The End of the World is a Cul de Sac

Product Information

Weighing available evidence has led a few US cities including Austin, Texas; Charlotte, North Carolina; and Portland, Oregon, to restrict and regulate the inclusion of cul-de-sac streets in new suburbs. [12] However, a 2010 study [40] [ moved resource?] on sprawl in North America by a legal expert concludes that "neighborhoods dominated by culs-de-sac are less walkable than those that include street grids. ... On the other hand, culs-de-sac do have a countervailing public benefit: because of their very inaccessibility, they tend to have less automobile traffic. Given the existence of important public policy goals on both sides, a city seeking to maximize walkability should not favor culs-de-sac over grids, but should also allow some culs-de-sac as a legitimate residential option. ... In addition, there are "middle ground" alternatives between prohibiting culs-de-sac and mandating them. For example, a city could encourage culs-de-sac combined with pedestrian walkways." This design combination is shown in the Village Homes layout and is an integral part of the Fused Grid. We have, in our medieval towns, showing very commendable methods of cutting up the land. I ought to mention here that to keep traffic out of residential streets is necessary not only in the general interest of the population, but, above all, for the sake of the children, whose health (amongst the working classes) is mainly dependent on the opportunity of moving about in close connection with their dwelling places, without the danger of being run over. In the earlier periods, traffic was excluded from residential streets simply by gates or by employing the cul-de-sac.

The End of the World is a Cul de Sac - Bloomsbury Publishing

Two other studies, [23] [24] reported in 1990 and 2009 respectively, confirmed the upward trend and determined the premium that cul-de-sac streets command. The first found a 29% premium over the streets in a grid. The second, focused on trails and greenbelts, found that other amenities including cul-de-sac streets add significantly to the home value. Masterful . . . [Kennedy] can make you laugh and wince all at once . . . A writer very much in control of her craft * Irish Independent * Remember, if you vote for a book and it wins, you are implicitly promising to read the book and participate in the discussion.Increases in pedestrian and bicycle permeability may result in a displacement of local car trips for short-distance destinations [22] and consequently a reduction in neighbourhood vehicle emissions. The impermeable cul-de-sac not only discourages walking and biking but also increases the length of car trips by the circuitous geometry of the dendrite network structure of which it is a part. Research studies examined the influence of several variables on the amount of car travel that residents of several types of districts recorded. Results vary considerably among them, but there is general agreement on a number of key correlations: [31] [32] a) the wealthier and the larger the family is, the more cars they own, and the more they drive, b) the farther away a family lives from the city centre, and the fewer the jobs in the vicinity, plus a slow bus service, the more they drive, and c) street patterns may add a 10% length to local trips, but the total VKTs are affected more by the "macro" urban than the "micro" neighbourhood structure. When the author described a woman in her home doing the dishes...or ferreting in her make-up bag...I said: "I do that!" That is the strength of these stories...you are drawn in with bits and pieces of the narrative and you embrace them! The bittersweet beauty of this book is perfectly captured by its wry title. Indeed, in this debut collection of short stories by Irish author Louise Kennedy, dramatic events are met with weary resignation, life’s pains and sorrows experienced as things so predictable and familiar that they are almost cherished. The book reads in many ways like a panorama of personal intimacies, as if the author’s lens is panning around the smooth curve of the cul de sac, relating the myriad of individual stories that take place behind each quite unremarkable façade. Since the end of World War II, [12] new subdivisions in the United States and Canada, as well as New Towns in England and other countries have made extensive use of the cul-de-sac and crescent (loops) street types. Typically, there is one or several central roads in the subdivision with many cul-de-sac streets of varying length, branching out from the main roads, to fill the land in the subdivision, a dendrite or hierarchical pattern. [13] Since the 1960s, the pattern has been the dominant road network structure of suburbs and exurbs in the United States, Canada, and Australia. It is also increasingly popular in Latin America, Western Europe, and China. In this pattern, there are only a few roads (relative to the number of cul-de-sac streets) leading out of the subdivision and into other subdivisions or onto major roads. A] dark, funny, brilliantly downbeat Irish debut. Bitterness, beauty and a caustic wit colour Kennedy's stories, as the past makes itself unforgettably present in the lives of her vividly drawn characters * Daily Mail *

