Quote:
Originally Posted by CaptainYooh
Gee, SebC, sometimes I wonder if something horrible happened to you in a suburb when you were a kid... The most cost-efficient way to house people is concentration camps. Not only they live communally in a high-density setting; they also contribute to the society by working hard and exert very little strain on the infrastructure.
According to Conference Board of Canada, 80% of Canadians would prefer to live in a single-family home. High-density setting does increase property taxes from a smaller area of land (the point that Rollin Stanley love to proclaim on his stupid slides), but they also bring a variety of negative issues, i.e. traffic woes, inner-city infrastructure shortages, crime etc. It should not be one or another when it comes to housing, but a peaceful co-existence based on people's preferences.
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The single to multi split is evolving though - 55% to 45% last year in Calgary. Housing expectations and desires are shifting and people at different life stages require and want different housing forms. I was talking with two different (very) large land developers & home builders and they said they have been really adjusting their housing mixes to adapt to market conditions (not because of any sort of City policy).
I would also challenge you on the traffic front - low density, segregated land uses are worse for traffic than somewhat denser, mixed use areas where different mobility options are more realistic options. If you make a place car dependent you guarantee traffic congestion - it is impossible to build out of. Living in Lower Mount Royal it seems much easier to me to navigate by car (or any other mode) than say Scenic Acres because not everyone else is driving!
Also, I have never seen a correlation between crime and density. People on streets reduces crimes of opportunity.
Of course that is not to say in any way we should not build single family homes, or new suburbs, but evolve the way we design these communities. This is already happening - often led by developers - Brookfield is looking at very innovative things in their new South Seton ASP for instance, which is great!).