If you are familiar with Penn State and what is outside of State College, PA then you are well aware that it is mostly surrounded by rural areas. My hometown, Bellefonte, is 20-30 minutes outside. I do not live directly in the town of Bellefonte therefore, my house is surrounded by farmland and woods or as some like to think of as small forests. Where my house is, it would be considered an automobile suburb since there are few houses near me but as you move closer to the center of Bellefonte it is more pedestrian-oriented. I would have to say that the town itself would have about 5,000 people in it and the closer to the core of the town is where the majority of these people are. Living in Bellefonte my entire life I have realized that it can be very laid back and boring at times due to the lack of people and things to do. Typically, most Bellefusions find themselves spending all of their leisure time in State College.
All though Beacon Hill located in Boston, Massachusetts is very different from my town, I have found some similarities between them when it comes to being pedestrian-oriented. Within the actual town of Bellefonte you are able to walk to a few things such as school, a few restaurants, the court house and some areas of work. Like the people in Beacon Hill, people a tend to walk everywhere within the town rather than drive cars around unless they are similar to my family who is still considered part of the Bellefonte zip code but lives too far to walk. If my town had more of its housing options closer to the the core of the town I definitely think we could be more similar to Beacon Hill and increase our sustainability efforts by more people walking rather than having to drive.
I never thought I would ever compared Detroit, Michigan to Bellefonte, Pennsylvania but due to the Urban Farming video that was provided in our module I realize that the two do have similarities. In the video it even mentions how Detroit is nothing like the rural areas in Pennsylvania but it does not mean they cannot have similar things like farming in Detroit. As I have said the town of Bellefonte is very pedestrian-oriented in the center so you never see things like farms or backyard gardens but after watching the video in Detroit, I can see the feasibility behind it. Growing up my parents always had a garden so this was something I could really relate to and with that being said every so often central Bellefonte would have farmers markets were local farmers would sell their goods for cheap to the community just like they showed in the video. Bellefonte could absolutely do this more often to be more sustainable.
Hi Andrea, my name is Shelby Epstein and I am from Doylestown, PA! Here is a link to my blog if you want to check it out! https://wp.me/p3RCAy-cha
Like your hometown and Beacon Hill, Doylestown has a Borough that is very pedestrian-oriented. There are many shops and restaurants for people to walk around instead of using automobiles, although everywhere else is Doylestown is automobile reliant. We also both compared our hometowns to Detroit and urban farming! Unfortunately, Doylestown is very reliant on driving to the local grocery store to get its produce. I also said that my hometown could adopt more urban farming in order to become more sustainable and lower environmental impacts! Great work!!
Hi my name is Dustin. I live in North Texas. You would think that there would be more urban farming here but that is just not the case. My wife and I grow a lot of vegitables in our suburban home but most people do not utilize their land for that. In the community I live in, curb appeal is more important. People have very large, estate like front yards and very small back yards. We went against the social norm and have a large back yard where we grow a variety of things.