How to turn your Neighborhood into a Village

[@trillium7582]

I grew up in a traditional small village. I have mixed feelings about Americans enthusing about things like this. In my experience, Americans are very individualistically oriented: they want what they want and they tend to be appalled at the idea of conformity and social control. And yet my experience in a small village was that there was enormous social control and enormous pressure to conform: everything from the color you painted your front door to what you planted in your garden to what time your children went to sleep was subject to collective judgment. "Surveillance" was everywhere and privacy levels were very low, because the properties were close together. I really wonder, when I see things like this, if the people who are so enthusiastic about it have really considered what actual village living means. There are elements of villages that are really wonderful, but I do understand why people often want their own space, too. It's like some Americans hear about villages and assume that the village will be run exactly the way they individually prefer? I don't know, but that has not been my experience, as a village dweller. It is also my experience that villages tend to be very socially conservative, which is also often left out of this sort of thing.

[@MarkLL1961]

This is a great piece of reflection on your part, and entirely justified concerns. One my own first thoughts is that our "individualism" is a bit of a conditioned response. We are individuated perhaps first through the geographic and social isolation that thee video refers to, which results in thinking and behaving as if we are truly separate. Then we receive tremendous amounts of indoctrination here in the USA, though all cultural institutions including public education and religious institutions. What you're referring to as individualism I tend to see as individuation, similar but opposite. One more thought, I think your caution that Americans may just be romanticizing "village" is well placed, and at the same time I have more to say. In village design, and especially in the culture of permaculture design, we are attracted to models that prove themselves through high indications of public health and ecological sustainability. So our affinity for learning from diverse teachers and circumstances and is grounded in goals and outcomes. In my case, my immersion in village cultures and my direct experience of villages, social structures, and community places has spanned 3 decades. I personally try to implement ideas in my own city and neighborhoods so that I can experience and enjoy the benefits of these efforts myself. This is more many reasons, including to see firsthand what works and what doesn't. In the colonial grid of isolation, as we reach for any way out, everything has to be treated like an experiment.

[@hlaw2830]

Nah, you're both stupid, go look up the "nation of joiners" and realize that YOU, not architectur, are what changed. All of the stuff he's talking about, it exists, you just don't know about it because you don't go outside to explore and socialize.

[@shitemastermike]

forcing it to either extreme is bad, having the option has to be better, right? if i had to guess i think theyve basically reduced personal property for micro community spaces right in their now interconnected backyards, definitely different from a traditional village, maybe "modern micro village" for lack of a better term

[@daltonl8751]

Thank you for providing your perspective. You're right that it may be that Americans have a fascination with what they assume is "natural". Americans tend to self-loath, and try to reject the things that have made America what it is. Instead, they believe what they've done must be entirely wrong, and throw the baby out with the bath water. In reality, there are ways to adapt and modify what has already been done, while maintaining the options for privacy and individual interests. Thank you for reminding us all that the grass isn't as green on the other side as we think it may be.

[@hydrangeadragon]

I think it really depends on the village, I think a new village with clear values of acceptance from the start and open and authentic communication between people can work well

[@toadscoper4575]

There’s one important factor I’d add: mixed-use zoning. Most American suburbs have antiquated Euclidean zoning laws that separates commercial zones from residential; this forces people to drive across town for simple amenities. In a village, people must be within a 5 to 10 minute walk from businesses such as pharmacies, grocers, cafes, general stores, pubs, clinics, etc. Not only is this model more economical, but it will further create strong communities

[@karmicbreath]

Agreed. I want cafes and workspaces above, below, or right outside my home.

[@edim108]

It's not only more economical, not only does it build stronger sense of community, but it's also way more environmentally sustainable. You don't need to burn gas. You don't need massive parking lots for cars. You don't need all that stuff. And it also provides more jobs per customer than the current system. One of the main reasons people here in Europe eat a lot more good quality bread is bc you have small bakeries making delicious bread 5-10 minute walk away from the house. If you have a shop that close, you don't need to buy in bulk- you can always just walk and buy something if you need it- as opposed to when you have to go to a supermarket. And if you don't have to buy in bulk, you don't have to buy things with long shelf life and you don't throw away as much food.

[@shinyshinythings]

This is the true European model. Until it can be replicated in the US, this type of village will continue to be just a different model of suburbia.

[@TrophyClubLive]

Zoning was completely ignored. It's amazing how many people don't have any idea how much of a wealthy neighborhood dream this is.

[@seanharan9521]

@@TrophyClubLive how about we just get rid of the zoning?

[@WildWest144]

Not only have bankers and builders set up the US housing landscape to let residents feel like they have no power, they've set up HOAs who tell you what you can and cannot do on your own property. Heinous. I made the mistake of buying a home in an HOA once but they wouldn't even let me park my own car in my own driveway, it had to be inside the garage when the car was not in use or they issued fines and I certainly could not have a food plot in my yard not even in the backyard. The power HOAs have is incredibly disturbing to me but hey homeowners agree to them so it's sort of a problem that we've created for ourselves. This is a fantastic video.

[@Phobos1483]

It would be banned under national socialism because it's another Jewish trick and subversion of society.

[@stephenbryan9335]

Definitely agree with your thinking! As a nation we have submitted to regulations that take our power and freedom in the hopes that “those who know best” will protect us from discomfort. Too many lies to count in the housing crisis.

[@carmenortiz5294]

I made such a mistake once also. After dealing with those psychos for three years, I sold it to this crazy Russian woman at a loss. I have zero doubt she made their life miserable. She was one scary young woman. Don't know what came of it. Bought a house NOT HOA, but ended up with other crazy people. This time sold with a huge gain. Moved to the middle of nowhere, where no one is friends with anyone, with one exception, he met a woman in church is now getting married and moving. I am staying put this time.

[@NoirMorter]

I despise HOAs each one I've seen has been power hungry mini tyrants.

[@someguy1559]

So who maintains this model after someone sells? Like if I buy a home in a hippy neighborhood can I just fence off the yard and cut down on all the fruit trees or is there some local authority that would prevent me from doing that?

[@scarofherobrine]

This man solved the mystery of "why do so many people want to leave where they are and begin a life in a fantasy world" You explained this so beautifully, gosh I want this so much.

[@MrTeethpaste]

Do you trust your neighbor?

[@evannicolay4390]

@@MrTeethpasteI would if I got to know them. Hyper-individualistic fear mongering is good for no one

[@justthere845]

@@MrTeethpaste yes I do. heck we even share cooked/baked goods and share a pet cat.

[@drinkyourtea]

@@evannicolay4390 then you are naive if you would trust just anyone because you can never truly know someone.

[@Dumbdumb-idiot]

⁠​⁠​⁠@@drinkyourteaso what then? You don’t know your friends and family inside and out either, why talk to them? It’s not naïve to make connections with the people around you, communication and community are extremely important. You’re the one being naïve.

[@smashley5687]

I’m an urban planning student and THIS is why I got into the major. I want to create landscapes that UNITE people and foster connection, accessibility, and help assure basic needs are met. Thank you for the video!

[@customsongmaker]

You could design the next Pruitt-Igoe housing community of the future

[@yolkthosenuts]

I'm also doing urban planning but from what I've heard, we most likely wont be doing stuff like this once we graduate. Landscape architects are more of the designers BUT after some years in the field I think there's room for moving around. I've heard that new planners (for local governments at least) mostly just process rezoning applications, but I imagine the responsibilities at a private design firm could be closer to what a landscape architect would do

[@dimatadore]

Best of luck to you! I hope you succeed.

[@rubyredlotus]

I predict the systems and structures of capitalism that have created the terrible modern urban planning will prevent you from accomplishing your goal and you'll become a left wing extremist when you realize things are FUBAR.

[@rubyredlotus]

Good luck though. I wish it was possible

[@rqn2274]

If you wish to make a village, start with a central square with a market, shops, restaurants and a place to stay. Leave people some privacy in their own home and garden. A village is not making all space accessible by everyone but rather a community with common and private parts.

[@DaNintendude]

When I think about what I want in a community, I certainly do not think of my backyard being connected to everyone else around me. I think about the small towns where people mostly just walk everywhere, because there are so many local shops and parks and stuff close together. I'd love to be able to walk outside on a Saturday to get an ice cream or something, and see some people I know hanging out along the way. But in housing we need that privacy, not just to feel safe, but to feel comfortable. You are spot on.

[@miri-dz9oy]

I absolutely agree. I want to keep my garden private. I don't want anyone no matter how well-meaning they are forcing their ideals on me. They can start with their own property if they feel this urge.😂 Some parts of the equation need to develop organically and not on a map. I can imagine having open-backyard days etc. And food production is also something I love. But not this communal stuff on my property. There will never be a one-size fits all. It would be equally boring if now all neighborhoods started to look like the master plan in this video.

[@Flamingerudostalion]

AGREED!!!!!

[@lounaannajung4454]

I think that if you'd like to make a village, you need to start thinking like the people who did create beautiful villages in the history of humanity. Usually it doesn't start with a market. Rather, someone realizes that this spot is really important : great soil, is "spiritual" ground, sometimes both... then they build something for them and their family.... start a little farming spot and somewhere to worship... then more people will find that place important and it starts growing with both flows of outsiders and families growing from inside. The marketplace, shops, central Square are surprisingly usually the last things to spring up.

[@jackharvey1637]

@@miri-dz9oy What about a smaller garden/ back yard etc to allow for walkways/alleys behind homes

[@ZidaneSteiner]

My Landlord in Los Angeles built something like this. My neighbors became some of my best friends who I still keep in touch with to this day. We shared a garden, entertaining area, picnics, dog play dates, etc.

[@Sov.Beowulf]

Was your landlord involved in the land development or just owned the property? He's doing my end goal haha

[@cheezicle6690]

that's so lovely!

