Gasoline still dirt cheap in the USA

[Slimprofits]

Re: Gasoline still dirt cheap in the USA

Leading the way, huh? No surprise a German investment bank would be pushing research about how the Germans are so far ahead of the rest of us.

oh that comment was specifically about cogeneration as a percentage of electricity usage and future goals.

In fact, I was wrong about that too. Cogeneration already accounts for 40% of Denmark's power production.

source: American Council for an Energy-Efficient Economy

[raja]

Re: Gasoline still dirt cheap in the USA

Now which option will governments and individuals elect in a world of $20 a gallon gasoline - to simply scrap multi-trillion dollar legacy infrastructure and go build equivalent infrastructure from scratch into massively dense urban cores, or to refine concepts such as the PANDA car and keep the world mobile?

I think to answer the future housing question -- suburbs vs. cities -- we need to figure out what kinds of jobs people will do in the expensive-oil future . . . .

As cheap peak oil comes upon us, the U.S. will become poorer.
Agriculture, transportation, etc. are oil dependent, so around the world the cost of living will go up.
The U.S., accustomed to having the equivalent of some 1000 slaves per person thanks to cheap oil, will feel the pinch the most. In addition, ever-increasing competition for raw materials from other nations will hurt the U.S.

My question is, what kind of work will be available in the U.S. given the economic and lifestyle changes caused by cheap peak oil and commodities?

EJ has talked about telecommuting . . . but in the future, the demand for jobs possible by telecommuting may decline.
As life gets poorer, and things get down to basics, there will probably be an increase in manufacturing of real goods of practical use, and this requires an on-the-job presence.

If that scenario comes to pass, I can see new plants being built in the middle of the suburban sprawl, creating mini-towns for employees around each plant using existing housing, with a Walmart-type store to provide basic needs. This, along with Lukester's idea of fuel efficient transportation, seems like the most likely path to me . . . rather than abandonning billions of existing houses and returning the population to the cities.

[phirang]

Re: Gasoline still dirt cheap in the USA

why don't we integrate the US with mexico and use slave labor from central american to reduce inflation...:rolleyes:

[Jim Nickerson]

Re: Gasoline still dirt cheap in the USA

I think to answer the future housing question -- suburbs vs. cities -- we need to figure out what kinds of jobs people will do in the expensive-oil future . . . .

As cheap peak oil comes upon us, the U.S. will become poorer.
Agriculture, transportation, etc. are oil dependent, so around the world the cost of living will go up.

The U.S., accustomed to having the equivalent of some 1000 slaves per person thanks to cheap oil, will feel the pinch the most. In addition, ever-increasing competition for raw materials from other nations will hurt the U.S.

My question is, what kind of work will be available in the U.S. given the economic and lifestyle changes caused by cheap peak oil and commodities?

EJ has talked about telecommuting . . . but in the future, the demand for jobs possible by telecommuting may decline.

As life gets poorer, and things get down to basics, there will probably be an increase in manufacturing of real goods of practical use, and this requires an on-the-job presence.

If that scenario comes to pass, I can see new plants being built in the middle of the suburban sprawl, creating mini-towns for employees around each plant using existing housing, with a Walmart-type store to provide basic needs. This, along with Lukester's idea of fuel efficient transportation, seems like the most likely path to me . . . rather than abandonning billions of existing houses and returning the population to the cities.

One of the things, and I reckon there are others, missing from these speculations about the future is the time frame over which one is speculating. One could choose 150 years into the future--that being the approximate time it seems it has taken to reach the neighborhood of peak oil, or one could take 10,000 years which, too, is not that long in history-of-Earth terms. In the latter instance, I predict something monstrous has to happen to the population of mankind, so that I surmise there will be enough to do for those still standing--perhaps if nothing more than hunting and gathering.

A lot about energy gets written on these pages, so naturally it should bring up the question of disposal of those who are to die, which society has the most energy-efficient method of disposing of the dead? And should all the world not adapt that method?

