Suburbs Are Failing Us (for now...) 

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This video is a great example of how suburban-style development doesn't have to suck. The sad thing about the US is that it equates suburbs with sprawl and anti-human car-centric design: This doesn't have to be the case! I actually like the suburbs (I just bought a home in one). But whenever I ask for more pedestrian and cycling infrastructure, so many Americans look at me like I want every city to be NYC with 20-story high-rises. Now I can show them this video to explain what I want, so thank you for making it.

I _need_ the "reimagining" chapter as a RU-vid short, I always try to explain what it would look like to friends

9:31 Ngl, this neighborhood looks like an absolute dream, although mindbogglingly rare (and as a result, expensive) in the US.

I’ve probably left a comment before, but this is basically the ideal argument for zoning reform. It won’t force you to change your lifestyle, but it’ll open up new lifestyle opportunities for those looking for something different. This is something that I think is much more practical in America without going full Netherlands bike and train network

do not stop building suburbs,stop building car centric suburbs

This is normal in 🇬🇧. I find it weird here in 🇺🇸 i cant walk to a corner shop to go buy milk eggs etc. Instead i have to get in a car n drive 10 mins.

I live in the suburbs. I can't go for long walks because there are very few sidewalks and there are too many bicycle -haters . Riding bicycle is scary in the suburbs because suburbanites thinks bicycles and cyclists are stupid. I plan on moving closer to city limits .

It’s also worth noting that many Americans have been propagandized to hate apartments. So the desire for single family housing may be somewhat artificial

The only thing I wonder as a non-American when I see those video: why are people who call themselves "conservatives" in America sometimes against this kind of development? Having strong, walkable and human-sized communities ist the most traditional kind of development structure I could think of. People have built like this for hundreds of years, being for this kind of structure is the most conservative/traditionalist I could think of. Why are some American conservatives against this? 😅

The real problem with car dependent suburbs is that they have the disadvantages of both urban and rural areas and the advantages of neither.

Another absolute banger from Streetcraft, this will be my new intro video to "orange-pill" my friends on why suburban development is so unsustainable. Your motion graphic design in the videos makes it SO CLEAR on alternative solutions to the land-use issues we face. Thank you for your work! Keep up the great content! PS - the "walkable & bikeable & liveable" sticker on your Etsy shop is straight 🔥

I've seen so many suburban homes that are run down and poorly maintained by the overworked people who bought them. Most of us don't need that space, and in fact cannot take care of a big yard and an expensive car. Why should we all have to live like that?

it's simple. delete all the zoning laws, throw HOAs in the garbage, and open businesses without parking lots directly inside the suburbs. vote me for US president 2036

I don't own and can't afford a car. I currently live in Manhattan in NYC because I'm disabled and I need to have things like groceries and doctors nearby and walkable. I would never move to a stereotypical suburb, but I'd love to move to a suburb that has the type of things you need at a reasonable and safe walking distance.

I love these videos. As a civil engineer I have some influence on how the neighborhoods are designed, but not enough to completely make these pedestrian friendly. It takes more people, especially voters to know what they’re missing out on. In America, car is the only way they know how to get around, so it’s viewed as a symbol of freedom. What they don’t know is that they have a lack of freedom because they are restricted to cars, so when you mentioned public transportation It’s viewed as an attack on freedom. When I fully explain why alternatives are needed, they finally realize what they’re missing out on.

streetcraft has to be my favorite urbanism channel right now. Channels like not just bikes seems to just complain, but this channel actually talks about real solutions. Good work guys!

I can't get over how good your graphics are for explaining concepts. The two versions of a new development on empty land were fantastic. I also appreciated how you went to a real place in person and heard from people there. That goes a long way to making these concepts land.

7:00 "just because you might want to live in a single family suburban home, doesn't mean that building other housing types is gonna take away your single family suburban home. Instead it opens up more options for more people." Ugh, so obvious. So perfectly said.

That cute little mixed-used neighborhood with multiple housing densities seems like an impossible dream gazing out on seemingly endless seas of tract homes :(

Put a hold on sprawl, force developers to densify what we have. Economic output would increase.

This is an incredible video. The balance you strike between educational infographics, storytelling, and actionable advice is fantastic. Keep doing what you’re doing, Streetcraft. If you’re a viewer like me, write to your local governments about these issues, it’s better for everyone!

