New and Old #120
Friday roundup and commentary
As Goes Long Island, So Goes America’s Housing Crisis, Bloomberg, The Editors, July 10, 2023
The plans for the northwest end of Pearsall Avenue, in the Long Island village of Cedarhurst, look like precisely the kind of development greater New York needs: a modern, 98-unit apartment complex, within a couple blocks of a lively main street and a train station offering 55-minute service to midtown Manhattan. New residents could move in, work in the city, and spend their money locally. Everybody would win.
It might never happen. Like far too many similar projects, it’s stuck on the front line of a larger battle: whether the American Dream will evolve to accommodate more people and prosperity.
Nassau County, where Cedarhurst sits, epitomizes a national problem: More housing is most needed in the opportunity-rich areas least willing to comply.
On that last bit—people will say there’s no such thing as an “opportunity-rich area”; these communities are nice and safe and the schools are good because there are so few people and the barriers to entry are so high. That appearance of opportunity will vanish once you let the riff-raff in. This attitude is the mental operating system of suburbia.
I don’t, obviously, think that’s true. And these inner or close suburbs of major cities—analogous to Arlington, Alexandria, or Fairfax in Virginia or Silver Spring or Bethesda or Rockville in Maryland—are the places that would naturally densify. Instead, we see new construction being pushed further out, because, to varying degrees, these nearer communities resist growth.
The result is this:
This resistance to change, spread across many neighborhoods, has the cumulative effect of stifling growth. New residential construction, particularly of relatively affordable housing, has long been at a near-standstill. From 2011 through 2021, officials in Nassau and neighboring Suffolk counties permitted only 2.3 multifamily units per 1,000 residents — far fewer than in housing-crisis hotspots such as Los Angeles or San Francisco.
I think they think they are preserving their normal. I think they are imposing a social and economic cost on the whole metro area and the communities beyond it, which have far more of a claim to resist development than do communities in the near orbit of the largest city in the nation.
This is also important, as it is a more accurate description of what we call “preemption”:
Now, the sheer magnitude of the housing crisis is altering the political calculus. Officials in states such as California, Connecticut and Massachusetts are reasserting powers they once delegated to localities, threatening to override neighborhood land-use rules unless growth targets are met.
If you don’t like the solution, don’t be part of the problem.
Despite our loss of the buildings themselves, the image of the Trylon and Perisphere has endured and we see these symbols pop up throughout New York City, whether adorning the top of a building, on the ground beneath our feet, or even as a gravestone. Here, discover 5 places where the Trylon and Perisphere have been recreated!
Fun stuff. My dad and I read a lot about the 1964 World’s Fair awhile back, and I remember two things. One, that a number of the structures had basements, into which their debris was pushed and filled over when the site was cleared. What’s still in there, just a few inches underground? Two, a Christmas tree farm in central Jersey supposedly had a World’s Fair structure on its grounds. We drove there and checked it out. It wasn’t, but it was fun.
An Ode to the Motor Lodge: 10 Retro Roadside Stays, InsideHook, Keri Bridgwater, June 5, 2023
I’ll just pull this one, which I’ve read about before. Read the whole charming piece.
With its scene-stealing neon sign, this roadside motel has been a landmark along Savannah’s Atlantic Heritage Coast since it opened in 1964. Today, the two-story classic champions eco-initiatives with solar panels and an EV charging station. It’s pet-friendly and extends Southern hospitality touches for new arrivals with bags of hot popcorn, complimentary moon pies and RC Cola in rooms and Krispy Kreme donuts and coffee for breakfast.
It’s so cool to see once-common things become neglected and then rediscovered and take on this air of rarity or fascination. It makes me feel a certain humility, and try to see value in everything. Who knows what cast-offs of ours people in 20, 50, 100 years will wish we had held onto?
Catholics and Episcopalians to Form A Combined Parish in Tidewater, Washington Post, Marjorie Hyer, July 8, 1977
This fascinating church community still exists; I found it while looking for a church in Virginia Beach. At first I wasn’t sure it was legit, as in, actually associated with the Episcopal Church or the Roman Catholic Church and not some sort of breakaway community. But it’s totally real!
It has the joint sponsorship and blessing of the Roman Catholic diocese of Richmond and the Episcopal Diocese of Southern Virginia.
An 18-month study preceded the announcement last week of plans to establish the church.
Roman Catholic Bishop Walter Sullivan of Richmond said the two groups are launching the joint church because “there is a need to further the unity of our two communions.”
This was after the Episcopal Church permitted female clergy; the Catholic bishop even said he wouldn’t object if the Episcopalians chose a woman to be their chaplain for this church. (It’s not really a parish, so it doesn’t have a pastor, per se.)
So how does it work? One worship service, consisting of a back-to-back Catholic Mass and Episcopal service, which, at least here, is virtually identical to the Mass—I watched their livestream out of curiosity. Bonus: the Catholic priest was the pastor of the church we ended up attending in Virginia Beach. I’ve seen him before, I thought.
Pair that interesting piece with this: a remote (as in, dispersed and meeting electronically) Benedictine monastery associated with…the United Methodist Church. That’s a new one for me.
Saint Brigid of Kildare Monastery is a dispersed, ecumenical Benedictine community, with members living across the United States. We do not have a central monastery building, but share a rich community life that includes daily prayer via teleconference, monthly formation meetings via videoconference, and an in-person yearly retreat.
Our community is made up of men and woman of all ages, both clergy and lay, married and single, representing a wide variety of Christian denominations.
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I still think once or twice a year about giving it all up and moving with my wife and kid to a monastery to just bake bread and make candles or something. They probably wouldn't take me, or it wouldn't be as great as it is in my mind, but I'm pretty sure the videoconference-only monastery doesn't have much if any of the same appeal.