What would happen if all the 6.5 billion humans die? Oops! I forgot, they are going to die. So to think in terms of some concerted action to control Earth's population is not that big a deal.

It seems perhaps shortsighted to keep thinking about solutions in terms of what we have with numbers of people in today's terms, but, of course, that is just my opinion.

[Guest]

Re: Gasoline still dirt cheap in the USA

My question is, what kind of work will be available in the U.S. given the economic and lifestyle changes caused by cheap peak oil and commodities?

A great "outside the box" question, Raja. We extrapolate which of our present jobs are best suited to the future we imagine, without factoring in that a resource depleted future (energy) may take a giant pair of shears to our "normal" job categories. Anyone suggesting this may be an issue is looked at askance, as though they were wearing a hair shirt or having a chip on their shoulder requiring the whole world to assume the mournful aspect of some sort of Calvinistic bore. It's not that - and it has absolutely nothing to do with Hansel and Gretel silly little morality tales - what it is instead, is that anyone wishing to live life large, with expressions of "animal spirits", may find they have to do so with a lot more parsimonious an expenditure of energy.

Tom Cruise, Mr. "Top Gun" suddenly finds when he's feeling like roaring through the heavens at Mach 2, to make a powerful existential statment, that he's offered a bicycle instead, and invited to set the land speed record. This has nothing to do with hair shirts, Calvinistic delusions, or morality. It is simply a matter of having enough BTU's to go around when you suddenly have 2 billion more consumers saying "me too", until we've dreamed up a chemical battery as powerful as oil again. Then we can roar - but not before. How about 40 years from now, and we stll haven't dreamed up the mass cheap power source that all the techno-weenies see as the holy grail of evolution.

Will we have popularised "Daytona 500" races where all the cars are souped up, gaudily painted versions of the FIAT PANDA 500 CC cruiser? (Imagine "Castrol" motor oil, "Marlboro" cigarettes and "Viagra" sponsor ads stencilled in glossy decals on the sides of 500 FIAT PANDAS, all burning rubber at the starting line).

A lot of Americans will have a powerful feeling of disgust, revolt and rebellion against this puny vision of the future - but it's precisely how large parts of the rest of the world have lived all along - spending BTU's wth a lot more parsimoniousness than Americans ever have. No need to get irate about it folks - that's just resource constraints reality poking it's head in the door, and saying "hiya fellas - pleased to meet you!".

[Wild Style]

Re: Gasoline still dirt cheap in the USA

One of the things, and I reckon there are others, missing from these speculations about the future is the time frame over which one is speculating. One could choose 150 years into the future--that being the approximate time it seems it has taken to reach the neighborhood of peak oil, or one could take 10,000 years which, too, is not that long in history-of-Earth terms. In the latter instance, I predict something monstrous has to happen to the population of mankind, so that I surmise there will be enough to do for those still standing--perhaps if nothing more than hunting and gathering.

A lot about energy gets written on these pages, so naturally it should bring up the question of disposal of those who are to die, which society has the most energy-efficient method of disposing of the dead? And should all the world not adapt that method?

What would happen if all the 6.5 billion humans die? Oops! I forgot, they are going to die. So to think in terms of some concerted action to control Earth's population is not that big a deal.

It seems perhaps shortsighted to keep thinking about solutions in terms of what we have with numbers of people in today's terms, but, of course, that is just my opinion.

Excuse my ignorance but are you saying the following. Given inadequate energy sources (like cheap petrol) the earth will not be able to sustain the numbers of humans we currently have? Do you see famine as something that could happen later on?

[Jim Nickerson]

Re: Gasoline still dirt cheap in the USA

Excuse my ignorance but are you saying the following. Given inadequate energy sources (like cheap petrol) the earth will not be able to sustain the numbers of humans we currently have? Do you see famine as something that could happen later on?

Yes, you aren't ignorant in your interpretation. There has to be a limit to what the earth can support in the way of human predators.

