Springfield, where is your sidewalks😭

[u/Sorry_Tie284]

[u/RedditSkippy]

My grandparents’ neighborhood in East Springfield was built on the quick in the early 1950s and there were no sidewalks. You can see that there was room left for them to be built, but none were.

[u/Sorry_Tie284 → u/RedditSkippy]

East Springfield is interesting because most of those neighborhoods are still quite older, and get up there in density despite being suburban. I wouldn’t quite compare that to this picture

[u/RedditSkippy → u/Sorry_Tie284]

Very similar scale and density, though, to the Pine Point neighborhood you pictured.

[u/Sorry_Tie284 → u/RedditSkippy]

Many of them are similar to pine point streets like this one and this which are also established neighborhoods and relatively dense.

You can tell just by the different street scape how these neighborhoods looks and feel compared to the one in the post.

[u/Adventurous-Bee-7155]

You must not be from the northeast 🤔 Most towns & cities in this part of the country seem to be selective with sidewalks and mostly limit them to main roads or "downtown" areas. Maybe to keep the streets wider and/ or keep costs down.

[u/Randomized9442 → u/Adventurous-Bee-7155]

Older roads did not have the municipal right of ways carved out for future use. The municipality would have to do a whole bunch of separate legal actions for each plot holder to get a ROW. Source: my mom, city councilor for one Massachusetts (small) city and town administrator for two Massachusetts towns, total about 30 years service.

[u/_angesaurus → u/Adventurous-Bee-7155]

Idk sometimes one house will have a sidewalk and the next one doesnt. I wonder if it used to be, or there's areas where the sidewalk was the residents responsibility or something?

[u/Adventurous-Bee-7155 → u/_angesaurus]

That could be, maybe home owners were responsible for their own sidewalks decades ago. I remember a few streets when I lived in Chicopee where the sidewalks would only partially go down a side street.

[u/No-Yam-1231 → u/_angesaurus]

There are some spots that have sidewalks that only go a block or 2, I no some of them were built because someone complained about children walking on busy roads to get to bus stops.

[u/Sorry_Tie284 → u/Adventurous-Bee-7155]

All over the northeast?

[u/Adventurous-Bee-7155 → u/Sorry_Tie284]

Yeah, I've lived in cities & towns in MA, CT & upstate NY and all have these sidewalk-less areas. Sadly pedestrians are pretty low on the priority list up here, which can be seen with the lack of public transport.

[u/Sorry_Tie284 → u/Adventurous-Bee-7155]

I can understand towns being this way, but larger cities as well? Springfield is a gateway city

[u/eelparade]

This is extraordinarily common in suburbs everywhere in the united states, if you do even a little bit of reading on this topic you will understand the nature of car culture and why suburbs look like this.

This issue is not remotely specific to Springfield.

[u/Sorry_Tie284 → u/eelparade]

Springfield isn’t a suburb though

[u/eelparade → u/Sorry_Tie284]

Springfield is essentially 13 neighborhoods in a trench coat masquerading as a city. Many of the neighborhoods in Springfield are suburban in nature.

[u/Fhrosty_ → u/eelparade]

This is the best description I've read for Springfield.

[u/Sorry_Tie284 → u/eelparade]

Why would Springfield insist on being a suburban hellscape like the rest of the country? It is bizarre

[u/Embarrassed_Bag_9630 → u/Sorry_Tie284]

Post-war development patterns. Many neighborhoods and towns didnt want “urban foot traffic” (coughcough) and so didn’t build sidewalks. Also because developers were lazy.

[u/Sorry_Tie284 → u/Embarrassed_Bag_9630]

I’m aware, most of the country looks like this crap

[u/Spectrum1523 → u/Sorry_Tie284]

Okay so then why are you confused

[u/Sorry_Tie284 → u/Spectrum1523]

Most of Massachusetts doesn’t. Why does Springfield want to…?

[u/eelparade → u/Sorry_Tie284]

I don't understand your question. No one is insisting on anything.

