<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN"> <html> <head> <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html;charset=ISO-8859-1"> <title></title> </head> <body> And the larger the houses grow, the farther apart people live from one another: house from house; room dweller from room dweller. All this further fuels the paranaoia, alienation, and intolerance that destroys our lives. I have lived in many sizes of apts/houses. What mattered was not how big the space was, but who I was sharing it with. Joanna <a class="moz-txt-link-abbreviated" href="mailto:jthorn65@sbcglobal.net">jthorn65@sbcglobal.net</a> wrote: <blockquote type="cite" cite="mid4530EA3F.15924.18F32E20@jthorn65.sbcglobal.net"> <pre wrap="">On 14 Oct 2006 at 9:09, James Heartfield wrote: </pre> <blockquote type="cite"> <pre wrap="">Doug: "Wow, James, have you spent much time touring the U.S. landscape, what Kunstler calls the geography of nowhere? It's soul-destroyingly hideous." If you mean that Americans are hideous, I cannot agree with you. I read the news of 300 000 000 Americans as a good thing. And where else should they live but in houses? </pre> </blockquote> <pre wrap=""> What exactly is good about that many new houses? Houses in the US have grown immense. From 1100ft² in 1960 to 2400ft² in 2003. Family size has also decreased so we now have 893ft² per person up from 290ft² in 1960. As house size increases, resource use in buildings goes up, more land is occupied, available farmland is developed, increased impermeable surface results in more storm-water runoff, construction costs rise, and energy consumption increases. In comparing the energy performance of compact (small) and large single-family houses, we find that a small house built to only moderate energy-performance standards uses substantially less energy for heating and cooling than a large house built to very high energy-performance standards. When compared to multi-family dwellings even the small homes are substantially less efficient. Houses built further out from urban areas increase commute times and fuel consumption. I guess since we have the whole pollution problem under control and the issue of climate change equally under control none of this matters. And since everyone has a place to live, clean water, etc. we can now afford to be as wasteful as we want. Happy days are here at last. John Thornton ___________________________________ <a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://mailman.lbo-talk.org/mailman/listinfo/lbo-talk">http://mailman.lbo-talk.org/mailman/listinfo/lbo-talk</a> </pre> </blockquote> </body> </html>