Urban to Suburban: My experience

[bahua]

Something occurred to me, not long ago. I grew up in Peoria, IL, and until I was six years old, I lived in the city. I lived on a street where all the houses had big front porches with verandas and porch swings, the sidewalks proceeded uninterrupted down both sides of the street, and the majority of the auto traffic was police cars and taxi cabs. Not that it was dangerous, it was actually a very safe neighborhood.

We didn't have cable TV or air conditioning(except in Mom and Dad's room), so there wasn't much reason for us to stay inside. Our parents let us play outside almost all the time, and in the evenings, after dad had gotten home on the bus, all the parents on our block would gather for a beer on someone's front porch, and watch us play. It seems idyllic in memory. We came inside for the night when the streetlights came on, for example.

Anyway, with all this playing outside, in the streets, lawns, and sidewalks, it recently occurred to me that I really didn't watch a lot of TV back then. I would wake up, get dressed, eat breakfast, and walk down the street to Joey's house, and play outside with him, my brother and sister, and the other kids on our block, all day. Then, in October of 1984, we followed the "American Dream," and moved out to the suburbs.

There were other kids on that street, and less auto traffic, but people played in their back yards. We called each other on the phone, and arranged for inviting each other over, to play in the back yard, or in the basement, or to watch TV. We started watching a lot of TV, too. We stopped riding our bigwheels in the street. We weren't able to be summoned inside by the streetlights, because there were no streetlights, except one at the corner of Mt. Hawley Road, and one by the cul-de-sac at the end of the street, and they were on all the time.

The parents, too, didn't visit each other like they did in the old neighborhood. People had pleasant, private dinners on their back patios, and entered the house through the garage. Dad had to buy a car, because bus service that far out was unreliable and scant. Years later, we were talking over dinner, about how life had been on the West Bluff all those years ago, and Dad said, "Nancy, can you imagine sitting on our front porch now, and drinking a beer?" She laughed out loud.

I was too little to realize it when it happened, but our lives changed completely, mostly for the worse, when we moved to the suburbs.

[chrizow]

very interesting.  thank you for sharing. 

i lived in suburban Raytown for the entirety of my formative years, in a 1970 raised ranch in the middle of a planned subdivision.  i don't even know the name of my subdivision.  (http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&hl=en&q ... 085831&t=k - not my real address, but this is my hood). 

i was born in 1981, so i was basically cognizant of reality from approximately 1985 on, and i would consider 1988-1999 my "formative years."  my parents house had (has) air conditioning, multiple televisions, a backyard which abuts a wooded area, video games, several musical instruments, VCR, multiple stereos, etc.  when i was young (until about 6th grade) i played outside with the neighborhood kids.  we played kickball/tag/wiffle ball/etc in the street until dark, then we went home and watched tv or played Mega Man 2 (or, later, Altered Beast) until it was time to go to bed.  in this regard, my childhood social experience probably wasn't a whole lot different than children in cities.

i feel that i was lucky in that the kids in the 'hood got along and played outside, but as i got older things became more contained and private.  my friends and i had to coax our parents to take us where we wanted to go.  every single conceivable trip required a relatively long car ride.  i lived 2 blocks from high school, but my parents insisted that they drive me anyway.  an "urban" lifestyle was never even a blip on anyone's radar.  my parents grew up in the 'burbs because their parents fled the city in the 50s like so many american families.  we had a van.  i played on various soccer and baseball teams.  we drove everywhere.  in the winter, our soccer team practiced at the UAW gym in Fairfax KCK rather than a local park.  there was no community "center" (literally or figuratively).  there wasn't a single place to hang out as a teenager except your friends' basement/garage or unless you could persuade someone's parents to drop you off at a mall.  i am fortunate in that some of my friends' parents were very arts/city-oriented, so we would frequently go on outings to the Nelson, the Plaza, Westport, the Rep, City Market, etc.  i fondly remember my friend's mom making us her amazing Honduran breakfasts with ingredients she got at City Market.  still, as youths we were totally isolated from each other unless we had someone to drive us.  we couldn't even bike, because our parents wouldn't let us bike on busy roads like Raytown Road or Hwy-350 (and rightly so). 

