[thatfrenchguy]

Never really understood why people have lawns in the first place, no-one ever sits on them. Really shocked me when I moved to the US, people value having backyards and just don't spend time there (yeah I'm watching you commenting down on how much you use it and challenge you to actual journal how much time your family spends in there)

[munificent]

> no-one ever sits on them.

Doing stuff on your lawn is only part of its function. Much of the value it provides, arguably most of the value is a combination of:

1. More distance and acoustic isolation from neighbors. A larger property with a house in the middle of it separated from others by space means you hear your neighbors less and they hear you less. It makes your home a little more of a sanctuary.

2. A better view out the window. Windows and the views they afford are a critical part of the indoor experience. They provide a connection to a larger space so that the house doesn't feel claustrophobic or too artificial. A window that opens onto a calm expanse of green can make the house feel more spacious and tranquil.

Now, of course, those benefits have to be weighed against the trade-offs. But, in general, people are not completely stupid and if millions of them have lawns, it's probably at least somewhat because they actually like having lawns and aren't mindless sheep manipulated by culture and nefarious HOA laws into having them.

[bluefirebrand]

> More distance and acoustic isolation from neighbors. A larger property with a house in the middle of it separated from others by space means you hear your neighbors less and they hear you less. It makes your home a little more of a sanctuary.

This purpose does not necessarily need to be serviced by a lawn, which is just a patch of grass.

Lawns are stupid.

[ThrowawayTestr]

As opposed to a lawn made of asphalt?

[KMnO4]

Trees, shrubs, naturalized landscape, pollinator friendly fescues, etc etc.

There are lots of options.

[bluefirebrand]

Trees are even better because they offer some privacy for the house and rest of your yard.

I swear the back yards of suburbs are designed to be flat and open so your neighbors can always snoop on everything from their windows. Panopticon design.

[CapstanRoller]

I'd read this short story, where a strange asphalt-covered parking lot planet is discovered and subsequently herbaformed[0] by an eco-hippie expedition ship (probably named 'A weed is but an unloved flower' in Iain M Banks fashion[1])

[0] maybe there's a 'green' non-evil version of the Evil Gray Goo

[1] https://theculture.fandom.com/wiki/List_of_spacecraft

[stephencanon]

Lawns provide almost none of that, though. Trees, gardens and meadows all provide much better separation from neighbors and much, much better views out the window. Lawns are just ... voids.

[robocat]

The #1 reason for lawns is status signalling.

  Whether you were a nobleman in 17th century England or a suburbanite today, the lawn is a symbol of success — a reflection of who you are as a person. A good, clean, weed-free lawn is a sign you have the wealth and resources to devote to such a fundamentally meaningless project.

https://www.dailycal.org/2021/03/20/why-do-we-have-lawns-any...

[munificent]

It is no longer the 17th century. When decaying abandoned properties in Detroit are still covered in a mostly even expanse of grass, I conclude that the signalling value of lawns has died.

[TheSpiceIsLife]

The trend in Australia at the moment is to build on detached homes on 700 square metres, with just enough lawn to make a small electric lawn mower or gardening service necessary, but none of the benefits.

See for example 26 Parkfield Drive, Youngtown Tasmania on your real estate platform of choice (Google search will do) to see what I mean.

[pintxo]

Not much of a difference to recent new builds in Germany. Here it’s a function of the price for the plot. It’s so expensive that people will go with the smallest plot possible. Even nice upscale houses come with tiny lawns only today.

See https://maps.app.goo.gl/nWzQHXVpKeBmW3UB7?g_st=ic

[balfirevic]

That doesn't look tiny at all.

[pdntspa]

The dog (a german shepherd) uses the backyard to run literally all day long. She'd go crazy cooped up in the house. We both use it for fetch all the time. I use it to smoke since I can't do so in the house. The shade from the big tree in the center is nice for reading. Pulling weeds (they got really thick and stalky this year) and leveling the ground around the holes the dog digs helps keep me in shape. It's a nice background for a twitch show I've been thinking of doing. It's a nice space for parties.

But yeah fuck off with the judging. I like space and I like living in the city.

[madoublet]

Looks nice. Soft to walk on. Great for kids and pets. Fairly inexpensive to maintain. Never really understood why people don't like lawns TBH.

[dgacmu]

In western and more arid states they're a huge waste of water. Really depends on the climate. In other areas they're just a lost opportunity for biodiversity. Mixing in some clover or other small perennial soft small flowers can help a lot with making it both self-fertilizing and more pollinator-friendly.