The End of the World is a Cul de Sac - Goodreads

Real estate developers prefer culs-de-sac because they allow builders to fit more houses into oddly-shaped tracts of land and facilitate building to the edges of rivers and property lines. [12] They also choose these discontinuous network patterns of cul-de-sac and loop streets because of the often significant economies in infrastructure costs compared to the grid plan. Elsewhere, words unspoken impose unbearable tensions. In “Powder”, a widow takes her late husband’s American mother on a tour of Ireland in a rented Nissan, the mission to scatter his ashes. She finds herself “talking incessantly: a running commentary on what they were doing … the important words were still unsaid”. And in “Brittle Things”, a mother tries tenderly to encourage her nonverbal autistic son to speak, while her husband lives in denial: “She fretted now that Ferda’s first words, if they ever came, would be words against his father.” It’s an intensely moving story, simultaneously poignant and defiant; a diamond amid the collection’s many jewels. Cul-de-sac streets increase spontaneous outdoor activity by children. A study in California examined the amount of child play that occurred on the streets of neighbourhoods with different characteristics; grid pattern and culs-de-sac. [18] The findings indicate that culs-de-sac showed substantial increase in play activity than the open grid street pattern. Culs-de-sac reduce perceived danger from traffic, thereby encouraging more outdoor play. O. Dag. "George Orwell: Politics and the English Language" (in Russian). Orwell.ru . Retrieved 2013-04-16. A relentlessly grim collection of stories about long-suffering Irish women with Irish names dealing with awful men and/or circumstances.Alberti, Leon Battista (1966). Rykwert, Joseph (ed.). Ten Books on Architecture. New York: Transatlantic Arts. book IV, ch. V. 75. In many stories the natural world, with its animal appetites and feral, sexual energy, impinges on the urban. A pregnant woman accidentally witnesses her husband commit adultery with an agricultural science student in the lambing shed, shattering her sense of self-worth; while in another story a man shoots a hare that he knows his partner adores: “There was a treacly hole at the front of his head, his eyes were hazel and still.”

Louise Kennedy | Penguin Random House

The natural world and the changing seasons are central to the stories, acting as a salve to the harshness of life and a reminder that time marches on. Kennedys heroines are just the same in the way that they accept their challenges. I’m not a lover of short stories normally but these blew me away. I find this genre can leave the reader frustrated and unsatisfied with the conclusion. Short stories can also be obscure and inaccessible. Kennedy provides clarity and resolution to each story which I found really enjoyable. I wanted to read more about her characters. I was fully committed to each story. Tomorrow's Cities, Tomorrow's Suburbs | Better! Cities & Towns Online". Archived from the original on 2017-01-18 . Retrieved 2019-07-20. In the UK, their prior existence is implied by the Public Health Act 1875 which banned their use in new developments. [ citation needed]

A dazzling, heartbreaking debut collection' Guardian 'Kennedy's voice, and her unforgiving gaze, are electric' Sunday Times 'These stories sing, haunt and inspire laughter ... One of the best collections I've read in years' Sinead Gleeson A SUNDAY TIMES BOOK OF THE YEAR WINNER OF THE JOHN MCGAHERN PRIZE A wonderful collection of short stories, each one more than capable of standing on their own. I found them to be utterly magical, with a mystical quality that captivated me from the very beginning. Many of the stories have elements of Irish folklore, nature, or our countries' past with themes such as alcoholism, depression, and grief being explored. Aristotle (1962) [335-323 BC]. The Politics. Translated by Sinclair, T. A. New York: Penguin. Book VII, sec. xi. 422. Darkly funny, beautifully crafted, intense - this is an outstanding first collection from a natural story writer”— Kevin Barry From the Publisher In medicine, the expression is used to refer to the recto-uterine pouch, also known as the Pouch of Douglas, the deepest point of the female peritoneal cavity.