11 annotations of studiesonlinepubs.trb.org/onlinepubs/tcrp/tcrp_rpt_39-e.pdf · in this book about...

The Costs of Sprawl–Revisited Land/Natural Habitat Preservation

Rutgers • Brookings • Parsons Brinckerhoff • ECONorthwest 183 TRANSIT COOPERATIVE RESEARCH PROGRAM(TCRP) H-10

CHAPTER

Annotations of Studies

LAND/NATURAL HABITAT PRESERVATION

Land/natural habitat preservation seeksto protect unique lands and environmentsfrom development. Because it is assumedthat this is the most logical and fertile areaof potential improvement by anti-sprawlmeasures, this is often the component ofthe literature that receives the leastempirical and analytical attention. Theliterature collected here for annotationcontains discussions of the importance ofnatural environments to communities andthe potential losses of naturalenvironments to the development process.The annotated literature in this chapter isorganized as follows:

Land Preservation and CommunityCohesion

Land Preservation and Sprawl: EmpiricalStudies

The first category, Land Preservation andCommunity Cohesion, includes the worksof Randall Arendt (1994b, 1996),Constance Beaumont (1994, 1996b,1997), Reid Ewing (1995a), Moe andWilkie (1997), and Arthur Nelson(1992b). The second category, LandPreservation and Sprawl: EmpiricalStudies, includes the works of Robert W.

Burchell (1995a) and John D. Landis(1995).

LAND PRESERVATION ANDCOMMUNITY COHESION

Arendt, Randall et al. 1994b. Rural byDesign. Washington, DC: AmericanPlanning Association.

In this volume, Arendt and his fellowauthors supply the reader with a great dealof material on a broad range of landdesign subjects, selected for theirrelevance to residents and local officials inrural and suburbanizing areas. Theauthor's objective is to present pertinentinformation both to people working andliving in small towns and to ruralplanners. The book's emphasis is ondesign issues, and it provides material thatis not readily available outside oftechnical publications.

The authors work to provide answers tocommonly asked questions, and supplyreaders with numerous examples of ruralresidential and commercial projects thathave used creative design techniques.

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Photographs and schematic site plans areused to show how these viable alternativesto conventional design approaches work.

One section of the book containsextensive information devoted to the"traditional town," in the belief that theserural communities will be able to conservemuch of their remaining character andsense of place only if residents and localofficials gain a fuller understanding ofsome of the basic principals underlyingthe form and the functioning of traditionaltowns. The authors see it as their role toencourage new development thatcomplements, enhances, and builds uponhistoric town patterns.

Arendt, Randall. 1996. ConservationDesign for Subdivisions: A PracticalGuide to Creating Open Space Networks.Washington, DC: Island Press.

Arendt published this book in response tonumerous inquiries concerning two earlierbooks on rural design principles. Readerswanted to know more about thetechniques available to landowners,developers, local officials, andconservation organizations who wereinterested in conserving land in thedevelopment process. They were alllooking for ways that land could beassembled and positioned so thatcommunities could enjoy open space foryears to come.

In this book, Arendt sets out principlesthat are far from novel, but presents themin a way that is easily understood by laypeople. He addresses residentialdevelopment around a central organizingprinciple—land conservation. Hedescribes a way that open space can bearranged so that it will create aninterconnected network of protected lands.Arendt views the "conservation

subdivision" as the key component of thiscommunity-wide system of open space.

Arendt's vision is for land-use planners towork much more closely withconservation professionals, and withdevelopers and landscape architects, tohelp strengthen the "GreenspaceAlliance." The author believes that thiscan be accomplished in a way thatrespects both the rights of landowners andthe equity of developers. According to hisview, developers can build at full densityonly when their design includes meadows,fields, and woodlands that wouldotherwise have been graded, andconverted into house lots and overly widestreets.

Beaumont, Constance. 1996b. SmartStates, Better Communities: How StateGovernments Can Help Citizens PreserveTheir Communities. Washington, DC:National Trust for HistoricPreservation.

In this book about restoring Americancommunities, Beaumont examines the roleof state governments in growthmanagement, especially the way they dealwith several primary aims of the historicpreservation movement, such asprotecting the economic viability ofhistoric downtowns and neighborhoods;preserving the countryside and characterof local communities; and maintaining asense of community. These are oftenexactly the objectives that are thwarted bysprawl-type development, which results inolder community disinvestment, a radicaltransformation of the countryside, and thecreation of "centerless, featurelesssettlement patterns."

Beaumont begins her effort by firstdefining sprawl, and then she explainswhy sprawl creates problems forcommunity livability and historic



preservation. She also examines theeconomic assumptions underlying sprawl-type development, and looks at variousstate policies that aim to manage this typeof growth.

Beaumont, Constance. 1994. HowSuperstore Sprawl Can HarmCommunities—And What Citizens CanDo About It. and 1997. Better Models forSuperstores: Alternatives to Big-BoxSprawl. Washington, DC: NationalTrust for Historic Preservation.

In How Superstore Sprawl Can HarmCommunities, Constance Beaumontlaunches an attack on the increasingpresence of big-box, generic superstorewarehouses (such as those of Wal-Mart,Kmart, etc.), which locate at majorinterchanges at the outskirts ofcommunities.

The author acknowledges that superstoreshave positive impacts. These includecreating jobs, generating tax revenues, andproviding affordable consumer goods.However, she believes that the hiddencosts of these establishments are oftenoverlooked. These hidden costs include:

• shifting retail activity out ofdowntowns and main streets toperipheral areas;

• taking retail spending money awayfrom existing local businesses;

• increasing taxes by requiringinfrastructure and services, such asnew roads, water/sewer lines, andpolice protection, in formerly vacantareas;

• causing abandonment of previouslydeveloped areas;

• homogenizing America by buildingstandardized structures that have norelation to their surroundings;

• increasing automobile dependence andits associated energy consumption andpollution effects.

In the second part of this work, Beaumonthighlights several case studies in whichlocal activists were successful in fendingoff superstore-type developments. Fromthese experiences, Beaumont is able toprovide a series of strategies andrecommendations for other grassrootsorganizations. These include a review ofrelevant local, state, and federal laws thatcan be used against developers; tips forutilizing the media; a review of regulatorytakings and property rights issues; and anaction plan for concerned citizens.

In a companion piece, Better Models forSuperstores, Beaumont reviews cases inwhich traditional big-box retailers chosenontraditional development in structureslocated in downtown.

According to Beaumont, retailers such asTarget (Pasadena, CA), Toys R Us (SantaMonica, CA and Chicago, IL), Wal-Mart(Rutland, VT), Kmart (Manhattan, NY),and others are discovering that stores indowntowns can be profitable. Also, insome cases, the big-box stores are movinginto historic structures that may have beenabandoned for decades.

Beaumont concludes that to effectivelyprevent superstore sprawl, communitiesmust have strong leadership, good designreview mechanisms, defined land-useplans, and aggressive zoning policies.With these elements, communities cannegotiate with retail chains and createalternative development patterns torevitalize the downtown, protect theenvironment, and generate profits forthese national retailers.



Clearly, these writings advocatecontrolling the spread of these types ofretail land uses. Notwithstanding theobvious point of view of the author, thetwo monographs present a significantamount of information on the land-useimplications of superstore development.

Dahl, Thomas E. 1990. Wetlands Lossesin the United States: 1780s-1980s.Washington, DC: U.S. Department ofthe Interior, Fish, and Wildlife Service.

Dahl points out that in colonial America,about 400 million acres of wetlandsexisted; by the 1980s, the wetlandsinventory had dropped to 250 millionacres.

Wetlands occur in every state in the nationin varying size, shape, and type. Variationoccurs because of differences in climate,vegetation, soils, and hydrologicconditions.

Until recently, wetlands were generallyconsidered a hindrance. Swamps, bogs,sloughs, and other wetland areas wereregarded as wastelands, to be drained,filled, or manipulated to "produce"services and commodities. Recently,however, wetlands have come to be seenas vital areas that constitute a productiveand invaluable public resource.

According to Dahl, in order to preventcontinued wetlands losses, developmentmust proceed in an environmentallyresponsible way. Development mustrespect the natural habitats of wetlandsand other sensitive lands or these landswill be lost for all generations.

Ewing, Reid. 1995a. Best DevelopmentPractices: Doing the Right Thing andMaking Money at The Same Time.Chicago: American PlanningAssociation.

Ewing addresses the need for change indevelopment policy and practice givenFlorida's expected rapid growth rates(approximately 5 million people duringthe next 20 years) and given Florida'sdominant development pattern of urbansprawl. Ewing argues that increasingsocial and economic costs will occur dueto the continuation of sprawl. In anattempt to minimize sprawl's costs, theauthor advocates a communitydevelopment process in which publicpurposes are weighed against marketconsiderations. He lists such publicpurposes as affordable housing, energyefficiency, and the preservation of naturalland masses and resources.

Discouraging urban sprawl by creatingvibrant more compact communities meansplacing an emphasis on populationdiversity (age and class), establishingstreet life, creating a sense of place, andestablishing other features that contributeto "livability." Recommendations torealize these goals are presented in theform of "best development" practices,which are meant to be used as a basis fordeveloping comprehensive plans for newcommunities and redevelopment projects,for structuring land developmentregulations, or for evaluating specificdevelopment proposals. Seven newcommunities (planned communitieswithin the 300-500 acre range) arediscussed in reference to his bestdevelopment practices.



Lewis, Peirce F. 1995. "The GalacticMetropolis." In The ChangingAmerican Countryside: Rural Peopleand Places, Emory N. Castle, ed.Lawrence, KS: University of KansasPress.

The author believes the term "suburbansprawl" is a misnomer. Instead, heendorses a concept he terms "metropolitandispersion." He utilizes this term todescribe the disappearance of theboundary between the city and thecountry. Lewis provides two meanings forhis use of "metropolitan." The first refersto the buildings, skyscrapers, parks, andother tangible aspects of the city. Thesecond refers to intangible aspects, suchas the people, institutions, ideas, and theirinteractions within the city's culture.

In the past, according to Lewis, thetangible and intangible aspects of ametropolitan city were intertwined. Lewispoints to major old-world European citieswhich were centers of civil authority,military might, and religious focus. Thearchitecture of these institutions wasdominant and imposing on the city'slandscape, including high defense walls,large palaces, and grandiose cathedrals.While these cities were also centers ofcommerce, this function played asecondary role to the others. Thus,markets flourished inside city walls forsafety and security and in cathedralsquares to attract customers.

In contrast, major American cities wereexclusively centers of commerce. Thecentral square was a market square, andthe largest buildings were officebuildings. Also in contrast to Europeancities, military, educational, and politicalinstitutions were dispersed into smallercommunities outside the urban areainstead of concentrated in the central city.

As a result, Lewis believes, majorAmerican cities were deprived oftraditional metropolitan functions. Theirsingle-minded economic focus alienatedmuch of the regional population andgenerated anti-urban prejudices.Conversely, however, this dispersion ofcentral metropolitan functions enrichednon-urban and rural areas of America.

Over time, through the process ofmetropolitan dispersion, these urban andrural areas of America have begun tomeld. The physical metropolis hasfollowed the cultural metropolis into thecountryside. Lewis names this new urbanform the galactic metropolis.

How did this galactic metropolis arise?The primary factor, according to Lewis,was the widespread use of the automobile.The automobile allowed people to liveoutside the crowded cities. And althoughsuburbs had previously existed, these newsuburbanites discovered that they couldalso work and shop outside the city center.The interstate highway program furthersealed the fate of central cities. High-speed highways made interchanges moreaccessible, more attractive, and lessexpensive than the downtown. In addition,the urban renewal programs of the 1950sand 1960s destroyed the infrastructure andarchitecture of many central cities. Thiscombination of flexible transportation,rapid accessibility, and cheap land luredcommercial and industrial enterprises outof the central city.

In conclusion, Lewis does not devise aplan to reform the new urban structure,realizing that it is not going away. Rather,he counsels that "we must learn to livewith it." In particular, we must learn threethings about the new metropolis: how it isarranged, why it is arranged that way, andhow it works.



Michigan Society of Planning Officials(MSPO). 1995. Patterns on the Land:Our Choices, Our Future. Rochester,MI: Michigan Society of PlanningOfficials.

This report by the Michigan Society ofPlanning Officials (MSPO) reveals that,over the past three decades, Michigan hasexperienced a major population shift tosuburban and rural areas. Sprawl is mostapparent in Southeast Michigan, theGrand Rapids area, and Traverse City, butis also occurring in most of the lower halfof the lower peninsula, and in a number ofnorthern counties.

The study's authors claim that there is agrowing sense of communitydegeneration, manifested by citizens atpublic hearings on land use. The authorswarn that if this pattern of developmentcontinues, certain costs and problems willbe created, including significant publiccapital and maintenance expenditureschanneled to water, sewer, roads, andother infrastructure; the continued declineof urban areas; the loss of jobs in keyresource-based industries such asagriculture, timber harvesting, and miningonce open land is converted to residentialand commercial uses; the loss of theaesthetic appeal of natural open spaces;and the loss of a distinct edge betweencity and country in the developinglandscape.

The authors warn that, although thecurrent pattern can be sustained forseveral decades, the impact on renewableresources and mineral deposits will beirreversible. On a more positive note, thestudy concludes that an informed publiccan achieve a different future throughcoordinated and integrated land useplanning, creative use of new technology,and better information.

Moe, Richard, and Carter Wilkie. 1997.Changing Places: RebuildingCommunity in the Age of Sprawl. NewYork: Henry Holt.

The authors begin with the premise thatmost of America's communities (new aswell as old; suburban and rural as well asinner city) are not functioning as theyshould. There are a number of reasons forthis, but Moe and Wilkie stress the factthat the leaders and residents of thesecommunities have either made badchoices, allowed bad choices to be madefor them, or made no choices at all. Theyclaim that communities can be "shaped bychoice" or they can be "shaped bychance." In other words, we can continueto accept the communities we get, or wecan insist on getting the kind ofcommunities we want.

Moe and Wilkie assert that the design ofmost contemporary Americancommunities is largely determined byhighway engineers and superstoredevelopers. They have stepped into thevoid left by public officials (who areeither resigned to, or eager for, this kindof development) and by citizens—who areeither complacent or feel powerless.Communities are built in a series of steps,each one so apparently logical orinnocuous that it goes unchallenged. Theresult, as the authors point out, is rampantsprawl, a phenomenon that has reducedthe social and economic vitality oftraditional communities and filledmillions of acres of farmland and openspace with "formless, soulless, structuresunconnected to one another except bytheir inevitable dependence on theautomobile."