[@drone124]

what was the name of the location/complex?

[@Lunavii_Cellest]

As an urban planner I think everyone on earth has to see this video. Not only is it better for the environment. it is so much better for our mental and phisical health. I am so happy to see that at least in my country of the Netherlands there are multiple projects that achieve many of the things you have pointed out. In my city of Helmond they are currently building a new suburb (Brainport Smart District) with many of these principles.

[@seanrowshandel1680]

Yeah but what's it supposed to be? A type of prison? Why would we risk our lives to escape villages/religions, just to be trying it out again? Did we make zero progress? Did we not take life seriously?

[@joannbaumann4028]

I wish I lived in the Netherlands. I live in a city in the USA> We need fences to keep out vicious pitbulls. 2 breeders on my block alone. One nearly attacked a toddler last night. I still can hear the screams. 3 weeks ago my dog small dog was attacked nearly killed by one. So how do I move to the Netherlands?

[@47ndrant42]

@@joannbaumann4028 Being from the USA you need a residence permit, afaik you do not need a long-term visa. Get an address where you can start at though i'm not sure of what does and doesn't count as a valid address. Register with the town hall as you need official documents of course. And then as always pay taxes though i don't know if they're different for someone who just moved. It's a beautiful country with beautifully honest people, past few years have been a bit drama filled with protests over certain things like sinterklaas. Will say where i'm from a lot of the friends and classmates will use the n-word and whatnot without it bringing or taking any offense, people are pretty laid back here, was a shocker for me at first but nowadays i find it pleasant that everyone is so lax with another.

[@Jaesdaes]

Hello there, I'm an American who's considering being an urban designer in the Netherlands as well. Would you mind explaining your work there? I hope to get more insight from someone within the career and system.

[@kaasmeester5903]

They could have come up with a better name for that suburb though, it has a rather dystopian over-planned ring to it. This seems to be the norm here in the Netherlands: almost all newer neighborhoods have all the important facilities within easy reach. For older outlying villages, it's a bit different, with small local stores closing, necessitating a car trip to do any kind of shopping.

[@prolepsis-hx8om]

You have no idea how much hope and excitement seeing this project brought me; this is the stuff I DREAMED of as a kid, always frustrated by why the adults weren't doing this kind of thing

[@frogboy831]

me too :) just graduated architecture school. i'll make u a cool neighborhood someday!!

[@givolimyerukim]

@@frogboy831 i'll be the first to reside there, hit me up on that day ;)

[@yolkthosenuts]

@@frogboy831 I just got accepted into a Masters of Urban and Regional Planning program, lets get it bro

[@frogboy831]

@@yolkthosenuts grats!!! let's run it :) and @noam u got it ttys!

[@char6081]

This video felt unreal it felt like a utopia. This is my favorite video I’ve ever watched

[@13ravenstears]

I grew up as an Army brat. One thing I will say for military bases is they have these kinds of communal spaces. Every complex or street has at least park and open field that all the families have access to. A lot of them have some kind of pavilion or gazebo for events. It's something I miss as a design element of neighborhoods I have lived in since.

[@thecommunity1102]

I stayed in a military housing place with my sis and something I loved was how the backyards were pretty much all connected and there was a park surrounded by the homes. Just perfect for raising kids and letting them roam and have their own adventures

[@XxJayandTomxX]

I hear a lot of people say this about universities as well. A combination of a walkable space, services, and people your age is heaven for just about everyone

[@kkhlufris]

This has got to be the best showcase of a village for the westerners In his plans he opens all space for the village but there is no such village, we have our own private grounds like back/front yards and the rest are pretty much all for the whole community to be used.

[@markarca6360]

Communal spaces, not just the mess hall!

[@Dowlphin]

Imagine the unexpected irony in that. (Although maybe not if one understands enforced communal efficiency. And that architect is not free from such temptations, as I explained in my root comment.)

[@angstyintellectual4960]

This needs to be a TED Talk because THIS is an idea worth sharing. The THOUGHT you put into this... my goodness. This is truly a dream.

[@angstyintellectual4960]

@longjohnthilver What would I need to tell you to get you to believe that it wasnt just a dream?

[@angstyintellectual4960]

@longjohnthilver Ok so what if I told you I actually had the funding ready and the proper licensing to build the first example of this style of neighborhood and we're going to have it complete by early 2025? 🤔 I absolutely do not, but if hearing that makes you think it could be a reality, then I guess I do have a rough idea of what would have to be accomplished.

[@Ugly_German_Truths]

@@angstyintellectual4960 try starting with all the nonsense he said that was factually incorrect about historical villages. Like trying to paint a 8 home neighborhood as deserving an village green/commons. Not how it happens unless 8 houses is your whole village, which is EXTREMELY rare. To "make" an artificial village, you'd need to find something like ONE Block for every 16 or 25 blocks that will take on the role of village center and clear it out. Turn some roads into no car zones, others into one ways to reduce traffic adn encourage walking. The eco utopia he showed with wilderness gardens connecting houses is NOT the reality of an old world village and it wouldn't be what a majority of people wants to live like, both in terms of how much frigging work it is to keep all thsoe small waterruns and ponds clean and healthy, and of installing the whole shebang in the first place. Yet they leave the outside square untouched, where the differences would be REALLY doable.

[@Dowlphin]

@Long John Thilver Yeah, it's not addressing the fact that the country is lacking that kind of living because of how the people think, what they want. Also, TED Talks mention is not exactly a compliment. They're kind of a smirky clichée at best, and appallingly hypocritical and pretentious at worst. (Kinda like Wikipedia especially these days.)

[@ggggeorgiaa]

AGREED

[@ilene_music]

I’m not an urban planner but I think about this stuff all the time because of how severely it is lacking from my life (and everyone else I know). Literally was talking with a friend a year ago about how the neighborhood I grew up in would be such an amazing communal space if we turned the backyards into shared space. Amazing ideas all around and they honestly seem very accessible!

[@justsomenobody889]

I know, it's so interesting how important our physical spaces are to our psychological wellbeing and propensity to talk to one another. I hate the standard suburbs so much it hurts

[@ilene_music]

agreed, the setup is painful in many ways!@@justsomenobody889

[@georgeousthegorgeous]

Honestly, I wouldn't want any people this close to me and my family. The less neighbours is actually the better.

[@circleinforthecube5170]

im just glad they keep our neigborhoods from being demo'd

[@tmmtmm]

@@georgeousthegorgeous haha this. The best environment isn't an urban one.

[@pdan4]

This guy is the Bob Ross of neighborhood planning. Thank you for this, God bless.

[@TyneeBubbles]

*Definitely* full of happy little trees 😋🌲🌳

[@sonnigundbelanglos]

I use it as slow tv to be able to sleep. dreaming of a better world

[@emg.721]

same here but I think it would help us get out of our comfort zones more and more easily, until our whole 'village' would feel like home. also he did say you can just seclud yourself in hedges if youre so inclined lol.

[@thomgizziz]

No he is the hippy that thinks he has the one true view and that it would be "so easy man." You can just look into accounts from the past of why this once used to be the way that things were run and that there were very good reasons why it wasn't the best and why people moved away from it. Instead we get to make the same mistakes over and over again because people think that they know better and that their "solutions" will just magically work the way that they wish.

[@wesleychaffin4029]

I think that land use is important to also discuss. It is impossible to create such a village if to get your daily necessities you have to get into a car and drive to a big box store owned by a huge company. We need small corner stores integrated within walking distance of peoples homes to make the streets safe for children and to reduce pollution and co2 emissions from cars.

[@LeoMidori]

Indeed. Public transit, sidewalks, bike accessible space, alleyways and mixed use business/living spaces are missing terribly from a lot of modern design, and that's intentional and isolating. The more we accommodate cars, the less we accommodate people and everything else that people can actually enjoy without driving. I happen to live in an area that isn't overly laden with sidewalks, but at least is walkable to two grocery stores and a huge variety of businesses within 5-15 minutes, and some people think I'm nuts for wanting to be able to walk to work every day.

[@gabrielramos3201]

here in Argentina thats the norm. we have small stores located all across the neighborhood. Its very simple, Neighborhoods are designed for houses only, but ever house owner can do whatever they want, so for example, 3 houses to the left of mine theres a store that simply is just a garage full of groceries, youn want a coca cola? they have it, want milk? bread? candy? mayo? alcohol? cigarrettes? rice? they have it. If you walk one block you will find another of this stores, 2 houses to the right of mine theres a pizzeria, its just a oven, a stove, a fryer and a fridge, but you can go there, ask them to cook something (a burger, a pizza, a sandwich, french fries, etc) and within 15 minutes is made, in fact you dont even havo to go to the place, you just send them a whatsapp, pay with transference and they delivery you the food. the house thats in front of mine sells clothes (its a boutique), if you walk 1 block you have a hair salon, a shoe shop, a haberdashery, a smithy, a carpentry, a mechanical workshop, whatever. the sistem is simple, the front of your house could be use to put any kind of bussines you want (even a pharmacy) and you live in the same place but in a house located behind the actual place.

[@jenferanthony9457]

@@gabrielramos3201 This really reminds me of "Sari-sari stores" (Variety stores) in the Philippines. Some people in a barangay or neighborhood setup small shops in front of their houses where they sell common commodities from food, beverages, hygiene stuff, and more. If one store does not sell something you want, you just go across the street and ask the other store. It's way more convenient than actual convenience stores in terms common goods.

[@sneakers_smh]

well there's zoning laws for a reason :(

[@sneakers_smh]

@@LeoMidori peoples work here is usually hours away if you walk

[@MYDREAMGREENVILLA]

What a timely video for me ! I grew up in Japan and I have been searching a way to create a urban community. I went into depression while living in America past 23 years, longing to join a community. In US I moved over 10 times to finally find neighbors you describe here. We exchange produce and fruit tree, but I want our community to be better. I have a strong desire to build one. I SO needed to find this video!! Thank you for making this and shearing. I won’t give up my dream !!