[GRG55]

Re: Gasoline still dirt cheap in the USA

I lived in Italy in the mid 1990's in rural Tuscany (farming country). Everyone drove methane converted vehicles, and the cost was dirt cheap - I mean really realy cheap, like 4 or 5 cents per mile in a economy (EU economy class) 2 litre engine. Fiat has been making ultra light tiny FIAT 500's for the past 50 years, and they are real gas sippers as it's only a HALF LITRE engine. In the 1990's they developed the FIAT PANDA, a successor to the FIAT 500 that was available in a four wheel drive version. I have driven in wet, cold, icy muddy winter, in a tiny four wheel drive PANDA with a half litre engine, up the steepest and most horribly rutted mountain dirt tracks, with a load of five people piled into the car (going boar hunting). They get over ruts, giant stones and potholes in the road far better than any other car as they have a tiny, ultra short wheelbase. These vehicles are unstoppable on rough terrain and surprisingly sturdy under loads.

As was mentioned, the MultiEco is Fiats concept demonstrator vehicle for a milder, natural-gas/gasoline bi-fuel powered Panda that goes on sale later this year. Too bad that nothing like this will be available on our side of the Atlantic.

Lukester: Love your posts man (even the ones I disagree with)! This one had me LOL as I tried to picture one of those oversized Texas pick-up gun racks fitted to a Fiat...

You are correct. FIAT is [finally] back, thanks in large part to the enormously talented Sergio Marchione. I keep wondering how long before GM finally dumps Rick Wagoner and hires Marchione. Hey, if you can deal with the labour intricacies of Italy, the UAW and CAW should be child's play. I just hope he does something about FIAT's partially owned farm equipment subsidiary CNH Global before moving to Detroit...;)

P.S. I still think in North America, with its long distances and need for higher energy density fuels, that we will see more natural gas liquids (LPG - propane) conversion for auto fuel before widespread compressed natural gas (CNG - methane) takes hold.

[GRG55]

Re: Gasoline still dirt cheap in the USA

...As cheap peak oil comes upon us, the U.S. will become poorer...

Every time I read this sort of sentiment, I keep wondering why anyone thinks this is a given?

From the data posted repeatedly on iTulip it seems quite conclusive that through the 25'ish years of the FIRE economy the average US citizen's income didn't keep up in real terms, and most of the wealth accrued to the now-infamous "top 1%". During that time [excepting just the past couple of years] petroleum energy prices were in a secular downtrend.

So if most of the USA became poorer [in real terms] at a time of declining oil prices, and it is expected to become poorer still during rising oil prices, then what is really going on? Is oil price trend really a primary determinant of wealth and wealth distribution in the USA?

What if energy availability turns out to be "the great wealth leveler" in the USA in the years to come? Just one example: If agricultural products have become more valued worldwide, and US farmers and farm workers are among the world's largest suppliers of these foodstuffs, how can it be that they won't see rising real incomes in the years to come?

I continue to stubbornly maintain that the USA has the most flexible, adaptable, innovative economy in the world. Bar none. Period. It will be a crisis to some (just ask a GM worker in a pick-up truck plant), and those will be the ones that get all the headlines, thus making it feel like a crisis to everyone watching CNN.

But behind the scenes in basements, garages, college laboratories, and even a few companies, Americans will be doing what they have always done - find unique solutions to whatever the problem de jour happens to be. C1ue has suggested a conservation outcome that once again cuts energy demand materially, like it did in the early 1980's. That is not at all farfetched. There is an argument that the long period of low energy prices didn't discourage advances in the creation of energy efficiency advances, but discouraged the widespread commercialization of same. That "pent-up implementation cycle" could result in a much faster and more dramatic decline in developed country energy consumption than anyone is expecting today.

And it will not come about because Americans are starving and freezing in the dark. That just isn't going to happen.

[Rajiv]

Re: Gasoline still dirt cheap in the USA

Appropro to this is Jim Kunstler's latest missive

A catastrophe for Iowa farmers will not be just a catastrophe for Midwestern Americans. In the Iowa floods, we'll see more evidence of how the problems of weird weather (climate change) combine and ramify the problems associated with peak oil. In this particular case they lead to an inflection point sometime around the 2008 harvest season, which will also be our time of political harvest.