Moe and Wilkie put forth two alternativesto sprawl: (1) better planning of how weuse our land; and (2) the use (or reuse) ofthe capacity of older neighborhoods,towns, and downtowns to a greater extent



than they are used currently. Bothalternatives, claim the authors, areessential if we are to successfully managegrowth and contain sprawl before itbankrupts society and local economies.

Nelson, Arthur C. 1992b. "PreservingPrime Farmland in the Face ofUrbanization: Lessons from Oregon"Journal of the American PlanningAssociation 58: 471-488.

This article first reviews Oregon'seffective combination of policies topreserve prime farmland despite intenseurbanization pressures. It then proceeds topropose a scheme for comprehensivefarmland preservation, building onOregon's successes and mistakes.

Prime farmland near urban areas isrequired for three important reasons: theproduction of truck and specialty crops;the provision of key environmentalfunctions such as flood water absorption,air cleansing, and water filtration; and foropen space protection and the provision ofspatial definition to urban areas.

Communities in every state haveimplemented farmland preservationtechniques, with varying degrees ofsuccess. According to the author, for apolicy to be successful, it must influencethe land market in the several differentways. It must increase the productivevalue of farmland; it must stabilize,reduce, or eliminate the value of thefarmland tract as a single-family homesite(the consumptive value); it must removethe speculative value of farmland; and itmust eliminate the impermanencesyndrome.

According to Nelson, property tax reliefprograms reduce the property tax farmerspay for urban and educational serviceswhich mostly benefit urban residents. As a

result, this policy subsidizes housing costsand turns farmers into speculators. Right-to-farm laws protect farmers fromnuisance complaints from urban residents.However, although farmers usually wintheir legal battles, they often lose becauseof the heavy financial expense of theprocess. Transfer of development rights(TDR) and purchase of development rights(PDR) programs preserve farmland bycompensating farm owners formaintaining their farmland. However,these programs often fail because theprograms are randomly applied andusually result in isolated farmland tractsbeing surrounded by urban development.A final common strategy, agriculturalzoning, restricts land uses to farming andother open space activities. Non-exclusionary agricultural zoning alsorestricts lot sizes to certain minimums.Smaller minimum lot sizes (higherdensities) usually result in a form ofdevelopment called rural sprawl. As aresult, nonexclusive agricultural zoning isgenerally effective only when large lotsize requirements (160-acre-minimum)are coupled with strict developmentreview.

Exclusive agricultural zones, on the otherhand, restrict all non-farm activities andrequire that farmland be used forcommercial activities. This strategy canbe effective only when all prime farmlandis zoned for exclusive agricultural use andurban development pressures are divertedto other areas.

Oregon has implemented a statewideprogram to preserve farmland in theWillamette Valley. This 4,000-square-mile valley contains one-third of thestate's prime farmland; produces 40percent of the state's agricultural products;and houses more than two-thirds of thestate's population.

Oregon's farmland preservation plan doesnot rely on a single strategy. Rather, it



employs a multifaceted approachconsisting of exclusive agriculturaldistricts, urban growth boundaries,development restrictions in exurban areas,farm use tax deferrals, and right-to-farmprovisions. Data from the 1987 Census ofAgriculture suggest that Oregon's policiesare working. They are preserving a viableagricultural economy whileaccommodating a craze for hobby farms.

The effectiveness of Oregon's efforts canbe further analyzed by comparingdevelopments in Oregon with those innearby Washington, a state without astatewide farmland preservation plan.Oregon has lost more small farms thanWashington, but it has gained more largerfarms (over 500 acres), more commercialfarms (over $10,000 in earnings), andmore total farm acreage.

According to the author, a successfulfarmland preservation plan relies onmultiple techniques and strategies thatwork together and reinforce each other.

LAND PRESERVATION ANDSPRAWL: EMPIRICAL STUDIES

Burchell, Robert W., and David Listokin.1995a. Land, Infrastructure, HousingCosts, and Fiscal Impacts Associated withGrowth: The Literature on the Impacts ofSprawl versus Managed Growth. Paperprepared for "Alternatives to Sprawl"Conference, Brookings Institution,Washington, DC. March.

This short summary paper reviews themajor studies on sprawl through 1995. Itdraws heavily upon the research done bythe same authors for the State of NewJersey, as well as the work of JamesDuncan and James Frank in Florida. Thispaper, however, was prepared beforeBurchell's studies of Lexington

(Kentucky), the Delaware Estuary,Michigan, and South Carolina werereleased. The paper examines theimplications of planned developmentversus more traditional decentralizeddevelopment in the areas of landconsumption, infrastructure costs, housingcosts, and fiscal impacts.

Most of the studies reviewed in the papercontrast sprawl with at least one otherdevelopment pattern. Sprawl is describedas development that typically includessubdivision-style residential developmentand strip nonresidential developmentconsisting of skipped-over, noncontiguousland development, including low-densityresidential and low floor-area rationonresidential developments. In contrast,planned development is described asseeking to contain new growth aroundexisting centers and limiting developmentin rural and sensitive environmental areas,usually accomplished by increasing theshare and density of development close into existing development.

The growth analyzed in this paper isassumed to consist of household growththat in turn leads to job growth, whichrequires additional land. Ideally, thisgrowth and the provision of facilities toaccommodate it are handled in a timely,harmonious manner.

Traditional growth is shown to departfrom the most harmonious possible pathby locating residential and otherdevelopment in "a new outer ring of themetropolitan area with access from thisnew outer ring oriented increasingly to abeltway or interstate [highway] rather thancentral core job locations." Increasingunder-utilization of core land andinfrastructures result. This process isassociated with the development of "edgecities," which, in turn, generate a newfarther-out ring of bedroom residential



subdivisions. "The core of themetropolitan area, absent redevelopment,becomes relatively abandoned by a varietyof necessary and blue-chip economicactivities and a home by default for poorresidents who cannot follow ... or are notallowed to follow upper-income residentsto the suburbs (because of zoning). Evenwith redevelopment, the central core is astruggling entity with no soft-goods retailanchors, no quality supermarkets or movietheaters, a declining upwardly mobilepopulation, public school systems beingreplaced by private, and increasinglyhigher property taxes to pay for risingpublic service costs" (3).

Traditional growth is costly because newinfrastructure must be provided for thosehouseholds and businesses located far out,and the old infrastructure must bemaintained for those left behind. Yet inthe short run, traditional growth is not badfor a region. It distributes firms andhouseholds to localities that minimizeindividual out-of-pocket costs. Noconsideration is given to the largersocietal costs or impacts of theseindividual choices.

The alternative development pattern ofplanned growth channels the growth tomore efficient locations over the long run.Most of the far-out growth which arises intraditional development is containedcloser to existing infrastructure and built-up areas. Thus, "in the final equation ...there is a more orderly and less wastefulrelationship between old and newdevelopment" (5).

Another goal of planned development isthe conservation of open space (i.e.,agricultural land, forests, andenvironmentally sensitive areas). TheNew Jersey analysis compares the impactsof development in New Jersey for theperiod 1990 to 2010 under two

development scenarios—TREND versusPLAN. The authors developed a series ofmodels to examine the relative effects ofeach scenario.

They found that more than enough landexisted statewide to accommodate theprojected twenty-year development (1990-2010) of persons, households, andemployees under both traditional(TREND) and managed (PLAN) growth.The authors estimated that developmentunder TREND would consume 292,100acres, whereas PLAN could accommodatethe same level of growth but wouldconsume only 117,600 acres—175,000fewer acres than the alternative (Burchellet al. 1992b). PLAN's overall landdrawdown was 60 percent less thanTREND.

Managed growth would also offer theenvironmental advantage of preservinggreater levels of frail and agriculturallands. If historical rates of loss areprojected into the future, under TREND36,500 acres of frail lands would beconsumed for development during the 20-year period. By contrast, under PLAN,frail and agricultural consumption dropsto 7,150 acres, only 20 percent of theTREND scenario. In other words,managed growth in New Jersey couldaccommodate future development and atthe same time, save more than 30,000acres of frail environmental lands. In asimilar vein, although development underTREND would consume 108,000agricultural acres between 1990 and 2010,under PLAN, only 66,000 agriculturalacres would be drawn down, representinga savings of 42,000 acres, or 40 percent ofprime agricultural land.



Diamond, Henry L., and Noonan,Patrick F. 1996. Land Use in America.Washington, DC: Island Press.

In this compilation of papers, essays, andvignettes, the authors and a dozencontributors argue that better land use isessential to the health and well-being ofAmericans and their communities. Usingthe nation's land well yields many benefitsincluding cleaner air and water, and bettertowns and neighborhoods in which to live.The management of land, however, hasbeen largely neglected in this country dueto its highly politicized character and theconfused nature of its regulatory structure.In an effort to rectify this wantingsituation, the authors advocate a newpolitical agenda:

1. Local communities must define avision for the future by enlisting allsectors in devising land-use plans, andthen executing those plans withgreater efficiency and flexibility.

2. States must establish greater rules forland-use planning and provideleadership to encourage communitiesto deal with complex regionalproblems.

3. Rules governing the use of land mustbecome more adaptable whileensuring predictability to developers.

4. The rights of landowners must betaken seriously.

5. Cooperation among agencies andcoordination among policies areessential to achieving better land-usepractices.

6. A federal trust fund for assistingacquisition is needed to provide statesand local jurisdictions with funds andpredictability so they can plan ahead.

7. To redevelop vacant and deterioratingareas, a clearing of the regulatorythicket is needed, especially thoserules that unnecessarily encumber thereuse of land with a history ofhazardous wastes.

8. Private initiatives for conservation andquality development requireincentives; relief from regulationsshould be exchanged for efforts toenhance natural habitats.

9. Land trusts are an effective means offocusing upon geographic features ofa landscape and must be encouragedas a means for citizen collaboration inthe next century.

10. Land disputes should be resolvedthrough negotiation or mediation,perhaps in conjunction withgeographic information system tools.

This book is a self-described call foraction. The authors intend it to be arallying cry for land stewardship, qualitydevelopment, and environmental progress.They call for the American public and itsleaders to make a commitment to goodland-use practices and to pursue an agendafor the next century that would improveland use, much as the environmentalagenda of the past quarter century haslargely accomplished its goals.

Landis, John D. 1995. "Imagining LandUse Futures: Applying the CaliforniaUrban Futures Model." Journal of theAmerican Planning Association 61, 4(Autumn): 438-457.

This article explains how the CaliforniaUrban Futures (CUF) Model, a secondgeneration metropolitan planning model,works to help planners and otherindividuals create and compare alternativeland use policies. Landis demonstrateshow the model simulates the impacts ofregional and subregional growth policyand planning alternatives.

He expends much effort explaining thedesign principles and logic of the CUFmodel, and in presenting CUF modelsimulation results of three alternatives for



growth policy and land-use planning forthe San Francisco Bay and Sacramentoareas. The three alternatives offered are a)"business-as-usual"; b) "maximumenvironmental protection"; and c) a"compact cities" scenario. Eachalternative is evaluated for its impact onoverall land consumption and theconsumption of environmentally sensitivelands in particular, at the county level.

Alternatives (b) and (c) show considerableoverall land savings and considerablesavings in environmentally sensitive landsrelative to the business-as-usual scenario.Total land saved in scenarios (b) and (c)were 15,000 and 46,000 acres,respectively. Redirected growth in scenario(b) saved nearly 60,000 acres of primeagricultural land, 10,500 acres of wetlands,and 3,000 acres of steep sloped land;scenario (c) saved 29,000 acres of prime

agricultural land, 10,500 acres of wetlands,and 8,000 acres of steep sloped lands.

Landis believes that the CUF modelbreaks new ground in that it incorporatesGIS software to assemble, manage,display, and make available millions ofpieces of information about landdevelopment potential. The CUF modelalso recognizes the role of land developersand home builders in determining thepattern, location, and density of newdevelopment. Finally, the CUF model isadept at incorporating realistic localdevelopment policies and options into thegrowth forecasting process. It serves asimilar purpose as the Rutgers LandConsumption Model in that it specifiesgrowth alternatives as a beginning pointfor all subsequent infrastructure analyses.

The Costs of Sprawl–Revisited Quality of Life


CHAPTER


QUALITY OF LIFE

Quality of life reflects how we feelabout our environments. Those who areconcerned about living environmentsobject to sprawl's loss of a sense of placeand mourn the loss of uniqueenvironments. In this atmosphere, cities ofscale are no longer viable, andreplacement suburbs have no sense ofidentity. As "place" has becomeincreasingly important to businesses andindividuals, ratings of places have grownin the literature. Some of these areempirically based, whereas others merelyreflect the opinions of raters. Place ratingsand their limitations are a focus of thischapter.

Quality of life as a subject also hassignificant contributions from the fields ofeconomics, sociology, and psychology.Attempting to catalog these contributionswould dominate any compilation ofannotations. These contributions are justbriefly touched upon here.

The presentation of information in thischapter is as follows:

Popular LiteratureIndicators, Reports Cards, and

BenchmarksEconomics Literature

Sociology LiteraturePsychology Literature

In the Popular Literature section, MoneyMagazine's "Best Places to Live inAmerica," Fortune Magazine's "BestCities: Where the Living is Easy," and thePlaces Rated Almanac are commentedupon.

In the Indicators, Report Cards, andBenchmarks section, works by DowellMyers (1987) and the Oregon ProgressBoard (1994) are included. In theEconomics Literature section, works byN. E. Duffy (1994), Stuart Gabriel (1996),and Priscilla Salant et al. (1996) areincluded. In the Sociology and Psychologysections, works by David Popenoe (1979)and Oleg Zinam (1989) are found.

POPULAR LITERATURE

Fried, Carla, Leslie M. Marable, andSheryl Nance-Nash. 1996. "Best Placesto Live In America." Money (July): 66-95.

Money magazine publishes an annualranking of "the Best Places to Live inAmerica" that includes the country's 300largest metropolitan areas. To determine

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the rankings, Money first surveys itssubscribers and asks them to rate 41quality-of-life factors. The magazine thencollects data on specific measures for the300 cities and assigns the data to ninebroad categories: crime, economy, health,housing, education, weather, leisure, artsand culture, and transportation. The dataare then weighted according to readers'preferences to produce the final ranking.