[@hlaw2830]

All you had to do was leave the city, lol.

[@Danokh]

​@@hlaw2830 Cities can bring people together if they are designed correctly

[@hlaw2830]

@@Danokh Yeah, sure, jusy like one of you will definitely get communism right, and absolutely not murder tens of millions, lol. The problem is Dunbar's Number, it's human biology.

[@hlaw2830]

@Steve Sherman Absolutely, population density influences a great many things; for example, if you live in a town of 150 people, you'll know literally everyone, not just their names, but their lives, and without a local police station you'd _want_ your neighbors to be armed; conversely, if you live in the city, there might be more than 150 people in your _building,_ you might be sleeping ten feet from a total stanger with nothing more than a couple sheets of drywall separating you, and you probably won't want that person armed. The city is only good for three things, business, narcissism, and paranoia.

[@hlaw2830]

@Steve Sherman I think you misunderstand, I'm just talking about the psychological pressures which lead to such geographic political divergence, not making accusations. Perhaps a better example would be diffusion of responsibility, the fact that as the number of bystanders grows, the less likely all of them are to act, because they assume someone else will, or already has; I mean, just think about all of the stories you've heard about public sex crimes being ignored in New York. Mind you, people are still individuals, and while I might be from the city myself, if I was on the subway car featured in the most recent example of this social negligence, that guy would be little more than a stain today; however, my being exceptional does not disprove the rule.

[@cileft011]

the reason i love the way apartment blocks are set up in china is bc they're laid out like this. sure they are huge tall buildings, but they often all face the same open courtyard with gardens and walking paths, seating areas, a playground for little kids and light exercise equipment for elderly folks. my cousin's apartment block even had a community pool! i really got the sense that ppl there knew each other and it was a real micro neighborhood.

[@planefan082]

My HK complex was like this. Most lovely community ever. 24 floor buildings, set of five but you knew everyone. Still had privacy in your own unit and balcony or in secluded parts of the shared gardens but seconds away from good friends

[@anonview]

It looks great, but in my experience as someone who lives in a small village in the Philippines, most communal areas and sacred spaces are _never_ planned. They develop out of the personalities/interests of the people living there. For example, one neighbor grows veggies, so they started a vegetable stand in front of their house. Another neighbor has kids who like basketball, so they set up a wall-mounted hoop at a corner of the block. Another neighbor is a whiz at growing flowers, so they built a flowering archway over their part of the street. I think functional village layouts have to have a dynamic quality to them. The people themselves must have the rights and resources to develop a space that they can share with everyone else.

[@tobiassanders9455]

I think the beauty of engineering on a philosophical level is that it is always at its best when it identifies things that are already good in the natural world and optimizes them to make them great. Hopefully, this can be done with the natural phenomenon known as a "village"

[@Goldenhawk583]

@@tobiassanders9455 So, a pre engineered village, with everything allready in place? The basket hoop, the flowers, the little veggiegarden?

[@NoTengoIdeaGuey]

Yes but also Americans have lived in a system where this whole mode of living is completely foreign. It has to be actively taught and built around our preconceptions about what communities look like. Most of human existence this kind of thing happened naturally, but for the last 75 years we've had our communities hijacked by bankers and real estate developers and had them tell us what to do.

[@UGPepe]

@@tobiassanders9455 when you want to control other people's lives in the most minute detail, just call it engineering, maybe they'll go for it

[@eTootsi]

@@UGPepe engineering means building. theyre saying they like the idea of building a neighborhood in a way where multiple people can add on to a shared space and make it their own, literally giving them more control then they have now

[@aisky8633]

Thank you so much for this video. I am an architectural student and nothing at all like this exists in the universities i have interacted with. You completely reversed several years of developments in my architectural journey by providing a convincing argument for the salvation of the suburbs in a radically different way to me. Thank you so much again

[@amillison]

I shared this with Mark. This is a powerful testament.

[@dataexpunged8572]

in my village in germany there are benches everywhere, we even got a small castle and forest, we have multiple playgrounds for kids, the streets are quiet and people often walk around instead of drive everywhere.

[@Cortesevasive]

Not much brown people and sand apes I guess ?

[@johnbarker419]

I love this concept. I think the hard part is filling blocks with people who understand the advantages of such a village and are willing to treat their yards as common spaces.

[@michah321]

@@johnbarker419 people do not want to share their yard as a common space!!! Why did I pay for my yard and pay taxes for a common space???

[@johnbarker419]

@@michah321 thanks for proving me right.

[@michah321]

@@johnbarker419 well what did you really think?? It's obvious that wouldn't go over well. Why would anyone agree to that??! If you wanted to be in public space, you wouldn't pay for private space

[@johnbarker419]

@@michah321 and yet it took 8 months for someone to try to pick a fight over my comments. Look elsewhere for your fight.

[@michah321]

@@johnbarker419 eh, it's you tube. If you don't like it, don't participate. One thing about KZbin, anyone can continue the conversation, in an indefinite timeline. I think that's equality, don't you? And I suspect, in the real world, we might actually agree more than we disagree. My point is, ultimately, men and women should have equal chance at success and freedom, independently of one another, or together if they choose. The rest is details, and likely not that relevant. I chose to opt out of being a firefighter, though I really wanted to be. Because I'm 5 feet tall. If I tried to rescue a tall person, their arms and legs would drag on the floor. There are taller, stronger women than me who would be amazing firefighters, and they exist. There are loads of women first responders. But I get that sometimes there are limitations among people, but very rarely are they truly limited to gender differences. If everyone has a chance to do what they dream of doing, that's probably the best we can do. For ourselves, and more importantly, for the kids that come after us.

[@xrayblock8987]

As someone who grew up in an overdeveloped suburb in the middle of a highly populated urban city, this is incredibly refreshing. I hope more people connect with those directly around them, and I hope we find even more simple solutions to today’s issues through true community. Try and ask a neighbor how they’re doing, and see where that kindness leads.

[@miezepups15]

As an extreme introvert, this idea is just as mesmerising as it is terrifying.

[@steven12426]

This kind of neighborhood will help every introvert a lot. Just imagine that one day getting home your old neighbor calls you for help attending the garden, then both of you realize you're pretty good at it. Then after some time you become the primary caretaker of the agriculture. And this can happen with a lot of works, like woodworking, art, designing, etc. There's a special joy and pride in doing this kind of work, specially if you're passionate and even more if you can see it providing for other people's needs. This feeling will override any kind of social anxiety or doubt that you have in yourself. You will feel comfy

[@minkeymoo]

Introversion isn't an inherent trait as most people are being fed my internet these days, I was introverted as hell during middle school and high school, but once you start talking to people you like/enjoy, the introversion starts to fade for those particular people, you'll still be an introvert for everyone else, but just be closer and more comfortable with people you like

[@VoidUnderTheSun]

@@steven12426 I would even argue that introversion is largely a byproduct of isolation and neglect and a lack of proper, integrated supportive communities in the first place.

[@steven12426]

@@VoidUnderTheSun I agree with you

[@Shanodude1]

@@steven12426 that neighbour can do thier own garden.... and those people can also stay out of my business thanks

[@bigboopus5059]

You have perfectly put to words and display why so many of us despise the American suburb. I really hope this is something we as a country can agree and come together on.

[@amillison]

100%!

[@IamRocque]

You know a lot of us live in the city and not in the Suburbs? People who live In the Suburbs often want to escape the Urban landscape. In order to make community living good you have to change the center (the city) as well.

[@cowfat8547]

i don't despise the american suburbs. i think its great

[@thomgizziz]

@@cowfat8547 But they know that if you were just forced to live the way they want you to and do everything that they want you to do including act the way they want you to then it would be better for you whether you like it or not... just like every villain ever.

[@karinulll]

americans? Come together and agree? Would be nice, but just a fantasy.

[@xypysvyl]

As a countryside living Brit, I cannot describe how disturbing the typical US suburb feels. It reminds me of the ‘perfect’ monotone society of The Giver by Lois Lowry where everything is the horrifyingly ‘correct’. On a separate note, the local villages where I live are very old. Their design is often incredibly inefficient and irritating in the modern world (too small streets designed for horses), but that’s the charm of it. Along my lane, there is the closest thing I’ve ever seen to a stereotypical US suburb in the UK. Just like in this video there are these weird pathways that intersect people’s front lawns. I have never in my life seen anyone use them, we all just walk on the lane, and stand in the hedge if a car comes. We don’t change everything for the sake of modern convenience. There is history that will be forgotten if we do. Even further up my lane, there is this moss covered stone bench in the most awkward place imaginable. No one sits there, but it commemorates the favourite view of a doctor from over a century ago. There are a few ghost stories around it, but none I can remember with detail. There are stories and history behind and underneath every brick in a village as it grew hodgepodge to accommodate more over centuries, like fossils in layers of sediment. But ultimately they were built around the idea of community, as you described. No one had cars back then. If you wanted bread, you had to walk for it, so it had to be nearby. Many villages have similar names, because they lie along the same river. So many villages are built around rivers and water sources, I guess it never really occurred to me how intrinsic that was to my mental idea of a village, thanks for pointing that out! Great video that made me think about my own village and solidarity, thanks :]

[@GnawyArt]

If you have seen the movie of the Giver. It's actually better than what US suburbs look like.

[@ApproxKelly]

I live in the suburbs, but in a neighborhood that was a developer specific one, so all the houses are slightly different. In the developer made ones? Every house is exactly identical down to the color and the placement of a single tree, almost exclusively a bradford pear, in the front yard. It's insane and I hate having to go through them ever.

[@tomizatko3138]

Just like backrooms.

