Suburbia - A planned residence neighborhood

Summary: Looking for a quiet community where neighbors are dear and griefers fear? It's not in SL yet, but help us build it! Voice your support for the Suburbia Project!

---

What are some of the largest complaints we hear about Second Life?

* Free land is in total disarray.
* Neighbors don't necessarily agree on being neighborly.
* Buildings around the world have a very scattered, random feel.
* Residents feel they have no power to regulate things socially.

I propose a place where we can change that.

Introducing the Suburbia Project, a group dedicated to forming an organized residential community created by and managed by the players themselves. Suburbia will be the first real town within Second Life, and may very well introduce Second Life's first resident-run government.

Here's a breakdown of the Suburbia Project plan:

When the next batch of servers are released by the Lindens, the Suburbia Project will purchase the land for an entire sim, preferably either centrally located or near Ahern/Morris. (Generally as far away from the Outlands as possible.) We already have secured the funding for this stage.

Project members will convert the land into a quiet town village, complete with streets, a park, downtown, etc. Land will be parceled out for houses (larger than Lusk Court housing), and apartment complexes will be built. Storefronts will be erected downtown for various businesses.

During this time, project members will construct the preliminary Resident Agreement for Suburbia. These will be a set of resident-drafted rules agreed on by the residents of the community. Examples might include a 30m house height limit, a no-sign rule in housing areas, a noise ordinance, a no-guns rule, etc.

When initial construction and parcelling is complete, the project members will purchase, construct, and move into their preferred housing. At this this time, other residents will be allowed to buy land and build their own homes, provided they agree to the Resident Agreement.

The general principle is, anyone is welcome to join and move into Surburbia, provided they accept the Residence Agreement. Vistors are also welcome so long as they respect the RA (which generally means they are not disruptive or harrassing). Enforcement will be provided by a local police department; we already have several qualified residents. A sim-wide security system (lampposts!) will be able to block repeat griefers.

---

We have the funding, we have the builders, and we have the skills to implement whatever measures we need to make this community, OUR community. All we need are residents who are looking for a better, safer home for their Second Life.

If you have ANY interest in this kind of community, please reply and see me in-world! We hope to have as many residents willing to participate as possible by the time the next round of servers comes up!

I think this is one of the best ideas...period.

Now I have a comment/suggestion to make. Now we all know this game "will" get a lot of attention when it goes gold, mind you even the fact when the beta goes public. And you know that your Urban community will get full one time or another. Well as in the real world as we see many urban communities starting to get packed with popullation, we see many of them constructing buildings higher and higher. But this only allows small apartment size residents. Now as in SL our constructions does not have to follow any of the primary physic rules set in real world, our ablilties to make structures to the highest limits is very possible.

My suggestion based of this this fact, is that instead of building higher building to support the popullation concerns later on in time, we build land masses higher, in layers I mean.

Now I don't know if many of you know this, but in Japan they are starting to build one of the tallest, and largest building projects ever! Many people never thought they would ever build it but, they have already started it. It is called "Sky City 1000". It is a building that is taking circle ckunks of urban area and layering them into a building like cone. It is a HUGE Project they are doing, and when I saw this it gave me the idea of the possibilites of doing the same type of project in SL.

Check out the LINK for more info on this design.

It would save the space and create limitless popullation for this urban project.

Just my 2 cents.

That sounds like a grea idea!

Yuniq's idea is a good one and since she has the resources, I applaud her for trying such a huge task. But, it isnt going to be easy. Getting people to follow guidelines & rules is difficult, especially if there are no enforcement tools. Yes you can police greifers but what if you get one as a resident? Unless the Lindens give a SIM "governor" powers to alter and or delete owned items on that sim there is still the potential for problems. I hope that doesnt happen but I'm sure that'll be something that has to be dealt with as it comes.