The top 10 quality-of-life characteristics,as rated by Money subscribers, are lowcrime rate, clean water, clear air, plentifuldoctors, many hospitals, housingappreciation, good schools, low propertytaxes, low income taxes, and strong stategovernment. Money points out, however,that the rating of quality-of-lifecharacteristics differs by gender and bytype of household.

Although informative, the Money rankingdoes have some drawbacks. Since thesurvey results are based on a poll ofreaders, the results are probably notrepresentative of the U.S. population ingeneral. Furthermore, Money does notreveal enough about its specific measuresor scoring method to assess whether itsrankings accurately reflect the surveyresults. In addition, because the surveyasks Money subscribers to rate only 41quality-of-life characteristics, it may notinclude every characteristic that readersthink are important. Overall, however, thisarticle provides insight into how the topicof quality of life is typically treated in thepopular literature.

Hall, Bob, and Mary Lee Kerr. 1991.1991-1992 Green Index: A State-By-State Guide to the Nation'sEnvironmental Health. Washington,DC: Island Press.

Drawing from a variety of private andpublic data sources, the Green Index uses256 indicators to measure and rank each

state's environmental health. Theindicators encompass a broad range ofenvironmental conditions and are groupedinto eight major categories: air sickness;water pollution; energy use and autoabuse; toxic, hazardous, and solid waste;community and workplace health; farms,forests, fish and fun; congressionalleadership; and state policy initiatives.Based on these indicators, the authorsidentify the best and worst states overall.

Landis, John D. and David S. Sawicki.1988. "A Planner's Guide to the PlacesRated Almanac." Journal of theAmerican Planning Association(Summer): 336-346.

In this 1988 critique of the Places RatedAlmanac (1985 edition), the authors pointout that the essential problem with thecomponent measures used to rank placesis that they have not been tested againstthe stated opinions of migrants or againstobserved migration behavior. The authorsalso cite an article that compared overallmetropolitan scores (not rankings) in thePlaces Rated Almanac with a nonrandomsample of households and finds that onlyfour of the nine categories included in theAlmanac are actually statisticallysignificant to migration decisions. Thesefour categories are: housing costs, crime,education, and recreation. The authorsalso compare category rankings for 51metropolitan areas in Places RatedAlmanac with migration patterns between1975 and 1980. This comparison findsthat the rankings of housing cost andeconomic opportunity are significantlycorrelated with rates of in-migration.

Landis and Sawicki point out, however,that the Places Rated Almanac assumesthat a person's quality of life is criticallyrelated to the qualities of the place wherehe or she lives or works. Research,however, indicates that most individualsrank personal causes of satisfaction and



dissatisfaction as much more importantdeterminants of their quality of life thangeographical factors.

Precourt, Geoffrey and Anne Faircloth.1996. "Best Cities: Where the Living isEasy." Fortune (November 11): 126-136.

This article identifies the 15 best U.S.cities and the five best international citiesfor work and family. Much of the article isdevoted to qualitative descriptions of thebest cities, with little explanation of themethods used for the rankings. Among thevariables considered are the crime rate,quality of schools, availability of culture,traffic congestion, number of doctors, taxrates, price of real estate, and costs of amartini and a first-run movie. The articlecontains a table showing the attributes ofthe cities in the following six categories:

Demographics: Measured by 1996population, projected percentagechange in population 1996-2001,median household income, andpercentage of population withbachelor's degree

Cost of living: Measured by the cost ofliving index, high-end housing price,low-end housing rent, and the cost of aloaf of French bread and a martini

Business: Measured by percentageemployed in managerial positions,Class A office rental rate, best businesshotel, recommended restaurant, andaverage commute time

Leisure: Measured by the number of artmuseums, public libraries, and 18-holegolf courses, as well as the most-visited attraction

Climate: Measured by the number of daysbelow 32 degrees, above 90 degrees,and incidence of poor air quality

Quality of Life: Measured by violentcrime rate and doctors per capita

Savageau, David, and Richard Boyer.1993. Places Rated Almanac. New York:Macmillan Travel.

The authors use an extensive set of criteriato rank 343 U.S. and Canadianmetropolitan areas by ten categories.These categories, with their specificcomponent measures are:

Costs of Living: average house price, thecost of utilities, property taxes, collegetuition, the cost of food at home, thecost of health care, and the cost oftransportation, all indexed relative tothe U.S. average

Jobs: the number and percent increase innew jobs

Housing: annual payment for average-priced home

Transportation: commute time, and thecost of mass transit, nationalhighways, airline service, andpassenger rail service

Education: number of students enrolled incommunity or two-year colleges andprivate and public four-year orgraduate-level institutions

Health Care: number of general/familypractitioners, specialists, short-termhospital beds, and hospitals

Crime: violent crime and property crimerates

The Arts: number of concert or classical-format radio stations, touring artistsbookings (classical music, dance,professional theatre), resident artscompanies (classical music, ballet,professional theatre), nonprofit artmuseums/galleries, and public librarycollections

Recreation: number of public golf courses,good restaurants, movie theatrescreens, zoos, aquariums, and familytheme parks; incidence of parimutualbetting, professional and collegesporting events, ocean or Great



Lakes coastlines, national forests,national parks, national wildliferefuges, and state parks

Climate: number of very hot and coldmonths, seasonal temperaturevariation, heating- and cooling-degreedays, freezing days, zero-degree days,90-degree days

Each of the measures is converted into ascore. The scores are then summed to rankmetropolitan areas in each category. Thescoring method implicitly weighs thespecific measures and describes therelationship between the measure andquality of life.

The ranks in each category are thensummed for an overall score that is usedto rank the metropolitan areas. Eachcategory has equal weight in the overallranking, however, the authors discuss howthe reader can use his or her personalpreferences to weight the categories to geta personalized overall ranking ofmetropolitan areas.

Although this book puts forth a commonsense and anecdotal notion of quality oflife, it provides no theoreticalunderpinning or review of relevantliterature. The authors' scoring systemimplicitly weights the various measureswith no apparent basis other than theirown opinion. The book clearlyacknowledges that individuals will havedifferent preferences and unsuccessfullyattempts to provide a method of weightingcategories to reflect individualpreferences.

INDICATORS, REPORT CARDS,AND BENCHMARKS

Andrews, James H. 1996. "Going by theNumbers." Planning (September) 14-18.

Many states, cities, and hamlets useindicators to measure their own economicand social health, and to set future goals.This article takes a look at these indicatorswhich are often referred to as"benchmarks" or "vital signs." Localgovernments often create these measures,but they are sometimes developed bycommunity groups. All indicator projectsdiscussed in this article used some publicprocess to identify specific measures.Certain indicator projects have a specificfocus, such as government performance orthe environment; others are morecomprehensive. Three examples are listedbelow.

Jacksonville, Florida developed a Qualityof Life index in 1985 and updates theindex annually. A 1991 communityreview of the index revealed education asthe community's top priority. The othercategories in the index include theeconomy, public safety, naturalenvironment, health, social environment,government and politics, culture andrecreation, and mobility. Specificmeasures used in the index include thenumber of outdoor sign permits issued,the cost of 1,000 kwh of electricity,student fitness test scores in 50thpercentile or better, and reports ofcommute times of less than 25 minutes.Jacksonville has recently developed anequity index that provides a neighbor-hood-level looks at measures from theQuality of Life index related to delivery ofpublic services, such as police responsetimes.

• "Sustainable Seattle" is an indicatorproject focused on the region'slongterm cultural, economic,



environmental, and social health andvitality. The project has developed aset of indicators with the headings"environment," "population andresources," "economy," "youth andeducation," and "health andcommunity." Specific measures usedto determine quality of life include theincidence of wild salmon, VMT andfuel consumption, amount of workrequired to pay for basic needs, ethnicdiversity of teachers, and asthmahospitalization rate for children.

• The Upper Valley 2001 project in theupper Connecticut River valley hasdeveloped a list of indicators with 15categories, including citizenship,community, communications,education, recreation, health care,personal and public safety, humanservices, the arts, transportation,businesses, farms and forests, resourceuse, and the natural environment.

The goal of all these indicators is tochange policy and to move the measuresin positive directions. Change, the authorpoints out, does happen, but often on anad hoc basis.

Myers, Dowell. 1987. "InternalMonitoring of Quality of Life forEconomic Development." EconomicDevelopment Quarterly 1: 238-278.

Quality of life is recognized as animportant factor in economicdevelopment, but its exact role and themethods for measuring it are poorlyunderstood. The author identifies fourmajor limitations to developing quality oflife measures to compare cities or regions:poor availability of comparable objectivedata; lack of subjective data necessary foraddressing this inherently subjectivetopic; inability to address unique localfeatures; and the difficulties in choosing

commonly valued weights for combiningdifferent components in overall indexes.This article argues for the monitoring ofquality of life within a city or region as animportant complement to externalcomparisons. Internal monitoring canmeasure changes in local quality of lifeover time to guard against deterioration ofcompetitive advantages in the future.

Myers cites Austin, Texas as an exampleof a place where quality of lifecharacteristics have played an importantrole in the city's development. Austin hasrelied on its quality of life to attract high-technology firms. Locals are nowconcerned that rapid development,particularly suburban "silicon strips," willcause the city's quality of life to decline,and with it, the city's attractiveness tothose high-tech firms.

Austin's quality of life was a major factorin the location decision of one high-techfirm and an explicit element in the formaloffer to the firm to locate in the city. Tenquality-of-life advantages were itemized:excellent schools, parks and playgrounds;ease of mobility around the city; close-bylakes for water recreation; otheropportunities for hunting, fishing, andcamping; access within two-hours flyingto Colorado skiing and Mexicanvacations; abundant cultural andentertainment possibilities; general clean-liness of the city; attractive topographyand mild year-round climate; and an"open, receptive social structure, apopulation long noted for friendliness, anda reputation as a desirable place to liveand raise children."

Accelerated growth triggered by thehigh-tech firm's move to Austin producednegative consequences for quality of life,including decreased housingaffordability, traffic congestion, threatsto the area's water quality and natural



environment, and the perception thatdowntown office development threatenedthe city's music scene. Theseconsequences were perceived locally to becaused by unmanaged development.

In reaction, the Austin Chamber ofCommerce began a research program tomeasure trends in the area's quality of life.Leaders of interest groups wereinterviewed to identify significant aspectsof Austin's quality of life; measures forthese aspects were developed, andresidents surveyed about the importanceof these measures in their perceivedquality of life. It was determined thatresidents placed more importance onconcerns such as crime, cost of living,schools, traffic, and jobs, than they did onamenities such as shopping, restaurants,and entertainment. Sixty-two percent ofrecent migrants identified quality of life asan important factor in attracting them toAustin.

Oregon Progress Board. 1994. OregonBenchmarks: Standards for MeasuringStatewide Progress and InstitutionalPerformance. Report to the 1995Legislature. Salem, OR: OregonProgress Board. December.

The Oregon Progress Board is a part ofthe State of Oregon's EconomicDevelopment Department. Oregon"Benchmarks for Quality of Life" aremeasurable indicators used at thestatewide level to assess the state'sprogress toward broad strategic goals. Thecategories and subcategories of measuresused for the benchmarks include:

Unspoiled Natural Environment: air,water, land, plants/fish/wildlife, andoutdoor recreation

Developed Communities that areConvenient, Affordable, Accessible,and Environmentally Sensitive:

community design, transportation,housing, access for persons withdisabilities, access betweencommunities, and emergencypreparedness

Communities that are Safe, Enriching,and Civic Minded, with Access toEssential Services: public safety,justice, access to cultural enrichment,sense of community, access to healthcare, and access to child care.

Other measure have been devised as"Benchmarks for People" and"Benchmarks for the Economy."

ECONOMICS LITERATURE

Duffy, N. E. 1994. "The Determinantsof State Manufacturing Growth Rates:A Two-Digit-Level Analysis." Journalof Regional Science 34 (2): 137-162.

This examination of the nation'smanufacturing industries illustrates thepotential importance of amenities andtheir impact on migration patterns. Duffyobserves that, "One of the most noticeableeconomic phenomena of this century hasbeen the change in the regionaldistribution of manufacturing." Duffyexamines the factors related to interstatedifferences in the growth of employmentin 19 manufacturing industries between1954 and 1987. He finds that for four ofthe 19 industries, the pattern ofemployment growth was directly relatedto amenities. In the study, amenities arerepresented by two variables: one thatdistinguishes states with a warm climatefrom those with a cold climate; andanother that identifies the states thatexhibit both a high population of retireesand high in-migration rates. Duffy alsofinds that 18 of the industries studied hadshifted closer to their product markets and16 had shifted closer to workers.



Gabriel, Stuart A., Joe P. Mattey, andWilliam L. Wascher. 1996.Compensating Differentials andEvolution of the Quality-of-Life AmongU.S. States. San Francisco: FederalReserve Bank of San Francisco. 96-07.June.

This article examines how changes in thequality and quantity of amenities cancontribute to the evolution of quality oflife over time and across places; in sodoing it extends the existing "static"literature on regional differences inquality of life. The article providesestimates of quality of life rankings forU.S. states over the period 1981-1990.

Results indicate that sparsely populatedmountainous western states such asMontana and Wyoming, rank highly in theestimated quality of life throughout thedecade, whereas densely populatedmidwestern and eastern states consistentlyrank near the bottom in terms of quality oflife. Reduced state and local governmentspending on highways, increased trafficcongestion, and air pollution are found tobe the most important contributors to thedeterioration of quality of life. States thatascended in the quality of life rankings didso for a variety of reasons, includingimproved air quality, increased highwayspending, reduced commuting times, andreduced state and local taxes.

Gottlieb, Paul D. 1995. "ResidentialAmenities, Firm Location andEconomic Development." Urban Studies32, 9: 1413-1436.

In this article, Gottlieb investigateswhether residential amenities caninfluence the locational decisions of high-tech firms in New Jersey. In order todetermine whether firms evaluateamenities on behalf of potentialemployees, Gottlieb measures a variety of

amenities at both the potential site of thefirm and the residential area wherepotential employees are likely to live.Results of the study suggest that firms inthe high-tech sector are repelled bydisamenities like violent crime and highmunicipal expenditures at the work site.However, Gottlieb finds weak evidence tosupport his hypothesis that residentialamenities, such as recreation, low trafficcongestion, and strong public education,affect the locational decisions of high-techfirms.

