Gated Communities across Canada

[AmericanGuy]

Originally Posted by Newfoundlander

Brutal.

******

As for gated communities. I hate them. I was going to type I disliked them, but it is actual hatred.

They offend me for two reasons:

1. They are suburban sprawl. I consider suburban sprawl to be selfish and based on unsustainable expectations. I believe we should be doing everything in our power to encourage density and discourage sprawl.

2. They a selfish, cowardly, inexcusable reaction to social tension. Gated communities represent the people most capable of supporting positive change in society as a whole instead choosing to circle the wagons. They may offer a temporary sense of security, but they are a giant leap toward the type of society that will offer no security at all.

Guys, not everyone wants to live in an urban area. Many people enjoy the environment and amenities that suburban areas offer. Also many people feel safer in gated communities, there is a security manager at the gate throughout the night, and that brings comfort to many families, especially with younger children. The children can play outside on the driveway, and the parents dont have to worry as much as they would in a regular neighborhood.

[SignalHillHiker]

It's not actually any safer. It's like the stories people tell after experiencing war: "We hid under the table. Ha! As if that would make any difference. But, in a bombing... I'd have felt safer with a lace shawl around my shoulders than without one."

It's basically retreating from their wider communities for reasons that are not only selfish and ultimately unsustainable but also counter-productive. Every new generation will have to retreat further and further away as what's on the other side of the gate will ultimately continue to get worse as more young families leave.

[Wharn]

Originally Posted by waterloowarrior

People on private roads have a lower cost for the municipality (compared to regular subdivisions). The garbage, road plowing, road maintenance, etc are all done through condo corporation or other arrangement, and don't cost the taxpayers anything.

But not all gated communities are controlled by private condo corporations...

Originally Posted by AmericanGuy

Guys, not everyone wants to live in an urban area. Many people enjoy the environment and amenities that suburban areas offer. Also many people feel safer in gated communities, there is a security manager at the gate throughout the night, and that brings comfort to many families, especially with younger children. The children can play outside on the driveway, and the parents dont have to worry as much as they would in a regular neighborhood.

I grew up in a neighbourhood that was literally walking distance to a small public housing project. Not once did I ever hear of a break and enter, stolen car or raped kid. However, in eighth grade, one of my friends was mugged, but that was only because he was foolish enough to cut through the housing project at night. Aside from that there was absolutely no need for security checkpoints. I take it the situation is different in Americaland.

[cormiermax]

Originally Posted by AmericanGuy

Guys, not everyone wants to live in an urban area. Many people enjoy the environment and amenities that suburban areas offer. Also many people feel safer in gated communities, there is a security manager at the gate throughout the night, and that brings comfort to many families, especially with younger children. The children can play outside on the driveway, and the parents dont have to worry as much as they would in a regular neighborhood.

This is Canada, Iv lived in an urban area for 20 years, never locked my door at night and never been robbed. You don't need walls to feel safe here.

[freeweed]

Originally Posted by AmericanGuy

The children can play outside on the driveway, and the parents dont have to worry as much as they would in a regular neighborhood.

Worry about what, exactly? The fact that child abductions in the US are at all time record lows? That violent crime is lower today than at any point since the 1950s?

What, precisely, are parents supposed to be worried about in "regular neighbourhoods" that these gates magically prevent?

Or are you also one of those crying pansies who thinks that terrorists are trying to blow up every other airplane, and only removing your shoes is stopping it? My god, Americans have turned into a bunch of pussies in the past 20 years.

[Symz]

I don't understand the fascination with these gated communities.

[cabotp]

Originally Posted by AmericanGuy

Guys, not everyone wants to live in an urban area. Many people enjoy the environment and amenities that suburban areas offer. Also many people feel safer in gated communities, there is a security manager at the gate throughout the night, and that brings comfort to many families, especially with younger children. The children can play outside on the driveway, and the parents dont have to worry as much as they would in a regular neighborhood.

Yet living in a gated community does not make them any more safer. It just gives the illusion that they are safer. It makes kids less safe when they grow up and have to move out into the regular world.

[patm]

This forum has a pretty large hard-on regarding telling others how to live their lives... If people don't mind paying more to live in a gated community then screw it, let them do it. It's not like the government is subsidizing it...

Here is an interesting one from Calgary.
It's a faux-island on a suburban lake. It's just a single street of million+ dollar homes, all with lake access (obviously).

If the residents were seriously concerned with security, then this is one example where the gate could be effective. I mean if they put up a real fence, and manned the gate then it would be tough to rob someone and a huge pain to just cause some regular teenage mischief.

