We've had a whirlwind couple of months since my graduation, and have finally settled down now in Mountain View, California, a town as suburban as they come, and a new challenge for me to navigate as a fledgling urbanist. Three years in New York has changed the way I see urban environments, and so as I figure out how to find the grocery store, get up to speed on my new job, and finish unpacking from our move, I'm also trying to figure out how to grapple with our new environment. I can't feel smug any longer in my relative lack of carbon footprint. Our new circumstances mean that we are now car-owners and I have been driving to work every day. But I think we've been successful in at least a few areas, so far, to reduce the impact of our new less-dense lifestyle. While we do now own a car, we plan to have only one, in an area where almost everyone drives alone. We chose our new apartment carefully based on location: Justin can walk to work (15-20 minutes) a...
Musings on Architecture, Urbanism, and the Built Environment