(We kept part of our grass for exactly that reason but it helps that we don't have to water the lawn here. With added clover I'm quite happy with it.)

[morkalork]

Mixing clover and other small flowering plants with grass is definitely the way to go. I can sit on the swing in my backyard and lose count of all the bumblebees and small butterflies bouncing across the lawn.

What I don't understand is, is the need for huge front lawns. It's all the work with none of the benefits. Just a waste of space really. People don't use them the same way at all.

[jonnycomputer]

Different neighborhoods work differently. I played baseball in my front yard. First (and only base, besides home) was the mailbox across the street.

But it's true that a lot of people don't use their front yards for much, except perhaps as a noise buffer from the road. If you go a non-lawn route, you'll need to be careful to maintain it in a way that doesn't encourage intervention by neighbors, municipalities, etc. On the other hand, I'm rewilding a bit of my back, and nobody says anything.

[asow92]

> What I don't understand is, is the need for huge front lawns. It's all the work with none of the benefits. Just a waste of space really. People don't use them the same way at all.

Have you considered that some people just like looking at it and that's enough? It's their private property after all.

[bluefirebrand]

That's not a sufficient reason to have bylaws and HOAs that enforce front lawns. Which is amazingly common.

[Tagbert]

The lawns aren’t the reason for the HOAs. The HOAs are intended to try to protect the investment value of the homes by enforcing a level of maintenance in all of the properties. Not saying they are a net good but it doesn’t start with the lawns.

[asow92]

Have you considered that some people want it that way and choose to live in such a place?

[lotsofpulp]

> Fairly inexpensive to maintain.

Lots of things are inexpensive when ignoring externalities.

[badpun]

The noise from all the grass mowing is really annoying (second only to leaf blowing). Fortunately, people are slowly switching to much quieter electric mowers.

[roflyear]

Takes a lot of time to maintain. Or like $300/m.

[Dylan16807]

What kind of lawn needs that, rather than 1-2 hours of mowing per month?

(I'm assuming an area where grass actually fits the environment. If grass won't just grow then that's a problem that doesn't need more explanation.)

[chao-]

The HOA in the neighborhood I grew up in mandated grass from a narrow list of types, and live oak trees. That's fine for about 15 years, give or take, but then the trees start to kill the grasses below them. This wasn't a groundbreaking horticultural discovery, but the rules were written that way nonetheless.

It took years for the neighborhood to convince the HOA to allow other kinds of ground cover (jasmine, frog fruit, etc.). In the mean time, people were paying yearly to resod with new grass, or have to pay fines that cost more than just paying for new sod.

[Auracle]

I mean, our yard is large enough where each mowing session takes somewhere in that 1-2 hours on a riding lawn mower.

[roflyear]

Once a week at $80/w is not insane. Adds up.

[Dylan16807]

It's not insane but it sure sounds like overkill to me. That's a good bit for just mowing, and once a week is significantly more than I would expect from someone who views lawn mowing as an expensive necessity.

[roflyear]

It's mowing + weedwacking which most lawns will need. But yeah you can do every 2 weeks.

[dgacmu]

I'm probably not normal. We use it all the time. Probably helps that we have a playset and a trampoline and a garden back there - we were in the yard for several hours today (adults gardening, kids and their friend on trampoline). Of course, we've also eliminated half of the grass that used to be here in favor of more garden + perennial shrub/flower space, and I'd like to eliminate more over time as the kids get older, and we're the weirdos who compost and make our own mulch for the yard, etc.

[RHSman2]

You sound like me from another mother! I am 2 years into compost. I am obsessed with the concept and reality. Magical nature.

[kQq9oHeAz6wLLS]

That's the beauty of freedom (which France helped us gain) - I don't really need to justify my yard usage to you.

But I'll give you one anyway - it's a nice buffer between me and my stupid neighbors.

[brewdad]

What does a buffer have to do with a lawn? You have chosen a lawn. At least own it.

[camhart]

We never sit on our lawn. But we play soccer on it. Have water gun fights on it. Let the kids run through the sprinklers on it, etc.

[cmrdporcupine]

Unless you live in an arid area... if it's not grass ... something else is growing there. Something usually far more labour-intensive to maintain.

If humans displace natural grazing animals, something has to replace them. A lawnmower.

I live on 6 acres. Half of it I leave wooded. I have a small hobby vineyard. And the house and garage. The rest, well, it has to be mowed. Because I don't have sheep or goats to do it for me.

