I grew up in a small town without subdivisions. In high school I started going to a high-school in a small city nearby. Only 30,000 people lived there and although there were a few subdivisions, but they were small and contained.
My first introduction to big-city subdivisions came on a visit to Calgary, AB to check out the University in grade 11.
Calgary is known for it’s urban sprawl, but unfortunately the sprawl is very lacking in urban. Thousands upon thousands of the same cookie cutter houses stretch out in the plains around the city as far as the eye can see.
From the moment I first saw a large-scale subdivision, I hated them. They are a symbol of a life of compromising values and a death trap for the human spirit.
The cookie cutter houses, the illogical dead-end cul-de-sacs, and the extreme commutes from long-distance suburbs are all terrible, but the thing that annoys me most about them is the ridiculous street names.
In a sea of houses that all look the same, on streets that all look the same, the easiest thing to expect would some differentiation in street names. But if you ever find yourself in a large subdivision you will find a bland confusion of the same name.
Instead of making up an example I looked up the streets in Calgary subdivision called Panorama Hills. Here is a sample of some of the names:
– Panamount Boulevard
– Panamount Circle
– Panamount Way
– Panamount Hill
– Panamount Green
– Panamount View
– Panamount Lane
– Panamount Row
– Panamount Villas
– Panamount Street
– Panamount Manor
– Panamount Place
– Panamount Square
– Panamount Rise
– Panamount Close
– Panamount Drive
– Panamount Passage
– Panamount Gate
– Panamount Crescent
– Panamount Terrace
– Panamount Road
They repeat this pattern of outrageous street types (St, Rd, Cl, Cr, etc) with “Panorama Hills”, “Panatella”, “Pantego”, and “Panora”
There is some degree of creativity in being able to create 105 distinct streets with 5 street names, but the vanilla, low-risk, decision making here is incredible.
Instead of taking a risk at naming a street that one buyer may prefer, the subdivision has opted to make every street indistinguishable, even by name.
In the hundreds of thousands of subdivisions across the country, the pattern is repeated.
Obviously, the land developers behind these subdivisions have figured out that at scale, customers prefer street names like this, or else they wouldn’t do it. It is a low-risk move that clearly maximizes profit at scale. But that is exactly why buyers should be wary.
If you are living such a conventional, low-risk life, that you find yourself considering buying and committing the next twenty-five years of your life to a home on a crescent, gate, passage, place, row, or circle that has the same name as the road, blvd, lane, square, and rise next to it, my appeal to you is to pause for a moment. Take a trip, do something adventurous, reconnect with some childhood aspirations, and look around at the place you are in life and if it truly the life path you want to be on.
I’m sure living in a big subdivision is the right move for some people in some circumstances, but it is also a place where dreams go to die. Where life slips away in monotony and you find yourself embroiled in petty tyranny and disputes about who is and isn’t mowing their lawn.
So before you commit to life with a 25-year mortgage on Safe Circle, stop to consider what it would look like to spend a couple years renting on Risky Road.
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