A car-free town in rural Maine?

The guy is absolutely right. Thanks for posting this. What I particularly like is that, while this idea has been around since at least the 1980s under the banner of New Urbanism and Form-Based Coding for private communities like Seaside, FL--and even earlier than that in the garden suburbs of England, in a way--this guy cuts through the catch phrases and sticks to the principles. How many times today do I hear the activity around FBCs? New Urbanist this and FBC that. I am really into this stuff, but not for the sound of the words, rather for the principles the philosophies and regulatory approaches espouse and implement, respectively. This guy has traveled the world and is absolutely correct in what he has said. In Asia, the villages are ALL on foot (though there are plenty of cars now, too), and people mingle from house to house and from house to work and work to restaurant, all saying hi to each other as they do. Europe must be like this in older sections, too, but I don't know. I do know that Asia is like that, at least where I visited, as was the part of Mexico I visited, and many older New England villages. This guy is onto something. Covenant communities like this have, again, existed for years, so this is nothing new, but I think it is still very important, based on time tested principles of urbanism as it is.
 
Thanks for sharing this, czsz! This is the first I've heard about this so I read through the whole slideshow presentation. Some really interesting concepts and proposals. This does seem very new urbanism, and I wonder if they could find an ally in the Congress for the New Urbanism? The examples of good communities that are used in the presentation are beautiful and functional cities of Europe that existed before the automobile but we have seen in some more current creations, such as Seaside, FL as Patrick mentioned, that have had success with this approach. Although I'm not sure if there are other modern examples that aim to be mostly car-free (they will still rely on the connection to the outside world via automobiles which is to be expected)? As stated in the slideshow, one of the primary challenges is gaining the "regulatory freedom" to build in this manner while most towns here require individual building lots to be 2 or more acres and don't allow attached buildings. It will be interesting to see this play out!
 
Corey said:
Thanks for sharing this, czsz! This is the first I've heard about this so I read through the whole slideshow presentation. Some really interesting concepts and proposals. This does seem very new urbanism, and I wonder if they could find an ally in the Congress for the New Urbanism? The examples of good communities that are used in the presentation are beautiful and functional cities of Europe that existed before the automobile but we have seen in some more current creations, such as Seaside, FL as Patrick mentioned, that have had success with this approach. Although I'm not sure if there are other modern examples that aim to be mostly car-free (they will still rely on the connection to the outside world via automobiles which is to be expected)? As stated in the slideshow, one of the primary challenges is gaining the "regulatory freedom" to build in this manner while most towns here require individual building lots to be 2 or more acres and don't allow attached buildings. It will be interesting to see this play out!
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Regulatory freedom can be achieved in any number of ways, but a common one is a town's overlay zone--if it has one or has the desire to allow one--which can be drafted up as a sort of floating exception area from otherwise applicable standards. Once a proposal comes forth to build, the developer applies to have the project reviewed, and once the site plan or subdivision plan is approved, the "floating" zone is anchored geographically to cover the scope of their project. That's how the Town of Londonderry outside of Manchester approached a recent $1 billion proposal to build a new urbanist town center on former apple orchard land (designed by none other than the father of new urbanism, Andres Duany, whose interview the cut from my article for some inexplicable reason).

A form-based code also takes a similar approach, although typically just replaces the underlying zoning code (PUD, or "planned unit development" zones, can also be used to implement a FBC, but that's too technical for this level of discourse). The guy whose idea this is wrote me an email after I liked his fb page, and seems to stilll be moving forward with things. I wish him best of luck. Pedestrian centered urbanism is great. I don't know that the CNU would be of much use to him, but certainly couldn't hurt. It sounds like he's either already familiar with NU, or traveled the world and come to the same sensible conclusions. Many people get turned off by over use of catch phrases, so I'm personally glad he (Tracy Gayton) hasn't been using the catchy phrases to refer to this.......like "human scaled" "new urbanism" "livability" etc. etc. etc.
 
Insane concept for this day and age, and in my opinion and based upon observation, impossible without proper transportation to surrounding areas.
 
Why is it insane? The residents aren't car-free; the town is. The residents park their cars at the periphery of the town. This should work fine if the town is sufficiently small, dense, and compact.
 
It's an interesting concept and will be fun to follow. Still, one of my biggest criticisms of the New Urbanist movement has been its propensity for creating new towns rather than improving existing ones. That's obviously not always the case and it's probably more a function of developers than urban planners, but I really don't think we need any more Celebrations or Seasides until we are able to repair more of our existing cities and towns. I know almost nothing about that part of Maine, but my guess is that any eventual Piscataquis Village will not be the same sort of high-end chain retail mecca that those places in Florida are. At the same time, without any economic reason for being, it's hard to imagine a remote village--however nice--being successful, especially if it is to avoid the other problem of New Urbanist towns, which is their general inability to accommodate less affluent residents. It's a neat idea and I'll be impressed if they pull it off, but I personally don't think it's the best answer to reducing car dependency or sprawl.

