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"sprawl" is when one dense area seeps into the next without any definition or distinction. The natural order of things is: center, dense residential area, semi-dense residential area, mixed residential/rural area; semi-dense residential; dense residential; center, etc. It doesn't matter what scale--cities, towns, whatever--but the stages are important. Sprawl in when development skips the stages and the only way that you know that you've left one place and entered another is because of the signs!
For a lot of my clients (I'm a realtor) my market doesn't "sprawl" enough. Most would buy homes with even bigger yards if they could afford it or if they were even available. I don't get the "back to the city" thing you read about in some publications lately. I see no evidence of it, if anything the place that is increasing the most is the far suburbs into some areas that were rural until fairly recently. Of course those articles never ask real estate agents where the market is going only planners that have little idea about what people are actually buying.
I don't consider any place sprawl. Someone calls it home, and most like living there. In fact the majority of American's live there today. Its just people who don't like the way it developed since WWII that call it that to give a negative term. They don't see the independence that the personal car gives to most people today. My car gives me freedom (to make a living, btw), its not just a huge "burden" they claim it is.
The suburbs are no more harmful then living in the city (or where-ever). It gives the opportunity to a very large segment of the population to own their own homes since the suburbs are typically more affordable. Regulating that would be very unfair and probably unconstitutional to boot. Just look at cities with "growth" boundaries they are less affordable due to less product.
On the whole most people aren't clamoring for huge changes in the suburban landscape.
To me, sprawl is new construction (on virgin land) that happens in an area despite having a housing surplus, a stagnant, or declining population, and falling property values.
Do you think that Chicago, New York, Miami, Boston, Philly, DC, San Francisco don't sprawl?
San Francisco, D.C., and Boston are too small to sprawl. All are consolidated city-counties so they can't grow out anymore also all are 68.3 square miles or smaller. Thats pretty small in land mass for a big city. In the suburbs however there is big sprawl.
New York City sprawls but it has density and a great subway system to back it up. It continues well into the suburbs but again density and public transport make it more livable, urban, and more like a city.
Chicago and Philly have density and so does Miami.
I'd rather live in any of these cities than sunbelt cities, which are huge in land mass and have a nice size population but yet, have no type of density which makes the whole thing feel like one huge suburb.
Houston, LA, Atlanta, Dallas, Phoenix, Nashville, and New Orleans could all improve on public transport. Besides ATL, which isn't so great either, all have some horrible public transit systems for a city of their size and population. A city thats #2 and #4 in population in the US should at least have 4 extensive heavy rail lines as well as light rail and streetcars to subsidize it. BRT is not the way to go. Buses only carry about 50-70 people max assuming its an articulated bus. Subway trains can hold 800-1000 depending on the length of the train and how its design, for this example I used WMATA (D.C.) as one of our 8 car trains can hold 1000 people.
I have alwasy seen it when a city actually spreads to include sub burbs then people move further out and the process continue. Noramlly it starts as businesses move close be closer to the burbs.
Drive down Aborn Road in San Jose and you see it. The further you go, the newer the houses are. There is some retail, but nothing that would support the sky-high housing values. The closer you get to the freeway, the more congested the traffic (sometimes a 3 block backup in the overworked left lane). They developed it into oblivion.
Sprawling areas are extremely conducive to bicycling.
Really? Not in my experience. Bicycling down a eight-lane highway when there is no other real way of reaching your destination (which there is often not in the outer suburbs and exurbs) is not my idea of "conducive to bicycling". I can't say I haven't felt pleasure being a daredevil and riding in these places, but I think most people over 25 would be dissuaded.
Sprawl is a difficult term to define. Like a famous judge said of pornography, "you know it when you see it". It's also relative (to some extent) to the specific area you live in. Nevertheless, I would say the following characteristics are typical of sprawling environments (but certainly not necessary for them):
1. Sprawl's most remarkable quality is its strict segregation of land uses. Retail properties are usually located along a strip of highway or other busy roads; offices, in a self-standing "office park" with a mowed green campus; industrial, in an "industrial park"; and homes, everywhere else. Homes are almost never located within walking distance to any retail or offices. In some space-constrained areas, a situation arises in which low-income housing nearly abuts retail, but a car is still often the only practical option for reaching it, as fences or other obstructions keep the uses separated (and without walking paths). Civic institutions (especially schools) are usually located off busy highways too, making it practically impossible to walk to the school or post office. Usually the distances between these zones make traveling by private car the only practical way of getting there.
2. As a result, destinations (stores, offices, etc.) in sprawl are designed with the assumption that all who go to them will travel in a private car. This results in endless parking lots, no sidewalks, no or purely ornamental bike racks, and wasteful entrances and exits that are difficult to navigate and illogically located for pedestrians. It also means that commercial and office development in sprawl is concentrated on either free-standing structures or strip malls (essentially free-standing structures themselves), rather than the adjoining buildings of the downtowns of yesteryear.
3. Most homes in new sprawl lie in residential subdivisions created by a independent developers. These subdivisions are self-contained and usually contain only one or two exits / entrances, often onto busy roads. Often they have a strict homeowner's association that serves as a de facto private government.
4. This (like #3) is not a necessary condition of sprawl, nor does it make an otherwise non-sprawling area "sprawl", but in newer and middle-aged sprawl, franchises and chains often make up the majority of the retail and restaurants. Bed, Bath, and Beyond, Home Depot, Chipotle, Panera, Noodles & Co., Appleby's, Buffalo Wild Wings, Cheesecake Company, etc.
These qualities (strict divisions between land uses, automobile-oriented design, self-contained subdivisions) discourage utility pedestrians and cyclists, hence rendering a mortal blow to any "street life". The people you see out walking in sprawl are usually doing so purely for exercise. The perhaps intentional (due largely to laws and land-use restrictions) ultimatum of sprawl is every adult must have a car, and use it to get to any destination outside of their home. Most Americans, interestingly, don't seem to be the least bothered by this, and it has been my experience that even those who do not live in what I would consider "sprawl" use their car for every task and errand as well, even if the convenience store, school, or exercise club is within walking distance.
Last edited by tvdxer; 07-21-2010 at 04:15 PM..
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