These are not your daddy's or granddaddy's floods. These are 500-year floods, events not seen before non-Indian people starting living out on that stretch of the North American prairie. The vast majority of home-owners in Eastern Iowa did not have flood insurance because the likelihood of being affected above the 500-year-line was so miniscule -- their insurance agents actually advised them against getting it. The personal ruin out there will be comprehensive and profound, a wet version of the 1930s Dust Bowl, with families facing total loss and perhaps migrating elsewhere in the nation because they have no home to go back to.

Iowa in 2008 will be an even slower-motion disaster than Hurricane Katrina in 2005. Beyond the troubles of 25,000 people who have lost all their material possessions is a world whose grain reserves stand at record lows. The crop losses in Iowa will aggravate what is already a pretty dire situation. So far, the US Public has experienced the world grain situation mainly in higher supermarket prices. Cheap corn is behind the magic of the American processed food industry -- all those pizza pockets and juicy-juice boxes that frantic Americans resort to because they have no time between two jobs and family-chauffeur duties to actually cook (note: reheating is not cooking).

Behind that magic is an agribusiness model of farming cranked up on the steroids of cheap oil and cheap natural-gas-based fertilizer. Both of these "inputs" have recently entered the realm of the non-cheap. Oil-and-gas-based farming had already reached a crisis stage before the flood of Iowa. Diesel fuel is a dollar-a-gallon higher than gasoline. Natural gas prices have doubled over the past year, sending fertilizer prices way up. American farmers are poorly positioned to reform their practices. All that cheap fossil fuel masks a tremendous decay of skill in husbandry. The farming of the decades ahead will be a lot more complicated than just buying x-amount of "inputs" (on credit) to be dumped on a sterile soil growth medium and spread around with giant diesel-powered machines.

Like a lot of other activities in American life these days, agribusiness is unreformable along its current lines. It will take a convulsion to change it, and in that convulsion it will be dragged kicking-and-screaming into a new reality. As that occurs, the US public will have to contend with more than just higher taco chip prices. We're heading into the Vale of Malthus -- Thomas Robert Malthus, the British economist-philosopher who introduced the notion that eventually world population would overtake world food production capacity. Malthus has been scorned and ridiculed in recent decades, as fossil fuel-cranked farming allowed the global population to go vertical.

[Slimprofits]

Re: Gasoline still dirt cheap in the USA

The farming of the decades ahead will be a lot more complicated than just buying x-amount of "inputs" (on credit) to be dumped on a sterile soil growth medium and spread around with giant diesel-powered machines.

Wow, Kunstler is a true, true, true doomer.

Recirculating hydroponic systems in greenhouses and vertical farming.

There may be some short-term pain during a transitionary period, but all in all I still think that we'll be fine and dandy in the long run.

Feeding 50,000 people with a vertical farm building the size of one city block

[Wild Style]

Re: Gasoline still dirt cheap in the USA

Wow, Kunstler is a true, true, true doomer.

Recirculating hydroponic systems in greenhouses and vertical farming.

There may be some short-term pain during a transitionary period, but all in all I still think that we'll be fine and dandy in the long run.

Feeding 50,000 people with a vertical farm building the size of one city block

there was a professor from NYU who's name I forget. Anyway, he put together a great report and submitted it to NYC gov. Basically he proposed they build three hydroponic towers on Governor's Island. He said these three hydroponic towers would be enough to sustain the entire city. The report was partly published in the New York times last year. I have not been able to find this report again, if I come across it I will post it. One of the things he says in the report is, with these high rise hydro farms, the city wouldn't need to transport food in from hundreds of miles away, as is the case now.

In Chicago Mayor Daily has been pushing for urban farms as well.

