This post underwent several major revisions.  I had originally titled the post “Endangered Species: Single-Family Homes” when I realized that, ostensibly, developers were building single-family houses — not quite the same as homes, but marketed well enough to fool most.  So I thought about what was missing.  “Endangered Species: Large Lots”?  Well, yes, but what was the point of large lots?  “Endangered Species: Yards”.  Now we were getting closer.

It’s really about lifestyle.  And that’s really about community.

When I was a kid, we had a concept marketed to us as Kool-Aid Houses: The house on your block where all the kids went to hang out. The house where all the kids wanted to be. The place other parents felt safe letting their kids stay. Where parents talked to each other while their kids played outside.  In the yard.  With all of the other kids.

Kids are much busier these days, as are parents.  And lifestyles are changing.  With more and more people opting not to become couples, with more and more couples opting not to become parents, and with more and more parents overwhelmed by family and financial stresses, it appears that immediate needs are overshadowing wants, and health requirements are falling to the wayside.

Communities are ways for individual families to form teams, to fight common causes, share common joys, and support each other.  Or just make sure that the garbage bins are put away, that strange people aren’t prowling in the neighborhoods, or your kids aren’t climbing on the roof when they are not supposed to.  They are ways to get to know people who have something in common so that you can indulge in sharing your differences.  It’s about life and living, not business.  It’s about health and happiness, not efficiency.  It’s about arts and crafts, not just construction.

Communities aren’t even so much about the needs of the homeowners; they are about the needs of their children, and the future.  We need to look at why space is important, not just at how we can use it to fit more people and things.  We have so many ways to put pauses in our words, including commas, dashes, colons, semicolons, and periods; perhaps we should also look at how we can put pauses in our busy lives.  People are quick to state that they want to make the world a better place for their children, but slow to realize that this effort can begin at home, and in their own neighborhoods.

I would contend that Kool-Aid Houses would benefit both parents and children; instead, the lack of Kool-Aid Houses benefit the many private day-care centers popping up to support neighborhoods without such amenities. Santa Clara should be a place where people choose to come, choose to stay.  Not just because of lower housing prices, but something less tangible and far more rewarding: community.  They shouldn’t have to go outside their city for the opportunity to pay someone else money to make up for any difficiences in their neighborhoods.

Low-density houses with useful yards are a vanishing species.  Once these kinds of lots are sold, they tend to get converted into multiple family dwellings.  You can see this in what happened at Pomeroy Avenue and Brookdale Drive near the Challenger school: three single-family lots with yards were converted into nine high-density units.  You can see this with what is proposed at 1575 Pomeroy Avenue: another large lot with plans to demolish a single-family house and build three multi-story townhouses with a common driveway.  Once lots get converted into high-density housing, they don’t go back; it’s just not financially sound.

We need to be aware of our assets, and those extend far beyond just “three bedroom, two bath”.  We need to treat them with care and respect.  We need to understand what we have in the present, not regret our choices for the future or dream wistfully of the past.  Any developer that can understand this, I will gladly stand behind.

So bring on development.  Let’s look at different types of communities and lifestyles.  But don’t destroy existing communities and lifestyles to do it.

[In before tasteless “drinking the Kool-Aid” references…]

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