Tiny Dancer: The Hunt for Little Black Shoes
The Mayor of Paris, Anne Hildago, has recently rolled out a plan to create a city of 15 minute neighborhoods. The idea is to make the city “a place where everyone can reach their work, home, and any amenity within a 15-minute bike ride.” This will require a concerted effort to transform the streets to be more bike-friendly. Equally important, if we were to adopt this approach in the US, we would require a different approach to land use and zoning. Even in our densest cities, such as New York, require more time to access jobs — averaging 43 minutes per commute.
If we were to adopt the approach of 15 minute neighborhoods in KC, would we simultaneously address questions of affordability and equity?
In many ways, the changes we have seen in the downtown core of Kansas City, Missouri have started to lend itself to the 15 minute neighborhood. On any given week, we live as a family in the River Market and we can find what we need within the urban core. Our local market orders basics such as baby formula for us in bulk and there is a plethora of affordable food options at our finger tips. We can access daycare and a public elementary school by streetcar or foot. The public library and Union Station are great places to hang out inside and there are a few public parks as well.
As it stands, we can almost exclusively live most of our days without needing a car to get what we need for a high quality of life. Eliminating the majority of our costs of transportation from our monthly budget helps immensely when raising a family of five.
Households spent an average of $9,737 on transportation in 2017. By this measure, transportation is the second largest household expenditure category after housing because it does not include spending on behalf of households. This expenditure has increased more slowly than housing, food, and health expenditures. (USDOT Bureau of Transportation Statistics)
Yet, there are gaps in services and impediments to affordable downtown living — for all generations. For example, our youngest daughter recently had a hip hop performance through the Kansas City Young Audiences which required black leggings, leotard and dance shoes. In an effort to stay true to my 2020 Resolution to only shop downtown, I called the Kansas City Ballet and a local maker of dance wear on 31st Street (definitely the furthest extent of what you might call downtown) to see if they had what we needed. I scoured the web for potential options downtown. Nope.
Then, I remembered the children’s clothing shop at Crown Center. They carried black tights for $18.00 (compared to $4.99 at Target). Nevermind that my daughter had holes and pulls in the tights after wearing them just a few times, this is expensive. This store is clearly tailored toward the rare shower gift or special occasion outfit, not as a regular shopping experience for a mother of three. Plus, we still needed to find the black shoes and leotard.
Now, required clothes for a dance performance is a bit exceptional — and I would submit that it may not be essential for Downtown to serve these outliers (plus, I’m pretty confident my daughter would have rocked out with or without the black ensemble). However, I am also unable to find things such as school uniforms and play shoes which most families would require on a regular basis.
Ordering online would also be an option but there are additional social, environmental and economic costs to these services that we’re trying to avoid in 2020. So, I procrastinated and waited to figure it out until a snow storm and tire blow-out landed me at Target in Blue Springs (long story) the day before the performance. Alas, I failed in my effort to find a black leotard and dance shoes downtown but she looked great!
Cities increasingly have the capability to plan 15-minute neighborhoods by analyzing community needs and guiding economic development that meets those needs. In Brownsville, NY, for example, the Citizens’ Committee for Children of New York mapped community assets such as schools, after-school and summer programs, open space, food retail, transit access, healthcare, etc. to understand the potential for healthy development and upward mobility for children and families.
If we want to create diverse, affordable neighborhoods, we should invest in understanding the gaps to a car-less high quality of life. These inventories not only help communities appreciate the assets they have but can help identify priorities for business attraction and economic development efforts at the local level. If we design 15-minute neighborhoods, can we eliminate the cost of constructing so much parking, for example, for our buildings in the urban core? Developing more complete neighborhoods can help eliminate our city’s costs associated with sprawling infrastructure and transportation while making our daily lives more affordable and convenient.