i guess my point is that i loved my childhood.  i was very lucky in many ways.  it would have been cool to live in a city where the kids could walk around and meet and socialize, but at the time i didn't know what i was missing.  i now know what i was missing, and i plan on living in an urban setting very soon.  however, i really doubt i will live in an urban area when i have kids if i live in KC.  sad but true.  i am not going to wedge myself into an urban lifestyle for personal/political reasons and foist it upon my family.  when/if i have a family, i'll probably do what my friends' parents did:  live in an inner suburban area and frequently expose the kids to urban amenities and mitigate the influence of suburban banality.  i would very much like to raise the fam in Fairway or Westwood or maybe Brookside if i can afford private school.  i value urbanity, transit, walkability, diversity, etc., but i value my kids' education even more.  though there were some serious faults to my suburban upbringing, i feel that i turned out perfectly fine.  parenting and education are more important than architecture and "urban fabric."  thus, i strongly feel that i could raise my kids in a charming suburb and have the kids turn out as enlightened as the progeny of persons similar to me who raise their kids in a city.  urban KC is great and i love it, but i won't be raising my kids there unless and until i feel it is viable for me to do so.

[shinatoo]

very interesting.  thank you for sharing. 

i lived in suburban Raytown for the entirety of my formative years, in a 1970 raised ranch in the middle of a planned subdivision.  i don't even know the name of my subdivision.  (http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&hl=en&q ... 085831&t=k - not my real address, but this is my hood). 

i was born in 1981, so i was basically cognizant of reality from approximately 1985 on, and i would consider 1988-1999 my "formative years."  my parents house had (has) air conditioning, multiple televisions, a backyard which abuts a wooded area, video games, several musical instruments, VCR, multiple stereos, etc.  when i was young (until about 6th grade) i played outside with the neighborhood kids.  we played kickball/tag/wiffle ball/etc in the street until dark, then we went home and watched tv or played Mega Man 2 (or, later, Altered Beast) until it was time to go to bed.  in this regard, my childhood social experience probably wasn't a whole lot different than children in cities.

i feel that i was lucky in that the kids in the 'hood got along and played outside, but as i got older things became more contained and private.  my friends and i had to coax our parents to take us where we wanted to go.  every single conceivable trip required a relatively long car ride.  i lived 2 blocks from high school, but my parents insisted that they drive me anyway.  an "urban" lifestyle was never even a blip on anyone's radar.  my parents grew up in the 'burbs because their parents fled the city in the 50s like so many american families.  we had a van.  i played on various soccer and baseball teams.  we drove everywhere.  in the winter, our soccer team practiced at the UAW gym in Fairfax KCK rather than a local park.  there was no community "center" (literally or figuratively).  there wasn't a single place to hang out as a teenager except your friends' basement/garage or unless you could persuade someone's parents to drop you off at a mall.  i am fortunate in that some of my friends' parents were very arts/city-oriented, so we would frequently go on outings to the Nelson, the Plaza, Westport, the Rep, City Market, etc.  i fondly remember my friend's mom making us her amazing Honduran breakfasts with ingredients she got at City Market.  still, as youths we were totally isolated from each other unless we had someone to drive us.  we couldn't even bike, because our parents wouldn't let us bike on busy roads like Raytown Road or Hwy-350 (and rightly so). 

i guess my point is that i loved my childhood.  i was very lucky in many ways.  it would have been cool to live in a city where the kids could walk around and meet and socialize, but at the time i didn't know what i was missing.  i now know what i was missing, and i plan on living in an urban setting very soon.  however, i really doubt i will live in an urban area when i have kids if i live in KC.  sad but true.  i am not going to wedge myself into an urban lifestyle for personal/political reasons and foist it upon my family.  when/if i have a family, i'll probably do what my friends' parents did:  live in an inner suburban area and frequently expose the kids to urban amenities and mitigate the influence of suburban banality.  i would very much like to raise the fam in Fairway or Westwood or maybe Brookside if i can afford private school.  i value urbanity, transit, walkability, diversity, etc., but i value my kids' education even more.  though there were some serious faults to my suburban upbringing, i feel that i turned out perfectly fine.  parenting and education are more important than architecture and "urban fabric."  thus, i strongly feel that i could raise my kids in a charming suburb and have the kids turn out as enlightened as the progeny of persons similar to me who raise their kids in a city.  urban KC is great and i love it an all, but i won't be raising my kids there unless and until i feel it is viable.

That link is to Peoria Illinois.

I ecco your story. But my parents let me explore more. I spent most off my time in the woods south of 85th street and even walked to banaster mall a few times. Rode my bike to school ever good weather day, even when they transferred me to Spring Valley.

I enjoyed my time in Raytown, it's still a great community, I'm just frustrated with the lack of vision for downtown.