[@NJGardengirl1961]

Some municipalities here in NJ have "look alike" zoning, so developers can't make houses that all look the same. I don't know how people find their way around some of these neighborhoods (especially in California!) They're all the same color and have the same landscaping. The houses all look like garages. YUCK!

[@Glorious_Kim_Jong_Un]

Disturbed? 😂😂😂 Imagine if you saw Asian cities where 10 of the same residential skyscrappers are exactly the same, rectangle look in a row. Go to Germany, see new development. It looks identical to US development. You'd likely have a heart attack being that you get scared so easily! 😂😂😂

[@discontent2201]

This is the kind of place I want to raise a family. I'm encouraged and gladdened to hear such thought be put into reimagining the dull suburbs of our present into community centric homes for our future. Incredible!

[@discontent2201]

@TrainedACE Thanks for sharing, never hurts to add another perspective.

[@wavyy]

As an European I also think that having meeting spaces such as cafes, bakeries,, pubs or small restaurants in your neighborhood is essential. I don't understand why American suburbia decided against that. It raises quality of life.

[@komfyrion]

It's not just American suburbia that did that. I grew up in a formerly rural place that saw the local general store, school and community centre get shut down as car commuting to the nearby city gradually became the norm. We used to have a ferry connection which created a natural hub around the ferry pier. Working in the city and buying groceries in a bigger shop along the drive home killed the local general store decades ago and the community centre got abandoned by the local community and sold to an MC club. I don't think there's really an issue of zoning. It's just really hard to re-establish local meeting spaces when they've been gone for long enough that people have gotten used to getting cheap stuff at big stores and don't see the value of walkability. The school was too small to function as a proper modern school, to be honest, but it's a bit sad that the school building just ended up being sold and turned into a huge private house instead of some community-oriented use. My home island was very poor in the past and I don't think it was sunshine and roses back in the day, but now it's just a giant car dependent suburb with very few nice meeting places. It's mostly just shopping centres and car dependent single family housing. A lot of formerly rural places around cities in Norway share the exact same story.

[@fatalmystic]

As a european from austria i must say, that this kind of cummunity design is not at all done here. We are way closer to the US-model than to this beautiful vision of permaculture living.

[@Glorious_Kim_Jong_Un]

You'd be terrified of Canada too.

[@Felis-Concolor]

I live in a New Jersey suburb, we have everything you just described at a walking distance. Local cafes, local shops, a beach, a lake, restaurants, bakeries, bars, downtown, community centers, music hall, library, parks, ect. Not sure why you think that doesn’t exist here.

[@IsfarTausif]

As someone who loves playing Stardew Valley, this is like a dream come true. If I had the Authority and Capital, I'd definitely make something like this. I hope the government recognizes the potential this holds and encourages developers to make living zones like this.

[@commiec0n721]

You don't need authority, capital, or government to do this. You need the agreement of your neighbors, as many as you can get. The more you have, the less the city can really do to stop you.

[@amirhosseinyaghoubi1202]

​@@commiec0n721 Agreed. People don't need someone (or a collection of them, a governmental body) out of their community to decide what is best for them without taking their concerns, preference, etc., into account. Even when authorities have the best intentions in their heart, decisions made with their limited insight into the living experience in that community will undoubtedly lead to a disaster.

[@commiec0n721]

@@amirhosseinyaghoubi1202 Yup, and a big part of that is perspective and interests. People in the government and with authority in general are interested in doing things in ways that best suit the power structure they use to get things done. To the bureaucrat, a million licenses to ensure that everyone is doing things safely looks very enticing, whereas it's ruinous for any person or community wanting to better their neighborhood. Safety to a government looks like regulation, safety to workers and their communities looks like having free access to the information on how to work together to keep ourselves safe.

[@MarkLL1961]

@@commiec0n721 , YOU win the jackpot!

[@RaindropsBleeding]

you don't really need capital. you just need to appeal to your neighbors to work together. agree on a community day once a month to help maintain your community space. you can build it together, with your own hands.

[@uncoded.design]

I love this idea! I am creating a food forest out of my garden and implementing the pond idea, and curved pathways.

[@chordsofsteel-i4j]

hows it going

[@annitendo]

I grew up in a village within a city like that in the middle of Berlin, I played with the neighbourhood kids in a safe playground/park full of art and gardening and park benches and swings etc. and people sharing tools and books and helping each other out, so it is possible. This is how cities should look everywhere.

[@robgrey6183]

"Sharing" tools is how tools get lost and broken.

[@ramsaybolton9151]

I did too and it ended up in lots of fist fights. I prefer non-communal zones.

[@ljuc]

>This is how cities should look everywhere You see nothing wrong with this statement? Are you forgetting about something?

[@neonice]

I live in a village in Germany and here no one is forced to do anything. We share our fruit and veggie harvests out of generosity, we plant flowers for beauty and wildlife and the forests are free for everyone to walk wherever they want. It's actually quite easy and I'm surprised by how many people are appalled by it.

[@neonice]

​@@ljuc Germany simply does things well e.g. the recycling system or the fact that more than 50% of energy comes from renewable sources or the prison system. If something works then it's only logical to share those ways hence why global alliances exist.

[@CaptainWondermint]

I live in Portland and it's interesting to see the little clips of the city included in this video. I recognize a lot of them. This city has a lot of different, warring dynamics at play. Growing up in an isolated tract home subdivision in a conservative state, I was completely enchanted by the murals in intersections, weird benches covered in mosaics, etc, because these things were just unfathomable where I'd lived. It's been about 15 years and a lot of that stuff is still here, but it looks worse for wear and kind of oddly quaint now in the shadow of the giant, cubic apartment hives throwing their shadow over everything. I've developed a real cynicism that I'd like to shake off, but all these idealistic baubles that drew me in have a look to them now of a kind of pandering, dilletantish affluence that was always out of reach to working class people, and the role they seem to play now is a kind of tokenistic affirmation to the people living in the weird hive buildings that they are still somehow connected to nature and progressive thinking in spite of the hard fact that all the development is systematically choking out the elements that lead people to take on these projects in the first place. All that said, I do really like the ideas this guy is putting forward, and I'd love to see some more cooperative action of this kind around here to provide a counterbalance to the disingenuous BS that's proliferated so much. In other words, you can throw some kind of art studio into your luxury apartment building across the street from the community garden and churn out some ad copy about The Portland Lifestyle, but if I'd have to work 60+ hours a week at the wage I make to afford to walk in the front door, I don't think you're engaging in anything but branding and profit. Cripes, alright this is way too long for a KZbin comment and I bet I delete it tomorrow. Be well everybody.

[@katethegoat7507]

I hope you don't delete this actually, cause you did touch on something I'd suspected while watching the video: that this whole thing is like, 30% a genuine effort to create communities by using shared spaces, and 70% a way for richer people to waste money on something that is way too complicated for the main goal that they're trying to achieve

[@thelaboringheart]

I also hope you don't delete this because in my search to find intentional community, or even unintentional community, cost of living (or the requirement to build one's own house, or to have no student debt etc etc) has been a real issue. I think there's potential here, but no one in any neighborhood I've lived in has the capital for landscape design, bridges, fruit trees, solar panels, and so on.

[@CaptainWondermint]

@@thelaboringheart It's a pretty inextricable issue. I spend a lot of time imagining ways to make this kind of thing feasible for people in my "bracket," to the point that I've had a couple of dreams about walking around an area where it had been done. It's amazing what you can put together with second hand materials, etc-- the big issue is land, and it's like the only land that's remotely affordable for me and just about everyone I know is also remote enough in location that the question "where will the money come from?" becomes a real issue. Then I realize I'm basically imagining a run down hippie commune trying to sell beeswax or something. For the communities laid out in this video to actually get established, I'd like to know what they plan to do with everybody else-- do you have to buy in? If you can't, do you end up staying a part of some kind of underclass, living in some kind of favela on the outskirts and having to commute in to harvest apricots? I imagine this a lot as people I know, restaurant workers mostly, end up moving farther out of the city to chase rent they can afford and being put in the absurd position of having to commute back in to make sandwiches.

[@CaptainWondermint]

@@katethegoat7507 I'm a renter and the whole video there was a looming thought in my head-- "it looks like they're reducing the housing stock." I think these are great ideas but I can hardly afford to live here as it is. It's just something I'd like to find a way to work around. The best realizations of these ideas I've actually seen played out were in rental houses that were torn down when "development" hit overdrive around 2013 and the no-cause eviction laws hadn't been passed yet.

[@thelaboringheart]

@@CaptainWondermint Agreed. I noticed some of the B-roll footage in this video included a co-housing community that bought an entire apartment complex and tore up the parking lot to plant a garden. Seems like a good model for those of us in the working class, but unsure of the logistics.

[@henrypotter3024]

My parents neighborhood has changed. Growing up it had a small Christmas tree farm that was basically where all the kids would run around and play. Also had public woodland with trails. A small store that had the essentials and candy of course. The playground at the school was less than a mile, an awesome sledding hill at the end of a culs de sac. A river and a creek, and wild fruit to pick all around, either along the trails or banks, or just in the field of woods. We had community gatherings often. Thinking back, I think that it was when more land was developed that it all went downhill. It's still nice enough, but there are no real sledding hills or fields to play in anymore, even the woods is all broken up and segmented now, and the store is closed. This video has really made me think back and wonder...