Still, I think this statement from their Facebook page is something that should be adopted and understood by planning departments in all New England cities:

We believe that the most successful places are places where individuals and groups are free to do as they like as long as they don't infringe upon the freedom of their neighbors. We also recognize that in any settlement where people are brought together in close proximity, practically speaking, some agreed upon covenants need to be established.
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FrankLloydMike said:
It's an interesting concept and will be fun to follow. Still, one of my biggest criticisms of the New Urbanist movement has been its propensity for creating new towns rather than improving existing ones. That's obviously not always the case and it's probably more a function of developers than urban planners, but I really don't think we need any more Celebrations or Seasides until we are able to repair more of our existing cities and towns. I know almost nothing about that part of Maine, but my guess is that any eventual Piscataquis Village will not be the same sort of high-end chain retail mecca that those places in Florida are. At the same time, without any economic reason for being, it's hard to imagine a remote village--however nice--being successful, especially if it is to avoid the other problem of New Urbanist towns, which is their general inability to accommodate less affluent residents. It's a neat idea and I'll be impressed if they pull it off, but I personally don't think it's the best answer to reducing car dependency or sprawl.

Still, I think this statement from their Facebook page is something that should be adopted and understood by planning departments in all New England cities:
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Valid points about the NU movement and, as you said, more a function of developers than anything else. The concepts are sounds, implementation can be less so.

I think the quote from the FB page, while I understand it, is a bit contradictory, meaning a "however" or "but" should have started the second sentence. Also, covenants are private in nature, so the planning departments can't pursue them. Zoning, on the other hand and as we've discussed before, should be changed significantly in many cases, to allow more flexibility.
 
Ron Newman said:
Why is it insane? The residents aren't car-free; the town is. The residents park their cars at the periphery of the town. This should work fine if the town is sufficiently small, dense, and compact.
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I am not against the concept, I am for it, just want to make that clear. BUT, I think many, and most people would question the ability to live without (being in the town) a car. Now I didn't realize that there would be parking outside, I thought that that transport area was for like trucks only. But this makes sense. But knowing people, they would whine and moan when it snows because they have to walk in the snow or rain.

I think cars have really made people lazy, and it would be good to get away from vehicles. But now that I understand that people would have cars still, it is a bit more realistic in my mind.

I know that I personally would like to live in a more urban setting than I do now currently. One where I could walk to the stores rather than have to drive if I don't want to make it a day hike. However not owning a car is hard these days, but hardly ever using it would be great. Better exercise and less cost.

I still think the idea is crazy, more crazy as I am surprised people actually went this far to design something like this and even get to this point, but it would be awesome to see this actually put into place and possibly be simialr to an experiment for other similar designed communities.
 
knowing people, they would whine and moan when it snows because they have to walk in the snow or rain
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One would hope such people would have the foresight not to move to a no-car town?
 
FrankLloydMike said:
one of my biggest criticisms of the New Urbanist movement has been its propensity for creating new towns rather than improving existing ones.
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Hell, an entire new-urbanist city could be built on the Seaport... or City Hall Plaza for that matter.
 
I actually think the best of New Urbanism does assign value to cars, but does so in a way that maintains a human scale. This relatively new French suburb has a main square which serves as a parking lot and provides ramps to more below-grade parking - but it's also a space for outdoor dining, shopping, and festival celebrations. The vernacular of the parking lot is turned back over to the pedestrian. The streets leading from the square to the residences are purposely built narrow - cars can drive down many of them, but there are few places to park. Residences have separate parking lots at their rear - the periphery of the development - where they face the arterials.
 
Shepard said:
I actually think the best of New Urbanism does assign value to cars, but does so in a way that maintains a human scale. This relatively new French suburb has a main square which serves as a parking lot and provides ramps to more below-grade parking - but it's also a space for outdoor dining, shopping, and festival celebrations. The vernacular of the parking lot is turned back over to the pedestrian. The streets leading from the square to the residences are purposely built narrow - cars can drive down many of them, but there are few places to park. Residences have separate parking lots at their rear - the periphery of the development - where they face the arterials.
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All valid points (in all of the above, not just this quoted passage), and good discussion. New Urbanism’s critics have misplaced their accusations, as I believe has already been mentioned, because it is the developers who implement the philosophy incorrectly, and not the philosophy itself, which results in the sort of ironic situation of an urbanist village off of an interchange. (a side note is that another frequent criticism is lack of design innovation, which is also incorrectly leveled at the philosophy, which may suggest certain features but does not mandate architectural style)

I was fortunate enough to interview Andres Duany, one of if not “the” father(s) of New Urbanism, and according to him the most important aspect of a town is the ability to have all daily needs within walking distance. I suppose, if a new town is insular enough and all encompassing of human needs, this ideal can be achieved anywhere, new or old, but is more likely to be achieved in infill situations.

This project is not insane if for no other reason than thousands of places just like it exist and have existed for millennia, all over the world. It may be ahead of its time—somewhat strangely by going too far back to basics—but it is not insane.
 
czsz said:
One would hope such people would have the foresight not to move to a no-car town?
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Very true. And yet people always seem to have some complaint about the town they CHOOSE to live in. But I see your point, seems valid.
 
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