive. The lifestyle is definitly different from living in other places. Overall, I consider Atlantic Station to be a good place to live here in Atlanta. There are things you can do, as well as supermarkets to buy groceries.

for more information about Atlantic Station, visit this website
http://www.atlanticstation.com/

Phumthep Bunnak

Virginia Highland

I went to Virginia Highland on September 8th, early in the morning with Marta Bus line 45. I first took the Tech Trolley to Midtown Station, waited 10 minutes for the bus to arrive then had a 6 minutes bus journey to the intersection of Virginia and Highland Avenues, the heart of Virginia Highland neighborhood. It was a pretty easy commute from the campus, I didn’t wait much and rode a spacious bus. As far I have looked up on itsmarta.com, Virginia Highland has a pretty good bus system that connects the neighborhood to major MARTA stations and other important places in the city, which can be pretty effective if used with the schedule on MARTA website.

I have spent about 3 hours strolling around the streets of Virginia Highland, mainly through North Highland Avenue, though I`ve been to the side streets and other intersecting roads. One thing that surprised me was the narrow streets. I haven’t been to many places in Atlanta, but from where I’ve been so far, I can say that there were really wide and congested roads at the places I visited. Highland Avenue, the main road of the neighborhood is a single lane road where traffic is very low and sidewalks are wide enough for pedestrians and window-shopping. The area was totally pedestrian friendly, and the `slow down, neighborhood` signs were some measures taken by the local government to promote this. I also saw many people jogging and shopping on the sidewalks. Most people had basic necessities in their bags like groceries and beverages, and grocery stores are within walking distance, which effaces the need for a car.
While I was walking toward Virginia-Highland Intersection, I passed by John Howell Park and had a chance to observe the public spaces and parks of the area. There was a maintenance car in the park at around 8:45 am, preparing the park for the day. The park was in a perfect shape, grass was cut freshly, it smelled fresh and everything was clean in the park. I had a chance to observe the lawn of a house and it was very neat and clean, everything in order and kids were playing happily. Streets were also clean, not like streets of Toronto, Canada, but clean in Atlanta standards. I was pretty shocked to see that Virginia Highland was chosen as the first carbon free community in the USA. It is very interesting to see that such a community can exist in the USA where cars are worshipped. I then decided to add being environmentally friendly on my criteria.

As I was walking the area, the thing I liked the most was the homes and the architecture of the neighborhood. Every house had a distinct touch, but the neighborhood has its own unity in architectural style. Every house had a history, and no house was like the so called McMansion, there were some grandiose and more sumptuous homes, no house looked artificial and incongruent with the texture of the area. Speaking of architecture, most retail shops and restaurants seemed to be converted from homes and were in the same style of the neighborhood buildings. However, there were some other shops that totally ruin the charm of the neighborhood. I can say that Chevron gas station and CVS should not have been allowed to be built there. Chevron stands in the very center of Virginia-Highland intersection and overshadows the single-floor little shops with the gas pumps and the vast area it covers with parking lot, and the FOOD MART that is built in a very boring style. Moreover, CVS, with its giant parking lot and incongruent architecture, is a betrayal to the architectural style that is present in every stone of the place.

After all these physical observations of Virginia Highland, I would like to talk about the demographics. As I have previously researched and observed, the neighborhood is home to a pretty prosperous community. The cars in garages were good brands and shops and restaurants appealed to the upper class mostly. However, I also saw some very cheap condominiums and flats were students and lower income people reside. Apart from this partial diversity of income, there were people from different ethnicities, I saw many white people along with some African American and Hispanic people who were enjoying the neighborhood. I saw 4 churches and one synagogue on North Highland Avenue, indicating the different backgrounds of residents. While looking for community bonds, I found out that there are 3 neighborhood civic associations and 2 business communities, all of which strengthen the personal and commercial bonds of residents and local business.

My criteria for a neighborhood fit the traditional neighborhood definition and Virginia Highland complies with these criteria perfectly. I believe a traditional neighborhood is the most pleasant place a person can live in, due to the ease of life and the proximity of all basic necessities to homes. Community is stronger in traditional neighborhoods, residents have stronger bonds and they generally become happier pupils. I observed the happy residents of Virginia Highland and I justified my claim that a traditional neighborhood is better to live in than a suburban sprawl neighborhood.

Can Amado

inDECATUR

In today`s world where globalization adn becoming a global village is promoted, it is nice to see that there are people who preserve the spirit and coziness of a small community. As I was reading the blog inDECATUR, I saw that the authors of this blog are very conscious of their community within the giant metro Atlanta region. As I have observed, this blog is aimed both for people from and out of Decatur. Blog posts are very diverse, almost random, considering the distinct topics such as the history and legislature of Decatur and the Cookie Studio. He is very good in using media in his blog, enriched with a bunch of pictures for each post and an extensive list of links on the right column of the blog. The author also uses rss feed, twitter and facebook to promote and make his blog more interesting. It is obvious from his tone that the author is excited and proud with his community, he wants to enrich the community life by promoting non-Decatur residents to come to the town and encouraging Decatur residents to support local bussiness and events.

