The St Louis Contrarian

Urbanist and Simon Fraser University’s Director of the City Program introduced me to the expression “NORC” which stands for “Naturally Occurring Retirement Community”.  A NORC is any neighbourhood or area where a groups of folks over 60 years of age choose to reside. Patrick Sisson with Curbed.com points out that as the baby boom generation ages, they are rewriting where they are going to live. Instead of farms or small towns, this group values walkable urban centres. In a survey of 1,000 respondents across the United States, seniors wanted a walkable neighbourhood, low crime rates, and to be close to families.

R.D. Merrill, a  company that develops senior residences in the United States has found that while they have been building large campuses outside of town and city centres for older folks, that is not where their residents want to be. President Bill Pettit stated  “We were creating these…