Urban sprawl (also called suburban sprawl and Los Angelization) describes the growth of a metropolitan area, particularly the suburbs, over a large area. In examples of this phenomena, such as Los Angeles, California and Houston, Texas, new development is often low-density, where the metropolis grows outward instead of 'upward' as with higher densities. Environmentalists and an increasing number of urban planners deplore urban sprawl for several reasons.

In 1990, Atlanta, Georgia was noted in the United States as the city with the largest sprawl area, with 701 mile² (1,815 km²) of urban development. The Atlanta metropolitan area has a population of 3.8 million persons. In contrast, Hong Kong fits a population of 7.3 million persons in 421 mile² (1,090 km²).

Contents

1 Arguments for and against 2 Examples in the United States 3 Urban sprawl in fiction 4 See also 5 External links

Arguments for and against

By many measures, real estate development is taken as a measure of progress. When a city grows laterally, new homes are built, transportation projects are undertaken, and property value s often are higher in the new areas of the metropolitan area. In addition, many Americans--especially middle and upper class families--have shown preferences for the suburban lifestyle. Reasons cited include a preference towards lower-density development (since it often features lower ambient noise and increased privacy), better schools, and lower crime rates (even though car-related fatalities often make it more dangerous to live in the suburbs than in the city).

Yet after an explosion of sprawl in the later half of the 20th century in the United States, some drawbacks have emerged towards this growth pattern. When citizens live in a larger space, often at a lower density, car usage often becomes endemic and public transport often becomes infeasible, forcing city planners to build large highway and parking infrastructure, which in turn decreases taxable land, and revenue, and decreases the desirability of the area adjacent to such structures.

In addition, urban sprawl often consumes land that would otherwise be used for "natural" purposes, such as wildlife reserves, forests, and agriculture. Detractors of sprawl often espouse smart growth and/or New Urbanism. Urban sprawl isn't the only way to increase real estate development; many of the urban areas of cities in Japan, Hong Kong, and Europe which have urban growth plans show higher property values than do their suburbs.

Finally, suburbs are in large part to blame for the vast homogeneity of society and culture, leading to sprawling suburban developments of people with similar race, background and SES (socioeconomic status ). Segregated and stratified development was institutionalized in the early 1950s and 60s with the financial industries' illegal process of redlining neighborhoods to prevent certain people from entering and residing in a district. This is often referred to as a form of institutionalized racism , and was endemic to the occurring ("White Flight") of the urban cities. While certainly not as forthright today, the similar price characteristics for many developments in suburbs automatically limit those who would choose to live there to only a certain segment of society. The lack of cultural diversity (not the manufactured diversity driven by the media and marketers) is, in large part, a symptom of the spread of suburbia.

Examples in the United States

In the United States, about 2.2 million acres (8,900 km²) of land was added to urban areas between 1992 and 2002. But urban sprawl does not always imply population growth or indicate an influx of immigration. For example, between 1970 to 1990, the population of Detroit, Michigan declined by 8% while its land area increased by 28%. Similar cases include the American cities of Milwaukee, Wisconsin, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, New York City, Cleveland, Ohio, and Buffalo, New York. At the same time, the urban cores of these and other major cities experienced the related phenomenon of white flight. However most believe that there exists a correlation between the area of sprawl and population growth.

On the other hand, Portland, Oregon passed laws in 1973 limiting the area the city could occupy--essentially marking the largest possible area of the city and suburbs. After the creation of this boundary, population density increased by 53%. However, the city still sprawled an additional 39 miles (63 km) through the next decade, witnessing a population growth of 146,000. In July of 2004 the city of Portland increased its urban growth boundary to the boundary previously planned for 2040.

Urban sprawl in fiction

In William Gibson's fiction, "the Sprawl" is a slang term referring to the entire Eastern Seaboard of the United States. In Gibson's future, New York's City's urban area is continuous with that of other eastern cities, from Massachusetts to Florida; the entire area is formally known as the BAMA, or the Boston-Atlanta Metropolitan Area. The following three books are sometimes referred to as Gibson's Sprawl Trilogy:

• Neuromancer (1984) (part 1 of the Sprawl Trilogy)
• Count Zero (1986) (part 2 of the Sprawl Trilogy)
• Mona Lisa Overdrive (1988) (part 3 of the Sprawl Trilogy)

See also

• urban planning
• rural exodus
• urban studies
• regional planning
• demographics
• McMansion
• Faux Chateau
• Gaffney

External links

• Sprawl City http://www.sprawlcity.org/index.html
• Smart Growth America http://www.smartgrowthamerica.com/
• Sprawl Watch http://www.sprawlwatch.org/
• Evangelizing World Class Cities http://www.urbana.org/_articles.cfm?RecordId=317