"People like living in the suburbs" Well no, not exactly. People like living in their own home. Now where that home is or what form that home takes that varies a lot, yeah a good chunk of people like living in detached homes with yards, but not all of them. If there were also a lot of duplex, triplex, rowhomes, 2, 3 and 4 story multifamily homes and apartments built, then the people that don't feel like they NEED to live in a detached home with it's own separate yard, would choose to live in those homes instead, especially since those homes are cheaper. There isn't anything inherently wrong with single family homes, the issue arises when it essentially is the only choice for someone that wants a home.

You've earned a sub, these are some of the best videos I've ever seen exploring this topic. I get tired of the snarky, self-righeous tone of a lot of the RU-vid urbanists, so your very balanced, sensible, easy to understand explanation of these things is a real breath of fresh air. The animations and presentations are really helpful to, you've done a great job making urban planning and zoning reform understandable, and I love how your whole vibe is wanting to suggest solutions to make improvements to our towns and cities instead of just criticizing how they've been built or the lifestyles of people living in them. Keep up the great work!

Thank you for being one of the only urbanists on RU-vid you doesn’t ignore rural people. I know for some of our community, there is no sympathy for the latter because of politics or living style, but urbanism doesn’t just require thinking *about* cities. Rural and suburban areas are also affected and there is a huge untapped market of ideas about how those areas are also affected. If we do not think about those in those areas in urbanism, they will only come to loathe the ideology (and rightfully so if it doesn’t consider them). There are positives to thoughtful urbanism for rural lives, but we need to acknowledge them and advocate for them as well.

This is one of the best balanced how to improve suburbs video I’ve seen.

"Gentle" density for infill within existing single family home neighborhoods may be fine, but new development and infill that's not fully within a single family neighborhood needs to be much denser. It's not about whether or not something is or isn't suburban. It's more about how car dependent a place is. We have to reduce our dependency on cars. It's unrealistic for most places to completely toss the car, but we can do a lot to enable more people to be less dependent on them for literally everything.

As someone in Florida we are terrible at saving land

A lot of us are really getting screwed by housing restrictions. There's a little building outside the baseball diamond at the school across the street. It used to just have a couple washrooms, a counter where they served hotdogs, and a little storage area, I would assume. It's probably like 12ft wide by 20ft long. a couple years ago, they added an upper level to it. I look at that little building and think "I could live in something like that". I'm just one guy. All I need is a kitchen, washroom, and an open space upstairs. I'm a musician, I make noise, so being detached from others is important. I don't need a backyard, I don't need a front yard, just gimme the little house and a place to park my car (that I may not need if the neighborhood is diverse enough), and I'd be happy. small homes like that aren't in the cards around here though.

I honestly don’t mind living in the suburbs, but I live in DC where the suburbs are easily connected to the city via transit if you don’t want to drive. I currently live in a more urban area, but I wouldn’t mind living further out if I could get a single family home with some land. The suburban areas should be a bit more diverse so everyone could live how they like. Every suburb doesn’t need to be densely built/populated, but some should be.

Seeing nature be destroyed by suburban subdivisions saddens me greatly.

Unfortunately, anyone proposing these new urbanism suburb subdivisions haven’t solved the affordability problem for the people who work in the shops that are allowed to exist (no six-figure salaries are moving in without office buildings with parking lots-exceptions apply). Even the apartments are built for people who typically get paid at least twice what the shop workers do!

Videos like this are the reason why I subscribed to him when he had less than 1k subscribers. A lot of channels just love to assume that everyone will live in an apartment and cars are the worst thing ever invented. This channel takes into account how real people wanna live and knows that people don't wanna just give up their cars for nothing.

I'm a housing designer, and the common thing that really drives the entire design of new developments is car storage. People don't necessarily want long driveways and sprawling parking, but for a family of 4-5, that typically entails at least 1 car, often 2, which really screws up the lot for livable space at grade, unless you begin making these homes even larger to accommodate more vehicles. A 1600 sq. ft home built in the 1960s was considered palatial, but now, homes on average range between 2200-2600 sq. ft for a single family dwelling. And purchasers don't seem to be willing to give that up, even as the average household size has been decreasing over the decades. I am a big proponent of the architectural movement for selective urban infill, where a single family dwelling in an urban or suburban setting gets remodeled into a semi-detached or duplex, or larger lots add a secondary dwelling unit to them or even a standalone private business. Imagine living in the 'burbs, and you want to get a haircut, or you need to pick up a loaf of bread for breakfast. Normally you get in your car and drive at least 10 minutes away to the nearest grocery store or strip mall to get the goods and services you need. But imagine instead that there's a house on the corner that just converted their ground floor into a bakery, and 2 blocks away, someone opened a barber shop in their basement to cater to the neighborhood. Instead of moving an elderly person out of their home and away from familiar settings, they can downsize to a flat on the same property where they can live comfortably and still be close to family and friends. The entirety of North America is designed around car movements and placement, designing whole cities around roads, highways and parking lots. Instead of forcing people to rely on purchasing a vehicle, our cities and suburbs should be designed around the movement of people, and the facilitation of healthy living habits and comfortable environs that encourage people to engage with nature, not build over top of it. We vastly waste the land we already have in use, and it has not only exacerbated inequality and economic instability, it has damaged our ecosystems and natural resources too. It's also reinforced antiquated notions of "districts" that not only divide up cities according to building occupancy, but by age, income, and race as well. I love the concepts of intentional urban planning, designing spaces and interiors that support people where they live and work and play, because it fosters connection between community members, and contributes to better psychological health. There's a better balance to be struck between urban development and humane design, and I'm glad to see more places and forums discussing what that could look like for their communities.