[chrizow]

the link shows my raytown hood, which indeed abuts the woods off 85th.  i like Raytown okay, but i feel like it is going down the tubes.

http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&hl=en&q ... 085831&t=k

[Slappy the Wang]

Sounds like you moved into a neighborhood of wankers.  I libe in a Northland burb, know all my neighbors for several blocks, spend almost all of our time outside and have a great back yard.  I suppose it all depends on the effort you put forth in getting out.

[chrizow]

Sounds like you moved into a neighborhood of wankers.  I libe in a Northland burb, know all my neighbors for several blocks, spend almost all of our time outside and have a great back yard.  I suppose it all depends on the effort you put forth in getting out.

interestingly, no one in my parents' hood speaks to each other.  my parents are casual friends with our next-door neighbors because they have a daughter who graduated with me, but other than that we don't know the names of anyone else on the block.  this has been exacerbated by the fact that more and more homes on the block are becoming rental homes.

[KCMax]

I think my childhood experience (in Blue Springs and Overland Park) was similar to chrizow's, however I will be raising my kids most likely in KCMO, albeit more likely a more suburban environment. But I want my kids to be around the urban core a lot, not just a yearly trip to Crown Center like I experienced as a child.

I did kind of feel a sense of community in Blue Springs. We had the Fall Fun Fest, everyone went to high school football games, and Blue Springs seemed to have an identity.

OP is a soulless beast with no identity to speak of. Now, I like OP a bit more than others on this board, but it is completely devoid of character or charm save for maybe some pockets near north Metcalf.

Now, in Roeland Park, we have Roefest, people rally around Shawnee Mission North, there are several small businesses, festivals. It feels like a community again with strong civic pride in the area.

There are tradeoffs. Your kids will get a better education in the burbs, but will be more sheltered and less exposed to different kinds of people. Your kids will have more greenspace to run around in the burbs, but will probably get less exercise because you drive everywhere. Your kids will have more room in a bigger house in the burbs, but will be less exposed to culture and entertainment in the city. I don't think anyone is dumb for choosing to live urban or suburban so long as they make their decision based on facts and not fear. Different strokes for different folks.

[shinatoo]

the link shows my raytown hood, which indeed abuts the woods off 85th.  i like Raytown okay, but i feel like it is going down the tubes.

http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&hl=en&q ... 085831&t=k

We grew up a block apart. It's called Southwood Manor. My parents are moving out next month after 35 years. They will be the third house on their street to change ownership since the subdivision was built.

I love Raytown, but they are playing against a stacked deck.

[Tosspot]

I was a child of the city, but after high school I moved in with some relatives for four months in the western Shawnee sprawl, and the salient difference was that I was driving over 20,000 miles on an annualized basis. Of course, back then I kind of liked driving around everywhere.

[nota]

Sounds like you moved into a neighborhood of wankers.  I libe in a Northland burb, know all my neighbors for several blocks, spend almost all of our time outside and have a great back yard.  I suppose it all depends on the effort you put forth in getting out.

Same experience we have in our neighborhood. And in alll those we have lived in.

[ComandanteCero]

Where abouts do you guys live? (not because i want to stalk you, and you don't have to give me a home address, just a general intersection is fine, so i can get a feel for the urban scale of the area).

you don't have to either, just curious.

[warwickland]

during the 1980s, my old neighborhood was alright, even being the mega sprawl of st. louis. it seemed that as the 90s were underway, however, people started to withdraw into their homes more and more, and ultimately move out further, and the street started to go "stale." it seems that most sprawl has a limited lifespan, and many neighborhoods tend to dry up as they arent deemed places worth re-investing into. this would correspond to our "use up and throw away" culture that has evolved since world war two. surprisingly, some of the inner ring suburbs of kansas city have held on remarkably long, like raytown. it is the areas being built now that i think will not have the long term viability that these older sprawling areas have enjoyed. additionally, i don't forsee olathe or kansas city north experiencing the phenomenon of urban revitalization the way areas of the core have. it is my opinion that nothing being built now will have the charm of the volker neighborhood in 2106, for instance. builders no longer think about building actual communities, and have no expectation that these tract homes will last 100 + years.

my point is that while i believe neighborhoods in newer automobile dominated suburban areas do have a period of decent social interaction, they have a much shorter social and actual shelf life than traditional neighborhoods have had. this idea alone is disturbing enough for me to never invest in suburbia. furthermore, i believe that this "use up and throw away" culture is accelerating, as the metro population continues to leach further and further out into newer and newer homes. the idea is to keep moving out and on to the new, which is economically and environmentally unsustainable, irresponsible to our children and their children, and just plain crazy (in my opinion).