Jason,
"Sky City" is.. well, what can I say but WOW. However if the ball gets rolling here as the Lindens have predicted, this would not be necessary. We do have a big land crunch now but the long term goal is to add sims hand over fist (a new sim for every new 100 residents I think I read). The world is going to get big, and fast and there "should" be plently of land for all.
That kind of community (Sky City) would be interesting to see in game or out and that is another I think I'll follow for the end results.

Wonderful post! Lots of loot to make this happen, hehe. This idea'll be a winner, i'm sure there's lots of folks who appreciate this kind of project. Especially if they're comming from some game like the Sims (though i haven't seen SIMs online) it would have alot of appeal since suburbia is what it's all about. Heck, Catherine Cotton was just talking about this...
Can i be the bum who lets his grass grow 3 foot high with two or three junk cars sitting out in the yard?


Yeah Jason, SkyCity1000 - just looked it up and whoah, what a huge monster this'll be. It also freaked me out at first cause i knew an architect who was trying to sell a very similar idea like this to the Arabians back in the 70s. Now all we need is 2,000 acres worth of space to build it.

I love this idea! I would love to see a larger version of our neighborhood in Lusk. That would be fantastic. Rules well I like them no worries here

See you in game

Cat

I'm just going off the number Misnomer posted, which I obviously haven't verified...

But if a sim is designed to hold 100 residents, and we divided it perfectly evenly, everyone in that sim could have a 25x25 plot.

As it stands, I hope to offer a couple different plot sizes, apartment housing (so we can stack some people), and use the extra land to make it an actual town.

As for enforcment, yes I'm concerned, but not overtly worried long-term. Organization will be the first key. If a problem escalates, yes, we may have to get a Linden involved... which is no different than how it is now. But if the Resident Agreement is something everyone has to read and agree to before moving in, I think we'll gain some critical first ground.

The biggest throwback I'm getting from people who are disruptive is "hey, I can do what I want." If we are to impose any form of order to Second Life, we need to be able to impose law (more as a structure than a legal sense) SOMEWHERE.

Like anything else coming into Second Life soon, this will be a set of tools we can use to prevent and stop disruptions. Yes, Governor Powers will be nice... but short-term, we'll have far more capacity to stop disruptions than we do now. And as for long term... I think the easiest way to get a feature put in is to introduce a rabid demand for it. ^_^

It's not Utopia, but I think Suburbia will be a step forward.

I am extremely excited about this project! I would love to help in any way possible!

Yuniq add me to the list too I love this and 25x25 is perfect for a desent size home an apartment complex gee I realy love that idea too

Self govern again terriefic idea! a safe peaceful place oh please let it be so the town sounds fab and I am offering up my help in anyway I can.

Cat

Sorry forgot to add I love the downtown area idea and being as far away from the outlands as possiable. I cant wait for more land to open up this would be fantastic! I have had some newbies stopping by lately and wanting live in a nice neighborhood like the one I live in unfortunatly your correct land is scarce and scattered at best.

I got a question though, how come we are not going to the Lindens for funding like other theme communties have; wild west for example is it because ppl will be realy living there. They don't seem to realy live in the themed communities as far as I can tell. Then again it would not be unusual for me to be wrong


Ohh nearly time for me to live my Second Life yes I think I am addicted lol

Cat [/B][/QUOTE]

Sorry people about the "Sky City 1000" idea. Maybe this will not be benifical for this project entrely with the 100 users max limit in place, and with Linden intention to add more sims (was still not sure how many they can handel at a time) later in time.

I am the type of person where my thought and ideas get me to excited when starting or helping a project get underway. Some times it is a good thing and some times it is not.

Now to get back on track with "THIS" Project. I think their are many concerns that we need to discuss to get this underway, and for it to work right, so why don't we start to make a LIST of all the the areas of concern where we need to discuss.

