Monthly Archives: July 2013

Narratives built around the sociological “small world theory” of social networks

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A review of a new novel highlights recent ideas in the sociological analysis of social networks:

In sociology, the “small world theory” holds that any two people can be connected to one another along a chain of no more than a few acquaintances (typically six, the fabled “six degrees of separation”). Though the research behind it is at best contentious, there’s something deeply appealing about its logic-defying simplicity, something exciting about what it implies. In a world that can seem vast and alienating, the idea that we’re all much closer than it seems is, at first glance, comforting. The flip side is that our influence may extend further than we realize.

In his second novel, “The Illusion of Separateness,” Simon Van Booy presents a cast of characters who have had a profound effect on one another’s lives, yet cannot see the bonds that link them. He divides his book into six separate narratives, each following a different character through different eras, from the Second World War to the present: Martin, a retirement home caretaker; Mr. Hugo, a disfigured Wehrmacht veteran; Sébastien, a lovelorn young boy; John, whose B-24 bomber is shot out of the sky over France; Amelia, a blind museum curator and John’s granddaughter; and Danny, a budding filmmaker. Van Booy presents their stories in a nonlinear fashion, shifting back and forth from character to character, decade to decade.

Van Booy’s premise — that we are all linked in ways we may not fully understand, and that our smallest actions can have a significant effect on the lives of others — is fairly banal, and its execution verges on overly sentimental. He builds to the scenes in which his characters cross paths with great ceremony, yet these intersections are the book’s weakest moments. While the plot seems to aspire to present an overarching sense of meaning, Van Booy never quite drives it home. For some, the significance is inscrutable, as when John and Mr. Hugo engage in a tense, but ultimately inconsequential standoff in a field in war-torn France. Others, like when Martin cradles the dying Mr. Hugo in the book’s opening pages, seem like contrivances meant to give the narrative the appearance of structure and meaning.

For more popular descriptions of recent sociological research on this topic, see Six Degrees by Duncan Watts, Connected by Nicholas Christakis and James Fowler, and Linked by Barabasi (a physicist who covers a lot of ground).

This kind of narrative involving interweaving stories is not new. It seems to be popular in movies in the last 10-15 years – I’m thinking of films like Crash, Love Actually, and others that make use of intersecting characters. This leads to two thoughts:

1. Is this a good instance of social science discoveries, that social networks influence people without their knowledge, influencing popular culture? It could be relatively easy to track whether this is a new kind of plot or whether it has a longer history.

2. The reviewer suggests that while the author has impressive prose, the overall structure of the story is lacking. Since we do indeed live in social worlds strongly influenced by social networks, how can that be effectively translated into a compelling narrative? Going back to the movies I mentioned above, those intersecting storylines involved quite a bit of individual or small group interaction by the end of the movie. In contrast, this book seems to be going for a more disconnected set of stories. Setting up the structure of a social network narrative likely involves balancing the connections alongside the individual interactions that tend to characterize and propel narratives.

Building Gulf Coast houses on 10-20 foot stilts

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Federal regulations regarding building on flood areas on the Gulf Coast have led to a new kind of up-in-the-air house:

I’ve visited the Mississippi Gulf Coast at odd intervals since Hurricane Katrina struck almost eight years ago, and have been keeping tabs on an emerging architectural typology. Ordinary suburban-style neocolonials and ranch houses are being jacked up on sturdy wooden or concrete piers ten or 20 feet in the air, the heights dictated by the Base Flood Elevation set by the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) and enforced by insurance companies. These houses fascinate me because most of them make few concessions to the fact that they’re not built at grade. They look as if someone has played a cruel joke on the owners, as if the family had gone out to dinner and come back to find their house out of reach…

I know a little about the prehistory of these houses. About six weeks after Katrina, the then-governor of Mississippi, Haley Barbour, invited New Urbanist architect supreme Andrés Duany to bring pretty much everyone he knew to Biloxi to envision a rebirth of the storm-ravaged Gulf Coast. The Mississippi Renewal Forum, as it was called, filled a giant ballroom of the Isle of Capri casino with some 200 industrious, inspired architects, planners, and engineers, all champions of pedestrian-oriented development.