[warwickland]

Where abouts do you guys live? (not because i want to stalk you, and you don't have to give me a home address, just a general intersection is fine, so i can get a feel for the urban scale of the area).

you don't have to either, just curious.

warwick and 41st street...i'm an old school suburbanite...sadly, they took away my streetcars. born about 100 years too late.

[bahua]

Where abouts do you guys live? (not because i want to stalk you, and you don't have to give me a home address, just a general intersection is fine, so i can get a feel for the urban scale of the area).

you don't have to either, just curious.

11th and Broadway, thereabout

[staubio]

Well, for a change of pace...

I grew up in Hoskins, NE, a small town of 350.  There really wasn't a neighborhood aspect as the whole town was the size of some subdivisions.  I don't remember watching a lot of television.  We spent a lot of time around town exploring and I rode my bike all over the place.  Some things never change.  Most of the time, I would just go around and see if people were out playing and we'd do something.  Sometimes we'd call on the phone, where we only had to dial the 4 digit extension to call someone, and ask for permission to play.

We had a double lot, so our backyard was heavily used for football games.  We knew some of our neighbors -- the ones that went to our church or had kids in my private school -- and others in between we knew nothing about. 

Most of our time was spent 7 miles away in the town of Norfolk, NE, where I went to school.  That meant a lot of trips to and from "town."  I also had my high school job there and drove quite a bit.  At that time, 7 miles seemed like an incredible distance.  Now, in KC, I think "wow, that soccer place is in the east bottoms, only 7 miles, I can ride there fast!" -- amazing the difference in scale.

I really think that urban neighborhoods are so much more like small towns than the suburbs.  Urban neighborhoods have more of a neighborhood identity, more activity, more kids just meeting up with other kids without big time intervention, fewer expensive toys, etc... and you have friends all over town but may or may not know your next-door neighbor.

[KansasCityCraka]

the link shows my raytown hood, which indeed abuts the woods off 85th.  i like Raytown okay, but i feel like it is going down the tubes.

http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&hl=en&q ... 085831&t=k

What makes you belive that Raytown is going down the tubes?

[chrizow]

What makes you belive that Raytown is going down the tubes?

that topic is for another thread, my friend....and i am not sure i want to create a thread for the purpose of bitching about raytown. 

[Steve52]

interestingly, no one in my parents' hood speaks to each other.  my parents are casual friends with our next-door neighbors because they have a daughter who graduated with me, but other than that we don't know the names of anyone else on the block.  this has been exacerbated by the fact that more and more homes on the block are becoming rental homes.

It's bizarre how people can live on the same block for 10,15, 20 years and never even know or meet each other.

[aknowledgeableperson]

Grew up at 90th and Wornall in the late 50's and in the 60's.  I wouldn't call it an urban enviroment because it was far from the City (annexed in 59 or 60) and even then limited services, except for the summer rec program at Boone School.  So I guess it would be called at that time the suburbs.  Much of what bahua experienced early in his life I experienced too.  Didn't have sidewalks or big front porches and many houses didn't even have a driveway.  Maybe the things that changed were not the neighbors but the environment.
Life before air conditioning in the summer meant being outside.  Having only 3 TV channels meant you had to entertain yourself without the TV.  No video games or computers meant you had to have other games to play, often with others.  Walked or rode my bike to grade school at 85th and Wornall and home.  Mother took me to high school in the morning at Rockhurst but I walked home, that is until I started to drive and then had a job.

Our kids lived closer to grade school than I did but because of my wife's fears she took them to school and home.

You can pass some of the elementary schools in the suburbs when school lets out and you might be surprised by the number of kids who walk when the weather is nice.

Rambling on some but I think you get the point.

[Cyclops]

Interesting thread. Fun to read.  AKP, you and I were almost neighbors. We moved to near 88th and Holmes in 63. Sante Fe Hills. A very cool subdivision. Some, maybe all of the land was once a part of the Daniel Boone family. Anyway it was alot like what Bahua experienced (minus the porches and beer). Spent ALL the time outside playing with friends, some that lived blocks away. We knew all the friendly yards to cut through. We lived a block from Center High so we played all over that place. I went to Boone Elementary and then Center North Junior High.

We lived there through some of American history's biggies: the Moon landing, the Kennedy assasinations, MLK assasination and the ensuing KC riots. We transitioned from a B&W TV to a color TV. That was way cool. My older sister was one of the early hippies and brought home the Woodstock album and the Beatles White album. Peace.

Damn you know you're getting old when McDonalds had only sold 10,000 hamburgers.

Anyway, maybe that's why I still like the suburbs. That neighborhood is still a great memory. We moved to Arizona in 69 and it was a whole other world.