Life in the Suburbs vs Brookline

[whighlander]

I would just like to point out that Bellingham and Lexington are two completely different kinds of suburbs. Lexington has been an established town with a solid, walkable town center for hundreds of years, while Bellingham was just a couple hundred farmers and a church until after WWII. Lexington has fairly decent public transportation, even though the Red Line never quite made it out that far, while Bellingham has absolutely no public transportation of any kind and the nearest public transportation is the Commuter Rail in Franklin.

Lexington is really an outlier when speaking in terms of American suburbs because Lexington has some form of public transportation and a walkable town center, both of which you have noted. However, those two things are fairly uncommon when in comes to American suburbs in general, especially outside of the Northeast, where the closest thing a suburb might have to a town center is a group of strip malls along the major highway through that town. In fact, a lot of suburbs in the west aren't even in incorporated areas. For example, my brother used to live in a suburb about fifteen miles from downtown Denver. I can't tell you that suburb's name because it didn't have one and his mailing address was listed as Denver, which is odd considering that the area he was living in was basically a prairie and there wasn't another building within hundreds of feet of his house. That situation is by far the more typical experience of an American suburb than Lexington is.

So in conclusion, Lexington is a great town to live in and a fine example of a New England style town, but it is in no way a typical suburb.

Deh -- very well stated -- I never said Lexington was typical

Indeed I'd have to say that I'm proud that Lexingtron is atypical to the utmost -- you can't have too many towns where a World Changing Revolution was launched*1 -- and then there was the American Revolution which started much earlier in the center of the town and the 19th industrial Lexington as well as the home of the original Ponzi Scheme [his house still stands]

However, as I pointed out to Bigeman -- I really do regret having arrived to Lexington too late to have had a commuter rail station within an easy walk [still possible in the 1970's] or ideally the concept of a couple of Red Line Stations in town -- but we do have 2 hourly buses [more during rush hour] and the very frequent 77 stops only a 5+ minute walk away in Arlington Heights


*1 SAGE [Semi Automate Ground Environment] -- the grandfather of the computer as real-time device doing real things [tracking airplanes with real radar data] not just calculating something static was born at Lincoln Laboratory in Lexington

and by the way of peripherals -- the SAGE computer used a modem to talk to the radars located in many cases many miles distant, a light pen to input information and a graphic display to allow the "controller" to talk to the pilots -- kinda modern for 1950

The building of the full-scale SAGE also introduce the world to large-scale systems engineering and powered the rise of a small company into world prominence [IBM]

 

[Shepard]

I have a feeling based on your posts, Westie, that if you were barred from Lex and given a choice between a much more sprawly, less interesting, more chain-filled, less scientifically-notable suburb and Cambridge, you would choose Cambridge in a heartbeat. Just my guess.

 

[rinserepeat]

In a conversation with my suburban relatives over the weekend they told me they were jealous of my bike commute and wish they had a bike path to their jobs. This is mostly because they are struggling to find time to get exercise. one of them only works a few miles from his house but has to drive every day because he'd have to ride on a high speed numbered route. I feel like a lot of people would ride bikes if it were a safe option. Even in the suburbs.

 

[bigeman312]

Yes! And density is what makes biking a more viable option (for commuting, running errands, etc)

 

[autonomy]

My opinion is most likely worthless, but I wouldn't really call Bellingham a suburb. A suburb of what? It's closer to Providence than to Boston.

To me a suburb is somewhere in the vicinity of a large city where you have access to a great downtown core and yet still have public transit access to the city, e.g. Arlington, Newton, Lexington to an extent...

With that said, the comment about visiting Paris is interesting. One doesn't need to travel that far - just look at how Montreal works. Back-Bay/Beacon-Hill-style living with stores and restaurants aplenty around the corner.

Though I agree, not having to deal with doors, elevators, stairs with a baby is much more convenient if you own your own driveway.

 

[bigeman312]

My opinion is most likely worthless, but I wouldn't really call Bellingham a suburb. A suburb of what? It's closer to Providence than to Boston.

The United States Census releases Reference Maps for Urban Areas every census. Urban Areas are the best measure we have for what constitutes a "city and its suburbs." Interestingly, the border between the Boston Urban Area and the Providence Urban Area goes right through Bellingham. So, I would say Bellingham is a suburb. But, it can be considered a suburb of Boston or of Providence.

In terms of density, Bellingham is in the range that is considered "less-dense suburb" in the USA (~250-1000 people/square mile). Same as places like Concord, Lincoln, Sudbury, Wayland, Weston, Dover, and Sherborn, which are definitely suburbs of Boston. So, my conclusion:

Bellingham is an outer, less-dense suburb of Boston and/or Providence.