Greenwood, Michael J., Gary L. Hunt,Dan S. Rickman, and George I. Treyz.1991. "Migration, RegionalEquilibrium, and the Estimation ofCompensating Differentials." AmericanEconomic Review 81, 5: 1382-1390.

This study examines the patterns ofmigration across the fifty states andattempts to determine the relativestrengths of two primary motives thatworkers and households have for moving:(1) to earn a higher wage (adjusted fordifferences among the states in the costsof living); and (2) to have access to theparticular amenities of the individualstates. Based on migration patterns for1971-87, the authors estimate thedifferential in wages for each state,relative to a national average, that isrelated to amenities.

Roback, Jennifer. 1982. "Wages, Rents,and the Quality of Life." Journal ofPolitical Economy 90, 6: 1257-1278.

Roback investigates the role of wages andrents in allocating workers to locationswith varying quantities of amenities, boththeoretically and empirically. Robackfinds that regional differences in wagesand land rents are largely explained byregional differences in amenities. Theresults of her empirical work indicate that



crime, pollution, and cold weather aredisamenities, while clear days and lowpopulation density are amenities.Amenities will decrease wages andincrease land rents; disamenities willincrease wages and decrease land rents.

Rosen, Sherwin. 1979. "Wage-BasedIndexes of Urban Quality of Life." InPeter Mieszkowski and MahlonStraszheim, eds., Current Issues inUrban Economics. Baltimore: JohnsHopkins University Press.

Rosen examines the determinants ofintercity wage differentials for 19 SMSAs.He finds that particulates, rain, crime,population growth, and unemployment aredisamenities; whereas sunny days areamenities. Using regression estimates, hedeveloped, Rosen computes an averagequality-of-life ranking for the 19 SMSAs.Not surprisingly, he finds that the SMSAswith the highest average quality of liferankings in general exhibit less pollution,better climate, and lower crime rates thanthe SMSAs with the lowest rankings. Hecautions the reader, however, that therankings of the SMSAs may be altereddepending on the weight given to thevarious city attributes, especiallypopulation density.

Salant, Priscilla, Lisa R. Carley, andDon A. Dillman. 1996. Estimating theContribution of Lone Eagles to Metroand Nonmetro In-Migration. Pullman,WA: Social & Economic SciencesResearch Center, Washington StateUniversity. 86-19. June.

The main objective of this study is todetermine to what extent decisions tomove to the state of Washington andsubsequent employment are influenced bythe availability and the use of informationtechnology in the state. The study also

investigates the push and pull factors thatcontribute to a migrant's decision to move.

The study estimates that 2,600 so-calledlone eagles—individuals who are able tolive anywhere and telecommute to work—moved to Washington in 1995 and thatmany of them did so for quality of lifereasons. The most influential pull factorsthat lone eagles cited included the qualityof the natural environment, outdoorrecreational opportunities, a desirableclimate, and a safe place to live.Influential push factors included urbancongestion, undesirable climate, and fearof crime.

von Reichert, Christiane, and GundarsRudzitis. 1992. "Multinomial LogisticalModels Explaining Income Changes ofMigrants to High-Amenity Counties."Review of Regional Studies 22, 1: 25-42.

This article uses a survey of migrants to,and residents of, 15 high-amenitywilderness counties to determine whatfactors can explain the migrants'willingness to accept declines in incomeafter moving. Survey respondents wereasked about their dissatisfaction/satisfaction with their previous location(push factors) and the importance ofcertain attributes in their destinationcounty in their migration decision (pullfactors).

On the push side, such factors asenvironmental quality, pace of life,crime, scenery, and the lack of outdoorrecreation in their previous locationsproduced higher levels of dissatisfactionthan did the employment opportunitiesand cost of living there. In a similarmanner, survey respondents placed moreimportance on such pull factors asenvironmental quality, scenery, outdoorrecreation, and other natural resourceamenities in their new locations than they



did on employment opportunities and costof living.

The study finds that approximately half ofthe surveyed migrants received lowerincomes and that quality of life andamenities were more important factors inattracting migrants to the counties thanemployment opportunities.

SOCIOLOGY LITERATURE

Popenoe, David. 1979. "Urban Sprawl:Some Neglected SociologicalConsiderations." Sociology and SocialResearch 63, 2: 255-68.

Urban sprawl is defined by the author asvery low-density urban development,oriented to the automobile, with detachedsingle-family houses on relatively largelots. For Popenoe, urban sprawl implies ascatteration of jobs, shops, and services,often in the form of strip commercialdevelopment; a scarcity of large open orgreen spaces; and a lack of communityfocus in both the physical and socialsense. Despite its negative image,however, he points out that mostAmericans live in environmentscharacterized by urban sprawl.

Many Americans, including somesociologists, see urban sprawl as desirablewhen compared to crowded, noisy,violent, and corrupt cities. Urban sprawlgives the individual more space, increasedsafety, more privacy, and a piece of landto call one's own. Urban sprawl, however,has been attacked as expensive and asignificant user of natural resources,especially land and gasoline. This articleexamines the effects on residents of livingin low-density, suburban residentialenvironments. Since the positiveconsequences of suburban living are

reasonably well known, this article isdevoted instead to the negativeconsequences.

Four negative consequences have beenfairly well-documented by sociologists:1. Low-density suburban development

has led to an intensification ofresidential segregation by race andsocial class.

2. The benefits of urban sprawl aredistributed regressively with respect towealth.

3. Of all the alternative forms of urbanexpansion, urban sprawl is the onethat is most destructive to the centercity.

4. Although not an inherent consequenceof low-density development, urbansprawl, when linked up withAmerica's small scale,semiautonomous local governments,has led to the proliferation offragmented and overlappinggovernmental units.

The negative consequences of urbansprawl appear most tangible whenconsidering the situations of five groups:women, teenagers, the poor, the elderly,and the handicapped. The author statesthat "it is hard to escape the conclusionthat urban sprawl is an urban developmentform designed by and for men, especiallymiddle-class men." Urban sprawlfunctions best when a resident has regularand direct access to an automobile, andmiddle-class men have more access to anautomobile than the people in the fivegroups listed above. Furthermore, a majornegative consequence of urban sprawl isdeprivation of access. Even wherecommunity facilities and services arepresent and people can afford to use them,a large percentage of the population isdisenfranchised from their use, due toinadequate transportation.



A closely related negative consequence isenvironmental deprivation from adeficiency of local elements that provideactivity, stimulation, and well-being. Thisconsequence applies particularly toteenagers. The walking environment ofthe low-density American suburb isvirtually the sole environment for theteenage resident. Yet in this environmenthomes are often placed so far apart thataccess to local friends is difficult.Moreover, there is little diversity orvariety of activities. The best amenity thatusually is offered is a shopping center, orperhaps a fast-food restaurant, whereteenagers are often made to feelunwelcome if they just hang out.

Popenoe mentions other potential negativeconsequences, including "sensoryunderload" and the "fall of public man."He also points out that the suburban trendof differentiation of residential areas bystages in the life cycle—with families,single adults, and the elderly inhabitingentirely separate neighborhoods—breaksup the "round of life" and may havenegative consequences for young people.

PSYCHOLOGY LITERATURE

Zinam, Oleg. 1989. "Quality of Life,Quality of the Individual, Technologyand Economic Development." AmericanJournal of Economics and Sociology 48,1: 55-68.

This article relates Maslow's (1970)"hierarchy of needs" to components ofquality of life. These needs and thecorresponding components are:1. Physical—safety of natural habitat2. Peace—security3. Physiological—material well-being4. Reputation, Love, Belongingness—

social harmony and justice5. Independence—freedom, human

rights, and dignity6. Collective Self-actualization—cultural

heritage and consensus on values7. Personal Self-actualization—moral

perfection

It is now generally accepted that there is adirect positive relationship betweenquality of life and quality of the person;that a higher quality of life improves thequality of the person in a self-reinforcingmanner. But there is also ample evidenceof the possibility of an inverserelationship—i.e., a higher quality of lifemay reduce the quality of the person(moral decay) and that a lower quality oflife may increase the quality of the person("adversity builds character").

The Costs of Sprawl–Revisited Social Issues


CHAPTER


SOCIAL ISSUES

Sprawl is the movement of residential andnonresidential land uses to the outerreaches of the metropolitan area. As landuses move increasingly outward, the taxbases of the areas left behind areweakened. Unless there is a way tocompensate for peripheral growth, theurban center will almost always suffer.The literature of sprawl and social issuesis concerned with both the aftereffects of,and curative measures for, outwardgrowth. The literature concentrates onwhy outward growth takes place,alternatives to outward growth, the costsand benefits of outward growth, and waysto counter outward growth. Thesesubstantive declensions form the basis forthe organization of this chapter.

The chapter is composed as follows:

The Growth of Cities and MetropolitanAreas

Urban DeclineUrban Renewal

In the section on The Growth of Cities andMetropolitan Areas, the works ofJonathan Barnett (1995), Robert Fishman(1987), Gordon and Richardson (1997,1997b), Arthur Nelson et al. (1997), andDavid Rusk (1993) are annotated. Thesection on Urban Decline includes theworks of Marcellus Andrews (1994),

Katharine Bradbury (1982), AnthonyDowns (1994), Keith Ihlanfeldt (1995),James Kunstler (1993), Myron Orfield(1997), and Henry Richmond (1995). Thesection on Urban Renewal examines theworks of Peter Calthorpe (1993) and PeterKatz (1994).

THE GROWTH OF CITIES ANDMETROPOLITAN AREAS

Barnett, Jonathan. 1995. The FracturedMetropolis: Improving the New City,Restoring the Old City, Reshaping theRegion. New York: Harper Collins.

This strictly narrative analysis ofmetropolitan area trends advances thethesis that U.S. metropolitan settlementsare splitting apart into "old cities" and"new cities." It covers much of the sameground as Anthony Downs's New Visionsfor Metropolitan America but in a muchless systematized, non-quantitative way.The author proposes redirecting a share offuture growth into older cities where theyhave been "emptied out," and integratingnew and old cities with strong publictransit networks.

Barnett's analysis is heavily skewedtoward physical design, since he is an

13



architect and urban planner. He attacksstrip commercial development in suburbsand advances many of the ideas of the"new urbanism." He favors compactdevelopment over continued sprawl. Hesupports strong tree preservationordinances and other environmentallysensitive regulations.

Barnett traces the historic development ofolder core areas and shows why the desireof the rich to live away from the poor,combined with transportationimprovements, caused a withdrawal ofresources from the center of ourmetropolitan areas.

Attracting new investment to the bypassedareas of the older city is also the otherside of the coin of policies to restrictgrowth at the urban fringe. One will notwork without the other. (118)

He argues that some urban centralbusiness districts (CBDs) have beengrowing, but the remaining portions ofolder cities have been shrinking.

The current market for a new suburb inderelict parts of an old city is likely toconsist of people from nearby areas whohave started to make a little money, pluspeople whose other housing choice is asmall house or a mobile-home way out onthe urban fringe. (146)

The minimum requirements [of successfulinner-city revival] are to foster acommunity [with] affordable housing,public safety, and effective schools. (163)

The future of older cities dependsultimately on public policy initiatives thatcannot be controlled directly. Oldercenters and neighborhoods need rapid-transit links to the new centers in formerlysuburban areas so that the metropolitanarea can function as one economy.

Metropolitan services have to besupported by an equalized tax base; thereneeds to be limits to growth at themetropolitan fringe accompanied bymajor new investment in bypassedresidential neighborhoods and derelictindustrial districts. Reintegrating themetropolitan area is necessary for thesurvival of cities, suburbs, and theregional eco-system. (175)

The book's weakness is that Barnett doesnot indicate how to implement hisrecommendations or how to grapple withthe political forces involved.

He claims there have been major changesin the environment for metropolitandevelopment, including the following:

• The addition of design methods to thepractice of planning.

• Community participation in planning.• The rise of the conservation ethic and

the concept of sustainability.• Environmental conservatism.

He points out that we need positiveplanning about how to grow in the future.But, he says:

[L]ocal governments are not accustomedto making affirmative decisions aboutwhich areas of the natural landscape oughtto be preserved and which areas should bebuilt up. (191)

The basic components of any city designare the organization of public openspace—including streets, plazas, andparks or gardens—the architecturalrelationships among buildings, and thecomposition of building mass in relationto the landscape or the skyline. (193)

The most difficult and central problems ofurban design today [are] reconciling tallbuildings with lower structures, or theneed to incorporate parking and highway



viaducts within a physical fabric definedby streets and buildings. (196)

Experience has led city designers to seekto reestablish the primacy of the street inurban settings and go back to a mix ofuses in central areas, rather than create theseparate tower zones for office buildingsthat characterized many urban renewalplans." (196)

His national action agenda includes thefollowing:

• Creating urban growth boundariesaround all metropolitan areas.

• Adopting state planning laws in all 50states.

• Creating regional revenue sharingbased upon state-mandated revenueequalization formulas.

• Restoring natural ecosystems in urbanareas.

• Having local plans that encouragecompact neighborhoods with a mix ofhousing types and dense commercialcenters.

• Expanding public transit systems,beginning with more buses.

• Renovating public housing.• Helping some low-income households

move out of areas of concentratedpoverty.

• Spending more on inner-city schools,rather than industrial subsidies.

The environmental movement couldbe a strong political constituency forthe maintenance and restoration of theold city. (236)

Although this book contains an accurateanalysis of basic trends, it lacksquantified analysis and political savvyabout how its broad recommendationsmight be accomplished in real-worldsettings.

Drucker, Peter F. 1992. "People, Work,and the Future of the City." Managingthe Future. New York: Dutton. 125-129.

In this short essay, Drucker explains howthe growth of cities in the nineteenthcentury was due to advances intransportation that enabled people to moveto centralized locations to work together.But now the author points out, it ischeaper and more convenient to moveinformation to where the people are.Nevertheless, big corporations will stillwant their top people together; and manypeople will still want to work in groups.But, in the future, these groups will nolonger need to be gathered in downtownoffice clusters. Work will be out-sourcedto specialized firms that are notnecessarily located downtown. We areprobably at the end of the big boom inoffice construction in major citydowntowns, Drucker concludes.

This essay covers no more than afragment of the overall subject, withoutmuch depth of analysis and with very littlesupporting data.

