The Political Whore

By Grant Rimbey
Green Community contributor

The term “sprawl” was coined in 1956 and is defined as unplanned greenfield (undeveloped land) development on the periphery of urban areas that is generally single-use, single-story, low density, inexpensive to build, and requires little knowledge or expertise to create. Sprawl gobbles up our farmlands and woodlands while increasing dependency on fossil fuel, fosters obesity because you have to drive everywhere, diminishes the natural environment, decreases the feasibility of mass transit, all while failing to create a “sense of place” or build community.

There was once a time in America (before the second World War) when sprawl didn’t exist. The ascent of sprawl to the predominant development form in the United States is based on many criteria:

· Government loans for WW2 GI’s that provided mortgages aimed at new single-family suburban construction
· WW2 military-industrial assembly methods applied to the construction and planning of communities
· The favoring of simple single-use zoning over complex mixed-use zoning
· The Modern attitude of “out with the old, in with the new”
· Government subsidies for highways (road creation and widening), parking lots and gasoline
· The demonization of mass transit and affordable housing
· The ease and affordability of greenfield development versus complicated urban infill
· The increasing segregation of society by income and race (the abandoning of cities for the suburbs)
· The “back to nature” or “garden city” myth that coincided with the abandoning of cities (the popularity of the S.U.V. is rooted in this)
· The erosion of public confidence in the skills of the planner based on post-WW2 planning mistakes
· The creation of communities that were developer-led, not planner-led
· The favoritism of private and corporate control over citizen input for community plans
· The misconception that everyone in America wants to or should own a single-family suburban residence
· Creating sprawl is easy and cheap, and doesn’t require expensive consultants like town planners or architects

An excellent primer on the phenomena and history of sprawl in America is the book Suburban Nation, the Rise of Sprawl and the Decline of the American Dream by Duany, Plater-Zyberk, Speck, (2000). This book is a mainstay of the planning and architecture group “Congress for the New Urbanism“.

In the golden years of planner John Nolen (see my previous CL post), city officials hired very talented town planning experts like Mr. Nolen to create a master plan and governing code for their cities. The plan was created based on input from workshops attended by citizenry and local leaders and orchestrated by the planner. Only after the plan and code was created and refined were capable builders and developers invited to build this collective, well-thought, and sustainable citizen vision.

Compare this process with how sprawl is created: a developer buys land from a farmer (who views the land as his retirement fund). Without concern for existing roads, nearby retail or schools, the land is re-zoned from agricultural to residential. The developer then clear cuts the land and obliterates the ecosystem that existed on it, and they hire a questionably qualified but inexpensive “subdivision planner/designer” who is either the developer themselves, the civil engineer, or a relative or friend, and proceeds to build a low density, inexpensive tract home community. Ironically, the subdivision is often named for the ecosystem it destroyed, i.e. “Big Old Oak Preserve”. If it’s “exclusive”, it has a wall around it. The developer sells the lots in his subdivision and then moves on to the next former pasture that he can purchase for a steal. Because there’s no master plan, bigger vision, or citizen input guiding any of this (other then the easily revised comprehensive plan), the residents of the new subdivision and their neighbors are often left to fend for themselves regarding clogged roads, lack of nearby schools, office and retail, compromised natural environment, crazy drives, etc.

At the state level, our land development industry remains addicted to sprawl as seen by their tacit support of State Bill 360. Under the (I’m being hopeful) well-intended guise of “directing growth from sprawl towards urban infill the intent of this bill was to streamline the permitting process, concentrating development in cities, and creating construction jobs”, but the bill has a big flaw. The bill eases local review of all development in “urban serve areas”, the problem is that the bill naively defines “urban” density as 1,000 people per square mile or less than one person per acre, which can be considered “urban” only in places like Alaska. Hillsborough County has an “urban service area” that encompasses much of the county so this bill exposes most of the county to the worst kind of sprawl, one that doesn’t have even a respectable local review process as minimal protection. Whether by intent or ignorance, bad bills like this actively perpetuate the sprawl mentality.

As the fight rages on against sprawl locally many in the trenches forget that there IS such a thing as “good growth,” it’s just not common in our county, or even our state. I believe it is possible for human and natural environments to exist side by side without mutual degradation. To change our course from sprawl towards good and thoughtful growth (which sometimes means not building) we’ll have to abandon the sprawl mentality that’s destroying our quality of life and our state; and it may require removal of some of the sprawl that’s already created (a new green industry?). In future posts I will discuss alternatives to sprawl, some call it Sustainable Urbanism, or Transit Oriented Development (TOD), or Traditional Neighborhood Development (TND), or SmartGrowth, or New Urbanism (CNU), or just Sustainability. No matter the term, the underlying principles remain the same.

As an entrée to these posts, I will share an excellent video created by the Congress for the New Urbanism (CNU), which is the leading international organization promoting walkable, neighborhood-based development as an alternative to sprawl. The team of First + Main Media from Julian, CA and Paget Films from Buffalo, NY, produced this award-winning documentary film that shows how re-imagining our cities and suburbs to be sustainable and walkable will benefit everyone, and everything.

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