[@dw384]

Beautiful! Our local non-profit is promoting this. We call it "Living In The Garden"

[@Myria83]

I'm Italian, and last year I worked in LA and lived in a mansion in upper Beverly Hills. Well, I really missed being able to walk around, hang out in a nice park or square and meet people on the street. There was only cars, cars everywhere, and no people whatsoever, except that in those ugly, noisy malls (that I hate), where the only places you can sit and chill are the restaurants and bars (that would kick you out as soon as you finish gulping down in a hurry whatever is on the menu). I was living the best possible "American life", the life of the ultra-rich, and apart from visiting some very cool museums, I found it disappointingly boring on the long run. I've lived in every continent (except for Central/Southern America and Australia) in a lot of different countries, working and hanging out with privileged and underprivileged people, and compared to a luxurious mac-mansion hidden behind high walls and patrolled by armed guards, I far prefer to live in my small semi-detached house (a 19th century country village subsequently incorporated by the city) with a quiet garden surrounding it, walk and cycle around, cultivate my veggies and breath in the beauty of a lively Renaissance city whenever I feel like enjoying some public spaces (squares, parks, etc).

[@MrSwccguy]

Sounds like you're complaining 🤣 no shit dude urban and rual living are different

[@dylanboyd6147]

@@MrSwccguy He is complaining. Did you see the part where he called his time in america "dissapointingly boring". Suburbs are really just terrible, and before you disagree with me and tell me how amazing your isolated monotonous suburban life is, try living somewhere with a community.

[@doshineko9544]

@@MrSwccguy Buddy.

[@gablaxy42]

@@MrSwccguy man he is speaking about cities

[@lorenzogarompolo8074]

​@@MrSwccguy my dude, I'm from Italy as well and I live in a city. There's a park 5 minutes away from my house and another one that's 10 minutes away (both by walking). No, I don't live in the countryside.

[@thanksyoutubefortakingmyhandle]

I've always lived in blocky neighborhoods but my mom moved to Florida for a bit and she had an apartment. There was a huge firepit with like, 30 chairs around it and we would go down there at night all the time, hanging out with random apartment neighbors. It was one of the coolest things I had ever seen. There was nothing like that back where I lived. I wish public hangout spots in neighborhoods were more common. We did have cops show up a few times due to noise complaints late at night at that fire pit though, might be annoying for some

[@Stephen_Strange]

A black roof for winter, covered with trellis and deciduous climber to cover the roof for summer, so it's cooler. These Ideas I've been incorporating into my property, and also started creeping out to the immediate public areas to clear out the debris and fill with vegs and flowers etc.

[@anotherday-anotherslay]

never knew i ached for community-centered housing until i watched this and felt my heart sank when i realized what we're missing

[@altrimmamuti9317]

Urban Landscape Analysis and Re-design for the non-academic. This is great work. Thank Andrew for streaming it.

[@rainbs2nd]

I recently proposed a similar project to my community in Norway and I found this video while searching for ideas. Your project is really impressive, it's really inspiring to see how much your community improved and how alive it looks.

[@LincolnDWard]

I'd be curious to hear people's thoughts on pets in a place like this. In my experience, the primary reason people put up fences between houses is so that their dogs can have free rein in the backyard.

[@anskiusz]

I think the concept would involve walking your dog 2-3 times a day. At least where I live in Europe I've never known a person to fence their yard high enough for the purpose of letting their dog roam free in it, might be different in some parts though?

[@Nphen]

@@anskiusz Americans in the suburbs or single family houses cannot be bothered to walk their dogs every week, let alone multiple times a day. They let them out the back door and they run around a fenced yard. Some even keep them in a smaller fenced area with an outdoor kennel or wood doghouse where the dogs run around and bark all day. Nice subdivisions with yards too large to fence are served by underground radio fence connected to a shock collar.

[@gabojill19]

@@anskiusz How many people with private yards and dogs do you know though? A colleague has 3m tall walls around his garden, though it wasn´t for the dog, it was for privacy, something greatly appreciated by Germans.

[@youraveragesinner5474]

@@anskiusz where I live sometimes you can't see a person's house because it's all covered by a fence (it's almost like it's really dumb to say "Europe" and not the specific country because Europe is literally a whole continent with hundreds of cultures and tens of ethnicities)

[@syntheticpolymer620]

@@gabojill19 I live in a medium sized US city and having an enclosed yard is seen as something of a prerequisite to owning a dog. Every dog owner I know has a private yard.

[@darndrey7331]

Something about this video inspires me so much and makes me want to change the way I live but at the same time I feel very depressed because I feel like something like this will never happen, but it has to start somewhere.

[@SchatzInaoriginal]

Don't forget this is already the norm in most countries. This was the norm for 100s of years and only changed like maybe two generations ago. If one generation was able to tear down and bulldoze 100s of years of history without much of a challenge, why would another generation not be able to install a little pathway, plant a tree and dig a pond? Change is actually so much more achievable than people realize.

[@ElizabethMcDermott-cy4cv]

Ever watched neighbours? Aussie TV show? I used to be friends with a student architect. Her vision boards and models and what she was allowed to build in reality We're looking at erinsbough And Mrs Mangle lives there for sure. But so do Charlene and Scott I live in the dilapidated version in the UK It's achievable x

[@sclair2854]

I would say it's good to remember there are other sorts of issues in villages. "You're impeding my access space!" "No you cant connect to mains water, I own the property surrounding yours" but these are often superseded by the upsides, especially if the commons are maintained.

[@MarkLL1961]

Hear hear, there are many layers to consider. Strangely, the community where we've been putting these ideas into practice for 27 years has been virtually free of conflict in all of this time.

[@hlaw2830]

If the commons are maintained? Lol, y'all need to stop trying to fix problems you _cannot_ understand. None of these things contributed to the end of this being a nation of joiners, you being on KZbin did.

[@joshlanders]

​@@MarkLL1961 I would wonder if this is because they are creating/first-in/saw-the-work/appreciation etc. Versus, imagine, a buyer of that space and seeing the community space as part of the "asset" instead of part of the community.

[@vexcarius7100]

I live in the Philippines. Whenever I go home to the countryside, what I notice is that every neighbors have their common place where they hangout in the afternoon up until night. (In our village atleast) People would share their dinner, snacks, and chat a lot. Yes, there are times that disagreements happen, but the benefits and sense community outweights those.

[@baileescott401]

@Steve Sherman cooperation is how humans have protected themselves and grown societies. Cooperation is a trait present from birth, being selfish/having prejudice is a learned trait.

[@maderightamerica3216]

All that you spoke of is easily achievable. I live in a rural setting and our community is already developing a plan that our entire community can enjoy each other and more importantly take advantage of growing several large gardens that anyone in our community can go pick what they want to eat from all of the gardens. Our goal is to bring our fellow neighbors together and act more like a large family of freinds who work together for the betterment of our community. We live in zone 7 so we can use a greenhouse all year round with very little heating in the worst weather. I really enjoyed your vision Andrew. We need more people like you in this world. May peace and prosperity to you and your family be abundent.

[@MarkLL1961]

You so absolutely rock, thanks for this comment!

[@ubettershakethatgroovethang]

This is so awesome

[@xiaseth52900]

Genuinely, me and my friends have been thinking about doing something like this on a big piece of property. We really don't have the budget for any of it yet but inspiration stokes a fire and Im gonna take a deeper look into how we could make this a reality for us

[@azaleacolburn]

I love your humanistic and thoughtful redesign of what a neighborhood could be

[@amillison]

Thank you Elo, and thanks for watching!

[@kuyaradz26]

In the Philippines, growing up in the countryside, early in morning the elder women in our town would sweep their front house sidewalk and after doing so they would stay in the crossing section and have their chitchat session as a way to interact with neighnors. That always happen every single morning. Every house in the countryside have spaces for gardening whether that would be ornamental, or vegetables plants which is a good thing to water the plants early in the morning.

[@VermisTerrae]

Mark was a presenter one time while I was earning my permaculture design certificate before the pandemic. A very compassionate and imaginative soul. I remember we were talking about how people are so much more isolated from each other than we used to be. I've been hurt quite a lot by people throughout my life and have avoided connection as a result, but his presentation helped me realize that forming new connections with others and fostering a sense of community was the only way that I could heal those old wounds. Many years later, I'm part of a craft & brunch group that loosely meets each weekend in my apartment complex's community building with some of my neighbors, I have new friendships that I never expected I'd make, and most importantly, I feel more whole than I ever have. These ideas can seem kinda silly and hippyish if all you've known is urban or suburban life, but truly, we thrive when we can come together and belong. Feeling a sense of appreciation and pride in where you live and the environment of your community changes everything.

[@vilesleftnostril.4704]

Where can you get a permaculture design certificate? :O

[@VermisTerrae]

@@vilesleftnostril.4704 I got mine through Portland Community College, but I don't know if they still offer them. Oregon State University also had that program, but I'm unaware of any other states or places outside of the US. I'm sure there are others though! You could search around r/Permaculture and see if they have resources :) best of luck!

[@rachelcookie321]

I grew up in a town that resembled a village in Scotland and I also grew up in a town similar to the American suburbs in New Zealand. Living in my town in New Zealand I always felt so isolated especially because I was an only child. I could never go play with other kids because everyone kept to themselves. If I wanted to play with friends outside of school we would have to arrange two weeks in advance and get our parents to call each other. And when we did hangout we usually hanged out in someone’s house because there just wasn’t many community spaces and the ones we did have were far from our homes. It was only recently when I got into urban planning that I realised why I always felt so isolated in New Zealand compared to Scotland. It’s because in Scotland the town grew organically with a community focus but in New Zealand it was built by developers with an individual focus. It’s hard to realise when you haven’t experienced both but living in a village environment really makes you feel so much more welcomed and less lonely. It makes your life feel less boring.

[@ElizabethMcDermott-cy4cv]

Did your village in Scotland grow from crofters that joined together? I look at old footage of how my ancestors lived in Ireland, Scotland and Wales and it seems to be small crofters that for practical reasons live close together. The village we collectively seen to dream of is the crofts we were cleared from I think.

[@michah321]

My life isn't boring at all without constant random social babble just getting through my day.