Can Amado

I'm getting hungry just reading about it...

The Blissful Glutton wrote about various food places in the Atlanta area. By no means are they nationally recognized, but they do seem to be worth a visit. The blog about Southern Sweets Bakery stood out the most to me. Jennifer Zyman's blog about the brownies in particular made my mouth water. Zyman writes about food places that normally people might overlook. These small businesses are very important to a community and add a certain flavor that distinguishes an area.

VL

Atlanta Unshelter Blog Review

We are living in an information age in which news in one country can reach the other side of the world in seconds. Thanks to this advancement in the delivery of information, the big news company need no to struggle to get an interesting piece of headline that will catch the readers' eyes. However, it seems that when we are able to access news in a faraway land, we forget about the local news. The big news companies are focusing on main issues of importance whether it is the politics in Washington D.C or the North Korean nuclear crisis. They are not giving as much attention to local news as before. However, the internet provides normal citizens to be news reporters and some people choose to use this opportunity to spread out the "not as much important" local news.

Atlanta Unsheltered is a blog created by an Atlanta journalist. The blog focuses on as what the blog title says, "News & views on politics, media & the environment." Once you have entered this blog, you can read entries about the up coming mayor candidates, or corners of Atlanta that require attention. I think the reason this blogger choose to create this blog is to create a place where people in the community can catch what is going on, to find out things that they cannot find out on TVs. The author of this blog wants to provide stories and insights from individual's perpective. I think this is a good blog to read in order to understand the city of Atlanta more.

Phumthep Bunnak

Yes, we do wear shoes.

When some people think about Kentucky, they assume that it is just a huge horse farm in the middle of no where.



This isn't the case at all. While there are a good deal of horse farms, there are some pretty big cities too. Where I'm from, Lexington, everything revolves around the downtown area. Surrounding downtown, there are a ton of subdivisions. My average commute to high school one way was around 20 minutes from one of these subdivisions. Yes, the Lexington community is the perfect example of urban sprawl. Traffic can get bad at times, but that's just poor city planning.



I wouldn't have it any other way though. Ten minutes from my house will usually get me anywhere I need to be. Grocery stores, gas stations, movie theaters, the library, a multitude of fast food places, and pretty much anything else you can think of.



Most of the subdivisions are filled with cookie cutter houses, but in the older parts of Lexington there are houses with a lot of character.

Overall, Lexington is a nice place to live. The traffic isn't nearly as bad as the bigger cities and there are plenty of places to go out and enjoy nature.



Sure there are some cons, like not being within walking distance of a lot of places. On the other hand, one is just a short drive from practically anything which I find is a lot more convenient.

VL

The Odyssey in Bangkok

In respond to Can Amado's Post, I would like to share some of my experiences when I was living back home in Bangkok.

(A night view of Bkk)

"A big city can be a lonely place. Whenever I wanted to be alone, I could walk down the street of Bangkok. It was there, along the streets where no one seemed to notice me. I could be invisible among the many eyes of people. It was indubitable that the people I walked by would see me, but no one would notice me. I became a phantom, a mere illusion of their minds. Maybe this is why I get so awkward walking by someone without people all around. I am not used to the being the only attention. I used to be detached, walking down a crowded street where everyone's attention was only on themselves." - Phumthep Bunnak (Dae)

(As seen from the top of my house)


My neighborhood is not as close nit as John's, but one of the similarity between the city of Bangkok and Izmir is the distance to the vast plain of water. Bangkok is also a coastal city which located in the heart of Thailand. Many people know that this crowded coastal city is the capital of Thailand. However, I doubt that many non-native will recognize the name used by all Thais to call this city of around two hundred years old. Krungtep Mahanakorn can be translated literally from Thai to English as "The Big city of angels". I have to admit, I am quite ambivalent about my satisfaction with this City of Angels. It seems that this city of 7 million people is a place where visitors and its inhabitants can find most of the things they are looking for. Heaven and hell are not that far apart in this area.

(Part of one of the shopping mall)


If I have to describe this city in one word, no other words will suit Krungtep Mahanakorn more than "chaos". This is a place where a Hospital, a convenient store, and my house can coexist in not more than a hundred meters apart. Out of this chaos, one can say that Bangkok can be used as an example of a traditional city in the book Suburban Nation. There seems to be no zoning in this city. My house spawns near everything, from a hospital to a pub. There are also narrow streets around the city. However, despite the fact that Krungtep is a messy place where buildings of all type tend to pop up everywhere, the allure of this city seems to attract tourists from all over the world.