Fishman, Robert. 1987. BourgeoisUtopias: The Rise and Fall of Suburbia.New York: Basic Books.

This book discusses the role of suburbs inthe historic development of modern urbanlife. It looks at the two phases ofsuburbia—the "original" suburb, and thepost-industrial "technoburb."

The original suburb, as defined byFishman, was a retreat from the tumult ofindustry and commerce and high-densityresidences that characterized the earlyindustrial city into an exclusivelyresidential community. It first appeared inthe London area in the late eighteenthcentury, and became more prominent in



the nineteenth and twentieth centuries,both in England and in America.

The original suburbs were almostexclusively residential areas, occupiedalmost entirely by the middle-class elite;they excluded all industry and commerce,and all lower-income households. Theywere a retreat from the ills of city life intoa more utopian scene linked to naturethrough the prevalence of single-familyhomes with private yards. Suburban lifewas family-oriented and separatedmiddle-class women from the world ofwork; it placed them in a worldexclusively focused on the family. InFishman's view, the suburb was aspecialized bedroom community, theemployed residents of which commutedinto either the central city downtown or itsindustrial areas; the employed residentsnever worked in suburbs themselves.Exclusion was at the heart of the suburbsas thus conceived. Industry, commerce,diversity, jobs for women, and low-income households were all perceived aspotential threats to the primacy of thefamily-centered, lot-linked single-familyhome.

Over time, however, the suburbs havegradually evolved into a completelydifferent urban arrangement, structuredaround what Fishman calls the"technoburb." It can also be called theurban network form. What most peopleconceive of as the suburbanization ofAmerica, Fishman considers a shift to adevelopment pattern that radicallyundermines the original suburbs—and theold central city. Although suburbsmaintained their specialized roles asbedroom communities into the 1950s, themigration of so many other types ofactivities into suburban areas since thenhas changed the basic nature of thesecommunities. As they acquired firstshopping facilities, then warehouses, thenindustrial firms, and finally offices, they

lost their exclusively residential character.They have been transformed into fullyurban communities, but with no singlecenter, and with very low densities. Thistransformation was made possible byinnovations in automobiles, roadways,and communications.

Today, the metropolitan area is anoncentered amorphous growth,resembling an amoeba without a nucleus.Although regional downtowns still exist,and central cities still specialize inhousing the poor and some centralfacilities and amenities, the vast majorityof both residences and workplaces arescattered throughout the area in noparticular pattern. They are linked by ahuge network of roads and electroniccommunications. The center of eachperson's life is his or her own home, andthe universe of each consists of theterritory he or she can reach within onehour's drive from home. There is no singlecentralized urban form because eachhousehold essentially has its own uniquenetwork. The overall form is an undefinedmassive overlapping of all theseindividual networks. The exclusivity ofthe old suburb has been destroyed,although poor people still seemconcentrated in older core areas. But alltypes of activities are now found at alldistances from any one spot; there is nosingle center that everyone relates to. Thisuncentered network has replaced themonocentric city of old, and even thepolycentric city of the 1960s and 1970s.What most people perceive of assuburbanization today involves thedestruction of the former suburbs andtheir full urbanization in a totallydecentralized form.

A key question concerning the future ofthis trend is: "Is the low density of thenew city destructive to all culturaldiversity?" (200) Since this new networkcontains very few public spaces and no



set of places in which a large fraction ofthe community habitually gathers orinteracts physically, there is no sense ofcommunity. Television greatly aggravatesthis outcome because it fosters passive,home-centered separation of eachhousehold from all others, although itdoes provide some commonality ofexperience across the multitudes (whichmay be undermined by the multiplicationof channels). Fishman believes we are stillworking out the cultural implications ofthis new form:

The new city will probably never be ableto compete culturally with the old centers.There will be for the foreseeable future adivision founded on choice between thosewho seek out even at great cost the kindof cultural excitement that can only befound in the center, and those who choosethe family-centered life of the outer city.(202)

Fishman, however, underestimates thedegree to which cultural activities can takeplace in the outer regions of suchnetworks, because people with commoncultural interests can still gather togetherin outlying locations in sufficient numbersto support cultural activities likesymphonies, theaters, etc.

Seen in historical perspective, suburbianow appears as the point of transitionbetween two decentralized eras: thepreindustrial rural area and thepostindustrial information society...Suburbia kept alive the ideal of a balancebetween man and nature in a society thatseemed dedicated to destroying it. That isits legacy. (206-207)

Glaeser, Edward L. 1994. "Cities,Information, and Economic Growth."Citiscape 1, 1 (August): 9-47.

This article explores recent contributionsto the theory of cities concerning howinformation flow and usage contribute tocity growth or decline. Glaeser argues thatsimple capital and labor accumulationmodels fail to explain city growth. Avariable relating to human capital and onerelating to abstract intellectual capitalshould be included in any analysis toexplain certain failings in simpler models.

One aspect of cities that is not oftendiscussed is that of informationalexternalities. These help explain whypeople and firms locate in cities, and whycities grow. They also have negativeimpacts, they allow rioting to spreadrapidly, and increases in crime to becommunicated quickly.

Growth theory regards increases in thestock of human knowledge as a centralaspect of economic progress over time.Because knowledge is more easilyaccessed by people living close together,"closeness contributes to the degree ofappropriability." (11)

Growth theory based upon capital andlabor accumulation had an inconsistency:it could not explain why countries andcities did not converge on a steady state.Only an exogenous technological changevariable could explain that. But increasingreturns to scale from intellectualknowledge also made it possible toexplain continuous growth. However,increasing returns to scale are notcompatible with an economy based uponperfect competition, because the formerleads to monopolistic results. Also,marginal prices lie under average prices,which means firms would be losingmoney.



Romer solved this problem by indicatingthat private profits did not have increasingreturns to scale, but social benefitsproduced by general increases inknowledge did. His argument madeperfect competition among private firmspossible in theory, but also allowedgrowth to continue over time due to thesocial benefits of accumulated knowledge.Lucas focused this idea on returns tohuman (private) capital, but the truth mustbe that both private capital and generalsocial knowledge gain from innovations inthe long run.

These ideas are related to cities becausepeople living and working close togethercan more easily tap into the store ofaccumulated knowledge and exchangeideas with each other. The externalities ofknowledge exchange are clearly facilitatedby urban proximity, as opposed to itsalternatives.

Barro regressed growth in per capita GDPagainst several other variables acrosscountries, and discovered that poorgovernmental qualities are negativelycorrelated with rapid growth. His basicfindings were that education and absenceof regulation were positively correlatedwith rapid growth.

Rauch found that SMSA cities with highlevels of human capital had both higherproperty costs and higher wages thanother cities, holding individual traitsconstant.

Glaeser and others arrived at thefollowing findings: (1) initialconcentration in an industry does NOTseem to foster subsequent creativity,therefore scale economies in a localindustry do not really create growth; (2)urban diversity is positively related tolater growth; and (3) more competitiveindustries grow more quickly.

In general equilibrium theory, realdifferences in incomes among citiesshould be quickly eliminated by migrationof workers and capital. Any remainingdifferences should reflect negativeamenities in the higher-income cities thatmust be offset by higher incomes.

A strong finding from U.S. census data isthat the cities that grew quickly between1950 and 1970 also grew quickly between1970 and 1990. Growth in the first periodwas established as the best singlepredictor of city growth in the secondperiod. Thus, growth begets furthergrowth in spite of congestion problems.At least, that is one interpretation of thedata.

Another finding is that areas with highlyeducated work forces at the outset of aperiod tend to have higher levels ofeducation at the end. The well-educatedare either born or move to areas whereother well-educated people are alreadylocated.

High—and low—unemployment ratesamong cities also tend to persist overtime. No convergence occurs, such aswhat might be predicted by generalequilibrium theory. This lack ofconvergence may reflect permanentmaladies in the structure of those citieswith high unemployment rates. Similarly,high crime rates are persistent over timeamong cities.

Rioting is a phenomenon found mainly incities, because of contagion and othereffects. Almost every city has a potentialfor rioting if some spark ignites a crowd.

Neighborhoods play key roles in theaccumulation of human capital. Bothskills and behavioral habits are learnedfrom peers and neighbors and mentors.Stability of occupancy in neighborhoodsmay be important, because, according to



game theory the length of relationshipsinfluences the types of behavior one iswilling to carry out. If you have alongterm relationship with other players(neighbors), for example, you are morelikely to take the impacts of your actionsupon them into account, because they canretaliate against you in the future, and youmust live with them for a long time. Thus,residents in stable neighborhoods canmore strongly reinforce good behaviorthan residents in unstable areas—a findingthat presents an argument for subsidizinghomeownership, which creates greaterresidential stability.

Cities also foster proximity to politicalpower, which is concentrated there. Thisproximity may influence people toundertake actions to change the behaviorof key authorities located in cities.Political agitation is much more likely towork in cities than in rural areas for thatreason. There are also more people to getagitated per unit of effort in cities than inrural areas.

One of the most critical challenges in thefuture is reducing informational barriersbetween ghettos and downtown powercenters.

Suburbanization provides many of thebenefits of urban agglomeration whileavoiding many of its negative impacts,such as high rates of crime, greaterprobability of rioting and less residentialstability in local neighborhoods to inhibitnegative behaviors.

Gordon, Peter, and Harry W.Richardson. 1997b. "The Destiny ofDowntowns: Doom or Dazzle?" LuskReview (Fall): 63-76.

The authors remark that the prospect ofsuccessful downtowns is often promisedas a source of metropolitan economic

strength and prestige—but offer evidencethat suggests this is rhetoric at best, andprofit-seeking at worst. Gordon andRichardson assert that the futility of large-scale downtown-focused projects is easyto understand—the push-pull factors ofspatial decentralization constantlyreinforce each other. Improved mobilityhas given people more and better choicesat lower cost, as witnessed by continuallyincreasing automobile use. Furthermore,the telecommunications revolution hasirreversibly changed our concept ofdistance, making the concentrated, verticalcity a transient phenomenon.

The authors explain how these transitionswill continue to accelerate as newtechnology makes it possible for work,shopping, learning, entertainment, andsocializing to be at-home activities. Theseanti-urban trends are further reinforced by"push" factors like crime, panhandlers,and "dysfunctional public agencies" thatare found in downtown locations. Peoplecontinue to leave these ills for betteramenities and more pleasant shoppingopportunities in America's suburbs.

It is the authors' contention that thesepush-and-pull forces explain more thanjust the continuing demise of downtowns;they also explain the outward expansionof cities into suburbs and exurbs.Although the current political debate isabout the contest between cities andsuburbs, it is becoming less relevant. Themore important question hinges on howmuch future development will occur insuburbs, exurbs, and rural areas. Gordonand Richardson point out that most U.S.job growth since the late 1980s hasoccurred outside of large MetropolitanStatistical Areas (MSAs). This silentmigration, the authors conclude, has hadlittle impact on public policy because itdoes not match the conventional, but



hopelessly outdated, paradigm of howcities evolve.

Gordon, Peter; Harry W. Richardson;and Gang Yu. 1997. "Metropolitan andNon-Metropolitan Employment Trendsin the U.S.: Recent Evidence andImplications." Los Angeles, CA: Schoolof Urban Planning and Developmentand Department of Economics,University of Southern California.

This study looks at employment change inseven major industrial sectors over atwenty-six-year time span (1969-1994),using the Bureau of Economic AnalysisRegional Economic Information System(REIS) file that reports one-digit SICemployment and income data at thecounty level.

The authors observe a steadydecentralization, often beyond the suburbsinto both exurban and rural areas. Theysee new and mobile firms choosinglocations according to their demand foragglomeration benefits. These are nowavailable throughout suburban and partsof exurban America, obviating theadvantages of traditional centers and ofcentral counties as a whole. Exurban andrural settings are increasingly attractive tofirms because of breakthroughs in goodshandling and in the transmission ofinformation. The authors' work shows anegative and sometimes absolute declinein CBD employment over the period ofstudy.

The study suggests that the locationaldecisions of households are influencedmore by workplace accessibility than bythe availability of amenities, recreationalopportunities, and public safety. Inaddition, the locations of firms are lesstied to place because of access toinformation technologies, just as corediseconomies have displaced the original

agglomeration economies that pulledpeople and economic activities together.The authors therefore conclude thatcentral cities are not coming back anytime soon.

Nelson, Arthur C., and Thomas W.Sanchez. 1997. "Exurban andSuburban Households: A DepartureFrom Traditional Location Theory."Journal of Housing Research 8, 2.

In this article, Nelson and Sanchezdescribe how modern social, cultural,economic, and technological changes havepermitted households to settle farther fromurban centers than in the past. They thentest the proposition that exurbanites aredifferent from suburbanites in householdcharacteristics, occupation of householdheads, accessibility to employment, andresidence characteristics.

Nelson and Sanchez use a variety ofnonparametric and cluster analysistechniques, and find that exurbanites andsuburbanites are more similar thanpreviously thought. They conclude thatthe rise of polycentric urban areas seemsto have pushed the suburban fringe furtherout.

The results of this analysis suggest thatthe primary differences betweenexurbanites and suburbanites is that theformer have a greater desire to locateaway from urban-related problems anddisamenities, especially households withmiddle incomes and families with smallchildren. In contrast, smaller families orfamilies at the early or late stages of lifeare more likely to choose suburbanlocations.

In conclusion, the authors speculate thatthe continued outward expansion may beattributable to the inability of urban andsuburban governments to provide suitablepublic facilities and services at pricesaffordable to residents, and to suburban



policies that constrain the supply ofhousing relative to demand throughopposition to affordable housing orinnovative housing configurations, andthrough otherwise exclusionary zoningpractices.

Rusk, David. 1993. Cities WithoutSuburbs. Washington, DC: WoodrowWilson Center Press.

This book is a detailed and comprehensivelook at sprawl and at least one of itsalternatives, written by the former mayorof Albuquerque, New Mexico. Its basicthesis is that cities which have elasticboundaries—i.e., those that can annexsurrounding territories—are muchhealthier than cities which have inelasticboundaries—i.e., those where boundariesare frozen because they are surrounded byincorporated suburban municipalities. Theelastic cities can expand outward as theirmetropolitan areas grow, enabling them toretain access to the new taxable basescreated outside the original boundaries ofthese cities as they grew. In contrast,inelastic cities cannot reach out to newtaxable resources as growth expandsbeyond their borders. Both elastic andinelastic cities have disproportionateshares of poor people within their originalboundaries, but the former can counteractthe negative effects by expanding theirboundaries. Inelastic cities are stuck withrising percentages of poor residents andfalling tax bases, causing them to havefalling taxable resources per capita at thevery time that they need more suchresources to cope with the risingpercentages of poor residents.

