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CtownMikey

By CtownMikey
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Cotuit Megalopolis

Cotuit

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The study pointed to lower spending by New England states on community colleges and vocational education compared with states such as North Carolina and Virginia as an example of insufficient spending on worker training in this region.

Other recommendations involve improving the public transportation system so people who cannot afford the high-priced housing around major metro areas can commute more easily, and building on the region's foreign investment.

Education, Transportation, and International Relations (let me add housing costs). We all know that we have an education problem up here. We already have some of the best transportation in the country, but other areas are starting to pass us by, cities like Dallas and St. Louis are building good transit systems, and they already have higher capacity road systems than we do. Our ties to Europe and Canada are among our biggest assets, we need to strengthen those ties and capitalize on them regionally. And housing, we need more housing, cheaper housing, and we need housing for families. There's this trend now to build one and two bedroom units to discourage families from moving to communities adding burden to the school systems. If we don't build housing for families, those 25-35 year-olds will have no choice but to look elsewhere.

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Nyuszi Unincorporated Area

Nyuszi

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There's this trend now to build one and two bedroom units to discourage families from moving to communities adding burden to the school systems.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Seriously?!!? Who's behind this - cities themseleves, developers? Is this something you've observed in Pvd, specifically or is it all over?

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Cotuit Megalopolis

Cotuit

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Seriously?!!?  Who's behind this - cities themseleves, developers?  Is this something you've observed in Pvd, specifically or is it all over?

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

The towns mostly. It's bigger in Mass. right now than Rhode Island, but the trend is deffinately coming here. Look at all the development downcity, there's no three bedroom apartments or condos coming online. And a lot of the new construction outside of Downcity is not geared to families. It's moreso outside of Providence though. The proposed housing around the proposed train station in East Greenwich would be all one and two bedroom affordable housing. It'll help move the town towards it's 10% affordable goal, but not bring in more school children to burden the school budget.

We have plenty of housing for single people, and young couples, but once those people start settling down and having kids, the pickings are slim.

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scdavies1 Crossroads

scdavies1

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It is true that single family housing costs, tax-wise, more than other development -- i.e. industrial or commercial development -- and as a result, many communities are forced to consider the impact of residential units on the cost of community services (with schools being the primary cost). I'm not sure I would agree, however, that this is significantly slowing the development of single-family housing down. The EG proposed commuter rail development (which is 15-20% affordable, not 100%) is hardly representative of the type of development that goes on in that community. Instead, acre upon acre of land is eaten up every day for the construction of monstrous "mcmansions." This is largely the case in Rhode Island. The Providence apartments going up downtown are small because that's where the market is, not because of the tax implications.

On the topic of economic development, I found the risk of losing the bio-tech companies in New England to be a frightening prospect. I really think this is an area that the region can thrive with (as opposed to the financial industry, for example), but we have to convince companies that our schools can produce competent staff for them. Personally, I think Providence also has great potential to be a locus of creative industries -- architects, graphic designers, etc., and that's one area that we do have a fabulous student pool to pull from.

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Cotuit Megalopolis

Cotuit

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It's certainly a bigger issue right now in Massachusetts where towns, especially on the South Shore and the Cape, are coming right out and telling developers they want one and two bed units specifically because they don't want more school children. Though I did recently read an article about a northern Rhode Island town (Lincoln maybe) that came right out and said the same thing, so the attitude is coming to Rhode Island. I find it alarming for two reasons: One, our obvious need to attract 25-35 year olds to our workforce; and two, this creates a transient population. As soon as someone decides to have kids they are out. It's when people have kids that they really become invested in a community, and care about. They want the community to be a good place for their kids to grow up. A lot of those people end up being the dreaded NIMBYs, but they are also the people who speak out about school budgets, and public safety, and infrastucture. If people have an attitude about a place that it is temporary, then they don't invest as much in it.

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CtownMikey Burg

CtownMikey

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The comment in that article about biotech possibly moving south scurred me too!

Providence was supposed to build a performing arts high school downtown a few years ago, but due to lack of funding, that is in the PAST :)

I still think providence has a great chance of improving it's school system, and the good thing is that I don't it wont take a long ass time to do so. I don't really know exactly what needs to be done. But my experience with schools rating systems (high performing to low performing with no signs of improvement) is that a school can turn itself around in a matter of a few years.. My alma mater.. Cranston East, went from low performing in my sophmore yr i believe, to moderately performing with sign of improvement and a raise in math, writing, and science scores in my senior year. Now, that is only ONE high school.. i wonder how long it'd take for an entire school system to raise it's bar.? My guess is it wouldn't take over a decade, and that seems pretty promising.

I havent even noticed, but is the issue of providence schooling being dealt with as we speak? by whoever?

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eltron Hamlet

eltron

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The towns mostly. It's bigger in Mass. right now than Rhode Island, but the trend is deffinately coming here. Look at all the development downcity, there's no three bedroom apartments or condos coming online. And a lot of the new construction outside of Downcity is not geared to families. It's moreso outside of Providence though. The proposed housing around the proposed train station in East Greenwich would be all one and two bedroom affordable housing. It'll help move the town towards it's 10% affordable goal, but not bring in more school children to burden the school budget.

