Cohousing-L Mailing List: Re: Re: Front Porches

[Harry Pasternak (Harry_Pasternak]

Russell
In your last posting you stated that:
 "In the cold, damp North, we (still) tend to build Georgian, cape-cod,
brownstones, etc, none of which feature provision for porches - maybe a
covered portico for taking off snowy boots and coats."

Since you live in Canada--have you ever visited the older middle income
neighborhoods in Kitchener-Waterloo or the Annex or other parts of middle
class downtown Toronto or almost every older city or town in Canada?- You'll
see thousands and thousands and thousand and thousands  of middle income
homes with front porches- the vast majority. 

It would be interesting to ask the architects and builders who built these
homes in the 30's and 40's- why they did have the porch? However, its really
irrelevant-the fact is that:
- 85% of outdoor time is spent in the front of the home on and around the
porch -if there is one, while 85% of the time spent outside is in the back
yard if there isn't a front porch. 

- that inhabitants of homes with front porches will spend four to five
hundred percent more time talking to neighbors when they arrive home than
folks without porches.

-that the break in and vandalism rate is higher in neighborhoods without
front porches 

-that there is less overall interaction between inhabitants living in
neighborhoods without front porches than with.

With respect to your view:
" While I too recognize the immense potential for neighbour building that
front porches offer, I just wanted to point out that rather than blame those
nasty developers and architects, we should perhaps blame "ourselves", or at
least our culture, as one that has always prefered the ideal of detached
housing,"

Stop blaming the victim, blame the people who designed-the architects, and
built-the developers, those double garages with attached house in Suburbia.
What does attached or unattached have to do with these double garages with
house attached?
They were detached in the 30's and forty's--there were detached in the
fifty's, but since the sixty's are often semi-detached (without
porches)----you gotto maximize those profits.

I suppose you would also blame the automobile buying consumers for the badly
designed and badly made monstermobiles that left the factories with dozens
and dozens of deficiencies. Fortunately, Toyota and Honda began to ship their
cars to North American and once consumers had alternatives they flocked to
buy the Hondas and Toyotas.
Eventually, the North American auto designers and makers were forced to
design and make the quality cars that consumers wanted. Will it also take the
Japanese house manufacturers to teach North American architects and
developers how to do it?
 
Harry 

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