 | The examples and perspective in this article deal primarily with the English-speaking world and do not represent a worldwide view of the subject.(August 2022) |
Criticism of suburbia dates back to the boom of suburban development in the 1950s and critiques a culture of aspirational homeownership. [1] In the English-speaking world, this discourse is prominent in the United States and Australia being prevalent both in popular culture and academia.
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While the United States government has yet to define what counts as a "suburban neighborhood," more than half of Americans have described their neighborhoods as suburban. [2]
Suburbs in the United States have often been criticised for instituting explicitly racist policies to deter people deemed as other . [3]
The demand for single-family housing has led to urban sprawl in many metropolitan areas across the United States, notably in the Los Angeles Metropolitan Area and the Northeast Megalopolis.
One of the major environmental problems associated with sprawl is land loss, habitat loss, and subsequent reduction in biodiversity. A review by Czech and colleagues [4] finds that urbanization endangers more species and is more geographically ubiquitous in the mainland United States than any other human activity.
Sprawl leads to increased driving, which in turn leads to vehicle emissions that contribute to air pollution and its attendant negative impacts on human health. In addition, the reduced physical activity implied by increased automobile use has negative health consequences. Sprawl significantly predicts chronic medical conditions and health-related quality of life, although it doesn't predict mental health disorders. [5] The American Journal of Public Health and the American Journal of Health Promotion, have both stated that there is a significant connection between sprawl, obesity, and hypertension. [6]
A heavy reliance on automobiles increases traffic throughout the city as well as automobile crashes, pedestrian injuries, and air pollution. [7]
Living in larger, more spread out spaces generally makes public services more expensive. Since car usage becomes endemic and public transport often becomes significantly more expensive, city planners are forced to build highway and parking infrastructure, which in turn decreases taxable land and revenue, and decreases the desirability of the area adjacent to such structures.[ citation needed ] Providing services such as water, sewers, and electricity is also more expensive per household in less dense areas, given that sprawl increases lengths of power lines and pipes, necessitating higher maintenance costs. [8]
Residents of low-density areas spend a higher proportion of their income on transportation than residents of high density areas. [9] The unplanned nature of outward urban development is commonly linked to increased dependency on cars. In 2003, a British newspaper calculated that urban sprawl would cause an economic loss of 3905 pounds per year, per person through cars alone, based on data from the RAC estimating that the average cost of operating a car in the UK at that time was £5,000 a year, while train travel (assuming a citizen commutes every day of the year, with a ticket cost of 3 pounds) would be only £1095. [10]
Sprawling cities define the urban Australian landscape. The iconic "quarter-acre" block is often cited as fundamental to the Australian Dream; it has both cultural and political currency. [11] In 1901, the year of Australian Federation, "almost 70 per cent of Sydney's population were living in the suburbs". [12]
There is a profound cynicism that exists in much commentary on suburbia that is promoted by "intellectuals and others seeking to delineate the suburb" [13] which has been characterised by "conformity, control and some sense of false consciousness". [14]
Despite the fact the majority of Australians still live in the suburbs, or maybe because of it, negative discourse about suburbia, often termed "suburbia bashing", perseveres in the mainstream media. [15] Dame Edna Everage typifies this as she demonstrates both "nostalgia and disdain for the Australian suburb and suburban life". [13]
Prominent journalist Allan Ashbolt satirised the suburb that represented Australian nationalism, rooted in the post-World War II era, as passive and uninspired, inscribed strongly in spatial terms. In 1966, he described Australian reality accordingly:
"Behold the man – the Australian of today – on Sunday morning in the suburbs when the high decibel drone of the motor-mower is calling the faithful to worship. A block of land, a brick veneer, and the motor-mower beside him in the wilderness – what more does he want to sustain him." [16]
Ashbolt, among others, represent a "tradition of abuse of the suburbs and of the majority of Australians" in Australian mainstream media. [17]
Suburbia bashing is entrenched in questions of national identity. Disparaging commentary about the suburbs often appears in contrast to the national mythology of the Australian bush. The landscape that is portrayed in the tourism advertisements, by poets and painters, does not represent the experience of the majority of Australians. The suburb and the bush are counterposed, "the bush (cast as the authentic Australian landscape) with the city (regarded as blighted foreign import)". [18] The bush landscape is a masculine construction of a more "authentic notion of Australian national identity" exemplified by the poetry of Henry Lawson. [12] Conversely, the suburb is feminised, epitomised by Dame Edna for more than fifty years, and more recently, by comedic team Jane Turner and Gina Riley in Kath & Kim . [12]
Architect and cultural critic, Robin Boyd, also criticised suburbia, referring to it as the "Australian ugliness". [1] Boyd observed a "pursuit of respectability" in suburban spaces. [1] Boyd writes of a contrived and superficial sense of place, centered on a "fear of reality":
"The Australian ugliness begins with fear of reality, denial of the need for the everyday environment to reflect the heart of the human problem, satisfaction with veneer and cosmetic effects. It ends in betrayal of the element of love and a chill near the root of national self-respect." [19]
The ugliness that Boyd describes is qualified as "skin deep". [20] However, in the tradition of suburbia bashing, he proposes that there is an emptiness of spirit that can be read through an uninformed appreciation for aesthetics.