*edit*

Found the article and the professor wasn't from NYU, he was from Columbia University link

[raja]

Re: Gasoline still dirt cheap in the USA

Originally Posted by raja
...As cheap peak oil comes upon us, the U.S. will become poorer...

Every time I read this sort of sentiment, I keep wondering why anyone thinks this is a given?

From the data posted repeatedly on iTulip it seems quite conclusive that through the 25'ish years of the FIRE economy the average US citizen's income didn't keep up in real terms, and most of the wealth accrued to the now-infamous "top 1%". During that time [excepting just the past couple of years] petroleum energy prices were in a secular downtrend.

So if most of the USA became poorer [in real terms] at a time of declining oil prices, and it is expected to become poorer still during rising oil prices, then what is really going on? Is oil price trend really a primary determinant of wealth and wealth distribution in the USA?

I would say this suggests that oil price was not a primary determinant of wealth . . . in the past. But that doesn't mean it won't be a primary determinant in the future.

I believe there will be innovations that will help compensate for peak cheap oil, but to what extent? Other forms of existing energy will help, but they don't look poised to fill oil's shoes anytime soon.

Certainly demand destruction will reduce the need for oil . . . but isn't that loss of wealth? The same for conservation. For example, I can eliminate the ready-on appliances from my house that allow remotes to be used, but aren't I poorer as a result of losing that capacity to use a remote. Even conserving by turning off lights whenever leaving a room is a limitation of freedom imposed by being poorer.

We can argue endlessly about what poorer means . . . but to me it means less freedom of choice and less power to do things. Right now, I can buy a big car and drive anywhere I want (not that I want to). Will I be able to do that in 5 years? Now, I can eat whatever I want, but will food choices be limited in the future (imported foods becoming expensive due to transportation)? I can go to Walmart and buy cheap but usable clothes shipped from China . . . will I be able to do that in 10 years?

Your optimism about innovation is reasonable based on the amazing human achievements of the past. But our whole way of life is based on cheap oil, which is now over, and that's where my pessimism is coming from. If it were just transportation that's affected, I wouldn't be so concerned . . . but we're talking about agriculture, clothing, plastics, etc., etc. I'm not saying we're going to return to living in caves, but yes, I think it's a given that we will get poorer. How much poorer, I can't say . . . let's hope not too much.

What if energy availability turns out to be "the great wealth leveler" in the USA in the years to come? Just one example: If agricultural products have become more valued worldwide, and US farmers and farm workers are among the world's largest suppliers of these foodstuffs, how can it be that they won't see rising real incomes in the years to come?

Of course, some segments of society will do better than others, but on the whole I believe our society will become poorer.

I continue to stubbornly maintain that the USA has the most flexible, adaptable, innovative economy in the world. Bar none. Period. . . .
But behind the scenes in basements, garages, college laboratories, and even a few companies, Americans will be doing what they have always done - find unique solutions to whatever the problem de jour happens to be.

This problem de jour happens to be a problem de century or two. It's the end of an era, and many things must change.

C1ue has suggested a conservation outcome that once again cuts energy demand materially, like it did in the early 1980's. That is not at all farfetched. There is an argument that the long period of low energy prices didn't discourage advances in the creation of energy efficiency advances, but discouraged the widespread commercialization of same. That "pent-up implementation cycle" could result in a much faster and more dramatic decline in developed country energy consumption than anyone is expecting today.

You only MUST conserve if you're poorer. Rich people don't need to conserve.

And it will not come about because Americans are starving and freezing in the dark. That just isn't going to happen.

I really hope your scenario comes to pass.
My likely worst-case scenario is that the financial and peak cheap oil will combine to cause immense disruption leading to the government nationalization of the food and energy industries. So, no starving and freezing . . . as long as you don't lose your ration book.

[GRG55]

Re: Gasoline still dirt cheap in the USA

Originally Posted by raja
...I believe there will be innovations that will help compensate for peak cheap oil, but to what extent? Other forms of existing energy will help, but they don't look poised to fill oil's shoes anytime soon...