Even when I lived in Toronto on a 25'x100' property, I had to mow almost weekly to keep weeds down.

Yes, the lawn thing is a bit silly. But people who act like a native plant or whatever garden or landscaping is less labour intensive are fooling themselves. I've tried both. Around here, it'll fill with burrs and dandelions and pigweed and ticks and whatever in no time at all.

[thedougd]

Similar situation for me. The garden and natural areas of my yard take a lot of work to maintain. Much more than my lawn.

Invasive species can be a nightmare on their own but even the native ones can become impenetrable if you let it go too long.

Even if you have nice forest around your house you’ll pay for it with wood rot, termites, moss and mildew, and gutter cleanings. I loved living with trees over the house but ultimately decided I’d rather live with a bit more clearing.

[jonnycomputer]

It absolutely is more labor intensive. Partly because its a regularly disturbed area without a buffer zone to protect it from new weed intrusions. I get weeds I've never seen before each year on my lawn.

It's not just grazing animals btw. It's fire. Large parts of the US Southeast, for example, used to be savanna, basically grasslands interspersed by trees. Fire is necessary to maintain that, to beat back woody growth.

[cmrdporcupine]

There's good evidence that indigenous people along the whole east all the way up from the SE to the NE were managing forests with deliberate fire, too. For the purpose of maize agriculture, but also by keeping underbrush at bay they encouraged open grazing areas for the deer they hunted.

Also long before that, there were now-extinct species like mastodon that cleared forest floor, etc.

Anyways, all that is side-ramble. The reality is that in humid temperate areas the things you replace a lawn with end up being just as much or more work.

Nature is not the self-maintaining self-balancing paradise that it is often sold as. It is a world of constant intense competition (Say this in a Werner Herzog tone). If you leave ground bare, and there's water, something will grow there. That's fine in the woods. In the city, it's usually something you don't want that takes root.

[throwaway894345]

We use our yard every nice day. Technically we use it every day because our dog has to go to the bathroom somewhere and it’s nice just to let him in the back yard, but most days we play outside with him and/or read and/or work outside. Coming from the suffocating city, it has been really nice to have just a bit of private green space.

[bombcar]

So lawns are literally natural in some parts of the country; you can grind the land down to dirt and it'll grow a grass and become a meadow if you do nothing; if you mow it it'll be a lawn.

Those areas were instrumental in the "American Dream"-style imagery so the rest of the country imitated it, even though it's absolutely insane in some places.

Also the amount yards are used varies greatly by area, and by family size.

[asow92]

To release us of our ennui, we mow and landscape our lawns. While many disagree, to others it's a status symbol and key part of the American dream. This is just how it's been since victorian times in the US.

I live in upstate NY, where grass grows more or less on its own. You can have a lush lawn here without weeding or watering if that's your choice.

[Sir_Vic_Smasher]

I believe lawns came to the US after WWII with the returning GIs. The idea of lawns began with the French aristocracy a few hundred years ago, pre-industrialized agrarian society. The lawn and heavily manicured garden was a way to show off how rich you were. “Look at me. I’m so rich that not only can I afford to take a portion of my land and not use it to grow a crop or pasture livestock but I can afford to pay people to just grow useless grass and flowers in symmetrically shaped gardens and plant trees that get haircuts into the shapes of spheres and cones”.

Yes, I participate in no mow May. And I know my golf course fairway yard neighbors judge me. Especially with all the dandelions and clover patches I let go un-mowed all year long.

[zikduruqe]

>Never really understood why people have lawns in the first place

It is really dumb that we spend so much time, energy and costs on something that is only visual. Imagine if people spend the same amounts on something that produced food.

https://freakonomics.com/podcast/how-stupid-is-our-obsession...

[cafard]

I am too old for most of the activities I will list, but in my childhood our lawn (we had a double lot) served for

  kickball
  whiffle ball
  touch football
  tag
  hide-and-go-seek
  "Mother, may I?"
  throwing baseballs, softballs, footballs
  the neighbor's teenage son practicing his golf swing with a plastic ball

[hanszarkov]

dogs, camping out-at-home, and sledding with kids, baseball/catch. I practice my golf swing in the summer, family fun

[pfannkuchen]

I’ve never seen this aspect discussed, but a lawn does look like a whole lot of baby wheat, aka food in the near future. Any chance agrarian peoples developed an instinct to consider baby grain specifically attractive and perhaps comforting?