As a Brit, it's baffling to me how a country has become so fixated on the idea that suburbs = large single family homes ... we have plenty of suburbs in the UK, but the most common type of property in them is semi-detached (duplex), and pretty much everyone will have a local grocery store and a school and a few other facilities within 15 minutes walk (and often much less!). The model of development that you sketched out with a mix of low-rise apartments, town houses, small detached homes and large detached homes, a few shops, a school and a park is basically the standard pattern for any large development. Even smaller developments that aren't big enough to warrant shops and a school will have a mix of housing types. It makes life so much more convenient!

You didn't even mention public transit in this: traditional suburbs have basically no place to put a bus, but in the new layout presented, that town square would be a perfect place to have a bus stop. And if you have multiple neighborhoods like this right next to each other, you could eventually connect them with a tram quite easily as well; allowing people to visit places other than just their own little community, which makes room for even more diversity.

Instead of creating denser communities where people actually want to live they just make more soulless corporate housing.

We need zoning that allows shops and houses on the same street yet leaves skyscrapers, factories, and large supermarkets away. Thank you for showing us examples of what’s good rather than what’s wrong

Would we see neighborhoods like this become more affordable as they build more? They tend to be very expensive because of the demand.

Such a good channel. Love how all the logic in this video is presented, the way the visuals flow makes it so much easier to understand to the untrained eye. I've been looking at quite a bit of similar content for the past few months; the portion about tax revenue wasn't even something I heard or considered when thinking about the downsides of current suburban design, along with the partial solution of cottage developments. Currently a civil engineer undergrad, but this is definitely convincing me to go for the urban design minor I've been thinking about recently. Will definitely be sharing this with friends in order to get them hooked on city planning like I am (in a healthy way of course)!

Heart of the problems: Stroads/traffic flow, large scale single use developments and building/parking layouts

I live in a new urbanist neighborhood that is very similar to the reimagining you beautifully demonstrated with your great graphics. It's mostly single family homes but they don't have a front yard and a front facing garage. Instead the homes have garages in the back facing alleys which cut through the blocks. There are also town homes, cottage courts, apartments, mixed use development, a school, a church, and some public parks. The neighborhood also has a much more walkable street layout with better connectivity and no cul-des-acs and it even has direct access to lovely open space with walking and biking trails that can take you pretty far. In a not so large piece of land they've managed to fit so much more and create an overall way more pleasant place to live and walk around. Unfortunately it all ends abruptly once you leave the neighborhood and it devolves into the typical suburban nonsense we're all too familiar with. It's a shame that my neighborhood isn't the standard because despite the design differences it still has the suburban feel that many people like while also being free of many of the typical flaws in standard American suburban development. If all neighborhoods were designed more like that, we abandoned the strip mall for a more main street style of commercial development, and if we had way better transit everywhere American surburbs wouldn't be so bad, in fact they would be pretty great places to live.

In the rest of the world we build wall-to-wall houses with a patio and 5 people families live perfectly fine. You could use the English high density house layouts.

I love those colorful houses at 3:42! They’re so cute and you’re telling me they have minimal yards too? Sign me up!

It is time to end the annual housing tax. Housing should not be taxed. The regime calls it "property taxes". But it's a housing tax.

Something that absolutely shocked me watching the section on your hypothetical suburb for 1,000 people was just how much parking you were able to include. One of the things that I hear from so many people who are against this type of development is that it will force people to walk, bike, and use transit because it will be impossible to use a car... and yet, you just demonstrated a community where walking, biking, and presumably if it were scaled, transit are all completely viable options while still providing ample room for people who want to drive. If anything, I can predict a lot of urbanists being outraged at just how much parking you included.

