Why the push for greater urbanization?

[delete this account pls]

Happy birthday Jeff! have a good one :cheers:

[KAH]

I'll point out that this will have a significant effect on transportation costs for all the goods we ship around our fairly large country. That will raise costs for all sorts of good, particularly consumables, that people need.

That it will. All forms of taxes that hit consumption, and they will hurt the worse the poorer you are. Since the point of a carbon tax isn't primarily fiscal, I think funneling back the tax revenues back to the consumers. That will allow for less pain, but keep the desirable price signal for carbon emissions.

I personally think that three hour commutes are asinine, and they are far more the exception than the rule. Most people don't, and wouldn't, put up with anything like that. Especially if they are driving. But I do suspect the majority of people that are commuting that distance are in a few huge metropolitan areas, likely working highly renumerative positions. They'll be able to pay the tax, and it likely won't materially effect their lifestyle. The people who will really get hammered by this aren't the suburbanites, though. It will be the rural people.

Three hour commutes is extreme, I realize that. I'm assuming rural people would be hit because of increased transport costs, however?

In any case, the carbon tax isn't about hammering any particular group - the pain is a side effect, which can to some extent be mitigated.

In all seriousness, though, I do think there already are built-in incentives for people to reduce emissions, the cost of fuel, the general unpleasantness of commuting longer distances, etc.. And the reality is that in many cases, most people don't have the ability to adapt the way the urban planners would like. Few people are going to sell their homes and move closer to the city just to shave some time off their commute. Abandonment of suburbs and returning to cities is simply not going to happen in significant numbers in even the short or medium term. People will stay where they are and carpool to the extent they can (which many do already). But overall, the net effect of the carbon tax is going to me much less a changing of behaviors, and more of a reduction in standard of living for the middle and working classes. Just another tax.

Some of those "built-in" incentives aren't incentives to reduce carbon emissions, however. Take the higher cost of gasoline. This is an incentive to reduce the consumption of refined oil products, not carbon emissions - the fact that refined oil products are partly to blame for carbon emissions is beside the point.

Say that the electric car really gets off in the market, and leaves the old gas guzzler in the dust. Improvement? Only if the power the electric car needs is produced by a cleaner fuel than oil, rather than even dirtier stuff like coal. That is why a carbon tax is needed, because it targets what is actually desirable to target.

Moreover, a comprehensive carbon tax means that rather than focusing all efforts only on the transport sector, ALL sectors will be subject to this price signal. This will allow for far more efficient pursuit of lowering carbon emissions as a whole.

[lokisnow]

here's a lateral thought, perhaps the outrageous growth of suburbia was only possible because of the unique demographics of the baby boom in confluence with the unique global economic circumstances of the Post WW2 era when the USA was the world's only surviving manufacturing economy. The tail effects of the baby boom resulted in enough surplus population (even though it was less population than the BB itself) to continue to sustain the suburbs, just barely, but the second generation after the baby boom isn't supplying enough population to sustain the suburban model.

[Former Lord of Winterfell]

The relationship is quite small and it only controls for income and not for where people actually live.

Eh? The point I made was that folks with longer commutes tend to make more money, and that's exactly what the data showed. You and lockesnow said that the exact opposite was true. And your point about "controls" makes no sense because the point being made was correlation, not causation.

And the problem with your suggestion is that housing prices are almost always, overall, radial. The closer to the city, the more you pay.

And you base that on...what, exactly? There are a lot of cities with housing prices that have either collapsed, or never were high to begin with. There are a lot of inner ring suburbs built mostly with smaller, working class homes that are much cheaper than the burbs. By your logic, all those poor city dwellers should have no problem moving out to the burbs because housing prices are so much lower. I suppose if I was to make a more specific generalization -- although it varies widely by city -- you do often have very expensive downtown living in some cities. But once you get out of the extremely desireable locations, that is often surrounded by some quite cheap housing, and costs then start to go up a big as you get farther out to larger homes with bigger yards. But again, that can vary significantly between cities, and it certainly isn't "almost always" a direct radial relationship.

What is generally true is that a comparable home will cost more the closer it is to the city, though that is still not true in a lot of places. But even to the extent that is true, the point is that the homes generally aren't comparable. The farther you get from a city, the larger the homes and yards tend to be. Also, the newer and more efficient/better built they tend to be, and often the neighborhoods are safer and schools are better. But here you go, Shryke -- one of those lovely expensive urban homes. I suppose this means you get a nice home in the suburbs for what, 75 cents?