That is true, but the solution is not simply about replacing oil (that is the motive behind the idiotic ethanol policy). It is also about replacing the uses for oil.

Certainly demand destruction will reduce the need for oil . . . but isn't that loss of wealth? The same for conservation. For example, I can eliminate the ready-on appliances from my house that allow remotes to be used, but aren't I poorer as a result of losing that capacity to use a remote. Even conserving by turning off lights whenever leaving a room is a limitation of freedom imposed by being poorer...

Do you feel poorer because mankind experienced demand destruction for buggy whips? Or propeller driven long distance transport aircraft? Or black and white CRT televisions? Vinyl LP records? Demand destruction in and of itself isn't loss of wealth (other than perhaps for those who may persist in making whatever it is that nobody wants any more).

As for turning off the lights, who's to say that someone isn't already working on a way to keep all the lights in the house on all the time, and use a tiny fraction of the power that is used in a typical home today?

We can argue endlessly about what poorer means . . . but to me it means less freedom of choice and less power to do things...

You likely have many more varied choices in total in your life than your parents had. However, despite that, it is likely that you have fewer choices than your parents in some certain aspects of your life. Do you feel poorer as a result?

If your children have many more varied choices in their life than you have, but perhaps have fewer choices than you in certain aspects of their lives (say, no more cheap weekend flights to Cancun) will that really make them poorer than you overall?

Yes, we can argue endlessly about what poorer means, but overall I am optimistic that the next generation, barring a global war, will live longer, healthier, and better in most respects than we do.

Your optimism about innovation is reasonable based on the amazing human achievements of the past. But our whole way of life is based on cheap oil, which is now over, and that's where my pessimism is coming from...

...My likely worst-case scenario is that the financial and peak cheap oil will combine to cause immense disruption leading to the government nationalization of the food and energy industries. So, no starving and freezing . . . as long as you don't lose your ration book.

In large parts of the world, including the USA and the EU, the government involvement in agriculture is de facto nationalization already. Government involvement in power generation remains very high in advanced countries like France. And government sponsorship of public transportation systems is not only countenanced, but expected almost everywhere.

It's difficult to say if these sorts of things ever reach any sort of equilibrium, or if they are just constantly evolving, and peak cheap oil is just a forcing function (albeit a potentially immensely disruptive one) to accelerate that evolution.

[GRG55]

Re: Gasoline still dirt cheap in the USA

This is NOT a new trend, allegedly brought about by high commuting costs. Cities like Houston, Texas have been experiencing a revitalization of their inner core for two decades; a period of steadily declining fuel prices (until just recently that is). By whatever measure, restaurants, number of art galleries, live theatre or chi-chi loft conversions, there has been a steady increase in the density of residents living in or near downtown (20 years ago the Houston downtown was a ghost town after work hours). I doubt Houston is unique...

Perhaps increasing fuel and commuting costs will accelerate that trend (that you label it a "correction process" speaks volumes ), but the jury is still out on that. The main deterrent will be the same as always...living space in or near downtown sells for a considerable premium, the range of services, such as schools, is limited, and the change in lifestyle far to great for most people's tastes. That's why the overwhelming majority of people will still spend more than an hour a day, each way, commuting on the train from suburbs like Flossmore to the Chicago Loop. Or driving from the Woodlands to downtown Houston.
http://www.flossmoor.org/
http://www.thewoodlands.com/

Just so there's no misunderstanding, my wife and I do not have children and therefore, for many years, had the luxury of living an 18 minute walk to my downtown office (until I left North America to move overseas). I am well experienced with both the considerable advantages and also the disadvantages of inner city urban living (including the marriage-stressing passtime of lovingly restoring an ancient inner-city home, on a tight budget, while living in it).



There is no doubt that many new(er) suburbs, especially those built during the housing bubble, will not age gracefully. The tacky, badly designed (often pretentious), poorly constructed (out of pressed oatmeal panels to quote comedian Dave Barry) housing subdivisions deserve to become ghettos and bulldozed - this might be the one thing with which I agree with James Kunstler.

