[Newfie]

Not for me.

[ralfy]

Areas of some concentration, such as transition towns, will help to decrease distribution costs of manufactured necessities, such as medicine, various tools, etc.

[lowem]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('pstarr', 'L')owem, do the humans who live the apartments all the same height to? Do they get to wear different color coverings?

[SeaGypsy]

Iowem knows Singapore is not all like that; in fact it is a very beautiful city. I would rate Singapore very high on a list of potential bases despite the crowds and cement. Things I love about Sing...

Flying into Changi, either across the jungles of neighboring Malaysia or Sumatra, the Malacca archipelago, over the shipyards into the best airport in the world, getting on a train to Aljuneid and walking through Geylang to old China town. Safe at any hour of night, the best variety of food in the world, very easy relations between the members of every race and creed (mostly). A fantastic place to meet business contacts from anywhere in Asia for the above reasons. Plenty of nice cheap hotels, often cheaper than leasing a unit. Thriving business culture and positive relations with neighbours (again mostly). I love Singapore. My favorite city in Asia; just wish it would legalize pot to go with the wonderful food and beer!

(BTW Newfie, Singapore is one of the best places in the world to base a cruising lifestyle. Very easy access to- Sumatra, Malaysia, Philippines, Thailand, Cambodia, Laos, Vietnam, China, Korea, Taiwan, Burma, Bangladesh, India, the Nicobar/ Andaman Islands. It is a very kind country with visitors being given 60 days automatic visa on arrival, many free places to pull a yacht up a creek where you can walk to the golf course or your favorite restaurant. It has a reputation as a police state but really it's a classic Asian melting pot where if you don't disturb the peace it is very unlikely you will be disturbed. There are still lovely parklands and old style parts of Singapore, besides being really very close to so many other beautiful places. I was like you in my attitude until I had a few days to explore, have now been there many times and always book flights to have a day or two there on the way. It is a very special city state.)

[Newfie]

A visit is fine, and I have heard others speak as you of Singapore for cruisers.

Met a fellow this summer who spreads his time over Newfoundland and Thailand.

But I would not wasn't to live there on a permanent basis.

Showed Wife the photo and she said...".how do they feed them?...you know I appreciate the boat."

BTW I looked up some population density stats, each source was self consistent in ratio between say NY and Singapore, but very far off source to source. Don't know why.

[SeaGypsy]

Thinking of Singapore as in any way needing to 'feed itself' misses what Singapore is: a vital politically separate city-state on an island (actually there are a few islands, one main), surrounded by some of the most productive land and people in the world. A few years back there was much hoo-haa coming that Kuala Lumpur, Hongkong, or Bankok might supplant Singapore's key regional trading hub role. For several reasons this was never going to happen. Geography is the main strength of the city, being virtually on the equator and at the crossroads between South China Sea, the Pacific and Indian Oceans. A legal system in English and early adoption of multi-cultural adaptation post WW2 are major factors also. Singapore will continue to thrive for as long as Asia needs to do business across this region, with often huge cultural and linguistic barriers to trade.

[Newfie]

Ok, I presume it can continue to thrive without me. Which it shall.

Would like to visit some day.

[dinopello]

Yet another article in the business section about how from a market perspective, urban places are on the move

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', '�')��Market demand for drivable suburban development, which has become overbuilt and was the primary cause of the mortgage meltdown that triggered the Great Recession, is on the wane,” Leinberger contends in the study. “Meanwhile, there is such pent-up demand for walkable urban development — as demonstrated by rental and sales price premiums per-square-foot and capitalization rates — that it could take a generation of new construction to satisfy.”

[AgentR11]

I don't know why, but I'm really getting the "bubble-pump" feeling about these pushes to walkable/urban development. Not to say that I mind, as its a generally good idea that might actually work once the trendiness of it dies; but at the moment, just seems like yet another way to push demand at a restricted asset type in order to drive up prices and crank out more debt.

I mean honestly, how many people that are willing to pay 250k for 1000 sf of living space, are also willing to walk a mile to the grocery store? I'm not seeing a good behavioral intersect here, long term. Kinda a "seemed like a good idea" moment coming, when they take a step out into 95F air and start hiking away. There's a reason Houston was small before the general availability of residential air conditioning....