Here are some of my topics for the list:

- Max users for the SIM
- Land Section, How big should we provide for urban section, and how much should we provide for commerical areas
- Commerical areas should take avantage of buildings and mall where they can advertise their stores and offices in small areas, that can be stacked into a building structure
- Start making teams for different seciton of the project as this project is VERY BIG. Urban TEAM, Commerical TEAM, Gov TEAM

These are just a few of the many ideas we as a community shold discuss on here or inworld. Now lets start to add this this list and take out ones that are really not needed.

Are they ACTUALLY going to build this city-tower??? That would definitly be the coolest thing ever build!!!! Isn't tokyo one of the places with the most eathquakes???

I think we can't do it in SL because the servers are not fast enough for that.

But I think the city is a good idea... When I didn't have an account on SL yet, but did read about it I figured that there already would be city's etc... I guess not!
First we should ask linden for a better flatten tool. Then we can buy a sim, flatten it out (a least a little) and build streets etc. with street lighting...

I don't think that building houses is a good idea. they are practically good for nothing... Build shops!
We should make this place one big shopping city where you can get anything from guns to art to scripted doors... that would be great
Also something like the amphitheater (for events) would be a good idea, and something like the disco.
You need to have things to do in the city, or else it will be a ghost city

I believe that it should be more commerical than just residents in Suburbia also. But if we do make residents in Suburbia will they follow a buy land rule or will they follow a buy house rule. You know, sell land to the users for a price allow them to build any type of pleasent or wacky house design in their resident land, or have a range of houses already set up in the urban area where users can rent them out or buy them and make changes to the house as they please.

I think frist things first we should make a plan of the map of Suburbia, where the commerical area is going to be, the urban houses area, streets, sewers, highway(might be possible later on), etc.

Yeah first, how big is one SIM? 250x250 meters or something? and most SIM's are like an island, but we can also built street over sea if nessesary.

256x256xreally really really high

Add me to the list please! I'd love to help out

Mark I strongly disagree with ya post. What your talking about is already in the game. Head over to Avatar Centeral to see what I mean. Suberbia as I understand it is a suburbian neighborhood themed community. Meaning shops would be a strip mall or a central mall there would be public buildings like a post office town hall police station parks etc. In addition the crutial part; <bold>homes</bold>

Suburbian homes realy appeals to me and as I live in a small residential area I can tell ya a lot of ppl are also interested in living in a suburbian area. We just have run out of room in little neckof the woods, for more ppl to move into.

I do like some of your ideas they just are not what is already outlined for Suburbia.. Why not try and get your ideas off the ground in a new area As for the land the monies have been set aside and looks like we are just waitin on the lindens for an area to open.

I love this idea:
<i>- Start making teams for different seciton of the project as this project is VERY BIG. Urban TEAM, Commerical TEAM, Gov TEAM </i>

I think that is one thing that could be started while we wait for land to open up.

Cat

I think u r replying to the wrong person Cat. My name is not Mark. Either that or u quoted the wrong person.

Well then it's not really the kind of project I was hoping for. I bet it will look very nice... but there's just nothing to do in 'homes'. So my guess is that it won't be very crowded...

Sorry about that Jason i think i ment to hit the reply to Mark

Cat

Got any updates on Suberbia for us just keeping up to date on this project

(yes i am suppose to be working )

Cat

I'm writing the proposal, detailing exactly how we plan to proceed and the structure we hope to set up, socially as well as architecturally. Stay tuned, but rest assured: the second a sim comes online, we're ready.

That is great Yuniq! I saw that the Suburbia Group is now forming and some pretty impressive names in the community have joined. How will the group decide who can be a member? I would realy love to be a part of this project but I see the Suberbia group is by invite. I understand the idea is stil in its infancy just wondering as I am realy excited about this project.

Cat

? has this project been abandoned?

Cat

Well, aren't you full of surprises, Yuniq?!!

This is a grand idea and very well thought-out for an initial proposal. It would be nice for people like me (who have never participated in online games before) to have some written rules to follow and a "safe place," so to speak, to learn and improve.

Great idea.

Maggie