The picture above is just an example of the many houses that surround this suburban neighborhood. What was interesting is that despite having such beautiful and clean streets I rarely saw any humans just walking about. The few that did take a walk around the neighborhood were usually walking their dogs. All the houses have flawless lawns, and most have an abundance of trees and flowers in their yards.
This is one of the two parks I saw within a mile radius of the church. Though this one seemed more of a baseball field and the other park more of a family park where you can have a picnic and BBQ. It was not so full in the morning (11am) but by 3pm there was a large crowd in it. Mostly families watching their kids play what looked to be little league baseball. This suburb seems to be build in order to encourage family activities and safe places for the neighborhood kids to play in without the parents having to worry too much about them.
Trader Joe's was located on the main street before entering the heavily residential area. This seemed to be the closets Supermarket to this area. Inside the store was full with people shopping. Again, though the store was full there were not a lot of cars in the already small parking lot since a lot of the people simply walked to the market from their homes.
Further a long Mission Street there were some caffe shops and businesses such as cleaners a donut shops. It was all build in a very community based fashion. Nothing seemed out of place. Everything to the last car found in this area felt and looked like it belonged. Overall it was an interesting experience since everything in this area's purpose was to serve, look and feel part of a small community.
UPDATE: [So I went back to South Pasadena, and decided to do an update to talk about things that I i dismissed last time I was here. As expected the neighborhood is extremely quiet. Even when driving on their main streets, where one would expect noise or even traffic, there was none of that. Everything here is calmed and serene. What I did notice was a lot of family oriented activities being promoted throughout Mission St. Things such as fundraisers and activities like marathons held in the city. Therefore not only are safe havens provided for such activities (the surrounding parks) but encouraged through signs and posters all through the main street of the area I reported on.]
Hi there Stephany! I enjoyed reading your post about South Pasadena. What especially caught my interest was how you explored an area that didn't seem to be dominated by the use of cars. You discussed how this area seemed to be a very tight community in regards to location of stores, services and a church.
ReplyDeleteThis brings me way back to one of our lectures when we learned about how cities evolved to be more centralized. These center points are usually political, economic, legal, civic/cultural, or religious. In this case, it seems the community is centralized around the church you visited with your friend. I find this interesting because your post conveyed how this neighborhood, this area, seemed community based. You, yourself, stated that "a lot of members appeared to be from this community and as a result did not need to drive, they simply walked to church."
This as well as your observation that Trader Joe's, parks, and other services were well within a comfortable and easy walking distance. So it seems for more of the basic needs, cars aren't required (only when the residents want or needs to travel outside their neighborhood). Which makes me think about how the neighborhood's residents interact. If most attend the same church and do so regularly, than that would mean that they know each other relatively well. In a way, this seems like a community that holds onto the concept of Gemeinschaft, however I'm not sure how much. For all we know, while they may interact and may know details of their neighbors' life, they very well may not put the well-being of the community before their own. Unfortunately, you were not able to provide any information that could prove or disprove this. So we can assume that this neighborhood/community experiences the idea of Gemeinschaft within Gesellschaft.
On a final note, I would have liked to see you elaborate more on your ideas. A lot of it seemed very general and you only provide a sort of basic insight. I would have also liked to have seen you relate what you found, observed, and noticed to a concept, idea, or something we learned or read for class in order to further analyze the social difference within South Pasadena.