Rose Walks and kids

Many houses clustered around a central green hearkens back to the 'Rose Walk' style of apartments but makes a critical error. An essential element of the Rose Walk concept is that the wall-to-wall units make the common green a 'garden' suitable for unsupervised child play.  Given buyer-hostility to attached homes (most buyers of new homes are boomers), a compromise solution may be a site plan where each house is divided by a shed. No one hears their neighbors TV through the wall, and the front-facing shed serves the same function that so many garages do - weatherproof storage and ad-hoc workspace. And by facing such a shed onto the 'common' area, you get more of a front porch effect, but one with differential privacy, based on keeping the door open or closed.