But after several feverish days of dream-ing up antebellum casinos and neoclassical Walmarts, reality intruded. In the wee hours of day four, the conference leadership received the newest flood maps for the Gulf Coast from FEMA, and they showed Base Flood Elevations that were five to ten feet higher than those the designers had been working with. In the Velocity Zones, areas most likely to be impacted by a storm surge, the lowest habitable floor of a home suddenly had to be 21 feet in the air.

“I think the problem is totally recalibrating the aesthetic,” Duany said, leading an emergency meeting. “It’s not taking antebellum houses and cranking them up. The aesthetic has more to do with lighthouses.” While others in the room pointed out the political and economic ramifications of the flood map—some towns might not be able to rebuild at all, poor people would be driven off the coast for good—Duany was nonchalant. “It will be like Tahiti,” he said. “Totally cool.”

It is worth reading the rest as it discusses how such stilted homes make it really difficult to have the close community life desired by New Urbanists. On one hand, I imagine some sort of community will develop if all the homes share the same fate. At the least, they all become known as the people who live in the odd houses. On the other hand, being so high in the air may reinforce the notion that Americans care more about their private spaces – within their homes – than street life and the community.

One odd bonus of a home so far in the air: imagine the size of the vehicle that could fit below.

Los Angeles neighborhood group has a comprehensive set of arguments against McMansions

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A neighborhood group in Beverly Grove, Los Angeles is fighting mansionization and McMansions. Here are a few highlights:

-A definition from the front page: “Mansionization replaces older homes with houses that are out of scale with the homes around them. These oversize houses deprive neighbors of light, air, and privacy. They spoil the character of established neighborhoods.”

-From the page “Why Garages Count“:

Current LA City code excludes the first 400 sq ft of attached garages from the Floor Area Ratio (FAR). But the case for including that square footage is solid:  -Attached garages would not be prohibited, they would simply count towards the FAR calculation. -Attached garages add bulk to homes, eliminate the buffer of a driveway, and spoil the character of older neighborhoods.- Most people do not park in their garages. Excluding attached garage space from the FAR encourages bigger houses but does little to relieve street congestion.

-From the page “Mansionization myths and fallacies“:

 They say the city has no right to set limits on their property rights.

But the city’s zoning code does just that:  It balances individual rights and community responsibility.   And good zoning promotes compatible development.

They say the RFA will stop local residents from remodeling or rebuilding. 

But the RFA absolutely allows remodeling and rebuilding.  It just sets reasonable size limits.

They say the RFA will discriminate against large families that need large houses. 

But the RFA will allow spacious 3,000 sq ft homes that do not put a burden on their neighbors.

-From the “Debunking Green McMansions” page:

New York might have alligators roaming its sewer system, but LA can now boast of its own urban legend: “green” McMansions.  Yes, that’s right; in Los Angeles, McMansions, those boxy, oversized, energy-demanding suburban houses plopped into the middle of older neighborhoods are officially considered to be sustainable development.

How could this be?  After all, McMansions require huge amounts of energy to assemble their building materials and move them to job site.  Furthermore, the houses themselves are massive, which means enormous heating and air conditioning bills, even if their windows are double-paned, their walls padded with extra insulation, and their restaurant-sized refrigerators and stoves Energy Star rated.

Then we need to consider their multiple bathrooms and heated outdoor pools and spas, the most energy intensive features of modern houses.

Other McMansion features also have their detrimental environmental effects.  During demolition they release dust and asbestos into the air.  After construction, their large patios, pools, spas, and double driveways reduce natural open space.  Combined with their elimination of parkway trees and landscaping for driveway cuts, the cumulative result is a heat island with less penetration of rainwater.

Last, but certainly not least, we need to factor in their transportation system.  All McMansions are built on single-family residential lots located away from bus stops and transit stations.  This is why McMansion residents rely on their cars to get around; the only difference being that most of their vehicles are large, thirsty SUVs.

-And some photos of the McMansions in the neighborhood.

