Chris Leinberger, an urban land-use strategist, developer and fellow at the Brookings Institute, makes an almost paradoxical point in an interview in Model D, a development newsletter out of Detroit:
CL: We now know that drivable suburbanism, as you build more, you get less quality of life. The very things that you build suburbia for get consumed by surburbia….
MD: Is the converse true in the city?
CL: Yes, more is better. As you add more density, as you get more people on the street, as you add more restaurants, it just gets richer. It just gets more exciting.
Why the seeming paradox? Most people believe that increasing density causes the kind of problems they go to suburbia to get away from: particularly congestion. They assume, reasonably, that with development comes more cars, and since there’s only a limited amount of road space in the city, traffic gets worse. In suburbia, on the other hand, when they build more houses and office parks, they build more roads.
In many instances, when it comes to quality of life, the reverse is true. Car-dependent suburban development is what is generating the congestion in growing urban regions. In downtown Vancouver, by contrast, the number of moving vehicles is dropping. It’s crowded, of course, but that’s the idea. The mix of uses, close in proximity, with lots of transportation choice, allows people to solve the congestion problem for themselves. More and more people choose to walk, bike, take transit or grab a taxi. In single-use, low-density suburban environments, there’s no choice: you have to drive everywhere for everything all the time.
In Leinberger’s opinion, the pendulum is swinging:
CL: The market wants walkable urbanity. And walkable urbanity — which is simply that within 1,500 feet there’s a lot of stuff to do….
Consumer research divides the world into three categories: Folks that want walkable urbanity; folks that want what I refer to as drivable suburbanism; and folks that don’t know what they want. The research shows that 30-40 percent of us, depending on the metropolitan area, want drivable suburbanism; 30-40 percent want walkable urbanity; and 30 percent can’t figure out what they want….
So I think metro Detroiters will realize it by hook or by crook, because the market wants it, it’s coming back, and there’s not that much else happening. But the other reason I hope they would realize it is that if 30-40 percent of us want something, and you don’t offer it, from an economic development point of view, you’re out of luck.
According to the interview – the full text of which is here – “the only interesting, vibrant market right now is downtown Detroit.”
Detroit!
I once made a comment on a blog to the effect that I liked my neighborhood (Capitol Hill, Seattle) now but thought it would be much better with double the population. The original poster seemed to think I was literally insane.
This letter to the Vancouver Sun (never published) touches on the density paradox facing suburban regions.
Re: Pro-density folk take note: Suburbanites like where they are, July 4
Reality dictates that we push for greater suburban density, July 6
Perhaps if Mr. McMartin ( Pete McMartin, Vancouver Sun writer) dispensed with the notion that there is an urban conspiracy intent on relocating errant suburbanites can we undertake a useful discussion about urban density, sustainability and the future planning challenges facing us all in the Lower Mainland.
His premise that urban densification is simply a means of luring suburbanites to the downtown core is misplaced and ignores the more complex and nuanced issue of sustainable and livable density for the city as a whole. The reality is that Vancouver can easily accommodate more density; it just may not be situated in the downtown peninsula.
And contrary to Mr. McMartin’s view, density does not have to manifest itself in the form of high-rise towers. Take the Commercial Drive area that Mr. McMartin pokes fun at, for example. Despite Mr. McMartin’s aspersions about its ‘gentrified revolutionaries’, it is a thriving, dense, diverse, walkable and livable city neighbourhood zoned for multiple dwellings and two-family housing-a far cry from single family, cul de sac, residential enclaves.
Fundamentally, Vancouver will continue to thrive and grow because people will choose to live in an urban environment where they can walk to shops, ride their bikes, utilize public transit and easily access cultural amenities. Density and an existing city infrastructure afford such choices.
Such choices are more difficult for the suburban landscape. Despite Mr. McMartin’s conclusion that it is “time for suburbia to grow up” and start to densify, planners face enormous challenges overcoming existing realities. How do you, for example, transform cul de sac residential neighbourhoods into less car dependant, pedestrian friendly communities? Planners and municipalities will have to display some creative élan to solve these issues. And, to their credit, they are starting to.
But beyond these burning planning challenges lies a more fundamental conundrum. The act of introducing increased density to suburban communities undermines the very dream on which they were built, mainly the dream of a single-family dwelling with a white picket fence.
The real question is whether the dream can face a radical revision and still retain its appeal.