To Thrive Together community in Bloomingdale

[danbrotherston]

Canoeing the grand, cycling (unless you're willing to cycle on road), hiking, all require a car to do in that location. And driving not more than once or twice a week is a pretty limited number of errands to run. I don't know anyone who stays in their home 6 out of 7 days of the week.

And limiting a development to those who work exclusively from home or are retired does not seem to be something they expect.

I mean, I could be wrong, but I'd take out a pretty large bet that the vast majority of folks here will own a car and drive it nearly daily.

The development is about 100m from the Grand River so you certainly could canoe or kayak. Don't know whether there are any facilities. There is an unpaved trail starting about 50m upstream of the development that would allow hiking or bicycling; I expect that this would be extended to reach the development.

And while we don't stay inside our (downtown) home six days a week, we drive our car typically only once or twice a week. Some of our neighbours work from home every day, and already did so prior to the pandemic.

I don't know who the buyers will be, but my point is that it is certainly possible to live a low-carbon life at a development such as this. And it's what we would do if we chose to live there.

You only use your car 1-2 times per week, but how often do you go out to a store or other errand? In a downtown home it's obviously easy to avoid driving a car. Even at the height of the pandemic, when we weren't going out much at all, we still usually had something to do 4-5 times per week. Either picking up a package at the post office, or going to the Dr. or getting tested, or any number of other errands.

I really don't think it's possible to live in Bloomfield and avoid driving while also maintaining a similar quality of life.

It may be possible to avoid driving if one doesn't commute for work, and also is willing to shop very infrequently and all at once, and also only enjoys the very small number of amenities (like, your neighbour, and maybe a trail, and church) that are accessible by walking.

Yes, technically possible...just as rural people lived just fine before the car was invented.

But hardly typical of today's lifestyle, and I suspect, not what these folks have in mind. But again, that's why I want to ask them.