14:50 A year ago, few abonded warehouses were demolished and a park and shops were built in my town.

I literally grew up in Myakka and moved to the Netherlands for a walkable suburban life because it’s just available in America. The suburban sprawl in manatee county and Florida is just the worst.

This is how suburbs tend to be built in the uk. Tbh, they still sprawl. I think were're at a point where we need to focus on increasing density in already urbanised areas. There's lots of places where density could increase but the same detatched or semi-detached houses keep being built. I'm a big fan of row homes as you can fit alot more houses into the same space. Developers don't like building them though as they can't charge as much for them

There's a development a little like this being built near me, on what was previously a cattle farm. I think it's very exciting. I do have to chuckle a little though: It's being advertised as a "20 minute city", but every house has a 2-car or 3-car garage, and the parking lots will be huge. Until the commercial space is built in 5-10 years, people will have to drive 20+ minutes to work (plus people around here seem to fill up their garages with junk instead of parking their cars inside.)

I like how your channel also provides solutions to the problems we have 👏

That was a brilliant animation and clear description when you reworked the single zoning suburb into a more dense, mixed use neighbourhood. That needs to be made into a short to be shared! I think that would reach a very wide audience!

This is a fantastic video! I'll be sharing it far and wide!

What I love about this channel is that the solutions shown are attainable. The graphics are also great and the interview at the beginning adds a nice personal touch!

Some of this is starting to change. Most developments around Houston now require schools to be built by the developers, parks and retention-pond usage areas are becoming more popular, and in larger developments sets of apartment buildings, duplexes, townhomes, and occasionally cottages are appearing. They're still very bad at including commercial and mixed-use spaces, and most middle-scale or small-scale developments don't do any of this. (An example is the massive, ridiculously-sized development south of I-10 between the Katy Love's and eastward. There's probably still too many single-family homes, but other kinds of development are sprinkled throughout.) Personally, I want to live in the countryside and for it to remain rural for the rest of my time there, but the current urban sprawl is removing those spaces. Hopefully, developers see that this way of building a whole community, instead of just houses, will pay off for them in the long run. If they do, they'll start emphasizing this kind of development, and our rural areas can remain rural. I really don't want what's left of the piney-woods and prairies of Texas to disappear. It's beautiful as is, and something entirely different when "developed" into cookie-cutter homes.

this video is great because I live in Sarasota.

Top notch. Thank you for continuing to lean into the storytelling that makes your videos stand out (and the graphics of course)

Just stumbled upon your videos and decided to sub here. I think you’re one of the few channels that gives a fair and balanced view while actually giving realistic solutions

What about converting rail trails back into railway lines for better connectivity?

many suburban cities continue to annex land to continue low density development, rather than increasing density within existing city limits

Another great video. I always love the part where you show your own better solution graphically, which is quite rare among city planning RU-vidrs. It's true, if the US built more developments like densely built European towns, with mixed use almost everywhere, you'd need less than half the space for housing and parking across the entire country.

There are already countless urbanist channels that pretty much preach the same thing (Allan Fisher, City Nerd, Not Just Bikes, etc.). However, this is the only channel that is not entirely condescending towards the concept of suburban living. The fact of the matter is that suburban living (regrettably) is the most practical and financially attainable mode of decent living for the American middle class whether we like it or not. This channel seems genuine in its attempt to educate its viewers that we can at least make suburban living more enriching through design, but all the while not alienating the people (suburban dwellers) that probably need to hear it the most. Thank you Streetcraft for making these videos. Can't wait for the next one!

Maaaaaaannnn I absolutely LOVE your content & your editing!! I relate to your content as a Mexican who migrated to the US and continues to be annoyed and shocked by how anti-pedestrian the infrastructure and culture is here :( I've followed you on Instagram for a while and only just clicked on your RU-vid channel for the first time! Gold mine. Hope you continue to grow and create awesome things!

You did a FANTASTIC job with this video. I live in Orlando and have been preaching this since forever. We need to be more like her to have a fiscally sustainable Orlando.

not to mention that the new layouts would also make public transportation more viable with the entire area within walking distance of one or to pick up/drop off locations.

I LOVE that icecream shop analogy, I'm definitely stealing that one for any NIMBY encounters 😅😅

I love your channel so much. And your graphics are TOP TIER! The graphic at 9:10 is what I see in my brain all day long, and now it's on a video for me to enjoy

This was beautiful. I hope more developers can see this and will start building this way.