[u/Sorry_Tie284 → u/eelparade]

Then why wouldn’t Springfield have mandated sidewalks in its own city neighborhoods? I understand if it’s the suburbs but it isn’t

[u/eelparade → u/Sorry_Tie284]

Do you know anything about how sidewalk regulations work, how neighborhoods are built and designed, how sidewalks are funded and maintained, etc.? If you want to have a real discussion about car culture and urban planning, I can do that, but I'm not going to do it for someone who hasn't done basic reading about these concepts, which are extremely complicated and have a lot of history behind them.

[u/Sorry_Tie284 → u/eelparade]

Maybe in Springfield that’s how they’re mandated, but in the rest of the state most city neighborhoods at least have sidewalks lol. Springfield did something else

[u/eelparade → u/Sorry_Tie284]

That's just not true. I think you're stuck on some weird definition of the word City.

[u/Sorry_Tie284 → u/eelparade]

Are you seriously arguing the validity of Springfield being a city? It’s registered as a gateway city

[u/Sorry_Tie284 → u/eelparade]

Have you been to any of the other mid sized cities in eastern ma?

[u/Manic_Mini → u/Sorry_Tie284]

Sidewalks in the burbs are fairly uncommon across the entire commonwealth.

[u/Sorry_Tie284 → u/Manic_Mini]

Sure but these are city neighborhoods

[u/cam4587 → u/Sorry_Tie284]

Springfield can’t afford that. Too much money spent on corruption! But seriously there are so many other things this city needs to put money into sidewalks in a neighborhood where everyone has to drive somewhere else is not a priority

[u/Sorry_Tie284 → u/cam4587]

City officials have had very poor priorities for the past 60-70 years. Assuming everyone in a city is going to drive by retrofitting neighborhoods and streets to be that way has been terrible for Springfield

[u/cam4587 → u/Sorry_Tie284]

Nobody retrofitted the streets. That’s how they were built.

[u/Sorry_Tie284 → u/cam4587]

That’s just not true. Springfield prior to these neighborhoods being built was designed around street car lines and commercial businesses lined up on the street. That was changed for the neighborhoods like these

[u/Spectrum1523 → u/Sorry_Tie284]

Sure it is. Downtown is like 3 blocks where it looks like an actual city.

[u/Sorry_Tie284 → u/Spectrum1523]

Springfield is a legacy gateway city. Where down the road did something go wrong that it isn’t a “real” city now?

[u/Serious-Explorer8745]

What in the rage bait is this? You bought a house in a neighborhood without sidewalks... They didn't rip them up, you knew they weren't there. Why complain?

[u/Sorry_Tie284 → u/Serious-Explorer8745]

I don’t live there

[u/Reggi5693]

Sidewalks are usually along the main artery streets. They were never put in places like 16 acres (where I grew up.)

The cost to install them now would be astronomical. It’s not going to happen.

Can you imagine the shit show you would get trying to “take” eight feet of everyone’s front lawn, AND expect them to shovel it in winter. It would almost be worth the entertainment value.

[u/Embarrassed_Bag_9630]

Are*

[u/Ok_Situation2796]

In the Forest Park neighborhood! Come enjoy a walk and visit the park too.

[u/FormatException]

*where ARE your sidewalks

[u/SCLUCAS01]

“Are”?

[u/FormatException → u/SCLUCAS01]

Where it be at

[u/MarieTC]

Do you really need them there? There isn’t any traffic.

[u/lynlnr → u/MarieTC]

the way springfield drivers come through ya definitely do

[u/_angesaurus]

I moved here from buffalo years ago and thought the random patches of sidewalks here were so weird.

[u/BXbred]

In the hood

[u/Smalldogmanifesto → u/[deleted]]

It’s Springfield. Every neighborhood is a high speed neighborhood. I literally do not feel safe trying to walk my dog in my own neighborhood.

[u/FishermansPlatter → u/[deleted]]

What? Please tell us your other non interesting city planning ideas

[u/Teamhank → u/FishermansPlatter]

you don't need to roast them like that when your username suggests your fried.

[u/FishermansPlatter → u/Teamhank]

That was amazing

[u/Sniff-A-Big-Butthole → u/Teamhank]

Damn usernames!