The full site seems to have a fairly comprehensive set of arguments against McMansions. Now, it remains to be seen whether this rhetoric is persuasive…

Bike sharing programs in Chicago, NYC, Boston, Washington D.C. skew white

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The Chicago Tribune looked at the locations of the new Divvy bike sharing stations in Chicago and found overall they were more accessible to white residents:

By design, the Emanuel administration’s freshly launched Divvy bike-sharing network is centered in crowded neighborhoods. But one byproduct of the strategy is that the new transportation alternative is far more convenient for white residents than those who are black or brown, a Tribune analysis shows…

Federal and local taxpayers bankrolled $22.5 million in seed money for the bicycle system, but to thrive and eventually expand it needs to quickly attract a solid customer base and demonstrate financial viability…

Nearly half of all whites in the city live within a short walking distance — a quarter mile or less — of spots the city has designated for bike rental and drop-off, according to the analysis, which overlaid census data on the locations announced for Divvy stations.

By comparison, fewer than 19 percent of Latinos and nearly 16 percent of African-Americans live within a quarter mile of the bike stations, the data show…

In New York, nearly three times the size of Chicago, about 20 percent of white residents but only 8 percent of blacks and Latinos live within a quarter mile of a docking station for that city’s new Citi Bike system, the Tribune found. The two-year-old Hubway system in the Boston area puts a docking station within a quarter mile of 44 percent of the white population, but just 26 percent of Hispanics and 19 percent of blacks.

The proximity gap closes somewhat in the Washington, D.C., area, where the Capital Bikeshare system places a docking station within easy one-quarter mile reach of half of all white residents, 44 percent of Hispanics and 31 percent of African-Americans, according to the newspaper’s analysis.

A recent user survey released by Capital Bikeshare concluded that not only are 80 percent of the responding customers white, but nearly six in 10 are men, nearly two-thirds are under 35 years of age, 95 percent have an undergraduate college degree and 56 percent have a postgraduate degree.

Are bike sharing programs a new strategy for attracting or retaining young professional males in cities? Is bike sharing primarily a program aimed at the Creative Class and tourists? This would not be surprising as plenty of cities are looking to expand their downtown populations of young professionals.

It would be interesting to hear more about the process that went into locating the bike stations in Chicago. How exactly did the city try to balance population figures with economic figures? Now that I think about, we tend not to hear such insider information from Chicago…

Another thought: why not also map the bike locations by social class? Even for whites, are the bikes located more in upper-end neighborhoods or are they aimed at the working class?

Are McMansions due to Baby Boomers?

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I’ve seen this suggestion before: Baby Boomers are responsible for McMansions.

For decades, demographers, marketers and pollsters have been carefully tracking baby boomer trends, from the increasing demand for classroom space during their early school years to the rise of the McMansion as they began to raise families of their own.

This could be a case of confusing correlation and causation. The average new home in the United States in the 1950s was under or around 1,000 square feet while it has risen to near 2,500 square feet in recent years. There is little question that homes have gotten bigger. At the same time, is this due to the actions of the Baby Boomers? Are McMansions really a generational issue? A few thoughts:

1. This could be related to the common argument that McMansions are symptomatic of excessive consumption. After World War II, the prosperity in the United States made possible all sorts of new and more purchases including items like houses, cars, televisions, and more. However, this consumption might cross multiple generations and be the “normal” American pattern.

2. There is recent data suggesting two things. Aging Baby Boomers will look to sell many of these larger homes in future years as they retire and downsize. At the same time, Millennials may be less interested in big houses that their parents purchased. But, might this be more about life stages than generations?

I argue it is too soon to tell whether McMansions and big homes can be closely tied to a specific important American generation or whether McMansions have cross-generational appeal. It may be beneficial to an argument to tie the homes to Baby Boomers (they get blamed for other issues, they are aging so it suggests McMansions could be on the way out, etc.) but we need to see more evidence.