More recently there has been suggestion of a "new Australian ugliness". [21] New suburban developments have seen the proliferation of what have become known as "McMansions". McMansions epitomise the suburbia that is attacked by Boyd for both its monotony and "featurism" [1] Journalist Miranda Devine refers to an elitist perception that those who live in such suburban assemblages display a "poverty of spirit and a barrenness of mind" that is derived from a politics of aesthetics and taste, as expressed by Boyd fifty years ago. [15] In this "new Australian ugliness" some commentators attribute a rise in consumer culture: "There's a concern about over-consumption. But there's little thought of why – beyond advertising-driven gullibility". [21] Academic Mark Peel has rejected notions of gullible "consuming" residents of new suburbs by explaining his own "choice" to move to Melbourne's outer suburbs. [21]
Peel alludes to a discourse of suburbia that is elitist, and is based on matters of taste which have translated into a socio-cultural divide. When Miranda Devine refers to the elites, she refers to an inner-city population. [15] The divide is between the urbanites and the suburbanites, and the conflict is over national identity.
Suburbia in the United Kingdom has been a subject of criticism for many decades, with critiques focusing on various social, cultural, and environmental aspects. The criticisms often revolve around themes such as conformity, lack of community spirit, environmental degradation, and socio-economic divides.
The development of suburbs in the UK accelerated during the interwar period and post-World War II era. This was driven by a combination of factors including the desire for better living conditions away from crowded urban centers, government policies promoting homeownership, and advancements in transportation that made commuting feasible.
A suburb is an area within a metropolitan area which is predominantly residential and within commuting distance of a large city. Suburbs can have their own political or legal jurisdiction, especially in the United States, but this is not always the case, especially in the United Kingdom, where most suburbs are located within the administrative boundaries of cities. In most English-speaking countries, suburban areas are defined in contrast to central city or inner city areas, but in Australian English and South African English, suburb has become largely synonymous with what is called a "neighborhood" in the U.S. Due in part to historical trends such as white flight, some suburbs in the United States have a higher population and higher incomes than their nearby inner cities.
Smart growth is an urban planning and transportation theory that concentrates growth in compact walkable urban centers to avoid sprawl. It also advocates compact, transit-oriented, walkable, bicycle-friendly land use, including neighborhood schools, complete streets, and mixed-use development with a range of housing choices. The term "smart growth" is particularly used in North America. In Europe and particularly the UK, the terms "compact city", "urban densification" or "urban intensification" have often been used to describe similar concepts, which have influenced government planning policies in the UK, the Netherlands and several other European countries.
Commuting is periodically recurring travel between a place of residence and place of work or study, where the traveler, referred to as a commuter, leaves the boundary of their home community. By extension, it can sometimes be any regular or often repeated travel between locations, even when not work-related. The modes of travel, time taken and distance traveled in commuting varies widely across the globe. Most people in least-developed countries continue to walk to work. The cheapest method of commuting after walking is usually by bicycle, so this is common in low-income countries but is also increasingly practised by people in wealthier countries for environmental and health reasons. In middle-income countries, motorcycle commuting is very common.
Urban sprawl is defined as "the spreading of urban developments on undeveloped land near a more or less densely populated city". Urban sprawl has been described as the unrestricted growth in many urban areas of housing, commercial development, and roads over large expanses of land, with little concern for very dense urban planning. Sometimes the urban areas described as the most "sprawling" are the most densely populated. In addition to describing a special form of urbanization, the term also relates to the social and environmental consequences associated with this development. In modern times some suburban areas described as "sprawl" have less detached housing and higher density than the nearby core city. Medieval suburbs suffered from the loss of protection of city walls, before the advent of industrial warfare. Modern disadvantages and costs include increased travel time, transport costs, pollution, and destruction of the countryside. The revenue for building and maintaining urban infrastructure in these areas are gained mostly through property and sales taxes. Most jobs in the US are now located in suburbs generating much of the revenue, although a lack of growth will require higher tax rates.
A streetcar suburb is a residential community whose growth and development was strongly shaped by the use of streetcar lines as a primary means of transportation. Such suburbs developed in the United States in the years before the automobile, when the introduction of the electric trolley or streetcar allowed the nation’s burgeoning middle class to move beyond the central city’s borders. Early suburbs were served by horsecars, but by the late 19th century cable cars and electric streetcars, or trams, were used, allowing residences to be built farther away from the urban core of a city. Streetcar suburbs, usually called additions or extensions at the time, were the forerunner of today's suburbs in the United States and Canada. San Francisco's Western Addition is one of the best examples of streetcar suburbs before westward and southward expansion occurred.