Rusk presents a great deal of statisticalinformation to support his claim thatelastic cities are healthier economicallyand socially than inelastic ones. He doesnot use regression analysis, but rather

presents paired city comparisons andcompares averages of groups of citieswith different degrees of elasticity.

This book is one of the mostcomprehensive and intelligent analyses ofsprawl and other urban problems yetwritten. However, it has one serious flaw.The author believes that unifiedmetropolitan government is the bestsolution for inelasticity, but there appearsto be no political support for thisarrangement whatever. Even so, Rusk'sanalysis is definitely one of the beststudies of urban problems.

Where Rusk particularly excels is inanalysis of three aspects of the urbanproblem. First, he fearlessly confronts theracial aspects of urban problems. Second,he offers concrete recommendations forsolving the problems that he describes.His recommendations include: regionalgovernance of land-use planning; regionaltax-base sharing; a regional program ofcreating desegregated affordable housingfor the poor; and promotion of regionwideeconomic development. Third, Ruskpresents a cogent analysis of the "point ofno return" for central cities. He identifiesthree benchmarks: a low ratio of percapita income in a city relative to that ofits suburbs (70 percent or less); a highfraction of minority-groups (30 percent ormore of the total population); andsubstantial and sustained population loss(20 percent or more). He claims that nocity that has crossed all three of thesethresholds has ever even begun to recover.



Sclar, Elliot, and Walter Hook. 1993."The Importance of Cities to theNational Economy." In Henry G.Cisneros, ed., Interwoven Destinies:Cities and the Nation. New York:American Assembly of ColumbiaUniversity. 1-26.

This is the lead article in a volume ofessays presented at the 82nd AmericanAssembly held in Harriman, New York inApril 1993. The authors argue that centralcities are the vital centers of production inthe American economy. They complainthat most policy analysts in recent decadeshave viewed cities mainly as homes forthe poor. They cite the following facts insupport of their view on central cities:

• In most metro areas, the higher payingjobs are located in the central city. Suchjobs constitute 32.2 percent of all jobsnationally, but garner 37.7 percent ofnationwide earnings (no source for thisdata is cited). Wages of central city jobsare 20 percent higher on average thanthose of suburban jobs, and this gap hasbeen widening.

• Many suburban residents have jobs incentral cities. A survey by ArthurGoldberg of the suburban areas of thenation's 100 largest cities showed thathalf of suburban families had at leastone worker in the central city.

• The same survey showed heavysuburban dependence on central cityservices. Approximately 67 percent ofsuburban residents depend on the cityfor major medical care; 43 percent havefamily members attending or planningto attend an institution of higherlearning in the city; 46 percent believetheir property values would be hurt by aserious decline in their central city.

• The top 24 counties accounted for 39percent of all jobs in information-intensive industries but had only 27percent of total jobs. Wages for jobs in

downtown Boston were 3.55 timeshigher than wages for jobs in the samecategories in the suburbs, and 2.37times higher in New York City than inits suburbs.

• The production advantages of centralcities include: (1) minimizedtransportation and communicationscosts for both workers and customers;(2) easy face-to-face contact amongexperts, which facilitates analysis; (3)superior telecommunicationsinfrastructures which facilitatesinternational transactions; and (4) morespecialized producer services, whichtend to be located where the size of themarket is greatest.

One reason suburban locations continue togrow faster than central cities is that thecosts of moving are not fully borne by thebusinesses that move. Some of the cost isborne by their employees and publictaxpayers. If suburbanization were soefficient, one would see more of it ininternational competitor nations. Instead,the growth of the suburbs in the UnitedStates indicates that U.S. urban policy ismore concerned with stimulating demandsfor consumer products—such as housingand autos—than it is with productiveefficiency.

Suburbanization has also been encouragedby biased public policies, such as hometax deductions and federal highwayfinance—a subsidy that was not reflectedin public transit aid until very recently.The nature of pricing of telephone andother services has allowed higher-costsuburban services to be priced at the samerate as lower-cost city services.

The authors argue that continueddispersal poses major costs to society,especially concerning the inputs ofprivate firms. The need for virtually allemployees to own automobiles, for



example, increases wage demands. Autodependence also increases our tradedeficit because we must import so muchoil. We already spend far more on traveland telecommunications than rivalnations. The Japanese spend 9.4 percentof GNP on transportation, while we spend15-22 percent. Traffic congestion imposeshigh costs on production. The authorsclaim that most metropolitan areas devoteover half of their available land to roadinfrastructure. By undermining the taxbase of central cities, society has beenunable to invest properly in the educationand training of the labor force, or in theinfrastructure outside the downtown thatis critical to productive efficiency. U.S.investment in education through the highschool level is the lowest among the sevenmost industrialized nations—4.1 percentof GNP, compared to 4.6 percent in WestGermany and 4.7 percent in Japan. Weneed much more investment in the laborforce and infrastructure in central cities toremain competitive.

URBAN DECLINE

Andrews, Marcellus. 1994. "On theDynamics of Growth and Poverty inCities." Citiscape 1, 1 (August): 53-73.

This article presents a model of howpoverty concentrations within cities arerelated to city growth rates. "The centraltheme of this article holds that the logicof meritocracy creates class divisions inthe urban labor market which mayundermine the very conditions that makerapid economic growth possible" (53).The need for high-skilled workers in amodern high-tech economy creates twoclasses of workers: those with therequisite skills, and other unskilledworkers. But schools in many large citiesare failing to provide their students withthe skills needed to be in the first class.

This failure creates a caste-like result,since the primary determinant of theschool performance of children is theeducational level of their parents.

The basic dynamic, Andrews points out, isas follows:

• Members of the "underclass" withincities strive to attain a higher standardof living and jobs suitable for high-skilled workers, but are frustrated bytheir inability to do so because of thepoor quality of city schools. Thelifestyles of the middle class have ademonstrable effect upon theunderclass, encouraging them to want toconsume more.

• The resulting frustration leads tocriminal behavior and violence on thepart of the underclass. Members of thisclass perceive that they have only twosources of income—transfer paymentsand crime.

• The behavior of the underclass drivesmiddle-class (upper-tier) workers andhouseholds out of the city into thesuburbs where they can escape fromcrime and violence.

• The departure of the middle classweakens the fiscal position of the citygovernment, thereby reducing its abilityto provide good quality schooling to theunderclass. This creates a negativedownward spiral—a "vicious circle."

A key variable in this dynamic system isthe "middle-class ratio"—that is, thepercentage of the total populationconsisting of middle-class residents.

Another key variable is the attitude ofstudents towards academic achievement.The author argues that membership in theunderclass causes anti-academic attitudesamong students.

Andrews also argues that there is a"critical failure ratio" among city students



which determines whether the middleclass will grow or decline within the city.If the actual failure rate among students(which determines whether they willbecome middle-class or under-classmembers) rises above this critical rate, themiddle-class ratio will decline because thebehavior of the underclass, then larger,will drive middle-class residents out. Ifthe actual failure rate is below the criticallevel, then more students will graduateinto the middle-class, and the incentivesfor middle-class residents to leave isreduced—even though greatercompetition in the labor market among thelarger numbers of middle-class workersmay cause the unemployment rate to rise.

The author regards this entire situation asa negative externality—an unintendedconsequence of technological change thathas raised the skill requirements for high-wage workers. But it is society that hasprovided unequal access to learningamong its young people. Thus, "theincreasing importance of knowledgecapital in economic growth contributes tothe problem of urban poverty." (63)

The future of the city, and particularly itsability to change the way it grows, mayultimately depend upon the willingness ofthe middle class to remain in the citydespite the difficulties of caste divisionand crime that are the underside of therole of knowledge capital in economiclife. In turn, a national government policythat encourages the exodus of middle-class citizens from the city may makesignificant urban reform andreconstruction impossible. (63)

The federal government must recognizethe role of knowledge capital inunwittingly exacerbating the urban crisis.In particular any urban policy that intendsto make cities into virtuous circles mustrecognize the folly of forcing localgovernments to deal with the negative

aspects of knowledge capital withdiminishing economic resources. Further,a macroeconomic growth strategy thatemphasizes human capital must carefullyaddress the inequality, poverty, violence,and crime that result from educationalfailure. (63)

Bradbury, Katharine L., AnthonyDowns, and Kenneth Small. 1982.Urban Decline and the Future ofAmerican Cities. Washington, DC:Brookings Institution.

A central component of this book is theidea that every city has certain specificsocial functions, and therefore changes inits ability to perform those functionsconstitutes urban decline. In contrast, alow level of ability to perform thosefunctions—a static concept—constitutesurban distress. The authors point out thatnot all cities with high urban distress aredeclining. Some may even be growingrapidly—cities with high poverty ratesand high immigration, for example.

The specific index of urban decline usedin this study is based upon change overtime of four variables: the unemploymentrate, per capita income, the violent crimerate, and the government debt burden. Theindex of urban decline was calculated byranking all cities for each of thesevariables, and assigning points to eachbased on its relative position in theranking on each variable. Cities in thelowest third (in terms of desirability)received a -1 for that specific variable;cities in the highest third, a +1, and citiesin the middle third, zero. The scores ofeach city on all four variables were thensummed. The highest possible index scorewas +4 and the lowest was -4. A similarindex was computed for city urbandistress. This index was based on fivevariables, each at a single point in time:the unemployment rate, the



incidence of poverty, the violent crimerate, the percent of housing consideredold, and the city's tax revenue relative tothat of its metropolitan area.

It is notable that neither city populationchange nor city employment change wasused as part of the decline measure. Thereason is that not all population declinesare bad (if the city is overcrowded tostart). Moreover, the authors useddeclining population as a separatemeasure that they related to the index ofdecline. They reasoned that theunemployment rate captured some aspectof employment change.

Two other measures were computed inthis study: city disparity, a measure of thedifference between each central city'sscores for these variables and the score ofits suburban areas; and city divergence, ameasure of the rate of change in citydisparity over time.

This book contains a relevant discussionof the future of large cities. It points outthat although both self-reinforcing andself-limiting factors are involved in urbandecline, the former seem to be much morepowerful than the latter. Hence theconcept of a self-reinforcing downwardspiral of decline is validated by the book'sanalysis.

Downs, Anthony. 1994. New Visions forMetropolitan America. Washington, DC.The Brookings Institution.

The most dangerous result of growthmanagement policies, claims Downs, isthat they help perpetuate the concentrationof very poor households in depressedneighborhoods in big cities and oldersuburbs. These neighborhoods, containinga small percentage of the nation'spopulation, are riddled with four problems

that are undermining social cohesion andeconomic efficiency: crime and violence,poor families, poor public education, andthe lack of labor integration. Downsmakes the argument that these problemsare aggravated by low-density growth,which most people favor, so they don'tseem to threaten the status quo. But if theyare allowed to fester, says Downs, theywill gravely impair the political unity,productivity, and economic efficiency ofAmerican society and the personalsecurity of everyone.

The situation is not clear-cut, and it isdifficult for communities to decide howbest to respond to rapid growth. Downsseeks to clarify this situation by answeringthe following series of questions: Are theundesirable conditions really causedprimarily by growth? Which policies mightsucceed in ameliorating them? Whichmight have severe side effects or makeconditions worse? Is limiting local growthdesirable at all for either a given locality orsociety as a whole? If so, what should thegoals of such limitations be? To whatextent do communities need to coordinategrowth management policies with othercommunities to achieve effective results?Can the multiplicity of governments inmetropolitan areas manage growtheffectively, or does that arrangement needto be modified? If so, how?

In addition to attempting to answer thesequestions, Downs considers the problemsassociated with rapid metropolitan growthfrom a perspective that encompassesinner-city problems as well as examinesthe effects of growth management incommunities that have tried to alter thecourse of urban growth. Downs alsoanalyzes three other ways growth couldoccur—alternatives that might reduce theproblems that have arisen from the patternof unlimited low-density development—focusing on the relationships between



central cities and their suburbs. Finally,Downs attempts to identify the policieslikely to be most effective in helping toresolve growth-related problems.

Downs concludes with a call for Americato strengthen the bases for its continuedunity by placing more emphasis on socialsolidarity and less on individualisticvalues, beginning in early school years,and by engaging the news media andadvertising industry in the discussion. Heproposes that we begin by persuadingresidents of suburbs across the countrythat their concerns in many ways aresimilar to those of central city residents.This would lay a political foundation formajor federal funding of nationwideprograms that disproportionally aidcentral cities and their residents, both ofwhich are vital to the long-run prospectsof the entire U.S. economy.

Ihlanfeldt, Keith R. 1995. "TheImportance of the Central City to theRegional and National Economy: AReview of the Arguments andEmpirical Evidence." Citiscape 1, 2(June): 125-150.

This article reviews most of the literatureon the linkages between central cities andsuburbs. According to the author, thereare five basic linkages: (1) Outsiders'perceptions of the appeal of an entiremetropolitan area are influenced byconditions prevailing within its centralcity; (2) Cities contain many amenitiesvalued throughout their regions; (3)Individual cities may provide a "sense ofplace" valued by both their residents andoutsiders; (4) Fiscal problems in centralcities may eventually raise taxes onsuburbanites and thereby reduce suburbaneconomic development; and (5)Agglomeration economies create specialroles for central cities in their regionaleconomies.

The author does not cite two otherlinkages that are believed to be important:(1) Cities provide low-cost housing forlow-wage workers employed in—andnecessary for—activities in suburbs wherethose workers cannot afford to live; and(2) Cities provide many jobs for suburbanresidents that increase suburban incomes.

The author claims that there is noempirical evidence either supporting ordenying the first four factors he cites;therefore he dispenses with them in twopages. He does not deny that theselinkages exist, but says that no one knowshow strong or important they are becauseno studies have measured them. Hedevotes most of his article toagglomeration economies, which havebeen studied at length and by manypeople.