The best civic apps for Chicago

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Finding people to test civic apps is no easy task but here are some of the best civic apps in Chicago, according to the Chicago Tribune:

Foodborne Chicago Many people don’t report food poisoning to the health department, slowing responses to outbreaks of food-borne illnesses. This service scans Twitter looking for anyone complaining of food poisoning and flags anything that appears to be legitimate and local. A real person reviews the flagged tweet and, if it checks out, sends a reply via Twitter asking them to report the poisoning to the health department via an online form. (Developers: Joe Olson, Cory Nissen, Scott Robbin, Raed Mansour, Daniel O’Neil)…

Spothole Do you see a pothole? If so, click “Spot a Pothole” and easily file a complaint from your mobile phone. The app then uses an algorithm to rank the potholes, allowing city crews to address the most critical ones in a given area. (Stefan Draht, Brett Schnacky)

Can I Bring My Bike on the Metra Right Now? Simple question. Simple answer. Plus additional information on bike parking around Metra stations. (Steven Vance, Francesco Villa)

Clear Streets A more muscular version of the city’s Plow Tracker. This site reports which streets have been cleared of snow and includes a “plow leader board” of most active trucks. (Forest Gregg, Derek Eder and Juan-Pablo Velez)…

Sweeparound.us Type in your address and find out when your street will be swept. Register for an email, text message or calendar alert — or all of the above — to remind yourself to move your car to avoid a ticket or tow. (Scott Robbin)

Was My Car Towed? Supply your license plate number and find out whether the city towed your car. (Scott Robbin)

These could be very useful in a pinch. I get the idea that these apps are intended to help residents improve and understand the services in their city. At the same time, the apps listed by the Tribune seem fairly negative (potholes, avoiding tickets, making sure restaurants are clean, etc.) and giving citizens tools by which to complain about or track what the city is doing with their tax dollars. What about civic apps that help residents enjoy the city more? Perhaps this has already been taken by apps like Yelp. Plus, do apps like these take out the randomness of urban life or simply free people up to enjoy the city even more?

The possible effects of driverless cars on cities

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With the advent of driverless cars, here is one take on how they might transform city spaces:

Inner-city parking lots could become parks. Traffic lights could be less common because hidden sensors in cars and streets coordinate traffic. And, yes, parking tickets could become a rarity since cars would be smart enough to know where they are not supposed to be…

That city of the future could have narrower streets because parking spots would no longer be necessary. And the air would be cleaner because people would drive less. According to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, 30 percent of driving in business districts is spent in a hunt for a parking spot, and the agency estimates that almost one billion miles of driving is wasted that way every year…

“The future city is not going to be a congestion-free environment. That same prediction was made that cars would free cities from the congestion of horses on the street,” said Bryant Walker Smith, a fellow at the Center for Internet and Society at Stanford Law School and a member of the Center for Automotive Research at Stanford. “You have to build the sewer system to accommodate the breaks during the Super Bowl; it won’t be as pretty as we’re envisioning.”

Mr. Smith has an alternative vision of the impact of automated cars, which he believes are inevitable. Never mind that nice city center. He says that driverless cars will allow people to live farther from their offices and that the car could become an extension of home.

Interesting suggestions. Would sprawl be even more acceptable to people if they didn’t have to do the driving themselves? Pair this with the idea that there is a near endless supply of oil/gas and sprawl might be around a lot longer. I wonder if this would also lead to more cars overall and an uptick in miles driven per year, a figure that has been relatively flat in recent years.

But, I think this article doesn’t go far enough in reimagining cities with a major transportation change. Where would parking be consolidated? How might this change how buildings are designed? Are we imagining some sort of Le Corbusier world with large buildings surrounded by parks, a more New Urbanist design with plenty of dense neighborhoods where cars stay toward the outside, or something else all together?

h/t Instapundit

Watching Beliebers on the streets of Chicago

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While walking around in the North Michigan Avenue area yesterday, we came across an interesting scene: one side of the block full of mostly teenage girls looking at the Peninsula Hotel. What were they doing? Waiting to catch sight of Justin Bieber, reported to be inside:

BeliebersChicagoJul0813

We first passed the crowd a little after 4 PM, waited with them for 45 minutes around 7 PM while waiting for pizza at Giordano’s (across the street), and saw them again when leaving the restaurant at 8:15 PM. No Bieber by that point. But, here are a few observations:

1. It was mostly a crowd of teenage and pre-teen girls, as one might suspect, but there were a decent number of families. Indeed, there was a crowd of moms in the back, leaning against the adjacent building (a parking garage) and holding on to food and drinks. In other words, the crowd on the street would not have been possible without a fleet of moms.

