Farmland and Sprawl
Farmland and Sprawl
“The Next Slum?”
By Christopher B. Leinberger, posted March 2008
Atlantic Magazine
Strange days are upon the residents of many a suburban cul-de-sac. Once-tidy yards have become overgrown, as the houses they front have gone vacant. Signs of physical and social disorder are spreading.
At Windy Ridge, a recently built starter-home development seven miles northwest of Charlotte, North Carolina, 81 of the community’s 132 small, vinyl-sided houses were in foreclosure as of late last year. Vandals have kicked in doors and stripped the copper wire from vacant houses; drug users and homeless people have furtively moved in. In December, after a stray bullet blasted through her son’s bedroom and into her own, Laurie Talbot, who’d moved to Windy Ridge from New York in 2005, told The Charlotte Observer, “I thought I’d bought a home in Pleasantville. I never imagined in my wilde
st dreams that stuff like this would happen.” Read more.
“Death of the ‘McMansion’: Era of Huge Homes is Over”
Posted August 19, 2010
CNBC
They’ve been called McMansions, Starter Castles, Garage Mahals and Faux Chateaus but here’s the latest thing you can call them – History.
In the past few years, there have been an increasing number of references made to the “McMansion glut” and the “McMansion backlash,” as more towns pass ordinances against garishly large homes, which are generally over 3,000 square feet and built very close together.
What sets a McMansion apart from a regular mansion, according to Wikipedia, are a few characteristics: They’re tacky, they lack a definitive style and they have a “displeasingly jumbled appearance.” Read More.
The American home is shrinking – and gaining appliances
By Les Christie, posted August 26, 2010
CNNMoney.com
The American home is shrinking. Toll the bell for the McMansion.
After years of growth, the Census Bureau recently reported that median new home size fell to 2,135 square feet in 2009 after peaking at more than 2,300 earlier in the decade.
“Home buyers are asking for less, cutting back on options and reducing square footage,” said Steven Pace of the North Carolina-based Pace Development Group, which builds both custom and tract houses ranging in price from below $250,000 to more than $2 million. Read More.
“Housing Market Study Affirms Lexington’s Need for Innovative Growth Model” Op-ed by Knox van Nagell, kentucky.com, posted October 25, 2009
Knox van Nagell, Executive Director of The Fayette Alliance, has been appointed to the recently established LFUCG Downtown Design Guidelines and Form Based Codes Taskforce. This diverse taskforce will discuss and make recommendations on how we can create a downtown that we can all enjoy and be proud of. Council will then consider the group’s recommendations for adoption.
