THE BELGIAN DREAM

[The Cake On BBQ]

Can we have some more Belgian suburban house pics taken from street level? I like Belgian suburban architecture

[Yuri S Andrade]

Originally Posted by joshsam

In Londrina there aren't any favella's indeed, but vast majority of the houses do look tiny, from air and from pictures taken on the street, they have 50% of time no garden are build super close together (even your Londrina) Exept for the small area's where houses are suddenly big and have a swimming pool.

The vast majority of the houses are not tiny. At least not tiny as the European counterparts. And even European suburbs don't get so much space, the American ones are at least 4 times bigger. That's only a matter of urban development, and not wealthy or poverty.

There are huge sections of the city (the whole west, after the buildings; south the other side of the lakes; east on the way between Downtown and airport) where almost half of the houses get swimming pool (and Londrina isn't a hot city for Brazilian standards; we get a long and relatively cold winter). And the lower-classes part (the whole north, the other sections of east, the west near the border with Cambé looks decent to me. Look around on GE, Aug 2006, without clouds.

About the vertical areas, it's all middle class and upper-middle class. Here, we don't have vertical slums like Chicago or Paris ones.

I know Brazil has huge regional disparities, and the South reality is not the same as Northeast. Even though Brazil is not Mary T's paradise but it's not the Rio's bad cliche. I think we are mature enough to acknowledge this.

[joshsam]

Originally Posted by The Cake On BBQ

Can we have some more Belgian suburban house pics taken from street level? I like Belgian suburban architecture

It's quite hard because there is no street level in Belgium yet. I made some pictures of my neighbourhood several months ago I'll post em here..
If I have time tomorow I shall make some more of other neighbourhoods too...

[joshsam]

I was biking and it was raining so excuse me for the poor quality

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[joshsam]

The house in the fourth pic is where I live. A middle class home build in 1998.

[Yuri S Andrade]

You get a quite green frontyard, but your neighbours on the first 3 pictures, don't. What are this stones on the sidewalk all about?

Nice pics!

[joshsam]

Originally Posted by Yuri S Andrade

You get a quite green frontyard, but your neighbours on the first 3 pictures, don't. What are this stones on the sidewalk all about?

Nice pics!

It's not comon in Belgium that the community provides sidewalks in suburbs, they won't be used anyway...But still the first two meters is property of the community. That's why people trow grind on them because when something needs to be fixed on the water or gas or sewage...your front yard is all messed up...

It also not common in Belgium to make you're front yard look good. It was a very dry period before the pictures where taken and people are lasy so don't feel like watering their grass . But our front yard got replanted in spring

[Mike____]

nice pictures joshsam!

[joshsam]

thx mike

[kostya]

Interesting. Never thought that people in Belgium like that kind of housing so much . I guess, if not too spread, it's ok to live in suburbia

[joshsam]

Well de difference is that suburbia in Belgium around cities are grown around small villages and then got conurbated with the City. So they all have their own small center with little shops and cafés and so on...
You could compare it to the suburbs in England only that ours are not planned that well

[joshsam]

For those who are intrested. I study geography and our course of Belgian city geography explains it like this:

(The black lines are main roads)

In the middleages towns and cities grew bigger. Most of the time there was one bigger city where a lot of smaller villages and towns depended on. (= red)



Then , untill in almost half of the 20th century, the cities and towns gradually expanded. (=blue)



In the second half of the 20th century( afther WWII) cities began to exapand more rappidly and people became much wealtier and suburbs began to form untill now. (=green)



What's left is a conurbation of several towns, villages and cities. That's also why you can still find open area's close to city centers...Something that is absolutely not in the case in the USA or anywhere else (correct me if I am wrong) than Europe for that matter...

[The Cake On BBQ]

Awesome houses, thanks

[JPBrazil]

Jesus, I hate attention whores...

[Chrissib]

Originally Posted by joshsam

What's left is a conurbation of several towns, villages and cities. That's also why you can still find open area's close to city centers...Something that is absolutely not in the case in the USA or anywhere else (correct me if I am wrong) than Europe for that matter...

In Germany there also was near to no planning in metropolitan areas. Suburbs grew very chaotic in Germany, maybe not as chaotic as in belgium, but if you compare them to France or Spain, you got a very mess.

[dlbritnot]

Americans aren't the only ones raping the earth.

[Chrissib]

Originally Posted by dlbritnot

Americans aren't the only ones raping the earth.

Who said that you rape the earth?

[Dahlis]

Originally Posted by joshsam

I was biking and it was raining so excuse me for the poor quality

Those houses look nice, or at least they would if they didnt all look the same. How about some colour belgium? Maybe some wood or plaster? Why all brick?

[Vovin]

This style of housing is prevalent in all of Belgium or just in Flanders?

[gonzo]

I believe Belgium is among the most densely populated countries in the world, so this kind of development strikes me as a bit irresponsible.