2. The crowd engaged in some singing as well as cheers. We drove past them on the way out of the city and they were happily loud.

3. You might think you could look for nice vehicles pulling up to the hotel to get a clue if Bieber was being picked up. Alas, the Peninsula Hotel has lots of nice cars that pull up and use the valet service. Within the 45 minutes we were waiting there, we saw two Tesla sedans, multiple Escalades and Yukons, and a mix of other upper-end car models.

4. The Giordano’s across the street (sitting just behind where the picture was taken) was getting a lot of business from people eating while waiting or just attracted to the scene. Even with it being Monday night, traditionally a slow night at restaurants, the place was full. At the same time, you could drive a block or so away and you would have little idea of what was happening in front of the Peninsula.

5. It was amusing to see the reactions of people passing by who then asked why the people were gathered on the street. The typical response was to smile and laugh, as if to say, “Ah, those crazy teenagers and their pop stars.” But, at least a few of these passer-by then waited for a bit to see if anything would happen.

It takes quite a bit of dedication to stand for hours outside of a hotel just for a glimpse of a star. This scene might be read as an indication of American teenage obsession with entertainers who appeal to them or a reminder that lots of people of cities are interested in a scene on a lovely summer night.

NIMBY conundrum: live near a prison or McMansions?

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Here is a letter to editor that presents a dilemma: would the average American rather live near a prison or a large McMansion development?

After all, the new facility could very well provide an experience so rewarding and beneficial that an inmate would not want to leave. The main benefit will actually be to provide developers the 700 acres of valuable land the prison now occupies in order to build McMansions. I’ll bet the board will surely come up with many ways the prison proposal will benefit all of us. But the “in” crowd will be the only beneficiaries. You and I will suffer a tax increase.

Neither of these options would be very attractive. Prisons involve convicted criminals and ugly buildings. McMansions involve large garish houses and new infrastructure costs. However, prisons bring jobs and McMansions bring new housing options. If presented with only these two options, I suspect more people would settle for McMansions. But, these same people would probably want to do what they can in their communities to avoid a choice like this in the first place.

The sociological term “civil inattention” sticks with people

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I’ve noticed that some of my Introduction to Sociology students really latch on to the idea of “civil inattention” and it appears others might have the same experience:

Some returned only my smile. Others returned my eye contact, too, albeit very briefly. Most appeared to be uncomfortable, even painfully awkward, at our exchange of social pleasantries that bordered on something deeper. I became even more intrigued.

“It’s called civil inattention,” explained my girlfriend, Karen, who learned about this sociological phenomenon back in college. “For some reason, it’s always stuck with me.”

It has always stuck with me, too, but I didn’t know it had a label — civil inattention. I immediately looked it up.

“Civil inattention is the process whereby strangers who are in close proximity demonstrate that they are aware of one another, without imposing on each other,” one definition stated. “It’s a recognition of the claims of others to a public space, and a sign also of their own personal boundaries.”

Simply put, the unspoken rule is that in a transient public encounter, strangers give visual notice to each other — a nod, smile, or quick eye contact — and then withdraw their attention. This sort of exchange takes place even more commonly in big cities where newcomers initially don’t understand it’s needed for a peaceful co-existence.

So why does this concept stick with people? I have a few thoughts:

1. Individuals feel guilty about this breakdown in communication. Perhaps they blame themselves for not being able to engage others, perhaps they blame the other person for rejecting them. Either way, the involved people feel like something went wrong.

2. People really seem to notice this in cities where they are in close proximity to other people but there is no interaction. In fact, people are trying to deliberately avoid interaction. Think the image of New Yorkers avoiding direct eye contact at all costs. Perhaps there is some implicit contrast with the stereotypical small-town life where everyone knows everyone. Of course, most Americans don’t live in such a setting.

3. There is a larger issue of how to act around strangers. Kids often hear strangers are dangerous. Does this change much when people get older? We hear all sorts of stories and data involving other groups and perhaps simply don’t know what to do when presented with people who fit those categories. In other words, civil inattention represents an inability to interact with people different than ourselves.