[@patrickmazza7055]

I wrote articles about Mark and his Community Repair efforts for local publications in Portland when he was just getting going in the early 90s. Backstory is his dad was an urban planner, but Mark saw the limits of mass-scale planning so he honed in on the neighborhood level. Glad to see he’s stuck with it.

[@joeskys2362]

That sounds great. How many other neighbourhoods has he built?🤔

[@ChesterSam89]

I love this so much. I will work to implement something like this in my neighborhood! Thank you for sharing, this is game changing content.

[@amillison]

Wonderful! Thank you so much for your support!

[@KingThallion]

I am totally on board with a lot of the concepts here but come on, this is too Portland. The biggest problem people have in America with any kind of communal living is conflict with their neighbors-- people have different priorities, life goals etc. There is a lot or room for conflict in this set up. Rich people love to set this kind of thing up, either just for them, or they can simply pay to other people to maintain and manage the public spaces.. Most folks need good leaders to maintain these spaces and real local institutional strength to deal with conflict. Most Americans have not had the experiences with living in groups to convince them that this type of set up is compatible with their priorities and life goals. You have to demonstrate that it works for a wide variety of people, in different stages of life.

[@SteveBluescemi]

Yeah. It's not that "greedy developers" or w/e foisted the suburban grid on us. It's that Americans have an individualist culture that isn't interested in compromise or sacrificing their privacy or property. This more communal style of living no doubt appeals to some, but the majority dislikes it so much that they have voted to make it illegal through zoning. There are many ambitious developers that would love to make communities like this but hit roadblocks with the city and neighborhood opposition.

[@starrmont4981]

@@SteveBluescemi Thank you both for your comments. This video presents a nice possible alternative lifestyle for some, but there are still roadblocks and opposition to making it widespread.

[@CaliMeatWagon]

@@SteveBluescemi Exactly. People want private backyards.

[@GalpsPGH]

@@SteveBluescemi People constantly make this argument in the US, but what about us as Americans makes us any different from any other group of people? We don't have some special brain chemistry or something that makes us more "individualistic". In fact the whole idea of this extreme individualism people push in the US goes against everything we know about the social aspect of humanity and what's good for our mental health. I honestly believe most of us in the US mistake "individualism" for "tribalism". We're a tribal species. This works great if our built environment encourages community and encourages you to view your whole town/city as one tribe. It works terribly when the built environment encourages you to only view your nuclear family as your tribe and everyone else as others which is exactly what the suburbs in their current form do.

[@dominicgunderson]

@@SteveBluescemi "Yeah. It's not that "greedy developers" or w/e foisted the suburban grid on us. It's that Americans have an individualist culture that isn't interested in compromise or sacrificing their privacy or property." This is just flat propaganda. Americans don't have some special, individualistic genome that the rest of the world lacks. We were shaped and molded by hegemonic powers to care for private property and suburban solitude. Neither of which are remotely conducive to better individual health or communal well-being.

[@ninacioffi7162]

These videos on Andrew Millison's channel is the flame of hope that needs to be fanned. Share these videos! This video touched my heart. I live in south Florida. The land of strip malls and subdivisions, flat land and straight lines. To see what is possible with a little thought and care. We all complain about builders and developers and city planners and HOA's, me included, but unless we get involved in our communities on a local level and have our voices heard, nothing will ever change.

[@BuffieTaylor]

This is what gives me chills. I can't even describe the feeling this gives me.

[@Dowlphin]

Well, the wavy roads surely bring a sickeningly sweet smell into the air. 😑

[@Elle_Riley]

i imagined living in something like this across from family and our closest friends and got emotional because it actually gave my depressed ass hope and motivation and a desire for the future which feels uhhh rare for mee lol

[@ciro_costa]

@@Elle_Riley maybe you feel like that because you can't even fathom how to start working towards this as a goal... i don't blame you, ofc. we were never taught how to have an effect on our communities.

[@OldSaltyBear]

This is all fine and good as long as your neighbors are on all on the same page. When I lived in the city, I had kids playing in my yard all the time and I never minded. Then their parents started picking my flowers... their dogs dug up said flowers after pooping in the yard... and eventually certain individuals started using my yard as a community park without asking permission. All it took was one knucklehead friend of theirs getting drunk, hurting herself and then suing me for that to change. The fence went up and all of a sudden I was an @sshole. I have since moved to a rural area... and low and behold the problem is even worse. I have neighbors cutting down hardwood trees for firewood, setting up hunting stands, taking mushrooms and roots, running dirt bikes and UTVs through and having bonfires back in my woods. They seem to not have any reservations about picking fruit and veg from my garden as well. The idea is good if everyone involved is respectful... but good luck finding five to ten neighbors who are all on the same page.

[@discarded1414]

Except for the fact that this literally isn't a problem in Europe or places like it. There are public spaces maintained by the community to do this, people don't go on other peoples property to let their kids play generally speaking.

[@ryedj707]

You're making that out to be an intrinsic part of people. When in reality it's a part of how American values and how our towns/cities are built.

[@cardboard2night]

It's kinda wild to me that you own the woods...

[@vedicboul]

@@ryedj707 ?

[@TheINFP_Diary]

i'm sorry that happened to you, don't be afraid to put your foot down when needed, i hope all is well

[@matt-lang]

I grew up in a small town but our backyard setup reminds me of this. We had ~8 houses or so with connected backyards, everyone had gardens, and kids were allowed to cut through the properties when walking home. It was unique even in the area I grew up in and it's something I've looked for in possible future homes, but it's just not something that's been planned for in the US/Canada for a long time.

[@Red_Steampunker]

To keep in mind for areas that have mosquitos, you can still have lakes and fountain. You just need bubblers or ways to create ripples in water, it hinders the babies. If done right it won’t affect fish, larger animals like ducks. And gives you just that lol bit of extra love in the area. I live in a place you can’t have water anywhere due to these pests. Since no one does it, while it’s quite simple to set it up off grid using a solar panel. Think outside the box

[@SchatzInaoriginal]

Also dragonflies. If a body of water has the fitting habitat for dragonflies, you won't have to worry about mosquitos too much, because they'll eat them both out of the water and out of the air. In general when a natural environment is well balanced, pests aren't as likely to take over, especially if you allow their natural predator to do their job. Setting up bird perches is also another important thing I'd recommend to do near ponds!

[@jethrozpectiva]

I was only listening this video while working. It felt like you were literally describing my neightborhood with locals in oaxaca, which i love so much. No regrets of moving to this beautiful place.

[@pongop]

Wow, amazing video!!! This one kinda blew my mind! So holistic. It made we realize there's a village like this in Fresno, California at Margaret Hudson Studios that goes back at least 15-20 years. Four neighbors knocked down their fences and turned their backyards into one common area with trees, paths, a pond, gardens I think, and an art studio. It's so cool and and a rare hidden treat within Fresno. It's been there at least 15-20 years and possibly longer. It's cool to know that it's a thing that other communities are doing, too! Plus the countless villages and indigenous communities around the world who give us this model and inspiration.

[@hlaw2830]

>indigenous people >Germans in Germany >1943 Y'all really stop need to using big words.

[@thelaboringheart]

This is so cool and inspiring. I've been planning a move to an ecovillage for a while, but it's amazing to think everyone on a block could come together and change the landscaping to make a common area, food forest, water collection, and energy reduction. Truly magical!

[@thelaboringheart]

@Disabled-Megatron I once lived in a suburban neighborhood where the only thing anyone did outside was cut down trees and spray Round-up on driveways. This would never have worked. The ecovillage I'm moving to has been thriving for 30 years. So, yes, you have to exercise some realism with regard to the capacities and proclivities of your neighbors

[@Yomanchamcru]

​@Disabled-Megatron Hey, don't knock lazy people; some of the worst people in the world for obstructing precisely the ideas outlined in this are super motivated early bird grinders - I reckon I could negotiate help from a lazy person easier than I could reprogramme local HOA authoritarian types.

[@hlaw2830]

Nah, nope, that's not possible, not even a little bit, there's a reason everyone from Occupy quit working on the farm they were given for FREE within two weeks, and there's a reason all these Marxists don't simply go join one of the many communes or co-ops which exist... they actually just want to own slaves, simple as.

[@hlaw2830]

​@@Yomanchamcru HOA authoritarian types are lazy, kiddo.

[@lavillenouvelle]

I tried to live in an ecovillage, and left after 6 months. Too high standards, and too much pressure to conform. Then, a friend introduced me to an informal network that was growing in our neighborhood, and this changed my life: we had lots of potlucks, we had meetings almost every weekend, and we helped each other in every possible way.

[@stevemiller7949]

It is thrilling and fabulous to see how many comments this segment has created. It shows you how important the message is!🙂🙂❤️💯💫

[@lelagrangeeffectphysics4120]

When thinking from a preping/ disaster preparedness angle this is amazing: -renewables and communal grid means power is available after disruption -plenty of water resources to use and manage -active communal food growing -social design means the village is a community that sticks together

[@hk4lyfe59]

I like the idea of finding community not directly next to my house. That way I have a place to escape to if that community ever becomes toxic.

[@obalasmora4192]

Our ancestors knew how to live with nature and each other... Modern lifestyle takes us away from both... We humans took a wrong turn somewhere in history... But there is a way back, I'm glad there are people who keep and share the ideas about connecting back... Big THANK YOU to all of you!!!

[@Zoey--]

Have you stopped to ask our ancestors their thoughts? Oh you can't because they're dead? Better just make sweeping assumptions about all of human history then :D

[@thehomeschoolkids4644]

I never really liked developments whether it's the rules or the cold look it gives, but you've just shown me a whole new light of it. Another thing to add to the list of things I want to do in my life, take a development and turn it into this!