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2381283/Going-going-going-Detroit-family-home-sale-519-days-despite-market-just-1.html

People with long commutes don't just do them for the money, they do them because, just like you, they don't want to live in the city.

You don't make more money because your commute is longer -- that's nonsensical. But the other point is correct -- they don't want to live in the city, but it is generally more expensive to live in the suburbs.

[Former Lord of Winterfell]

Three hour commutes is extreme, I realize that. I'm assuming rural people would be hit because of increased transport costs, however?

Right. The distances neeed to travel are greater there -- Where I grew up, there wasn't a store of any kind within miles.

In any case, the carbon tax isn't about hammering any particular group - the pain is a side effect, which can to some extent be mitigated.

Unless the money is going right back in the same amounts to the people who paid the taxes (which would defeat the purpose) it is still going to be a pretty blunt instrument.

[Former Lord of Winterfell]

That said, present day suburbia exists SOLEY because of government (highway engineer) planning and a pact between the oil companies and automotive industry. That is far too solidly established to be open to serious dispute.

Really? What exactly is this "pact" between oil companies and the automotive industry that created suburbs?

As for suburbs existing because of "government planning" --which amounts to adding an exit to an existing highway -- how is that any less true for cities? Cities could not possibly exist in their modern form without huge government expenditures in terms of maintaining roads, sewers, power and water lines, subsidized public transportation. Modern cities are generally supplied with vast quantities of food and other goods shipped in over a highway system, or over other major roads specifically put in place to service that city.

The vast majority of suburbs are unplanned. They're just the result of people not wanting to live crammed into cities, so they move a little further out. Exits were generally put in place only after enough people lived there to start bitching about it, or because non-suburbanites started bitching about commuters clogging other roads. And since a lot of their tax dollars were going to the highway system, they were no less entitled to exits than anyone else.

[Former Lord of Winterfell]

Now, you may love that sort of thing, but countless studies have shown that these types of barriers, divisions, and isolations are detrimental to communities in the long run. It may work for you, for the few years that you're living there, but it's not sustainable over generations,

There are plenty of suburbs and satellite cities that have existed for many generations, and continue to do so. And the dramatization of a strip mall as "barriers, divisions, isolations" sounds more like social policy/preferences than anything else. It's about 1/2 from my house to the nearest store, and about 1 mile to the nearest strip mall. I'd wager that the area encompassed by that is larger than the average "neighborhood" of a city dweller, whose boundaries likely are bisected my roads even more busy and "divisive".

and is especially a hindrance to any increased saturation or growth.

I'm not sure what you mean here, but I'm assuming you're talking about it being a hindrance to increased population density. What's wrong with that? Some people prefer not to live in a high population density area.

The problem is that people like you look at it as a snapshot... Hey, look... crime is low here. It's pretty and I can ride my bike with my kid along the street. But over time, these communities decline, become less diverse, more run-down (because of cheaply-made housing stock), and less desirable to subsequent generations.

Are you talking about cities, or suburbs? Because I've got to tell you, I've driven through a lot of cities in the U.S., and a great many have significant swaths that have declined, more run-down because of cheaply made housing stock, and less desireable to subsequent generations. That's often exactly why so many former residents of those cities have moved to the suburbs/smaller outlying cities.

And in terms of "cheaply made housing stock", again, that's quite the generalization. A great many older homes were built with lead paint or pipes, crappy wiring, grossly inadequate insulation, poor drainage, etc.. For the most part, the homes even in the inner rings suburbs where I live are generally in much better shape than homes in the city.

[naz]

here's a lateral thought, perhaps the outrageous growth of suburbia was only possible because of the unique demographics of the baby boom in confluence with the unique global economic circumstances of the Post WW2 era when the USA was the world's only surviving manufacturing economy. The tail effects of the baby boom resulted in enough surplus population (even though it was less population than the BB itself) to continue to sustain the suburbs, just barely, but the second generation after the baby boom isn't supplying enough population to sustain the suburban model.

I've thought about this a lot and have come to the conclusion that a unique confluence of factors is really what contributed to the growth of the modern suburb in the US. Government subsidization of mortgages, postwar prosperity, the GI Bill, baby boom demographics, conversion of wartime industry to construction, racial issues, immigration, government redlining, the highways, the automobile, residual American pioneerism and individuality, and postwar clustering/dispersal of industry and shipping (not to mention the War itself) all contributed to the cauldron of American suburban growth and changed the landscape and settlement patterns for a long, long time. You can point to any one of these things, but it was really all of them happening at once.

