The unused backyard

The ideal. (Levittown House, 1948. Original source unknown.)

According to the LA Times, "The yard: so close, yet so far: Many families see their backyard as essential, but they rarely use it, a UCLA study finds. There's too much to do elsewhere."

From the article:

Cox and Deyden participated in a new study by UCLA, the first scholarly examination of how Los Angeles area families use the outdoor space around their homes. The findings show that neither parents nor their kids are enjoying much time of any sort, much less leisure, in their yards.

Anthropology professor Jeanne E. Arnold, lead author of the study that will be published in the March Journal of Family and Economic Issues, says that Angelenos put a lot of money into making their yards attractive and entertaining. "They are a buffer of green" from the outside world, she says, but "backyards might as well be blocks away considering how often the families go in them."

Of the families with working parents and school-age children monitored for the study, more than half of the children didn't spend any playtime in their backyards and most parents only wandered briefly there to perform chores: take out the trash, feed dogs or wash off chairs. "Occasionally a kid would kick a soccer ball but it wasn't for too long," says Arnold. "We admire backyards from inside the house or in our mind's eye, while we're busy doing other things."

The real. (© Baby Blues comic strip, 10/8/2006.)