[@Maria-ok7oe]

the idea is great, but I think there should be a place next to the house that is completely the space of the person who owns the house and where they have ultimate say about what they do, because otherwise, you have to discuss about every little detail and dont have your own outdoor-space anymore that is just your own sanctuary where you go after a long day of work to drink your cup of tea in quiet.

[@Homiloko2]

Exactly. I was wondering if this concept would still work if the houses were fenced in, each with their own yards or backyards, but still enjoying a common area in the middle. Maybe there's a good point of equilibrium, or maybe it just defeats the purpose completely.

[@clairet5636]

Maybe the front yards could be the common area and the backyards could be private.

[@SlapStyleAnims]

I agree.

[@johnhachey9239]

I think it's good to consider people having a private outside space of their own. However, in my experience a lot of people don't utlize their own private outdoor spaces very much, especially if they're uninspired. I only sit on my back deck because i can look at the ravine next to my house, but if it was just a green lawn with a pool I wouldn't be out there very much. Everyone is a little different. I think this creates more of a reason to appreciate the outdoor space. But a balance is good.

[@frogboy831]

front yards could become private fenced areas? could also include the gaps between houses where there aren't paths. and in the backyards, you can still make private niches without having to put up fences. plants, planters, aesthetic walls, etc. can all help partially obscure nightlines :) it'd be more of your transitory space between the shared and your space.

[@AlecMuller]

I have long been fascinated by intentional communities. How do you plan to manage social risk? There are huge potential benefits to communities like this, but there are also inconsiderate people (people *you* wish you could control a bit to improve the community) and control freaks (people who try to control *you* while claiming to improve the community). Are they open to everyone? Do they form from people who already know each other? How is property handled when someone leaves?

[@willengelmann6303]

A lot of urban gardening rights are protected by municipal law. Fences in the suburbs aren't really a necessity. The people in the community can't control you, there's no contracts. If people decide to coordinate their gardening and path set-ups, do you really need someone in charge? Many are open to whoever buys the house. A lot of the people in intentional communities are still private land owners who can sell their share at any time. Some form from people who know each other, some people just talk to their neighbors about landscaping projects and it goes from there. Good questions

[@ryanmccauley1139]

The social risks are the biggest things that make me hesitant about systems like these. I just feel like they may be great in theory but disastrous when you consider how crazy some people are.

[@NoirMorter]

I'd say look into the past with how those people were delt with in communities of old. For the ones that require extra help to civilize (using this term for now) look at sheriffs (locally elected law enforcement in a small place you would need maybe one.) For the power freaks and geeks its a difficult one. Greece had some interesting ideas as did France in the 16th century but my favorite is personal responsibility a covenant (maybe Constitution if you read Rights of Man) where everyone agrees on what the pseudo lairs can do. The rest can be way more complex to overly simplify in a youtube comment. All great questions though!

[@CaliMeatWagon]

@@NoirMorter You are right. Easy way to fix the problem is to bring back lynching parties and public executions for something as minor as theft, like how they used to do it in the past.

[@tefinnegan5239]

You're really focused on controlling people. A government indoctrination facility success story. 😢

[@ZachariahMBaird]

I've been watching a lot of urban planning videos praising dense cities, but not everyone wants to live in downtown Paris, so I've been wondering what the human focused alternative would look like in the suburbs, and I think I've found the answer. I hope to implement these as much as I can when I own a home.

[@melonlord2229]

I don't know crap about architecture but you certainly helped me make my D&D villages so cheers!

[@BenWasTakenTooManyTimes]

I have always been interested in doing real-estate investments on the side, and after watching this, I have a newborn dream of getting a whole block on a neighborhood and doing something like this with it! Thanks for the inspiration, and keep up the great work!

[@aria5981]

i love this so much, the idea of sharing and having a sense of community is something a lot of younger people are lacking.

[@isadora6092]

no, this is the doing of boomers. younger people are the ones desperately clinging to whatever sense of community they can get

[@robgrey6183]

@@isadora6092 LOL multi player video games are NOT community.

[@Descriptor413]

@@robgrey6183 Given America's complete poverty of natural community, it's no surprise that kids flock to multiplayer games as one of the few outlets still available. Young people grew up in a society so devoid of true community that we don't even really know where to start, and are only now really figuring it out.

[@matthewgoetzka8855]

Much appreciation for you Andrew for sharing these ideas and opening up a space for this dialogue 🙏🏼✌🏼

[@superkitty9215]

I wish every architect is as enlightened as Mark 🙏

[@sundersquare]

As an Irishman dating an American, coming over to visit their family and seeing the seemingly infinite copy & paste suburbia was pretty eyeopening and horrifying. sadly in Ireland, people often look to the US for ideas and lots of these terrible ideas are being copied for new developments. I don't doubt for a second that this design is the main cause of the loneliness crisis

[@titaniumvideos1039]

I definitely think if there is a loneliness crisis modern technology is to blame way more than the way we build our suburbs. You can still socialize witg people your neighbors and your community the way stuff is built

[@rokuonl2297]

Fr, back in my country you will have to interact with people for basic amenities, houses and commercial zones are mixed, so practically everything is within 10 minutes on foot. And since you go to the same places you meet the same people and build a relationship with them. It's also better for kids because all of their schoolmates are in their neighborhood/within walking distance. And since everyone knows everyone you don't have to watch your kids 24/7

[@levant5378]

To be fair, most Irish villages are dead now

[@microcolonel]

It isn't the main cause, but the main cause made it harder for people of the past few decades to understand what they were doing to themselves.

[@SwitchedDreams]

Socializing is easier in the US than Switzerland imo, and I've lived in switzerland my entire life.@@titaniumvideos1039

[@EVtripper]

Mark Lakeman always knocks it out of the park. He speaks to the heart and truth of the source of life.

[@chriso3130]

Man, I love this stuff so much. It makes my imagination wild with ideas

[@amillison]

It's inspiring to think of what could be, isn't it?! Thanks for watching! :)

[@ileiad]

as a writer, this video helps me a lot in worldbuilding

[@FlapjackMunicipality]

What a down to earth and intelligent man! I never thought about the constraints our infrastructure sets upon us, amazing work! ❤

[@bohansenboh]

This concept is based on the idea that every neighbor is a good person that you want to be around and associate with. But there are plenty of needy (emotionally), controlling, exploitative and down right psychotic people in the world. Sometimes you want a fence to keep your neighbors out.

[@Elkator955]

I'm sure that is what the people who invented the modern suburbs thought as well. Look where it got us. HOAs and nimbys galore. The fences didn't stop shit.

[@nowistime8070]

that bad behaviour is a product of the living with the straight lines and flat surfaces he talks about. I also think there are a lot of shitty people

[@bohansenboh]

@@nowistime8070 Could be that you're right about the behaviors being a product of our environment. Doesn't mean it's not a factor. The thing I learned about people with shitty behavior is, you can't change it. Unless that person wants to change there is no growth from a narcissist. And even if they do want to change it doesn't usually stick. I'm not telling anyone how to think about this issue, that's up to you.

[@jeremymartin8962]

@@bohansenboh i mean there will always be shitty people, but we shouldnt let a few assholes ruin it for everyone else ya know

[@HansKuloss]

Village communitys just pushed out people who dont want to be good villagers to other. Also if you disconnect people they naturally grow more suspicious and uneasy to each other.

[@PlantGuild]

The video delivered as always. Some really cool insight into helping change what we already have instead of only focusing on what we did wrong when we created our ‘burbs. Truly inspiring.

[@hlaw2830]

It delivered on delusions, lol, go search "nation of joiners", and then recognize that you are your problem.

[@amillison]

Glad you enjoyed it Jordan. Thanks for watching. :)

[@NyxiiPyxii]

This is amazing. Thank you so much for your thoughts. I have always desired to be part of a village.

[@Chocolate-wb1bu]

Why not use both common and private solutions? In places like Germany for example it's not rare to find both private and common gardens on the same block, or to see private houses and apartment buildings right next to each other. I may be wrong but it seems like a lot of people in the U.S. tend to fixate on just one solution, as if it's impossible to do multiple things.

[@frafraplanner9277]

American culture tends to use analytic thinking, and the worst part about Analytic Thinking is you fixate on one solution. Meanwhile Holistic Thinking like in Japan is better at mixing solutions

[@simonestreeter1518]

You just successfully analyzed the whole U.S. of A. in one sentence. I'm here in the States laughing, thank you.

[@user-th1pv6ks5o]

I mean this is that, you just would widen the square. so front yard, house, backyard, communal area that leads to all of the other houses that have the same set up. The main thing is setting up houses in squares instead of lines.

[@ChiefGodspeed]

I’ve been thinking of something like this for years. It was beautiful to see it. Thank you

[@hlaw2830]

Why have you been thinking about this instead of taking the initiative and just joining a club? None of the things in this video created our Nation of Joiners, nor did their disappearance lead to it's end. It's not the landscape which changed, it's the people, it's you. Y'all need to stop treating your feelings like the equivalent of knowledge and understanding, because they're not, they're the obstacle standing in your way.

[@virajsharma1654]

This video was so good and informative, and I am king of proud to say where I live our society unknowingly follows most of the things listed above, like we don't have wandering paths, but we have parks every 2nd or 3rd block, around 40% of the houses here have a solar water heater and solar electric, benches everywhere, there are two weekly market which take place on Monday and Thursday where two streets are completely blocked for the market and the biggest part people celebrate their childrens birthday, house inauguration party or someone's marriage these all occasions take place on the roads a small section of road just transforms into a beautiful temporary hall kind of thing and the whole community enjoys it.

[@ARandomPersonOnHere]

This kinda reminds me of my neighborhood which is almost like a village. I played with lots of the neighborhood kids and all our backyards where connected, and my grandmas backyard’s garden is connected to our neighbors garden where it’s like a big garden. We would go to our neighbors house and play in the pool and I would visit my friend next door from time to time. The neighborhood is also fun to explore since behind the garden when it’s winter we can go to the nearby creek and explore it since there are no more poison ivy, and the neighborhood is messy, in a nice way with big trees that make it feel closed in. This is mainly because the neighborhood is pretty old so maybe that’s why.