Really? What exactly is this "pact" between oil companies and the automotive industry that created suburbs?

As for suburbs existing because of "government planning" --which amounts to adding an exit to an existing highway -- how is that any less true for cities? Cities could not possibly exist in their modern form without huge government expenditures in terms of maintaining roads, sewers, power and water lines, subsidized public transportation. Modern cities are generally supplied with vast quantities of food and other goods shipped in over a highway system, or over other major roads specifically put in place to service that city.

The vast majority of suburbs are unplanned. They're just the result of people not wanting to live crammed into cities, so they move a little further out. Exits were generally put in place only after enough people lived there to start bitching about it, or because non-suburbanites started bitching about commuters clogging other roads. And since a lot of their tax dollars were going to the highway system, they were no less entitled to exits than anyone else.

The extent of government planning didn't simply rest with adding an exit to existing highways. The planning of the highway system, while championed by Eisenhower to provide for mobilization for defense, was also spurred by the advice of auto executives who advised Eisenhower among others who would benefit from the highways being constructed and industrialization, shipping, and jobs moving outward from cities. E.g., Charles Wilson, a former GM chairman, was Secretary of Defense under Eisenhower and heads of the Teamsters and road construction companies formed his advisory committees.

But it went beyond highways, or do you choose to ignore the Federal Housing Act which subsidized mortgages for middle class whites and through redlining, effectively shut out blacks and immigrants from taking part in the system?

Also, the vast majority of suburbs were not, in fact, unplanned. The earliest suburbs in the 1920s and 1930s were railroad suburbs, which were planned around existing rail lines and now form the inner ring suburbs of many Eastern cities. When the government started subsidizing mortgages and building highways, savvy developers such as the Levitts were buying up land along proposed highway routes. They may not have been planned well, but they were planned, usually in conjunction with government-funded highway construction.

[naz]

There are plenty of suburbs and satellite cities that have existed for many generations, and continue to do so. And the dramatization of a strip mall as "barriers, divisions, isolations" sounds more like social policy/preferences than anything else. It's about 1/2 from my house to the nearest store, and about 1 mile to the nearest strip mall. I'd wager that the area encompassed by that is larger than the average "neighborhood" of a city dweller, whose boundaries likely are bisected my roads even more busy and "divisive".

I'm not sure what you mean here, but I'm assuming you're talking about it being a hindrance to increased population density. What's wrong with that? Some people prefer not to live in a high population density area.

Are you talking about cities, or suburbs? Because I've got to tell you, I've driven through a lot of cities in the U.S., and a great many have significant swaths that have declined, more run-down because of cheaply made housing stock, and less desireable to subsequent generations. That's often exactly why so many former residents of those cities have moved to the suburbs/smaller outlying cities.

And in terms of "cheaply made housing stock", again, that's quite the generalization. A great many older homes were built with lead paint or pipes, crappy wiring, grossly inadequate insulation, poor drainage, etc.. For the most part, the homes even in the inner rings suburbs where I live are generally in much better shape than homes in the city.

I suggest you do some reading on the topic as I tire of trying to explain the difference between what you personally feel and experience and what has been studied by many, many people over the last 75 years. If you want a reading list, I'd be happy to provide one.

[Edda van Heefmstra Ruston]

I suggest you do some reading on the topic as I tire of trying to explain the difference between what you personally feel and experience and what has been studied by many, many people over the last 75 years. If you want a reading list, I'd be happy to provide one.

Can't speak for FLoW, but I'd be interested.

[Fragile Bird]

And really, who wants to live in the suburbs, 80 percent crotchety old people who will run outside screeching waving a gun if the kids that are outside are playing too loudly. Why live in a place where all the angry boomers terrorize your kids on a day to day basis? Why live in a place where retirees out number kids 8 to 1? ;)

in 20-40 years, when the Great Boomer Die Off has run its course and the world is rid of the most selfish generation to ever live, then the generation of kids being born now might start moving back to the suburbs... Hoping against hope not to disturb the angry and restless ghosts populating the empty suburban streets and abandoned houses because even dead the boomers are too selfish to move on to the next world. ;)

Wow, you really don't like older people, do you. :stunned: :lol:

[Former Lord of Winterfell]

I suggest you do some reading on the topic as I tire of trying to explain the difference between what you personally feel and experience and what has been studied by many, many people over the last 75 years. If you want a reading list, I'd be happy to provide one.

