Article: Reinventing the Cul-de-Sac

[Image from Treehugger via tessellar]

The other day I was discussing the mortgage crisis and mentioned that I believe that we should be moving towards a more dense mass transit rich residential development model. Treehugger recently posted about a possible reinvetion of the the Cul-de-sac. This interesting article revisions suburbia as a series of duplexes, triplexes, quadruplexes, and sextuplexes which could be tessellated to efficiently fill space and allow for a maximum of residents on their own quiet cul-de-sacs.

While this is a great idea for land use and would provide increased environmental efficiency I fear that this would never happen in the US. Most people move to low rise suburbia to escape sharing walls and floors with their neighbors and while this adds to environmental efficiency by providing increased insulation it means less perceived privacy. I say perceived because the advancements in sound abatement technology which have occurred in the past few years have made it such that modern condos and duplexes are for all intents and purposes soundproof. In addition, this proposal while making efficient use of land, it would be a nightmare for traffic and road navigation. I have had a first hand experience with this, where I live none of the subdivisions connect, so all traffic must use main arteries. There are no secondary routes – and this system would just increase that problem.