Suburbanization, also spelled suburbanisation, is a population shift from historic core cities or rural areas into suburbs. Most suburbs are built in a formation of (sub)urban sprawl. As a consequence of the movement of households and businesses away from city centers, low-density, peripheral urban areas grow.Proponents of curbing suburbanization argue that sprawl leads to urban decay and a concentration of lower-income residents in the inner city, in addition to environmental harm.
Urban decay is the sociological process by which a previously functioning city, or part of a city, falls into disrepair and decrepitude. There is no single process that leads to urban decay.
In urban planning, infill, or in-fill, is the rededication of land in an urban environment, usually open-space, to new construction. Infill also applies, within an urban polity, to construction on any undeveloped land that is not on the urban margin. The slightly broader term "land recycling" is sometimes used instead. Infill has been promoted as an economical use of existing infrastructure and a remedy for urban sprawl. Detractors view increased urban density as overloading urban services, including increased traffic congestion and pollution, and decreasing urban green-space. Many also dislike it for social and historical reasons, partly due to its unproven effects and its similarity with gentrification.
Urban flight, sometimes referred to as suburban colonization, is the movement of people from an urban area to its suburbs. The phenomenon is often studied for the effects that it has on the city, especially the reduction of political power and the reduction of tax revenue which occurs as a result of the depopulation.
Mixed use is a type of urban development, urban design, urban planning and/or a zoning classification that blends multiple uses, such as residential, commercial, cultural, institutional, or entertainment, into one space, where those functions are to some degree physically and functionally integrated, and that provides pedestrian connections. Mixed-use development may be applied to a single building, a block or neighborhood, or in zoning policy across an entire city or other administrative unit. These projects may be completed by a private developer, (quasi-)governmental agency, or a combination thereof. A mixed-use development may be a new construction, reuse of an existing building or brownfield site, or a combination.
The Australian Dream or Great Australian Dream is, in its narrowest sense, a belief that in Australia, home ownership can lead to a better life and is an expression of success and security. The term is derived from the American Dream, which describes a similar phenomenon in the United States also starting in the 1940s, although they are differentiated from each other in that the American Dream is more concerned with the abstract notion that upward social mobility in general is achievable for all while the Australian Dream is more invested specifically in home ownership as a means of prosperity. Although this standard of living is enjoyed by many in the existing Australian population, commentators have argued that rising real house prices have made it increasingly difficult to achieve the "Great Australian Dream", especially for those living in large cities and the Millennials.
An inner suburb is a suburban community central to a large city, or at the inner city and central business district. The urban density is usually lower than the inner city or central business district, but higher than that of the city's rural–urban fringe, or exurbs.
An ethnoburb is a suburban residential and business area with a notable cluster of a particular ethnic minority population, which may or may not be a local majority. That can greatly influence the social geography within the area because of distinct cultural and religious values. Ethnoburbs allow for ethnic minority groups to maintain their traditional identity, forestalling cultural assimilation.
Medium-density housing is a term used within urban planning and academic literature to refer to a category of residential development that falls between detached suburban housing and large multi-story buildings. There is no singular definition of medium-density housing as its precise definition tends to vary between jurisdiction. Scholars however, have found that medium density housing ranges from about 25 to 80 dwellings per hectare, although most commonly sits around 30 and 40 dwellings/hectare. Typical examples of medium-density housing include duplexes, triplexes, townhouses, row homes, detached homes with garden suites, and walk-up apartment buildings.
Peter Calthorpe is a San Francisco–based architect, urban designer and urban planner. He is a founding member of the Congress for New Urbanism, a Chicago-based advocacy group formed in 1992 that promotes sustainable building practices. For his works on redefining the models of urban and suburban growth in America Calthorpe has been named one of twenty-five ‘innovators on the cutting edge’ by Newsweek magazine.
A commuter town is a populated area that is primarily residential rather than commercial or industrial. Routine travel from home to work and back is called commuting, which is where the term comes from. A commuter town may be called by many other terms: "bedroom community", "bedroom town", "bedroom suburb" (US), "dormitory town" (UK). The term "exurb" was used from the 1950s, but since 2006, is generally used for areas beyond suburbs and specifically less densely built than the suburbs to which the exurbs' residents commute.
A large number of books and articles have been written on the subject of suburbs and suburban living as a regional, national or worldwide phenomenon. This is a selected bibliography of scholarly and analytical works, listed by subject region and focus.
New Suburbanism is an urban design movement which intends to improve on existing suburban or exurban designs. New Suburbanists seek to establish an alternative between a dichotomy of the centripetal city and centrifugal suburb, by features such as rear-loading garages and walking-focused landscaping.
Transport divide refers to unequal access to transportation. It can result in the social exclusion of disadvantaged groups.
Urban retrofitting is a combination of policies and phenomena done with the goal of undoing or remedying the effects of urban sprawl. The phenomena of adaptive reuse and infill development to combat sprawl are key to this. It often follows the new urbanist school of thought, which aims to undo the sprawl and flight from urbanized areas that occurred in the US and Canada after WWII.