Stampede to the suburbs

In the US, where the suburban experiment really flourished, people are disenchanted. Al Gore has made urban sprawl a key issue ... it might make sense for us to learn from others’ mistakes

How should cities develop? In Mumbai the approved wisdom has been the need for devolution. The removal of offices, markets, state institutions and homes from the city centre to newly created zones such as New Bombay and to the suburbs. Given the pressure on the city this has seemed understandably the only viable solution.

And yet, there are pitfalls. In the United States, for instance, where the suburban experiment really flourished, people are increasingly disenchanted. The Republicans are still wary but Al Gore has made urban sprawl a key issue in his campaign. There is a growing consensus against putting ‘shopping centres in the middle of cornfields’. And a New York Times op-ed piece claims that ‘‘Public officials, citizen activists and chambers of commerce throughout the country have begun to talk about sprawl in terms they used to reserve for pornography or Communism.’’ The stampede to the suburbs began after World War II with tax deductions that encouraged new-home building. Congress later authorized a massive web of interstate highways that further encouraged the development of previously inaccessible tracts. Easy connectivity became one of the primary factors in urban development. People began to move out of downtown centres and into the suburbs in search of larger, more affordable homes, better schools, etc. The only problem was, everyone had the same idea, so the suburban dream gave way to traffic jams, overcrowded schools and a loss of the green spaces that had lured people there in the first place.

Cities meanwhile suffered. They lost population, businesses, jobs and tax revenues. Inner cities became crime-ridden and many downtown centres just died in the ’60s and the ’70s. Choked roads meant people spent more and more time in cars, leading to other problems such as the recent incident of road rage in Atlanta where an ordinary middle-class housewife shot and killed another woman much like herself because she was blocking her way.

Much of this growth has been a result of the government’s policy of encouraging highways. But now a demand is being heard for local people to have more choice in how federal funds are spent. Portland, Oregon home of Congressman Earl Blumenauer, prominent campaigner against urban sprawl, has implemented a series of city planning measures. The first of them being a growth boundary on the city. Second, citizens asked if the money the government was willing to give for a highway could be used instead for a light rail link. Third, it encouraged the development of mixed housing (row houses, condominiums, apartment blocks) so that the old, families, the young would live side by side and use various modes of public transport. These days campaigns are being launched around old-fashioned symbols as well. Aging neighbourhoods and the need to revitalize them. And post offices. A survey in Iowa found that 80 per cent of people planned their shopping trips around a visit to the post office, which also served as a meeting point. Space problems, however, have led to post offices moving outside cities. Various small cities (Castine, Maine; Freemont, Ohio) have taken up a fight against the trend.

Sidewalks are another preoccupation. ‘‘We have to interconnect people again. We have to get people out on those sidewalks,’’ says John Williams, big-time Atlanta developer-turned New Urbanist who now believes in mixed-use projects with stores on the ground floor, apartments above, transit shops as close as possible and sidewalks to stroll on.

For us in Mumbai, living in a city that is expanding by the day, these may seem like idyllic obsessions. On the other hand, it might make sense for us to learn from others’ mistakes. As the man who would be president puts it: ‘‘Plan well and you have a community that nurtures commerce and private life. Plan badly and you have what so many of us suffer from firsthand - gridlock, sprawl and that uniquely modern evil of all, too little time’’.

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