A tourist might enjoy taking glimpses inside a temple then go shopping at a gigatic mall within arm reach distance of the temple. The agglomeration of everything in a small area here is what I value. I remember getting stuck in a traffic for more than an hour for traveling to a friend's house 1.3 miles away. I am also thankful for the train transit system. The trains can get me to most places that I want to go. However, an hour before and after 5pm is the time I usually avoid getting on the train as the feeling of getting canned in a train like a sardine is not so appealling. Sometimes I would think I will enjoy living in a suburbia which I saw in a Hollywood movie more. However, a year in Arlington, Texas changed my mind.

(Walking to School in TX)

I did an exchange program in which I spent 10 months in Arlington, a city located between Dallas and Fort Worth. At first living in a suberb was what I saw as freedom from all those chaos of Bangkok, but I started to have a feeling that things are too far apart. The only way I could go somewhere is to get a ride from someone. I walked to school everyday along a whirling cul-de-sac with the same monotonous, and suspicious houses along the way. I found out later that I do not find sprawl appealing. Houses located in the middle of nowhere in my opinion is not suitable for life. A community where people live should provide its inhabitants means of transportation other than by automobiles. After I went back to my hometown, I started to appreciate the chaos more. In the end, I feel that no place deserved to be lived unless it is a walking distance away from everything.

(Same Looking Houses)

City`s Beating Heart

I live in Izmir, a bustling coastal city with 3 million residents, and in the very heart of this giant city is Alsancak, pronounced as Alsanjak, my neighborhood since the day I was born. I was born at a hospital in this neighborhood, moved two times and still live in the same neighborhood. Alsancak is a small neighborhood, about 4 square miles as I have measured from Google Earth.

It borders the sea and has the best seaside park in the country called Kordon where all of cities best restaurants, pubs, bars and my house are located. Although the sea is heavily polluted, it provides a very nice view and is a major income source for the businesses due to the nearby port.

Alsancak is the de-facto center of the city, because it is also the intersection point of roads, not highways, that go on all directions of the city, though the official city centre is 2 miles away. As a traditional neighborhood, Alsancak has generally 8 flat buildings, most of which were built in late 1960s and 1970s and look alike.


Although records show settlement in the area since 17th century when it was populated mostly by Greeks and Europeans, most historic houses were destroyed after the Second World War due to excellent (!) urban planning. Remaining houses mostly serve as bars and pubs or used as illegal brothels. New high-rise office and condo buildings are starting to be built, contrasting with the historical texture of the place.



Though Alsancak is the major intersection of roads, it is a pedestrian area with very narrow and busy streets. Similar to New York City, all shops and restaurants are on street level, so people walk all the time and it is very common to run into someone. It has always been very hard for me to get to somewhere because each time I go out the right time and see a close friend or relative and start chatting, and not go on time naturally! Alsancak has been a very close-knit community since the time my grandparents moved there, basically because it is home to the small prosperous community of town who has been family friends for many generations. In terms of close knit, I mean how I feel when I take a walk and feel that everyone is smiling, and everyone is very open against each other because we basically are from same big families and same schools. To illustrate, my house is on a building by the sea and my best friend lives one block away, my maternal grandparents live 2 blocks away, aunt lives 3 blocks away. Due to this physical proximity of the place, I never ride a car, never take public transportation or even ride a bike unless I go to school. We have a pretty easy life compared to the suburban mega neighborhoods because we have grocery stores offering fresh food on every corner and a butcher on every block where we walk.


When analyzed, it is evident that my neighborhood is diverse in age, since my generation, my parents` generation, my grandparents and even my great grandma used to live there when she was alive. However, it is hard to see that diversity in prosperity because it has been one of the most upscale neighborhoods in town ever since, due to the nearby port and the presence of entertainment industry.
As a result of the high-income population, Alsancak is the most cosmopolitan neighborhood of Izmir, home to the historical Jewish, European and Greek population of the city, and most of the expats. As a real life example, I am Jewish and our main synagogue is in this neighborhood, along with the whole Jewish population. There are 8 churches and only one mosque, in a country with 99% Muslim population. My sister`s piano instructor is a Greek lady who has been my mother`s friend for 35 years and we have Spanish neighbors. In Turkish standards, this is a very diverse profile, unique to Izmir, perhaps to Alsancak only.

Having born and lived my entire life in this neighborhood, I cannot compare a sprawl neighborhood to a traditional neighborhood because I never experienced life in a sprawling neighborhood. However, I can say that living in a traditional neighborhood is a really nice experience because you have the best of both worlds, all the amenities of a big city and the coziness of a small place. You can take a walk on the seaside and forget that you are in a big city or jump right into the bustling streets and have an excellent time with your friends.