Despite this the "death" of the classic American suburb is grossly exaggerated.

Maybe we should substitute "oil" for "sun" in the strip below?

This will sound familiar. From Bloomberg this morning...

Death of America's Suburbs Is Greatly Exaggerated:
Commentary by Joe Mysak

June 20 (Bloomberg) -- Don't write off the American suburbs just yet.

With gasoline at $4-plus a gallon, lots of thinking people see the U.S. undergoing a vast demographic shift, with millions of people moving back to cities. The suburbs, and those places beyond the suburbs, the exurbs, will dry up and blow away.

The notion appeals especially to people who like to think they'll be in charge after the revolution. They would apparently love nothing more than for the population to be confined to Soviet-style concrete-block high-rises and be forced to take state-run streetcars to their little jobs at the mill.

Or something like that. It would all be so much more convenient, so much more environmentally friendly, too, according to these master planners.

I went to a wedding in Vermont last weekend, and driving to the reception, out in the woods and down a long road that became a dirt road, I thought that all the people who lived out there were in a fine pickle. My language was a bit more salty.

People who live out there have to carry out every transaction, even the smallest, with an automobile. Gasoline at $4-plus a gallon hurts.

It's easy to become hysterical and call for the end of the world as we know it. Wail: What's going to happen because of the high price of gasoline?

No Catastrophe
People will pay more to drive their cars.

Some people will sell their houses and move to the city, or closer to a city. Some people won't be able to sell their houses, and some people will lose their houses. Some towns may become ghost towns.

Taxes will go up for the survivors who remain, and they will find fewer and fewer businesses to fulfill their needs. States that are more rural will find it in their best interests to try and pay people to live there, and offer subsidies for them to buy food and fuel. The implications for state and local credit ratings are profound.

The high price of gasoline is a relatively short-term problem, not a catastrophe that is going to cause a massive population shift. When whale oil became scarce in the 19th century, people didn't sit in the dark; they came up with new ways to light their lamps.

Virtue and Vice
The suburbs aren't unreasonable. They aren't symptoms of selfishness, greed and extravagance. They sprouted up because cities are inherently cramped, and the continental U.S. is enormous. It's not a matter of virtue (cities) and vice (suburbs, exurbs). So everyone stop being silly.

Cities are cramped, unless you are rich. Of course Tom Wolfe captured the subject perfectly, and long ago, well before the real-estate bubble started to inflate. There's a scene in his 1987 novel, ``The Bonfire of the Vanities,'' where one of the characters, a lawyer who works in the prosecutor's office, bumps into his wife's pantyhose and stockings hanging up and drying in their tiny city bathroom. But precisely! -- as Wolfe would write.

I think the bride whose wedding I attended in Vermont, and who lives in New York City, wants to buy a house. Is this somehow unreasonable? She wants a little more space.

I was looking at a real-estate Web site this week, and came across a nice house on Schermerhorn Street in Brooklyn Heights. And as I looked at the pictures of the place, I thought, ``Hey, I know this house.'' We used to live across the street. Right out the front parlor's windows I could see our old front door.

The Airedales
We rented an apartment in a townhouse back then, 20 years ago it must be, and could see into the house, and admire the front parlor. We called the people who lived there the Airedales, because they had an Airedale improbably named Pedro, and imagined the privileged and perfect lives they led in this nice house. I remember the time the fabulous chatelaine came home on a Christmas Eve afternoon in a taxi full of bags of presents.

I looked at the listing, and now got to see inside, with the photographs, and the floor-plan, and you know what? It's a house, a very nice house, but not especially grand, not what anyone would really call a mansion or a palace. The price: $5,895,000.

Do you really think the cost of a gallon of gasoline is going to doom suburbia?


(Joe Mysak is a Bloomberg News columnist. The opinions expressed are his own.)
To contact the writer of this column: Joe Mysak in New York at jmysakjr@bloomberg.net
Last Updated: June 20, 2008 00:01 EDT