Urban and Suburban Features and Change Continued...

Planning a city continued… The following slides will give you some more things to think about when planning your city.

What will the government look like? Annexation? – Process of legally adding land to a city – In the past was preferred when cities could provide more and better services – Annexation less likely to occur today Peripheral residents prefer to organize their own service using their own tax dollars

What will you do to keep the original city productive and appealing? Inner city challenges – Inadequate job skills – Culture of poverty – Crime – Homelessness – Poverty – Deteriorating housing

Will you look to gentrification? – Process by which middle-class people move into deteriorated inner-city neighborhoods and renovate the housing – Reasons Larger housing Closer to place of work (downtown) Proximity to amenities – Appeals to singles and childless couples

How will people get around? – Walking cities – Street railways - Aka trolleys, streetcars, trams – Subways – Railroad - Allowed for early suburbanization of wealthy – Restricted suburban development to narrow strips within walking distance of the stations

Arguments for public transportation – Better suited to larger cities – Cheaper – Less polluting – More energy efficient – Constitute ~5 percent commuting trips in United States – Recent expansion in United States

Issues with automobiles – Facilitated suburbanization – Encouraged by US government – Problems with automobiles Roads and parking lots consume space Increased road maintenance costs Create pollution Create congestion – Technological innovations to rectify

The price of sprawl... – Roads and utilities must be extended – Higher fuel consumption – Loss of agricultural land Other sites lie fallow while speculators await – Local governments typically spend more on services for these new developments