However, I know two different people that live their and they both have told me that they couldn't care less about the security of the gate. They just liked the house, the lake access and the reduced traffic on the street.



P.S. Having hung out at one of these houses a few times, I have to say, Lakeside living is one of my goals. Nothing better on a hot summer day.

[harryc]

Originally Posted by Dmajackson

Gated communities are illegal in Nova Scotia.

The end.

New place to visit - evaluate for retirement.

[harryc]

Originally Posted by Newfoundlander

Brutal.

******

As for gated communities. I hate them. I was going to type I disliked them, but it is actual hatred.

They offend me for two reasons:

1. They are suburban sprawl. I consider suburban sprawl to be selfish and based on unsustainable expectations. I believe we should be doing everything in our power to encourage density and discourage sprawl.

2. They a selfish, cowardly, inexcusable reaction to social tension. Gated communities represent the people most capable of supporting positive change in society as a whole instead choosing to circle the wagons. They may offer a temporary sense of security, but they are a giant leap toward the type of society that will offer no security at all.

Well put -

[artvandelay]

I have a deep-seated hatred for gated communities; I probably hate them more than anyone else on this forum. So much so that I think anybody who decides to live in a gated community should be shot.

[waterloowarrior]

Is there a huge difference between horizontal gated communities and vertical gated communities (condo towers)? I can't access your common areas, pool, meeting rooms, parking lot, etc and there is security at the door keeping out undesirables. Toronto puts provisions in the condo agreement that greenspace created by these condos downtown can be publically accessible, but most places do not.

[rousseau]

Originally Posted by patm

This forum has a pretty large hard-on regarding telling others how to live their lives... If people don't mind paying more to live in a gated community then screw it, let them do it. It's not like the government is subsidizing it...

We subsidize suburban developments by having to pay for the increased costs to build and maintain the services and roads that go out to them.

But even so, nobody here is telling people how to live their lives. We're just expressing distaste for a lifestyle. Don't like it? Sue us.

[BIMBAM]

I'm alarmed to see gated communities being built in Canada. I find them to be in shockingly bad taste and fundamentally anti-social, much worse than a regular suburban development with roads that lead in and out of the regular network, where it's part of the rest of the city.

[patm]

Originally Posted by rousseau

We subsidize suburban developments by having to pay for the increased costs to build and maintain the services and roads that go out to them.

But even so, nobody here is telling people how to live their lives. We're just expressing distaste for a lifestyle. Don't like it? Sue us.

I'm not going to de-rail this thread with the urban v. suburban debate but saying that you want to shoot people who line in a gated community, is steering pretty close to dictating how people should live.

I want to shoot all the people who live in condos that are built to subpar standards and thus encourage the development of more of these paper thin walled, unlivable units.

There, does that not sound like dictation?

[vegeta_skyline]

An ex of mine did her dissertation on gated communities a couple of years back. Man do I really wish goggle street maps was around back then, would of save me from a dozen or so hours of driving around to find all the damn places

[Andy6]

Originally Posted by BIMBAM

I'm alarmed to see gated communities being built in Canada. I find them to be in shockingly bad taste and fundamentally anti-social, much worse than a regular suburban development with roads that lead in and out of the regular network, where it's part of the rest of the city.

Who actually lives in these gated communities? For Toronto, I'm guessing mostly wealthy immigrants to the GTA who are used to this sort of thing in their genuinely dangerous home countries, consider a gate a mark of prestige, and/or aren't really in Canada all that much and fear burglary.

If people want to live in a gated community, then so what? We have a balkanized society in a thousand ways now, why not make it a thousand and one ways? (Apologies to the Balkans and current denizens thereof.)

Most downtown condos don't let you wander around their "community" either. That's what the doorman and the buzzer/intercom are for. Are downtown hipsters antisocial and cowardly because they don't let random people off the street wander in and lounge in their "private" rooftop hottubs?

[rousseau]

Originally Posted by patm

I'm not going to de-rail this thread with the urban v. suburban debate but saying that you want to shoot people who line in a gated community, is steering pretty close to dictating how people should live.

Who said they want to shoot people in gated communities?

[patm]

Originally Posted by rousseau

Who said they want to shoot people in gated communities?

Originally Posted by artvandelay

I have a deep-seated hatred for gated communities; I probably hate them more than anyone else on this forum. So much so that I think anybody who decides to live in a gated community should be shot.

[rousseau]

Oh, I missed that. I searched on "shoot," but not "shot."