1. Key Issue 4: Why Do Suburbs Face Distinctive Challenges?

2. Suburbanization:
Suburbs: Residential areas on the outskirts of a city or large town. Most modern suburbs are commuter towns with many single-family homes. Many suburbs have some degree of political autonomy and most have lower population density than inner city neighborhoods.
Auto oriented society:
mass transit peaked in 1920’s
shortage of consumer goods during WWII
declining friction of distance
GI Bill
Baby boom
Pull forces (low crime, quiet, less crowded, less pollution and noise)

3. What was the American dream in the 1950s?

4. Changes in Cities in the U.S.
U.S. population has been moving out of the city centers to the suburbs: suburbanization and counter-urbanization

5. Overview of Suburbanization
Year
Percent Urban
Percent Suburban
Percent Rural
1950
40%
20%
2000
30%
50%

6. Government Intervention
G.I. Bill
Provided numerous opportunities for veterans to transition to civilian life
Subsidized tuition, fees, books, educational materials for veterans desiring college
Provided low interest loans to veterans for the purchase of single family homes

7. Veterans return from WWII
Housing
Americans previously suffered from financial constraints such as ten year mortgages and 80% down payments
Federal Housing Authority: allowed thirty year mortgages and approve mortgages with only 10% down

8. The Levitt Brothers Took advantage of new market for houses
Purchased land once used to grow potatoes and constructed in Hempstead, Long Island the first of three Levittowns (later Pennsylvania and New Jersey)
Applied Fordist approach and mass produced houses to reduce costs
Later added baseball fields, shopping centers, schools, parks, and churches to neighborhoods

10. The Peripheral Model
The central city is surrounded by a ring road, around which are suburban areas and edge cities, shopping malls, office parks, industrial areas, and service complexes
Suburbs (peripheral areas) lack inner-city problems, but have to deal with sprawl and segregation

11. Cost of Suburban Sprawl:
Sprawl: progressive spread of development over the landscape; not contiguous
Undesirable traits:
Wastes land
Higher taxes and home prices
Greenbelts: rings of open space (London, Birmingham)

13. Why Are Urban Areas Expanding?
The Cost of Suburban Sprawl
A flattening of the density gradient for a metropolitan area means that its people and services are spread out over a larger area.
U.S. suburbs are characterized by sprawl, the progressive spread of development over the landscape.
Suburban Segregation
The modern residential suburb is segregated in two ways:
Social Class
Similarly priced houses are typically built in close proximity to one another, thus attracting a specific range of income earners.

14. Figure HOUSING SEGREGATION: GATED COMMUNITY Dana Point, California, a Los Angeles suburb, has a gated community called Lantern Bay.
HOUSING SEGREGATION: GATED COMMUNITY Dana Point, California, a Los Angeles suburb, has a gated community called Lantern Bay.

15. Why Are Urban Areas Expanding?
Suburban Segregation
The modern residential suburb is segregated in two ways cont’d.:
Land Uses
Residents are separated from commercial and manufacturing activities that are confined to compact, distinct areas.
Zoning ordinances enacted in the early 20th century have contributed most notably to the segregation of land uses associated with suburban areas.

16. Why Are Urban Areas Expanding?
Urban Transportation
Public Transit
Benefits
In larger cities, public transit is better suited than motor vehicles to move large numbers of people, because each transit traveler takes up less space.
More cost effective than privately operated vehicles
Emits relatively less pollutants than privately operated vehicles
More energy efficient than privately operated vehicles
Limitations
Most people in the U.S. overlook the benefits of public transit, because they place higher value on the privacy and flexibility of schedule offered by a car.
Not offered in most U.S. cities

17. BOSTON PUBLIC TRANSIT Boston’s subway system, known as “the T,” includes heavy rail (top) and light rail (bottom).
Figure BOSTON PUBLIC TRANSIT Boston’s subway system, known as “the T,” includes heavy rail (top) and light rail (bottom).

18. Europe versus U.S. Cities: Sprawl
European cities, including this hypothetical U.K. example, tend to restrict suburban development, thereby concentrating new development in and around existing concentrations. This leaves large rings of open space, so-called greenbelts. 18

19. Northampton, United Kingdom:
There is usually a sharp boundary between an urban area in the U.K., such as Northampton, and the surrounding rural area.

20. Density Gradient:
Density gradient: change in density in an urban area; the number of houses per unit of land diminishes as distance from the center city increases
However in recent years:
Less people living in center city
Less density difference within urban areas

21. Cleveland, Ohio Density Gradient 1900-1990
The density gradient in Cleveland shows the expansion of dense population outward from the city center over time. In 1990, population dispersed over a wider area with less variation in density than before.

22. Suburban Segregation:
Residents are separated from commercial and manufacturing activities that are confined to compact, distinct areas
Housing in a given suburban community is usually built for people of a single social class
Zoning ordinances: a law that limits the permitted uses of land and maximum density of development in a community
Encouraged spatial separation

23. Transportation and suburbanization
Motor vehicles
More than 95 percent of all trips are made by car
Public transit
Advantages of public transit
Transit travelers take up less space
Cheaper, less pollutant, and more energy efficient than an automobile
Suited to rapidly transport large number of people to small area
Public transit in the United States
Used primarily for rush-hour community for workers into and out of CBD
Small cities-minimal use
Most Americans prefer to commute by automobile

24. Contribution of Transportation to Suburbanization
Urban sprawl makes people more dependent on transportation (work, shopping)
Motor vehicles had led to large scale development of suburbs; more flexibility
U.S. government has paid 90% of the cost of limited access high-speed interstate highways
¼ of land of city is roads and parking lots

25. Contribution of Transportation to Suburbanization
Rush-hour commuting: heaviest traffic because large numbers of people are reaching small areas of land at the same time
Public transportation is cheaper, less polluting and more energy efficient
Average American loses 36 hours per year sitting in traffic jams and wastes 55 gallons of gasoline

26. Contribution of Transportation to Suburbanization:
The public transportation heavily used is rapid transit (subways, streetcars)
Subways have been modernized across the country
Not everyone without a car has access to public transportation (especially if live in city, but have suburban job)

27. Central London Traffic Sign
This sign near Marble Arch in London warns motorists that they are about to enter the Congestion Zone. A charge is levied for driving a private vehicle into central London from 7 AM to 6:30 PM.

28. Tram Line in Brussels
A Line 92 tram on the Rue Royale in Brussels.

29. Urban Realms Model:
Developed by Vance based on San Francisco Bay area and metropolis
Describes spatial components of modern metropolis
Includes independent suburban downtowns within the sphere of influence of the central city and CBD
Depends on:
Overall size of metropolitan region
Amount of economic activity in each urban realm
Topography and major land features
Accessibility of each realm

30. Edge City
Includes a central business district, central city, new downtown, and suburban downtown