Buying a home in a New Urbanist neighborhood in Eugene, Oregon becomes a practical lesson on the line separating academic discussions on New Urbanism and personal lifestyle choices for Professor Sriram Khé.
"..Discussions on New Urbanism were nothing more than academic exercises. As disconnected as I am from Ethiopian poverty or nanotechnology, I was equally disconnected -- at a personal level -- from urban sprawl and New Urbanism.
...When we first spotted the house that we eventually bought, my wife and I ignored it. Not because it was not spacious; its 1,983 sq. ft compared well with our 2,150 sq. ft. home in Bakersfield. But, the neighbor's house was too close, and the driveway to the garages behind the respective homes is a shared one. The streets are narrow, barely two lanes wide. There is practically no backyard space-after all, the house sits on a lot that is not even 5,000 sq. ft.! In other words, the house and the neighborhood were almost like the examples I would find in a textbook on New Urbanism and I was having problems with that."
Thanks to Chris Steins
FULL STORY: Practice What You Teach?
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