Greetings worldnick:

You wrote:

>My heart nearly lept out of my body on discovery of this web site.
>imagine a whole group of people devoted to

It's a pretty impressive site. I was somewhat less bedazzled than you
on my first visit, but after careful review of the book that goes with
this site, I too have become fairly excited at the possibilities that
lie before us.

> the VERY point I have been
>trying to convince people of since I was 12 years old.

How many years does that make, then?
How many have you convinced? :^]
I never seem to get very far when I 'try to convince' someone of
something. My impression is that most people prefer to reach their own
conclusions, based on the information available to them. First-hand
experiences are perhaps the most persuasive.

>but then all my hopes were dashed
>by this monstrosity of blindness:
>"Four-Story Buildings
>In fact one of the most VITAL aspects of
>building a carless city is building 3 dimensionally, making things
>CLOSER, NOT FURTHER.

Four-story buildings are in fact three-dimensional; and in most parts of
the world their construction would bring many people much closer
together.

>a groundless arguement that living higher causes harm.

Some of the 'grounds' upon which this controversial argument is based,
were referenced in the exerpt from carfree.com which you pasted in your
message: "(See A Pattern Language for a detailed discussion of
this point.)"
Part of this detailed discussion (in Christopher Alexander's pithy,
magnum opus, 'A Pattern Language', pp. 114-19) goes as follows:

"At three or four stories, one can still walk comfortably down to the
street, and from a window you can still feel part of the street scene:
you can see details in the street---the people, their faces, foliage,
shops. From three (or four) stories you can yell out, and catch the
attention of someone below. Above four stories these connections break
down. The visual detail is lost; people speak of the scene below as if
it were (a distant, alien place) from which they are completely
detached. The connection to the ground and to the fabric of the town
becomes tenuous; the building becomes a world of its own, with its own
elevators and cafeterias."

"...high-rise living takes people away from...the casual everyday
society that occurs on (porches, sidewalks and streets). It leaves them
alone in their apartments. The decision to go out for some public life
becomes formal and awkward; and unless there is some specific task which
brings people out into the world, the tendency is to stay home, alone.
The forced isolation then causes individual breakdowns."

Alexander cites the following evidence to support his argument:

"Families in Flats", British Medical Journal, November 18, 1967,
pp.382-86. "(author of the study) D.M. Fanning shows a direct
correlation between incidence of mental disorder and the height of
people's apartments. The higher people live off the ground, the more
likely are they to suffer mental illness. ....the correlation is
strongest for the people who spend the most time in their apartments.

"Mental Health and the High Rise," Canadian Public Health Association,
April 1971. ( Dr. D. Cappon): 'Young children in a high-rise are much
more socially deprived of neighborhood peers than their Single Family
Dwelling counterparts, hence they are poorly socialized and at too close
quarters to adults, who are tense and irritable as a consequence.'"

"A Danish study by Jeanne Morville (reference in Danish) adds more
evidence:
'Children from the high blocks start playong out of doors on their own
at a later age than children from the low blocks: Only 2% of the
children aged two to three years in the high blocks play on their own
out of doors, while 27% of the children in the low blocks do this.
...Young children have fewer contacts with playmates than those in the
low blocks...'"

"Oscar Newman, in 'Defensible Space'...compared two adjacent housing
projects in New York---one high-rise, the other a collection of
relatively small three-story walk-up buildings. The two projects have
the same overall density, and their inhabitants have roughly the same
income. But Newman found that the crime rate in the high-rise was
roughly twice that in the walk-ups.

I would add that high-rise buildings also usually have miserable,
one-setting-fits-all, heating and ventilation systems; oppressive rules
governing access and the behavior of users; and dreary circulation
corridors that frustrate social interaction:
Imagine the level of warmth (vs. suspicion) which is greeted upon a
person standing alone in a long, narrow, artificially-lit corridor....
Compare this image with one of the same person, standing alone on a
balcony or an open-air passageway, overlooking a pedestrian-filled
street.
Imagine a grand, open stairway, with generous landings that invite
people to pause and chat briefly, or survey the area below them; where
some come to sit and have lunch, read, or simply watch the world go by;
and where many people can get some of the regular excerise they so
desperately need....
Compare this with waiting for, then riding a stuffy, lumbering
elevator: all feet pointing toward the door, all eyes on the floor
number overhead. Where few would ever dream of lingering. Where in the
presence of a fire, power failure or a criminal, there exists a very
real threat of becoming trapped and injured or even killed.

Because of code limitations on population density, high-rises are also
often surrounded by inhospitable open space; which, lacking proper
enclosure and human scale, are typically lifeless, and prone to neglect.

All this having been said, their is no reason that part of a carfree
city could not be built with skyscrapers; for those who enjoy the views
from them, prefer the relative isolation from the street, and are
willing to pay the full costs of living in them. The downtown districts
of any carfree city will inevitably have some taller buildings.

>The most logical way to build a car free city...

...may not necessarily be the most desirable. However...

>...with travel taking place on MULTIPLE levels...

Good point. An elegant variation of this, which is mentioned (and
pictured) in 'Carfree Cities' (p. 159), is a ground floor passageway
which leads through a building, called a 'sottoportego'.
Open catwalks, like those seen in Mediteranean vernacular architecture
(atop archways that span the narrow gaps between buildings), would also
be a nice feature, which would offer delightful pedestrian travel
between the upper floors of opposing buildings.

> the quickest path between point a and point b...

...(for distances too far to walk) will usually be either on a bicycle
or a train; at, or below, grade level.

>Your location in a city should not be designated by a mear 2
>coordinate system, but also a third coordinate accounting for height
>or even DEPTH, as building underground is just as practicle.

This is an interesting point. Personal satellite navigation devices may
soon help guide tourists and other infrequent visitors through
unfamiliar cities. These are already available in rental cars. Adding
the third coordinate to a homing device that parents could use to locate
their children (or spouses to locate each other while shopping, etc.),
could be quite useful.
Building underground, while seldom as practical as building on it, can
be desirable in areas with long, cold winters. The (passenger) metro
described in the book, 'Carfree Cities', is underground. The separate,
metro-freight system runs below street level in an open trench.

>I'm sorry, but I cannot possibly condone this web site which had for
>a brief moment been the boon in my crusade. There is a grievous flaw
>that negates the whole arguement present and to refer someone here
>would only confuse them.

Well, that's a shame. Should you change your mind, however, and if you
promise to tone down your rhetoric a couple of notches, and work on your
spelling { :^] }, some of the subscribers to this list would be happy to
hear any other interesting thoughts you might have, and we'll try and
dispell any confusion that arises.

Best wishes,

-T.J.








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