Gates Open the Doors to Interaction

Regarding “Gated Communities Called Data-Age Foe” (July 17) on telecomputing and information cities: Orange County’s gated residential communities are criticized by an urban planner as inhibiting interaction between people involved in similar work.

Actually, protected neighborhoods are a response to perceived threats to an “open” lifestyle. Within (and between) these communities, personal interaction is enhanced, not diminished, because people feel safe when venturing beyond their private domain. How much personal interaction would there be at USC, for example, without campus security? Telecomputing would probably be preferred to, and substituted for, personal contact in similar areas of high risk.

Granted, there are many obstacles remaining to telecomputing and “information cities” becoming widespread. But a gated community is not one of them!

RICHARD A. ULENE, Newport Beach