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| On current suburban planning | |||
Unlike
the traditional neighborhood model, which evolved organically as a response
to human needs, suburban sprawl is an idealized artificial system. It is
not without a certain beauty: it is rational, consistent and comprehensive.
Its performance is largely predictable. It is an outgrowth of modern problem
solving: a system for living. Unfortunately, this system is already showing
itself to be unsustainable. Unlike the traditional neighborhood, sprawl
is not healthy growth; it is essentially self-destructive. Even at relatively
low population densities, sprawl tends not to pay for itself financially
and consumes land at an alarming rate, while producing insurmountable traffic
problems and exacerbating social inequity and isolation. These particular
outcomes were not predicted. Neither was the toll that sprawl exacts from
America's cities and towns which continue to decant slowly into the countryside.
As the ring of suburbia grows around most of our cities, so grows the void
at the center. Even while the struggle to revitalize deteriorated downtown
neighborhoods and business districts continues, the inner ring of suburbs
is already at risk, losing residents and businesses to fresher locations
on a new suburban edge. |
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