Agglomeration economies are, essentially,increasing returns to scale in processingactivities. Ihlanfeldt refers to them as "theeconomies of large-scale production,commonly considered, [and] thecumulative advantages accruing from thegrowth of industry itself—thedevelopment of skill and know-how; theopportunities for easy communication ofideas and experience; the opportunity ofever-increasing differentiation ofprocesses and of specialization in humanactivities." (128, quoted from NicholasKaldor—1970)

Agglomeration economies are dividedinto two types: localization economiesthat arise from the concentration ofsimilar activities (such as a singleindustry) either in one place or very neareach other; and urbanization economiesthat arise from the location of an activityin an area that has a wide diversity ofactivities—so production costs decline asthe size of the area concerned rises.Urbanization economies generate benefits



for all types of firms located in an area;whereas localization economies generatebenefits only for those firms in industriesthat are highly concentrated in an area.Central cities are considered to haveadvantages over their suburbs for bothtypes of economies.

Both types of agglomeration economieshave three major causes: (1) labor marketeconomies; (2) scale economies in theproduction of intermediate inputs; and (3)communication economies. Labor marketeconomies cause localization economiesbecause the concentration of many similarfirms together creates a large pool ofworkers skilled in that industry, andreduces search and training costs for thefirms. Urbanization economies also arisefrom large diversified labor pools.However, these labor pool economies donot favor central cities much over suburbsin large metropolitan areas.

The other two causes of agglomerationeconomies, however, clearly favor centralcities. Both types involve face-to-facecontacts, which occur most efficiently inor around downtown areas. Theimportance of communications economieshas also been increased by the shift fromgoods-producing to information-producing activities. Innovations incommunications technology, however,have made face-to-face contacts lessnecessary for the sharing of information.

The author reviews numerous empiricalstudies of these economies. One of themore interesting shows that both suburbanfirms and central city firms rely heavilyon central-city suppliers for certaincorporate services, such as investmentbanking, commercial banking, and legal,auditing, and actuarial services. Thestudy, authored by Stanbeck in 1991, dealtwith 14 large metro areas, and alsodemonstrated that suburban companiestend to be smaller and more likely to be in

manufacturing than central citycompanies.

Several other studies have correlatedconditions, such as levels of per capitaincome in cities and their suburbs. Thesestudies all show positive linkages betweencities and suburbs. Voith (1994), forexample, shows that positive city incomegrowth is highly correlated with positivesuburban income growth.

The author's conclusions are:

• Significant linkages clearly exist.

• The maturation of the suburbs hasweakened these linkages over time.

• Telecommunications changes willNOT greatly weaken the importanceof central cities.

• "The hypothesis that cities make animportant contribution to regional andnational economic growth isattractive," though not fully proven(139).

Kunstler, James. 1993. The Geographyof Nowhere: The Rise and Decline ofAmerica's Man-Made Landscape. NewYork: Simon & Schuster.

Kunstler has written a polemic—a true"exagger-book"—about the aesthetic andother qualities of metropolitandevelopment in the United States,especially during the post World War IIera. The tone of this book is conveyed inthe following quotations from the firstchapter:

More and more we appear to be a nationof overfed clowns living in a hostilecartoon environment.

Eighty percent of everything ever built inAmerica has been built in the last fiftyyears, and most of it is depressing, brutal,



ugly, unhealthy, and spirituallydegrading.

To me, it is a landscape of scary places,the geography of nowhere, that has simplyceased to be a credible human habitat.

These statements convey the spirit inwhich Kunstler denounces everythingAmerican. There seems to be nothingabout American life that appeals to him.He attacks individualism, low-densitydevelopment, business, you name it:

Riverside seems a template for all theghastly automobile suburbs of the postwarera—individual houses on big blobs ofland along curvy streets. (49)

Yet, for all their artificiality andimpermanence, the early railroad suburbswere lovely places to live.

He decries architectural modernism andthe art-deco style, and high-rise officebuildings generally. But his greatestenemy is the automobile and highways.Still, he admits that:

The suburban subdivision wasunquestionably a successful product. Formany, it was a vast improvement overwhat they were used to.... The mainproblem with it was that it dispensed withall the traditional connections andcontinuities of community life, andreplaced them with little more than carsand television. (105)

The development of suburbs drainedactivity out of cities: "The cities, ofcourse, went completely to hell. The newsuperhighways ... drained them of theirfew remaining taxpaying residents." (107)

The separation of households andactivities inherent in low-density suburbshas also ruined any sense of community

life, according to Kunstler. And becauseof the spending of all public money onhighways, all other aspects of public lifehave become impoverished.

The motive force behind suburbia hasbeen the exaltation of privacy and theelimination of the public realm. (189)

This book contains no statistics, noquantitative analyses, and no databases. Itis an endless diatribe expressing theauthor's contempt for modern suburban,auto-oriented life. He claims we can nolonger live this type of life because it hasbecome too costly, both in economic andsocial terms. The social costs include thedestruction of community and family life.In the last chapter, Kunstler puts forthpolicy suggestions including thefollowing:

• We must rebuild our cities and towns.• We shall have to give up mass

automobile use. (248)• We should adopt the approach of the

new urbanism in designing smalltowns. (He specifically discussesSeaside and Peter Calthorpe'spedestrian pockets as cures for all theills he has been blasting. Mandatoryopen space zoning is also praised.)

• Until we do these things, "the standardof living in the United States is apt todecline sharply, and as it does theprobability of political trouble willrise." (274)

• We will have to give up our fetish forextreme individualism and rediscoverpublic life.... We will have to down-scale our gigantic enterprises andinstitutions—corporations,governments, banks, schools,hospitals, markets, farms—and learnto live locally, hence responsibly.

He offers no guidance about how toachieve these ends, however.



Ledebur, Larry C., and William R.Barnes. 1992. Metropolitan Disparitiesand Economic Growth: City Distress andthe Need for a Federal Local GrowthPackage. Washington, DC: NationalLeague of Cities. March.

This is a statistical study of therelationship between income disparities incentral cities and their suburbs on the onehand, and metropolitan area growth rateson the other. The basic conclusion is that:"During the period 1988-1991,metropolitan areas with greater internaldisparities tended to perform less welleconomically than metropolitan areas withlesser disparities" (1).

Overall, central city per capita income as apercentage of suburban per capita incomehas declined from 105 percent in 1960 to96 percent in 1973, to 89 percent in 1980,and to 59 percent in 1987. Much of thisarticle aims at justifying a substantialfederal aid package to cities, especiallycities in distress. Data on children beingraised in poverty, by race, are presented.In 1990, 45 percent of all black childrenunder the age of four were being raised inpoverty, compared to 38 percent ofHispanics and 20.6 percent of all children.These proportions were higher in centralcities, and lower in suburbs.

Orfield, Myron. 1997. Metropolitics: ARegional Agenda for Community andStability. Washington, DC: BrookingsInstitution Press and Lincoln Instituteof Land Policy.

In this study published jointly by theBrookings Institution and the LincolnInstitute of Land Policy, Orfield assertsthat the way to restrain suburban sprawl isfor central cities and rural andenvironmental interests to ally themselveswith older and inner-ring suburbancommunities.

Until this occurs, Orfield maintains newsuburbs will continue to siphon off the taxbase from older cities and suburbs.Further, unrestrained growth will continueto consume farmland and forests,threatening regional ecosystems.

These problems call for a sweepingrealignment of traditional politicaldivisions. According to Orfield, reformersmust: unite voters in central cities anddeclining suburbs; demonstrate to thesevoters that tax-base sharing lowers theirtaxes and improves local services; andconvince them that fair housing willstabilize residential change in theircommunities.

Orfield's ultimate strategy is the creationof a regional authority in eachmetropolitan area, whose mission wouldbe to encourage new suburbs to permit thedevelopment of affordable housingaccording to a fair-share formula. Othergoals for this regional authority would beto help bring about tax-base sharing,limits on outward expansion of themetropolitan boundary, and efficient useof new and existing infrastructure.

Richmond, Henry R. 1995.Regionalism: Chicago as an AmericanRegion. Chicago: John D. AndCatherine T. MacArthur Foundation.December 6.

This is the most comprehensive attack onsprawl yet launched. Henry Richmond,one of the architects of the Oregon stateplanning system, has collected everyknown argument against sprawl andwoven them into one long polemic—but arelatively sensible one. Among thearguments he marshals against sprawl:

• Sprawl concentrates poverty in inner-city areas, undermining their fiscalviability. This concentration also



produces a host of other negativeconditions.

• Sprawl undermines the transition ofthe inner-city unskilled workforce to ahigh-tech workforce.

• Sprawl thereby weakens theinternational competitive positions ofU.S. metropolitan areas.

• Sprawl reduces the efficiency ofbusinesses and the productivity ofagricultural land.

• Sprawl undermines equality ofopportunity within metropolitan areas,thereby raising inner-cityunemployment with all the resultingpernicious effects.

• Sprawl destroys the viability of inner-city schools and contributes tostudents' failure to make the properlabor-force transition.

• Sprawl breeds crime that drives viablefirms and households out of cities, andweakens the ability of young peopleraised there to sustain themselveseconomically.

• Sprawl undermines middle-classsecurity, especially the security ofworking-class households whoseinvestments in home equities arejeopardized by racial transition.

• Sprawl damages the environment interms of air pollution, and waterpollution; it ruins historic buildingsand wrecks environmentally sensitivesites.

• Sprawl undermines the sense ofcommunity in suburban areas, and thesolidarity of our entire society byseparating suburban residents fromcity ones.

• Sprawl makes urban developmentinefficient by generating indecisivegovernments, disputes, and delays thatadd to costs.

Richmond believes that a significantnumber of public policies at all levelshave generated sprawl, and perpetuate it.

He catalogs these at length. He thenpresents a political analysis of why theseforces are not likely to change.

After having set forth all these points ingeneral, he applies the argument to theChicago region in detail. He then setsforth his recommendations on how toattack sprawl and the many institutionalsupports underlying it. In this regard, hecomes up with a more comprehensive setof ideas than anyone else. As a result, thisdocument is an invaluable reference forboth arguments against sprawl andpossible tactics to remedy it. It has notbeen given widespread publicity, but it isa very solid linkage of causes andremedies.

Thompson, J. Phillip. 1996. "UrbanPoverty and Race." In Julia Vitullo-Martin, ed., Breaking Away: The Futureof Cities. New York: Twentieth CenturyFund: 13-32.

This author discusses the status of povertyand its relationship to race in inner-cityareas, primarily in reference to New YorkCity. He points out that the middle-class isstill dominant in most large Americancities, but it has become a minority-groupmiddle class as whites continue to leavethe city. In six of the nation's eight largestcities, a majority of the population in 1990consisted of minority-group members—only Philadelphia (48 percent minority)and San Diego (42 percent) wereexceptions. In New York, the number ofpersons with incomes above the medianremained about the same in the 1980s, butthe ethnic composition changed to becomeminority-dominated, as the whitepopulation fell by 432,000.

Thompson reviews various theories ofwhy poverty persists in inner-cityneighborhoods.



• The cultural deprivation theorystresses that some families are lessintelligent than others, and a deprivedculture is partly a geneticphenomenon. A newer view is thatpoor families are stuck in poorcommunities, where conditions areripe for a negative subculture todevelop around excessive teenagesexual promiscuity, a separate streetlanguage, and a depreciation ofacademic achievement. Both viewsstress deviancy and immorality ofbehavior among many poor people,with the newer theory attributing thebehavior to the spatial isolation of thepoor and especially of the poor blacksfrom white culture. ChristopherJencks claims that centuries of racialsubordination and prejudice havecreated an unwillingness amongblacks to do certain types of work orto work in white culturalenvironments. Black alienation fromcertain types of jobs is rarelydiscussed in analyses of poverty.

• The racial discrimination theory saysthat black poverty in particular iscaused primarily by continued racialdiscrimination and the resultingspatial segregation. Massey andDenton, advocates of this view, arguethat housing discrimination isolatespoor blacks in poverty-concentratedneighborhoods with other poor blacksas their only neighbors. Butdiscrimination itself is not new; sohow can it explain rising crime ratesor family instability, which are recentdevelopments? Massey and Dentonclaim that white prejudice anddiscrimination cause spatial isolation,which in turn results in culturaldeprivation.

• The structural transformation theoryclaims that black unemploymentresults from a change in labor marketsand industry that has shifted more jobsto the higher-skill category and moved

industrial jobs out of big cities whereracial minorities live. William JuliusWilson is a leading proponent of thisview. But unemployment does notexplain many of the other pathologiesof inner-city poverty areas. Wilsonalso claims the departure of middle-class blacks from poverty areas hasremoved good role models, and theresulting negative culture is the resultof economic deprivation and lack ofjobs. But is it not clear whethercultural traits of blacks, rather thandiscrimination by whites, causeswhites not to hire black workers.

• The social breakdown theory claimsthat poverty itself does not cause acultural shift to negative values. Manypoor neighborhoods do not exhibitsuch traits—especially poor areasoccupied by immigrants. There are avariety of cultures in poorneighborhoods, and only in thosewhere family networks break downdoes the culture of poverty arise.

What remedies to alleviate poverty mightbe used? Cultural deprivation theoristsstress the personal responsibility of thepoor themselves, and claim they need tochange their behavior. Their remediesinvolve orphanages for children ofmisbehaving mothers; forcing all poorpeople to work—including mothers;forcing fathers to pay for support forchildren; and making all governmentbenefits temporary. (It appears that thesearguments were embodied in the recentwelfare "reform" bill.)

A major problem with this approach isthat it assumes job opportunities exist forthe poor with wages high enough tosupport decent living standards. This isnot the case; public jobs programs wouldbe necessary if all poor people wereforced to work. Also, making all motherswork would reduce supervision overchildren and might worsen the children'sbehavior. Cultural deprivation theorists



do not study or seem to care about theinternal dynamics of poor communities,and pay too little attention to what mightresult if their remedies are tried.

Racial discrimination theorists wantstrong anti-discrimination measures, and abig effort to spatially integrate societyracially. This would require immensemovements of people, a scheme that ispolitically opposed by the vast majority ofAmericans, including Congress.

Structuralist theorists want labor marketchanges, such as the introduction of apublic jobs Marshall Plan for inner cities,job travel and information centerprograms to link inner-city workers tosuburban jobs, and provision of day care,job training and drug treatment programsfor inner-city residents. These remediesare quite expensive.

Local-oriented strategies includeenterprise and empowerment zones toimprove conditions where the poor livenow. The purpose is to create "vibrant"businesses where poor unemployedpeople are located. Community-basedefforts fit into this view, and many suchefforts are now underway across thenation. Building local housing is one oftheir major activities. A whole host ofquestions is raised by the author thatmight be answered by more careful studyof community activities currentlyunderway.