Okay, but not a list. One book or article, the best one you can think of to make your point. And I'll read it.

Personal experience cannot prove a general rule. But it can disprove one. I have severe doubts that the same rules apply to, say, aging rust belt cities that apply to cities that are booming. My state is full of former industrial cities that have been dying for a long time because their industry has gone. Yet, many of their suburbs -- which usually are actually cities of their own (and sometimes were cities before they became suburbs) -- have managed to survive and even thrive because they had developed businesses of their own.

I'll admit to having a severe skepticism with respect to certain social sciences type of studies because I think they are easily tainted by the biases of the authors. And the greater the scope of the subject matter being studied, the greater the potential for biases because of the overwhelming amount of data. They sometimes become more case studies than actual research off all the relevant data, which obviously creates the opportunity for the researcher to focus on the case studies and data that support the desired outcome. I say all that so you can keep that in mind in selecting a book or article that is most likely to be convincing to me.

I do have a question that you can perhaps answer before I read any of that stuff. You mentioned the "snapshot" period when suburbs work. Are you suggesting that people should stop living in those suburbs that are currently working, to return within the city limits of the nearest major city? Are the people who have moved out of Detriot or Gary, Indiana wrong for having done so? Because ultimately, people are quite rationally going to make the decisions that are best for themselves and their families.

[naz]

I already mentioned one book earlier upthread: Crabgrass Frontier, by Kenneth Jackson. If it had to be one book, that's the one I would read. I have a l-o-n-g list, though, of other readings. :)

But if you're going to be tainted by the supposed biases of authors, and are unwilling to read more than one point of view, then I can't help you, and frankly, there's no point having a discussion with you. If you don't give any weight to what we say, and if you don't give any weight to what academics, scholars, and researchers say, then what's the point of discussion? Heck, everything that *you* say is tainted by your own bias, so why should anyone care what you think either? The point is, that if you limit yourself to one book and one point of view, then certainly you'll be skeptical. Which is why, when anyone talks seriously about these things (which are admittedly broad in scope) they refer to many authors and publications, even the ones that have contrary views (those are on my list, too). You ask a question in this thread, and when people with (some) knowledge give you an answer that you don't like, and you revert back to your own biases, then we just regress to bickering, which is pointless.

I know for a fact that you're going to read Crabgrass Frontier and dismiss it is liberal propaganda, so it's with some trepidation that I recommend it. But of all the books and articles I've read about suburbia in America, it's the most comprehensive, clear, concise, and well-written, and can easily be read by a layman. I'll go so far as to recommend a contrary view: Sprawl: A Compact History, by Robert Bruegmann. He tries to refute the arguments of Jackson and others, and makes a convincing case at first glance. But his claims have since been refuted by other authors as being short-sighted and narrow and flat-out false, so make of it what you will.

Re: your question about "snapshot". I'm not suggesting that, realistically. Ideally, I'd prefer if the suburbs had never existed, but since they do, I'd prefer they'd have been planned better, and less sprawl-like. I prefer suburbs that can eventually become satellite cities; ones that allow themselves to accommodate growth and urbanize in their own ways, albeit smaller than the central core. Satellite cities have the possibility to retain their individual character, have some balance between urban and suburban life, are less reliant on the automobile, and have some strong ties to the central core and other satellite cities. Kind of like the Garden City model promoted by Ebenezer Howard late in the 19th century, which had some flows, but was meant to be a starting point for thinking about how cities can expand and specialize without wholly becoming what we now know as sprawl. I'm not saying that suburban residents should all move back into cities; but they can make their suburbs a bit more city-like with proper zoning and planning, allow for better transportation options (including walking), and have a certain identity or image that isn't exactly like every other suburb in the country.

[naz]

Can't speak for FLoW, but I'd be interested.

You want my full list or just... <ahem> the one book?

[Sci-2]

Wow, you really don't like older people, do you. :stunned: :lol:

I'm starting to worry all us Bakker fans are trending toward disturbing psychological profiles. ;-)

[Edda van Heefmstra Ruston]

You want my full list or just... <ahem> the one book?

Say... five. You've given two to FLoW, so I'm guessing they'd be part of the list, but whichever five you think give the best basic knowledge.

ETA: Having said that, if you have a reading list, such as for a class, I'd be interested in seeing it.