This is the perfect all in one video explaining the problem with suburbia and had a solution too

The animations and explanations in this video make it so good. Ive been following urbanism for a while but have struggled to comprehend how a walkable suburb might look. Your video has helped me understand. I will definitely be showing this to whoever I can❤❤

Heh, the downtown of my home city of Calgary is the video stand-in for "dense urban area" and around here it is considered sprawl country.

My question is just, why do people WANT this? They wouldn't build it if there were no demand, but to me living somewhere so heavily controlled and isolated from everything, where you are shut out from both human life and nature if your car breaks down, is unthinkable. I love the idea of suburban towns and villages like your demo (I'm situated near Pinecraft now, which has been pretty nice), but not single-family wastelands. ...Though, I question your choice of putting your notional family houses' backyards right in alligator territory. The gators might thank you, but little Billy's parents and Mr. Fluffins' owner definitely will not :P

Beautiful graphics! They complemented the provided information without seeming cluttered. Really well done 😊

This video completely fails to mention transit connectivity as well, especially at 4:39. Sure, having a walkable suburban neighborhood is nice and you can get amenities that are close together in a walkable suburban neighborhood, but what if someone wants to go to another part of the city/metropolitan area? In the example at 10:01 there is no transit connection at all, the example assumes that if you want to go to another part of a city/metropolitan area, you have to drive there. I like the idea of this but walkable suburban neighborhoods absolutely NEED reliable transit such as bus rapid transit, light rail, and regional rail.

I think the U.S. could emulate pre-war suburbs - maintain suburban comforts while restoring financial sustainability and the community & health benefits of walkability & density. Could look something like suburbs around the UK or other Northwestern European countries.

I love your videos man! Can I ask what type of program you use?

Waterside is one of the highest demand neighborhood in Sarasota/LWR it's amazing they didn't replicate it in more of the new developments

Your videos are fantastic my dude! Here's hoping this is the next NJB or CityNerd!

I’m 23 and really hope I can live in something like this one day 😢

Yes my mom designs and sells ADUs and often times houses veterans in them. Such an amazing solution without recking houses and communities while still attacking the problem.

Essentially you are describing more master plan communities. I for instance live in nocatee Florida. It has many of the design ideas your speaking of but with more of a focus of golf carts as the primary mode of transport

I feel so seen when it comes to my desires for how live and the type of housing I want! Why has no one seen there is a huge market for this sort of development and community.

Excellent video. It’s so important that we imagine a better future, and obviously we need to be able to live in it too

The supporting graphics are sublime, dude. Very clearly demonstrates the aspects of optimal (sub)urban planning. Great video overall.

Growing up in the Suburbs is the worst. I wish my parents never moved us from NYC.

Great Video!!! Very Informative!!!!

your graphics are amazing! what do you use for them, i wanna make stuff similar to that

5:16 I would just walk through the trees. IDC if its against the rules or whatever, I'm not walking all the way around.

I absolutely love your channel, especially how you try to ground all of our hopes and dreams in reality. I watched your interview on a podcast, can't remember the name right now, where you explained your background in city governance, which explains a lot regarding your grounded approach. I can't say it enough, dude. Absolutely love your content. I do have a question about the "how it could be" diagram. I've seen it quite often how underground parking is never considered as an option, or even overground but in stories, instead of just flat concrete. I'd be very interested in knowing if there's a specific reason for that, since it's always intrigued me why that's never considered as an option except in large cities. Even if you ignore the car centrism of it all, leaving your car in an entirely exposed space, without any kind of roof over it, is far from ideal, so I just don't get why parking buildings, rather than just parking lots, are never considered

4:59 what is THAT monstrosity of a road?! 💀

Great channel, thanks for the content !

A lot of times I watch videos or read complaints about the suburbs and it doesn't really match my experience. The suburban model described here is much closer to my experience in NJ than the endless residential sprawl people often complain about. I really love that this video doesn't demonize people who prefer not to live in hyperdense cities.

Love the video! in the future, could you say the name/locations of the developments you are showing?

Excellent graphics! The only thing i would add is a bus or train stop at the front of the neighborhood that goes to downtown or a transit hub

I would like to see you build a city in City Skyline 2, would be cool to watch

Co-op apartments are also a compromise. I would live in apartment if I owned it.

Great video. We have to move towards a city that developed in the 50s and everything is so spaced apart it hurts my soul.

What software are you using to make road layouts?

Hi, I've been wondering that if could someone make a video (or you) that how do you redesign all those intersections, thank you!

I am curious about what software you used for the reimagining section. Thanks.