[@joshknapp9878]

I almost cried when I watched this. I live in Portland too, I've gotta connect with Mark, this is so much of my personal hopes and dreams and what I think about on a daily basis.

[@axoa-noah8331]

Unironically, its amazing how similar this is to a Minecraft world. A natural flow of utilities, several people having their homes close together, communal functions, unnecessary but interesting designs or features. I just find it interesting how something that happens organically in a videogame has been lost by the people who plan these developments. This was a fantastic video, keep up the amazing work!

[@beefufo]

BRO I WAS THINKING OF MINECRAFT THE WHOLE VIDEO, I really re-thought my way of building my village, gotta connect the tree with bells and my market! So easy!

[@user-og6hl6lv7p]

"It's just like my video games!!" Other way around

[@samw7998]

that makes sense because minecraft is a reflection of the ancient world, and ancient peoples built cities in a way that made sense.

[@ASlickNamedPimpback]

You mean minecraft villages, or player-made things? Because plenty of people will fuck off to the mountains or some distant spot instead of building shit together

[@moritz4562]

I love the idea of your concept. I am becoming a landscape architect soon and really want to do projects like you and bring people together !

[@hlaw2830]

People don't need anything from you to come together, they just have to want to, go look up the term "nation of joiners" and realize that YOU are what changed, not the landscape.

[@Thorinusingen]

Great! We need people designing spaces for people, not for cars.

[@hemaroidsjr.5192]

@@hlaw2830 Nothing has changed this concept is older than you and everyone alive, and it has a better time describing loyalists who buckle and scratch for any right/bit of power they can get while disregarding their peers and ethics as a whole, and that individualists will always be manipulated to be collectivists while being convinced they are individuals. Not the people who "changed society" by wanting to do something productive like build houses and maybe change zoning laws just a tiny bit by contributing to not being a corporate shill who continues shitty practices for money. Change only gets us away from the "nation of joiners" concept you bring up, we have been that for a long time, the last 8 generations were that, it shows when someone doesn't want to go with the status quo, Then people like you bring up shit that they know nothing about to try to put the idea down and sound smart. You may be projecting a little bit. Just something to chew on

[@Mogswamp]

Love how the top comment is people still obsessing over their illusion of privacy. Lots of folks missed the point.

[@amillison]

Reading the comments on this video has been a fascinating study of the American mindset :-)

[@Bugman563]

I dont get it, my top comments are all people who are drooling about how great the things are what the guy in this video says.

[@Bigboisully]

or you just dont get that Americans are self reserved and dont like getting help from people/ having people in their business

[@Bigboisully]

just look at all the houses in the videos they all have fences, why? for privacy. sure it is a property line to but why would literally almost every house have a fence like that, because no one want someone else in their business/property. when you give people the right to do whatever with their land they get very defensive over it

[@YOjeremyRaps]

Oh hey Mogswamp haha

[@Esgelrothion]

I love the concept of this, and was just talking to friends about how we'd love to live in one of those quaint villages in England. But there are a couple criticisms I have of this concept as presented. The first is lack of privacy. Sometimes you just want to get away from it all, and don't necessarily want to hole-up inside your house. Having a bit of private outdoor space would be critical. Having every margin between homes, and every backyard area, as a communal space also leads to people wandering right up next to your house at all hours, which could pose a potential crime risk. But the biggest issue I see is time commitment. When do the people in this idyllic block find the time to take care of any of the extensive amount of infrastructure they've created? If you work a standard 9-5 at an office 30 minutes away, factor an hour to get ready and have breakfast and an hour for dinner right when you get home and get 8 hours of sleep that leaves you only two uncommitted hours a day. That's not near enough time to maintain those cheery paths and keep the waterways free from debris, nor enough time to care for all the planting beds and livestock, let alone time to man a little stall on your corner. The weekend would not afford sufficient time to handle those commitments as well as a bit of time to relax. This is perhaps more of a critique of how our modern society demands we structure our time but, if you'll pardon an overused phrase, we live in a society, and must perforce orient ourselves to the strictures of that society. Now, if you had a work-from-home job that was only in the morning, that would free you to use the afternoon to help maintain the common areas, but it's hard enough to find a full-time job that would afford you the opportunity to live in this sort of neighborhood, let alone a part-time one. All this is to say that, yes, this is a beautiful concept, but it's a beautiful concept in amber, held in perfect stasis, without due attention given to the realities and externalities which auger against such a community.

[@Druidlord91]

Or just pitch in to pay a landscaper to cut the grass and check the gardens every other week like many busy people do anyways.

[@Urbsie-]

Dream bigger my friend! With a food forest and stronger community where we decentralize consumerism and consumption in our life, what is possible! Challenge the idea of the 9-5! Does labor need to exist as it presently does if we create free and open access to things like food and shelter and medical care! Have beautiful imaginings! Imagine lifestyles of joy that seem impossible and then ask why they seem that way, keep pushing the question!

[@gillianmoody7822]

How can we have free and open access to food, shelter, and medicine? Someone has to do the work to provide those things. Why would you expect to take from them and offer nothing in return?

[@Urbsie-]

@@gillianmoody7822 this is a great question and an interesting starting place! Why do those things feel like they must be transactional? Do people only become doctors and make medicine for money and what they get in return? Or is there more there? By creating a community that cares for and supports each other, what you get in return is that community support. It’s things like free childcare because there are people in your community who love kids and enjoy being caretakers! Does the system for distributing theses kinds of resources necessitate a 9-5 for all people? I’d argue not!

[@gillianmoody7822]

@@Urbsie- I don't think of it as "must be transactional". To me it is about acknowledging that the things we all need - shelter, warmth, nutrition, healthcare, education, etc. - don't just appear out of nowhere. They take real, intentional effort by real people, who also need shelter, warmth, etc. When we say necessities should be free, it seems like we're saying that some people are expected to provide for other people, but no-one expects to provide for them. The reality is, if you want a clean hospital, the cleaner needs to be fed. I think we need to acknowledge that provision isn't free; the providers also need to be provided for.

[@cotyp1143]

this guy's never lived next to a crappy neighbor, fences and property lines can be your best friend

[@eeriecraft1797]

Even without crappy neighbors, My property is my privacy and my space. If I want to share it, I will. But I prefer it closed off like I close my front door.

[@diananovus9321]

This is lovely. Can’t wait to see more of this around the country

[@WeAreBlank18]

I’m in love. This is the stuff I dream of after playing a video game, reading a book, or watching a show!!!!!!!

[@resilientfarmsanddesignstu1702]

Andrew. You are spot on with this video. If climate change and all the other negative changes that are already occurring continue (and I fear that if people don’t start changing from the grassroots up, that they will), we will need all the neighborhood villages and larger communities that we can get. We will have to recreate extended families for ourselves. Why wait until you are forced to change? Start today!

[@Dowlphin]

"Why wait until you are forced to change?" - That's basically a threat that has already been put into action, based on disregard of truth by people of ill mind. The true challenge of our time isn't environmentalist, but spiritual: dealing with the profound perversion of truth that is rampant. We are being taught harsh lessons about not getting deceived by appearances. Those lessons try to bring us back to our natural instincts and intuitions.

[@resilientfarmsanddesignstu1702]

@@Dowlphin The goal of the universe is to produce a moral species like unto God. The universe is essentially an evolutionary machine. Species are given free will so that they can learn compassion and moral responsibility. They are given existential challenges to overcome: physical, chemical, biological, social, cultural, economic, intellectual, psychological, and moral. If they pass, their species continues to evolve towards the image of the moral being. They have eternal life and fellowship. If they fail, they go extinct, and suffer eternal death and their components are recycled into new candidate species and civilizations. Nothing goes to waste. No god's need be invoked to punish or save. A species lives or dies by its own moral decisions and actions. It is a fair and just system. The moral laws are present throughout the universe for all to see in the form of subsistence survival and respect for other living things and the mandate to be fruitful and multiply life throughout the universe. The prophets and the word have already spoken. The question is do we choose to obey and live or disobey and die.

[@Eri-ww9td]

Really inspiring video, as an architecture student sometimes I feel very unmotivaded with the profession curent cenario, the trendy professionals that only care about visuals (interior ones), even in my University where they pretty much teach focused on the most basic unchangeble cenario of the city landscape, everything is too tight and immutable. Seeing someone as inspiring and ethusiastic as Mark really lights the fire on me and reminds me the reason why I decided being an architect! How architecture can be fuctional, sustainable and transform the city and make it a better place for the people. I'm really moved. Love from Brazillll

[@DontDo_This]

Me and my neighbor both have our own gardens and there is a big patch of trees between us and our neighbors on the back of our houses. I’ve been looking for a way to implement a system like this for so long so THANK YOU for giving me a good base on how to go about pitching this to them!

[@kobeneilson6717]

So thrilled about adding bridges at water/pathway intersections

[@terriq902]

I loved his ideas for a village centered community. we need to get back to that

[@paultreviska9417]

You opened my eyes to how I lived in England as a child. Thank you for the ideas

[@natalieeuley1734]

This looks so beautiful to me. I knew American design wasn't like other places but I didn't know the differences were so drastic

[@BattleNekko]

I love the idea of my neighborhood being like this in the US. It reminds me of how much I loved Edinburgh, Scotland and London, England. They had so many unique paths and homes that varied in design and age in the same neighborhood. It added so much variety and excitement when I walked around the neighborhood we stayed in.

[@Picci25021973]

I do love the idea of the portals! A nice "Welcome back home" every night after a long day at work.

[@amillison]

Right?! It's a fantastic idea.