[dinopello]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('AgentR11', 'I') don't know why, but I'm really getting the "bubble-pump" feeling about these pushes to walkable/urban development. Not to say that I mind, as its a generally good idea that might actually work once the trendiness of it dies; but at the moment, just seems like yet another way to push demand at a restricted asset type in order to drive up prices and crank out more debt.

I mean honestly, how many people that are willing to pay 250k for 1000 sf of living space, are also willing to walk a mile to the grocery store? I'm not seeing a good behavioral intersect here, long term. Kinda a "seemed like a good idea" moment coming, when they take a step out into 95F air and start hiking away. There's a reason Houston was small before the general availability of residential air conditioning....

[AgentR11]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'A') few months of hot humid weather doesn't bother people while walking under the shade of the street trees.

[anador]

I live in Miami and I assure you, Street Trees make a huge difference.

That being said you still do get sweaty, fact of life I suppose.

Personally I cannot wait to get back to my native north... living on the concreted over surface of Venus down here is generally intolerable in the summer-time.

[dinopello]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('anador', 'I') live in Miami and I assure you, Street Trees make a huge difference.

That being said you still do get sweaty, fact of life I suppose.

[anador]

I live in a fascinating (if Dilapidated) walk up apartment building in downtown miami. It is one of only two vernacular walkups left that hasnt been demolished. The building was built as a hotel in 1916 and all of its infrastructure is pre-electric. There was a system of sophisticated solar chimneys grouped with operable skylights that produced cyclonic flow of cool air from a crawlspace under the building and distributed it between all the floors. The bathrooms and living rooms also contain windows with privacy glass meant to open out into the hallway, arranged enfilade with large bay windows, these caught the prevailing ocean breeze and pushed hot air from the building laterally. If the windows were opened in the right sequence you can also create a strong draft from the bathroom up the solar chimney to take out moist humid bathroom steam, without electric fans! fascinating building.

[anador]

This is a plan of the second floor, the small rectangular shafts are the solar chimneys, the dashed lines in the walls are interior windows and the dashed lines in the hallways show where the skylights were (there is also one over the staircase)

[AgentR11]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('anador', 'I') live in Miami and I assure you, Street Trees make a huge difference.
That being said you still do get sweaty, fact of life I suppose.

[lowem]

Talking about walking around, my trip to the mall takes all of about 5 minutes (if I walk quickly) to 10 minutes (slower a bit). The advantage of having all those apartment blocks you see stretching to the horizon? It puts people within walking (or at least light rail / short bus trip) distance to the town center which would typically consist of a mall or two, shops, and other centralized facilities such as train stations, bus interchanges, clinics, and so on. The doomers have of course talked about the cons to this arrangement, from ecological footprint, self-sufficiency, collapse and so on, but as long as it continues to work (which is another story) that's where it looks like the PTB are moving you guys towards and if you want a real-world example it's over at my side.

Looking out from my window across the road, I see the civic building which consists of : a government clinic (polyclinic), community club (which holds activities for citizens), various rooms in there where they conduct classes for both adults and kids (maths, art, language, cooking, etc), a police station, post office (where people pay bills, send parcels, and to a lesser extent send actual snail mail), as well as a cafe and indoor basketball / badminton courts. Pretty convenient if you need these facilities from time to time. That one takes me all of 2 minutes to cross the road to get to.

[lowem]

There's my local shopping mall across the road : Compass Point Mall. Not that big, 266,000 square feet net rental area. It's okay for a medium-sized neighborhood shopping mall.

This photo was taken from the roof of the civic building I was talking about. That was some years back, before they closed off access presumably for security reasons.

[lowem]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('AgentR11', 'M')aybe I'm just overly cynical from experience, but I lived urban, in a very walkable setting. No one walked. They would drive their cars to cross the street; 100yds at MOST. Walk ? no. Go downstairs, get out of the gate, around the complex, cross the street, park, in to store. Even when it indisputably would take longer to drive than walk, they still drove.