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Our building practices for the past century have been plain stupid - especially the glorification of the single-family house in a subdivision, at the expense of all other typologies and arrangements.
James Howard Kunstler
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James Howard Kunstler
Age: 75
Born: 1948
Born: October 19
Author
Environmentalist
Journalist
Novelist
Science Fiction Writer
Writer
New York City
New York
Building
Subdivision
Single
Glorification
Stupid
Expense
Century
Practices
Practice
Arrangements
Family
Expenses
House
Plain
Past
Especially
Typology
More quotes by James Howard Kunstler
Under the current high energy / high entropy regime, sustainable development is a joke.
James Howard Kunstler
Of course, the toxic bullshit of incessant advertising and show biz for nearly a century has stripped us of cognitive abilities for dealing with reality that used to be part of the normal equipment of adulthood - for instance, knowing the difference between wishing for stuff and making stuff happen. We bamboozled ourselves with too much magic.
James Howard Kunstler
America does not want change, except from the cash register at Wal-Mart.
James Howard Kunstler
I'm serenely convinced that we are heading into what will amount to a time out from technological progress as we know it.
James Howard Kunstler
Despite the obvious damage now visible in the entropic desolation of every American home town, Wal-Mart managed to install itself in the pantheon of American Dream icons, along with apple pie, motherhood, and Coca Cola.
James Howard Kunstler
The increment of new development will be the single building lot, if we are lucky, and most of the codes that are now enforced will be ignored because the redundancies they mandate will not be affordable.
James Howard Kunstler
Consider how badly-built suburbia is. Many business buildings are not designed to outlast their tax depreciation periods, and the McHouses are made of particle board, vinyl siding, and stapled-on trim. A lot of suburbia will simply become the slums of the future. Most of the rest will be salvage or ruins.
James Howard Kunstler
In my view, suburbia in general has very poor prospects. I think it will only become devalued and probably more dangerous. It's chief characteristic was that it represented a living arrangement with no future - and that future is now here.
James Howard Kunstler
Ridicule is the unfortunate destiny of the ridiculous.
James Howard Kunstler
It pays to remember that societies get what they deserve, not what they expect.
James Howard Kunstler
Once energy problems gain traction, there will be a large new class of economic losers, and consequently a lot of social turbulence.
James Howard Kunstler
I believe most of suburbia is unreformable and will not be fixed.
James Howard Kunstler
We will have to make new arrangements, or revive bygone ones. We may, for another example, see the return of the boarding house.
James Howard Kunstler
Detroit right now is virtually abandoned at its core to the degree that a lot of what had been slums thirty years ago are now wildflower meadows. The rebuilding of Detroit will occur a much smaller scale. It remains to be seen what will become of Detroit's vast suburbs.
James Howard Kunstler
I think we'll see a leveling off and then a contraction of population, not a continued upward trend.
James Howard Kunstler
Two decades from now, I doubt that the home building industry, so called, will even exist as we have known it.
James Howard Kunstler
Suburbia is the insidious cartoon of the country house in a cartoon of the country.
James Howard Kunstler
I have a new theory of history, which is certain things happen because they seem like a good idea at the time. And suburbia seemed like a good idea at the time, but it was a special time and place in history, with special dynamics. And now, we're going to have to live with the consequences of that. And the consequences will be tragic.
James Howard Kunstler
We have to do commerce differently because the WalMart system of big box chain retail will soon die. This means rebuilding local main street economies (networks of local economic interdependency).
James Howard Kunstler
I was not a hard-liner against nuclear, because I viewed that as perhaps the only way we might keep the lights on another 25 years. But lately I am on board with Nicole Foss's argument that we will not have the capital or even the social cohesion to build anymore nuke plants.
James Howard Kunstler