Is There A 'War Against Suburbia'?

Joel Kotkin charges that suburban living is under attack by planners and environmentalists, and the frontline is Los Angeles, where L.A.'s new mayor has declared suburbs 'an old concept.'

1 minute read

January 16, 2006, 11:00 AM PST

By Chris Steins @planetizen


"Suburbia, the preferred way of life across the advanced capitalist world, is under an unprecedented attack -- one that seeks to replace single-family residences and shopping centers with an "anti-sprawl" model beloved of planners and environmental activists.

...Experts differ on the impact of these regulations, but it certainly has not created the new urbanist nirvana widely promoted by Portland's boosters. Strict growth limits have driven population and job growth further out, in part by raising the price of land within the growth boundary, to communities across the Columbia River in Washington state and to distant places in Oregon. Suburbia has not been crushed, but simply pushed farther away.

...It is time politicians recognized how their constituents actually want to live. If not, they will only hurt their communities, and force aspiring middle-class families to migrate ever further out to the periphery for the privacy, personal space and ownership that constitutes the basis of their common dreams."

[Editor's note: The link below is available to non-subscribers for a period of five days.]

Thanks to Hugh Pavletich

Saturday, January 14, 2006 in The Wall Street Journal

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