[naz]

Here's a bit more than five. Narrowing it down is tough (from over 40 that I personally have). These are the least... "academic" of the list, and most suited for general readers. The Peter Hall book is the most comprehensive, but is long and reads like a dry historical narrative.) Helphand's article is probably the most concise (and tongue-in-cheek), but leaves out a lot of important viewpoints.

Kenneth T. Jackson, Crabgrass Frontier: The Suburbanization of the United States

James Howard Kunstler, The Geography of Nowhere: The Rise and Decline of America’s Man-made Landscape

Kenneth I. Helphand, “McUrbia: The 1950s and the Birth of the Contemporary American Landscape”, in Places, vol. 5, no. 2.

Peter Hall, Cities of Tomorrow

Robert M. Fogelson, Downtown: Its Rise and Fall, 1880-1950

Herbert J. Gans, People and Plans: Essays on Urban Problems and Solutions

Robert A. Beauregard, When America Became Suburban

Paul L. Knox, Metroburbia, USA

[Shryke]

I've thought about this a lot and have come to the conclusion that a unique confluence of factors is really what contributed to the growth of the modern suburb in the US. Government subsidization of mortgages, postwar prosperity, the GI Bill, baby boom demographics, conversion of wartime industry to construction, racial issues, immigration, government redlining, the highways, the automobile, residual American pioneerism and individuality, and postwar clustering/dispersal of industry and shipping (not to mention the War itself) all contributed to the cauldron of American suburban growth and changed the landscape and settlement patterns for a long, long time. You can point to any one of these things, but it was really all of them happening at once.

It always seems to me though that the factors creating suburbs must be uniquely North American, not just uniquely American. Canada seems to have experienced alot of the same kind of growth around it's major cities.

Though it's interesting to consider that maybe they developed for different reasons. White Flight or it's ilk weren't, afaik, a factor up here.

[Shryke]

Eh? The point I made was that folks with longer commutes tend to make more money, and that's exactly what the data showed. You and lockesnow said that the exact opposite was true. And your point about "controls" makes no sense because the point being made was correlation, not causation.

No, it's not and you are missing the point. Your data applies to urban populations as well. Which means it's also taking into account the urban poor, who are not relevant to a discussion of commuting from the suburbs.

And you base that on...what, exactly? There are a lot of cities with housing prices that have either collapsed, or never were high to begin with. There are a lot of inner ring suburbs built mostly with smaller, working class homes that are much cheaper than the burbs. By your logic, all those poor city dwellers should have no problem moving out to the burbs because housing prices are so much lower. I suppose if I was to make a more specific generalization -- although it varies widely by city -- you do often have very expensive downtown living in some cities. But once you get out of the extremely desireable locations, that is often surrounded by some quite cheap housing, and costs then start to go up a big as you get farther out to larger homes with bigger yards. But again, that can vary significantly between cities, and it certainly isn't "almost always" a direct radial relationship.

What is generally true is that a comparable home will cost more the closer it is to the city, though that is still not true in a lot of places. But even to the extent that is true, the point is that the homes generally aren't comparable. The farther you get from a city, the larger the homes and yards tend to be. Also, the newer and more efficient/better built they tend to be, and often the neighborhoods are safer and schools are better. But here you go, Shryke -- one of those lovely expensive urban homes. I suppose this means you get a nice home in the suburbs for what, 75 cents?

http://www.dailymail...ket-just-1.html

You don't make more money because your commute is longer -- that's nonsensical. But the other point is correct -- they don't want to live in the city, but it is generally more expensive to live in the suburbs.

Detoirt is an outlier and you know it. Stop being dishonest.

Comparable housing is more expensive the closer you get to the city core in general. People looking to buy a house of a certain size move further away to match their desires with their budget. Because "Location, Location, Location".

[Former Lord of Winterfell]

I already mentioned one book earlier upthread: Crabgrass Frontier, by Kenneth Jackson. If it had to be one book, that's the one I would read. I have a l-o-n-g list, though, of other readings. :)

But if you're going to be tainted by the supposed biases of authors, and are unwilling to read more than one point of view, then I can't help you, and frankly, there's no point having a discussion with you. If you don't give any weight to what we say, and if you don't give any weight to what academics, scholars, and researchers say, then what's the point of discussion? Heck, everything that *you* say is tainted by your own bias, so why should anyone care what you think either?

So I shouldn't consdier author biases in judging the merits of their arguments? A solid study/book should be sufficiently sourced and objective that the effects of any bias on the merits of the arguments are minimal. As to the arguments we as posters make, the goal is to make an argument that strikes some chords of logic, and that match up with people's personal experience, so that they find them convincing. Bias doesn't diminish a good argument.