We have plenty of housing for single people, and young couples, but once those people start settling down and having kids, the pickings are slim.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Yep, this definitly true, especially at the fringes and in the suburbs. Projects that are focused towards elderly or empty nesters OR singles or DINKS tend to be much easier to pass through zoning than family housing for the very (mostly false) reason of increased numbers of school kids.

Avalon Bay did bankrolled several studies in MA that showed that their projects would not increase school enrollment any more than conforming development allowed by current zoning in some Boston suburbs, but towns repeatedly grasp this as a reason to be anti-development.

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Garris Town

Garris

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Yep, this definitly true, especially at the fringes and in the suburbs. Projects that are focused towards elderly or empty nesters OR singles or DINKS tend to be much easier to pass through zoning than family housing for the very (mostly false) reason of increased numbers of school kids.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

There has to be a balance. The area I grew up in, during the 80's, had a huge surge in single family housing and family style condo housing that put an enormous strain on the school system without any additional retail or industrial development to help pay for it all.

It's all about planning. The pendulum swings too far both ways all the time. Right now, the trend in the area I grew up is to limit development to property over and acre or an acre and 1/2 at smallest. This is supposed to slow developement of family accomodating units and preserve open space, but, like here in RI, it's only resulting in less affordable housing and huge McMansions being built on 2 acres of landscaped grass mowed by illegal immigrants.

- Garris

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Frankie811 City

Frankie811

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forgive me for saying it like this... but off of exit 23 on 95 north.. taking the state offices exit and taking that first left at the light.. what are all of those huge cement pipes at that construction site???

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

It's part of our "big dig" project. It's the Narragansett Bay Commission's work to improve sewer/sludge overflow into Narragansett Bay. It will store the waste underground instead of allowing it to flow into the bay, thereby improving the water quality.

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Cotuit Megalopolis

Cotuit

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Well it won't actually store the waste, it will be a place to divert waste too during high demand periods (such as after a heavy rainstorm), allowing the treatment facilities time to catch up rather than dumping untreated waste straight into the bay. It'll store it for a time, then process it out.

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CtownMikey Burg

CtownMikey

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question...

Could anyone ever see Providence being capable of hosting the Olympics??!!??

It has been done by cities of populations under 500,000 before, so why not Providence??

We have world class restaurants, a internationally known waterfire event, one of the best art/design schools in the world, and by the time the next 2 or 3 olympic bids come around.. our skyline will be relatively small, but extremely beautiful and unique.

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Frankie811 City

Frankie811

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question...

Could anyone ever see Providence being capable of hosting the Olympics??!!??

It has been done by cities of populations under 500,000 before, so why not Providence??

We have world class restaurants, a internationally known waterfire event, one of the best art/design schools in the world, and by the time the next 2 or 3 olympic bids come around.. our skyline will be relatively small, but extremely beautiful and unique.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Sure. We can house people in NY/CT/NH/MA/ hotels. I'm sure they won't mind the commute.

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Garris Town

Garris

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question...

Could anyone ever see Providence being capable of hosting the Olympics??!!??

It has been done by cities of populations under 500,000 before, so why not Providence??

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Fancy that!

In reality, though, the Olympic Committee has made strong statements to the effect that only mega-metros will be acceptable for the forseeable future due to the resources it takes to pull off an Olympics. The trouble that Atlanta and especially Athens had in pulling off the games are the big reasons (despite the fact that the Athens effort was largely successful, even though construction stopped like hours before opening). Looks at this year's finalists: London, Paris, NYC...

Frankly, I'm kind of down on the whole Olympics thing... It's soooo big business, so technology and steroid boosted, so marketing saturated, that I don't really see the point anymore. It's just an event for the sake of an event. I'd rather go watch the RI high school finals for true amateur sports that give you a sense of people's hard work, efforts, and emotions... Not the pre-canned, amphetamine boosted, Nike-packaged, bribed-official Olympics.

- Garris

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CtownMikey Burg

CtownMikey

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http://www.urbanplanet.org/forums/index.php?showtopic=13409

if you go to that link.. and scroll down to the pittsburg picture, their citizen's bank building is a VERY tall citizens building. Why don't we have that here?? I'm assuming citizen's takes up little of that office space.. but still.. how do things like that work out?

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EPBOY Whistle-Stop

EPBOY

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http://www.urbanplanet.org/forums/index.php?showtopic=13409

if you go to that link.. and scroll down to the pittsburg picture,  their citizen's bank building is a VERY tall citizens building. Why don't we have that here?? I'm assuming citizen's takes up little of that office space.. but still.. how do things like that work out?

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

My guess is that the building probably belonged to some bank the Citizen took over, and they slapped their logo on the side of it after the transaction. Kind of like how our Fleet Building became the BankBostion Building, which then became the Bank Of America building.

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