Thompson explores why the election ofblack mayors and city officials has notimproved conditions in inner-cityneighborhoods very much, if at all. Andhe asks why black leadership has notincreased black participation in politics.Among the reasons he cites are: (1) Blackmayors have no control over nationaltrends toward decentralization of jobs; (2)The shift of population to the suburbs hasreduced the national political power of

big-city mayors of all types in Congressand in the state legislature, reducing thewillingness of these bodies to aid cities;(3) The need of individual cities tomaintain favorable tax rates and bondratings prevents mayors from engaging inredistributive activities—as observed byPaul Peterson in City Limits; (4) The fearof being charged with racism hasprevented criticism of black localleadership by either whites or blacks; and(5) The civil rights movement has becomeconservative and has not shifted fromnational issues to local ones to supportblack local leaders.

HUD's rules against building publichousing in poor communities haveblocked the efforts of many black mayorsto put new low-rise public housing unitsin inner-city poverty areas, therebyupgrading those areas. In New York City,court actions have prevented givingpreference in public housing projects topersons living in nearby communities.Voting district formation has reducedrepresentation by minorities on citycouncils and in Congress. Struggles overcrime rates have pitted civil rightsadvocates—who want less incarcerationof blacks—against local residents whowant more secure neighborhoods. Similarstruggles have occurred over schools.Those who want better schools have triedto shift disruptive students into separate"academies"—a move that is opposed bytraditional civil rights advocates.

The problems of inner-city povertydemanded an agenda from black mayorsdealing with neighborhood economicdevelopment, reform of education, police,human services, public housingbureaucracies, and relations with Latinosand Asians. Such an agenda might haverequired alteration of traditional liberalcoalitions that elect black mayors, withpossible fallout from municipal andteachers' unions, civil rightsorganizations, and fellow black



politicians. Few black mayors havepursued such a politically risky andadministratively arduous course. (31)

Thompson recommends supportingcommunity-building strategies, becauselittle help will come from the federalgovernment. These strategies cannot endpoverty, but they may improve the qualityof life in inner-city areas.

URBAN RENEWAL

Calthorpe, Peter. G. 1993. The NextAmerican Metropolis: Ecology,Community, and the American Dream.Princeton: Princeton University Press.

This book, written by an architect andurban planner, looks at the spirit ofAmerican communities and the "newurbanism" approach to altering that spirit.He primarily discusses changes in urbandesign, and presents relatively littlequantified analysis. As the author says,"Social integration, economic efficiency,political equity, and environmentalsustainability are the imperatives whichorder my thinking about the form ofcommunity" (11). He contrasts thosethemes to the excessive privatization andindividualism he believes have beenembodied in the suburban developmentprocess in the post-1945 period.

The scale of our environment is now set inproportion to large institutions andbureaucracies rather than community andneighborhood (11).

The suburb was the ... physical expressionof the privatization of life andspecialization of place which marks ourtime (9).

The alternative to sprawl is simple andtimely: neighborhoods of housing, parks,

and schools placed within walkingdistance of shops, civic services, jobs, andtransit—a modern version of thetraditional town (16).

As is the case for most planners,Calthorpe dislikes the automobile and thescaling of the urban landscape toaccommodate it. He wants to change thescale to allow walking to suburban transitand linkages among outlying areas and thedowntown area by transit. Caltorpe wantsto make both housing units and lotssmaller, link neighborhoods by walkingpaths, and encourage accessory housing.He strongly supports regional growthmanagement, channeling growth inwardto in-fill sites and limiting outwardextension.

At the core of this alternative,philosophically and practically, is thepedestrian.... Pedestrians are the lostmeasure of a community, they set thescale for both center and edge of ourneighborhoods.... Two complementarystrategies are needed. A tough regionalplan which limits sprawl and channelsdevelopment back to the city or aroundsuburban transit stations; and a matchinggreenbelt strategy to preserve open spaceat the edge of the region. We cannotrevitalize inner cities without changingthe patterns of growth at the periphery ofmetropolitan regions; it is a simple matterof the finite distribution of resources. (20)

This calls for regional policies andgovernance which can both educate andguide the complex interaction ofeconomics, ecology, jurisdiction, andsocial equity.... Adding transit orientednew towns and new growth areas canreinforce the city's role as the region'scultural and economic center (32).

Three constituencies—environmentalists,enlightened developers, and



inner-city advocates—can find commonpurpose in regional planning goals. Theycan form a powerful coalition (36).

Identifying rational infill andrevitalization districts, New Growth Areasand potential New Town sites should bethe work of an agency which spans thenumerous cities and counties within ametropolitan area. Lacking such entities,counties, air quality boards, and regionaltransportation agencies often take on thetasks without legal power to fullyimplement the results. Regionalgovernments are needed if growth is to bemanaged and directed in a sustainablemanner (51).

Suburbs are built upon a fundamentallywrong spirit and orientation:

The rise of the modern suburb is in part amanifestation of a deep cultural andpolitical shift away from public life....Socially, the house fortress represents aself-fulfilling prophecy. The more isolatedpeople become and the less they sharewith others unlike themselves, the morethey do have to fear.... The privatedomain, whether in a car, a home, or asubdivision, sets the direction of themodern suburb... In fact, one of theprimary obstacles to innovations incommunity planning remains the impulsetoward a more gated and private world(37).

Calthorpe's design strategy is based uponthree major principles:

First ... the regional structure of growthshould be guided by the expansion oftransit and a more compact urban form;second, ... our ubiquitous single-usezoning should be replaced with standardsfor mixed-use, walkable neighborhoods;and third, .. our urban design policiesshould create an architecture orientedtoward the public domain and human

dimension rather than the private domainand auto scale (41).

He advances the concept of the TOD, orTransit Oriented Development—a basicbuilding block in his regionaldevelopment scheme. It features"pedestrian pockets" within one-quarter ofa mile of transit stops—an easy walkingdistance. These pockets contain mixed-usedevelopment including commercialcenters and public services. Farther outfrom the stations are secondary areascontaining primarily housing. He believesautomobile usage in such communitieswould be much lower than it is now,because more people would walk toactivities. There would be both urbanTODs and neighborhood TODs (forlower-density areas). Average residentialdensities of 10 units per acre would bemaintained to support bus service, withhigher densities to support rail transit. Inother areas, he recommends net densitiesof 18 units per acre. Calthorpe would alsolike a 40-60 percent split between transitand auto usage, even though that split stillimplies a majority of travel by autos.

His larger regional scheme shows transitstops one mile apart. Each TOD aroundsuch a stop contains 288.5 acres—a circleof 2,500 feet in radius. A key element inthe planning process is what fraction ofthe land should be used for housing. At40 percent, housing would consume115.4 acres; at 65 percent, it wouldconsume 187.5 acres. Next, he asks whataverage density of housing wouldprevail? Calthorpe suggests a range from10 to 25 units per acre, but in anothersection, he indicates that neighborhoodTODs should have minimum densities of7 units per acre (5,600 persons per squaremile) and a minimum average of 10units per acre (8,000 persons per



square mile—just a bit higher than the cityof Los Angeles). In urban TODs, theminimum density should be 12 units peracre, with an average of 15 units, and withmaximums set by local plans. At 15 unitsper net acre, the gross density would be15,600 persons per square mile if theresidential land coverage was 65 percent.Gross density would be 12,000 personsper square mile if residential coverage was50 percent—the coverage used tocalculate other statistics in this paragraph.

According to Calthorpe, secondary areasshould have a minimum average densityof 6 units per net acre, or 4,800 personsper square mile with 50 percent residentialland coverage. This, he says, should bethe minimum permissible densityanywhere in the developed region.

Much of the book sets forth designguidelines for parks, commercial areas,transit stops, and a set of specific projectsdeveloped by Calthorpe embodying hisideas.

Clark, Charles S. 1995. "Revitalizingthe Cities: Is Regional Planning theAnswer?" CQ Researcher, 5, 38(October 13): 897-920.

This article is an analysis of whetherregional planning and other arrangementsare necessary ingredients in any effectivestrategy to halt the decline of so manylarge cities. It is a broad overview of theissues involved condensed into a fewpages. The analysis begins with adescription of how out-migration to thesuburbs is still occurring in large cities,partly in response to the much highercrime rates in the cities. Clark presents apotpourri of quotations on all sides of theissue, rather than a clear orstraightforward analysis leading in asingle direction. As a result, the article

presents few conclusive results. Studiesshowing linkages between suburban andcity prosperity are cited. Proponents ofregionalism, including David Rusk andAnthony Downs are quoted; and citiessuch as Portland and the Twin Cities arecited as models. Yet, "in all of U.S.history, voters have approved only 20city-county consolidations while ahundred have been voted down, accordingto ... HUD." (904) Selling regionalism as away to help the poor is considered "thekiss of death" politically. The best way toproceed, says Clark, is to developpractical approaches to regionalrelationships and try to sell them inindividual areas.

Katz, Peter. 1994. The New Urbanism:Towards an Architecture of Community.New York: McGraw Hill.

This book contains five very short essayson "the new urbanism," plus copiousillustrated examples of projects carried outunder that rubric. The authors include theprimary players in this field: e.g., PeterCalthorpe, Andres Duany, and ElizabethPlater-Zyberk. Calthorpe's essay is a verycondensed version of his book (discussedearlier).

Andres Duany and Elizabeth Plater-Zyberk have written an essay about theneighborhood, the district, and thecorridor. It is only a few pages long andhas little or nothing to do with sprawl.

Elizabeth Moule and Stefanos Polyzoidesprovide an essay about the street, theblock and the building. However, thescale of this article is too "micro" to beapplicable to sprawl.

Todd W. Bressi's essay, entitled Planningthe American Dream discusses the overallapproach of the "new



urbanists," repeating much of what is inCalthorpe's book. He claims that thesuburban explosion after World Wars Iand II achieved certain desirableoutcomes, but at heavy costs. Thesuburban explosion "reinforced theVictorian notion that a neighborhood wasa protective enclave requiring insulationfrom commerce, work, and traffic, andheld that the functional and literal centerof a neighborhood should be anelementary school." The suburbanizationmovement also "liberated significantnumbers of people from crowded,unhealthy living conditions." But itcreated the following problems: (1) Itraised the cost of homeownership andacceptable housing too high for manyhouseholds; (2) It forced people to spendmore and more time commuting [thispoint is debatable]; (3) It undermined themobility of people who cannot afford carsor cannot drive them; (4) It created airpollution; (5) It absorbed attractive rurallandscape into urban uses, and (6) Mostimportant of all but most problematic—itundermined civic life.

The main principles of the new urbanism,as he describes them, are as follows:• The center of each neighborhood should

be defined by a public space andactivated by locally oriented civic andcommercial facilities.

• Each neighborhood shouldaccommodate a range of householdtypes and land uses.

• Cars should be kept in perspective.• Architecture should respond to the

surrounding fabric of buildings andspaces and to local traditions.

New urbanists draw upon several pasttraditions, including the City Beautifuland Town Planning movements.

Calthorpe has written that in theory 2,000homes, a million square feet ofcommercial space, parks, schools and daycare could fit within a quarter-mile walkof a station, or about 120 acres.

The strategy of the new urbanists is tochange local zoning regulations to forcethe adoption of their principles, or at leastto permit them to be followed.

In fact, it has been difficult to implementTOD schemes, since most areas do nothave rail transit systems. Some criticsclaim that the new urbanists emphasizevisual style over planning substance. Theyclaim that the large-scale proposals seemto continue sprawl, rather than change it.Moreover, the critics argue that the impactof the new urbanists' approach will beminimal unless some type of regionalgovernance is more widely adopted.Finally, the new urbanists have largelyignored the growing divisions of wealthand power among households. As Katznotes: "New Urbanism is a welcome stepforward, but it is only a step."

The remainder of the book is a series ofillustrated case studies that detail the newurbanism approach to designingresidential and nonresidentialneighborhoods.

Ravitch, Diane. 1996. "The Problem ofthe Schools: A Proposal for Renewal."In Julia Vitullo-Martin, ed., BreakingAway: The Future of Cities. New York:Twentieth Century Fund 77-87.

The author criticizes New York's schoolsbecause they are run by a top-heavybureaucracy that makes all decisionscentrally and leaves almost no authorityfor decision making within individualschools themselves. The results areterrible—only about 50 percent of allstudents who enter high school graduate,even after 5 years of classes. According toRavitch, we now demand that our schoolseducate all young people, something thatwas never done in the past. We musteducate them, she says in order toprepare them for life in a hightech world.To do this, we must abandon



centralized control and change to a systemin which "each school must be managedby a group of adults who have direct,personal, and professionalresponsibility—and accountability—forthe success of their students." (81)

It may be that the best direction forreforming the schools is to seek adiversity of providers that are publiclymonitored, rather than a bureaucraticsystem controlled by the mandates of asingle government agency. What would asystem look like in which a governmentdid the steering and let many others do therowing (82)?

She advocates three major principles forradical reform:

Autonomy—Each school should controlits own budget and hire (and fire) its ownteachers and other personnel. Each shouldbe told how much money it has (basedupon enrollments, plus allowances fordisadvantaged students) and allowed toallocate that money as it sees fit—knowing that it would be rigorouslyaudited by public officials.

Choice—Teachers should be able to freelydecide where they will work, and studentsand parents should be able to decidewhere they want to send their children toschool.

Quality—The centralized authoritiesshould set standards for performance,periodically assess performances of everyschool, and constantly inform parents andthe public of the results. Centralauthorities would also oversee largecapital improvements, negotiate unioncontracts (without inhibiting schools fromhiring whomever they wish), approve thecreation of new schools, and auditperformance and finances.

Schools that want to manage their ownaffairs should be allowed to conductelections among staff and parents tobecome chartered schools, andimmediately be given autonomy. Thiswould permit successful schools tobecome self-governing right away. Asecond element of the strategy wouldinclude contracting out the managementof several or many schools to specificorganizations. A basic idea is toencourage as many new schools to beformed as possible. A third element in thestrategy is to provide means-testedscholarships to poor students who couldchoose to use them in whatever schoolsthey wanted. These would essentially bevouchers paid to the students or theirparents, not to the institutionsthemselves—thereby finessing thereligious school issue. This procedure hasbeen successfully adopted in some otherprograms around the country.

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