Chapter 1 ~ Sprawl "Sprawl has come to be associated as a term for the widespread expansion of the suburbs in the 1980's and 90's. It is is characterized by strip malls, developments of middle- to upper class housing(with large parcel single family dwellings), and the progressive decentralized development of rural areas." --Patrick Lichty Houses encroach on farmland in McFarland, California, near Bakersfield. David Wells/The Image Works Taken from my Synopsis of "What is Sprawl and Why?" by Andres Duany, Elizabeth Plater-Zyberk and Jeff Speck "The cities will be part of the country; I shall live 30 miles from my office in one direction, under a pine tree; my secretary will live 30 miles away from it too, in the other direction, under another pine tree. We shall both have our own car. We shall use up tires, wear out road surfaces and gears, consume oil and gasoline. All of which will necessitate a great deal of work . . . enough for all." -- Le Corbusier, The Radiant City (1967) Suburban sprawl is an unhealthy and inevitably self-destructive form of growth. Land is consumed faster than it can be paid for and many problems arise like that of traffic and social inequality and segregation. As these areas of sprawl grow out from the city, the inner core drastically deteriorates as more people move further out and fewer people can be convinced to move in. The five components of sprawl The simplicity of sprawl is the main reason that it has been able to continue. The five main components of sprawl while existing next to each other are virtually independent and segregated. 1) Housing subdivisions, commonly confused or categorized as a neighborhood, is simply a place for residential living. 2) Shopping centers, strip malls, corner stores, department malls; a place you normally wouldn't walk to. Places identified by generally large parking lot and the lack of office space or residential. 3) Office parks, places only for work that are normally a box or tower surrounded by a parking lot and normally roads or highways instead of some form of country side. 4) Civic institutions, town halls, churches, schools etc that are normally within the "town center" which serves as a focal point. These places are usually not accessible by the walking pedestrian. 5) Roadways, because of the distance between everything and the many activities that people participate in within suburban areas, these areas are able to produce as much if not more traffic than a larger traditional town. A brief history of sprawl Sprawl started as an encouragement for urban dispersal by the government. Also the cost of commuting began to increase as the interstate highway, which was to connect major cities within America, crossed 41,000 miles of land. As people started moving further and further out the merchants would follow to be where their customers were. As time went on businesses moved out to the suburbs as well because people wanted to work closer to home. As these suburbs continued to grow the development continued to be segregated into single use areas with no flexibility to change. "As a result, the new American city has been likened to an unmade omelet: eggs, cheese, vegetables, a pinch of salt, but each consumed in turn, raw." "[Sprawl] wasn't an accident, but neither was it based on a specific vision of its physical form or of the life that form would generate. As such, it remains an innocent error, but nonetheless an error that should not continue to be promoted."

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