The map library

I wouldn’t worry about it.

If you need to learn to drive on snow in a hurry, there’s going to be so much else going on that driving on snow is going to be the least of your problems.

15 Likes

Is NY marked that way as a joke, or are they including all the Downstate drivers, or both? I once had to drive way Upstate during a snowstorm (not a blizzard), & can vouch that both the NJ & NY drivers did alright (as did I)

9 Likes

I don’t know

6 Likes

(I’m guessing that inclusion in one set or the other is very much in the eye of the beholder, or intended as a zinger, or both)

7 Likes

We need a complementary map for states where people can drive in the absence of snow, maybe some are simply neither.

7 Likes

People in Minnesota drive better with snow than without. Less road rage.

11 Likes
15 Likes

Median age of housing units in USA, as of 2019-2023 ACS. (I used 2023 as the current year for determining age, as the table actually reports on the median year structures were built.)

Do you like really old housing stock? Move to Kansas!

I’d love to do this for other countries, but I don’t know where to get the data.

12 Likes

There is talk of Fairfax County changing its official designation from county to city to increase State funding. So soon there might be the City of Fairfax County and Fairfax City.

10 Likes

That’s really interesting. I’m guessing that this is driven by population shifts and the trends in them? Depopulating area have less need of “new” housing stock, so the existing houses get re-used and the county level median trends older?

And for other countries, England and Wales has this down to the property level:

9 Likes

:thinking: This makes me wonder how a map of disaster areas or public land re-zoned for private development during the same range of years would compare with this. Sadly, the reason for more newer housing units isn’t always good. I still prefer the quality of older, well-maintained units to the Styrofoam incorporated into new construction. Unfortunately, changes in code and requirements for more climate-resilient structures can’t always be applied to older houses.

15 Likes

That’s almost certainly true of coastal and seismic areas. For example, note certain similarities between my map and this one:

The map didn’t box, so here’s a screenshot:

Now, I’d also guess that in general, the humid, wet climate of the southeastern US results in houses not lasting as long, just because they’re often made of stuff that will eventually rot – not to mention that the SE is also generally poorer, so maybe maintenance costs play into it.

12 Likes

Seems very likely for KS and St. Louis city. Here’s a map from the WP article on the depopulation of the Great Plains:

8 Likes

Yep.

As a young, fluffy-tailed engineering student, my class once did a field trip to an oil refinery. One of the students asked “If there was a pending explosion, which building would you run into?”. The guide replied “If I couldn’t get offsite and keep moving? Because that’s my first choice. My second choice would be to run into the nearest old building. The newer the building, the better the designers knew and understood the limits and margins of the building materials. Before we really knew all this stuff, and before it was consistently and reliably made the same way every time, people just over-built things. Now that we know exactly how to meet the contract and not spend a penny more - I’m staying out of those in a crisis.”

15 Likes

I refer to it as “disposable architecture.” Easy to assemble, and easy to take down when you’re done with it.

10 Likes

What I suspect a lot of people are more worried about is that you don’t need to worry about taking them down when you’re done with it: they’ll self-dissassemble when they decide their lifespan is done.

And in increasing numbers of cases, their designed lifespan is "just long enough for the construction company to go “insolvent”, be dissolved, and reconstitute itself under a new name as a legally distinct entity. It’s called “Phoenixing” in these parts.

12 Likes
14 Likes

GOOD! More power to her!

10 Likes
15 Likes

:joy_cat:It was a terrible time for those poor concrete cows.

5 Likes