The point is, that if you limit yourself to one book and one point of view, then certainly you'll be skeptical. Which is why, when anyone talks seriously about these things (which are admittedly broad in scope) they refer to many authors and publications, even the ones that have contrary views (those are on my list, too). You ask a question in this thread, and when people with (some) knowledge give you an answer that you don't like, and you revert back to your own biases, then we just regress to bickering, which is pointless.

You don't have to make a life study of a topic to have a valid opinion, particularly in a topic in which we all have some knowledge simply by virtue of living if the best book can fairly be critiqued as having biases and lacking objective evidence, then 7 more books with the same flaw aren't any more persuasive. It's one of the issues where people are motivated to study/write about a certain field in the first place because of those biases. Of course, the fact that you've got another scholar out there who disagrees tells us that even reading all that stuff doesn't mean you'll agree.

I know for a fact that you're going to read Crabgrass Frontier and dismiss it is liberal propaganda, so it's with some trepidation that I recommend it. But of all the books and articles I've read about suburbia in America, it's the most comprehensive, clear, concise, and well-written, and can easily be read by a layman.

My suspicion isn't that it will be propaganda, but that it will have a lot of subjective/aesthetic assumptions as to what mode of living is more desireable. Okay, this is interesting -- I just cheated a bit and looked on wikipedia, and it gives the conclusion of Crabgrass Frontier as this:

"Recent changes in Europe support the thesis that suburbanization is a common human aspiration and its achievement is dependent upon technology and affluence. Since William Levitt erected his first houses outside Paris in 1965,^[25] the European landscape has become littered with all the trappings of suburban America."^[26] "For better or worse, the American suburb is a remarkable and probably lasting achievement."^[27] However, due to the energy inefficiency of the suburb, Jackson believed that the "long process of suburbanization, which has been operative in the United States since about 1815, will slow over the next two decades and that a new kind of spatial equilibrium will result early in the next century.

I'm still going to read it, but the thing is that I wouldn't take issue with any of that. I'm sure he doesn't subjectively prefer suburbs, and likely does not believe they are a good development overall, but that conclusion certainly sounds fair to me. The part about how long suburbs have been around, that they are a product of a common human asp[iration, and are likely a "lasting achievement (for good or ill)" is part of what I've been saying.

Let me ask this -- does he or any of the other authors you've recommended analyze, or draw any distinction between, suburban life around those cities that have remained successful, and those that have failed/are failing? Because that's really the core of my issue, and what prompted me to start this thread. I've not studied urban history in particular, but I did get my degree in history, and know that some cities have been far more successful than others, and that some are just ruins that have disappeared. They served a commercial, manufacturing, or other purpose for a period of time, and then essentialy disappeared.

That's one reason why I'm skeptical about the universal applicability of the "back to the cities" movement. The biggest boom in urban growth coincided (more or less) with the industrial revolution. People ran to cities because that's where the jobs were. But if we are deindustrializing to some extent, or at least, our industries have been trending out of major cities, then it makes sense to me that the people are going to follow some of those jobs. Some cities can make/have made a successful transition to alternative industries, or weren't that much dependent on industry in the first place, but there's only so much of that to go around. The bottom line is that a lot of these cities just don't have the work to support their population, so urging people to go back there seems odd to me.

Re: your question about "snapshot". I'm not suggesting that, realistically. Ideally, I'd prefer if the suburbs had never existed, but since they do, I'd prefer they'd have been planned better, and less sprawl-like. I prefer suburbs that can eventually become satellite cities; ones that allow themselves to accommodate growth and urbanize in their own ways, albeit smaller than the central core. Satellite cities have the possibility to retain their individual character, have some balance between urban and suburban life, are less reliant on the automobile, and have some strong ties to the central core and other satellite cities. Kind of like the Garden City model promoted by Ebenezer Howard late in the 19th century, which had some flows, but was meant to be a starting point for thinking about how cities can expand and specialize without wholly becoming what we now know as sprawl. I'm not saying that suburban residents should all move back into cities; but they can make their suburbs a bit more city-like with proper zoning and planning, allow for better transportation options (including walking), and have a certain identity or image that isn't exactly like every other suburb in the country.

I actually don't really disagree with that very much either, though there are still going to be people who simply don't like the greater population density of city life. But there has been that weird trend to build these upscale shopping villages, some with condos as well, in suburbs to kind of replicate a downtown feeling.