Sun columnist Pete McMartin took on architect Richard Balfour’s gloomy view of the surburban future in his column this morning. As usual, a spirited defense of the unsustainable, dripping with disdain. But he makes an important point:
… suburbs aren’t adjuncts to urban cores, anymore: they have their own dynamics and interests to protect. And in a world of An Inconvenient Truth, the inconvenient truth about suburbs, at least in the Lower Mainland, is:
They not only constitute the majority of inhabited land, they will soon constitute the majority of the population. While Sam Sullivan’s vaunted (and much covered) EcoDensity initiative hopes to squeeze a measly 70,000 people inside city limits, suburbs south of the Fraser, the Tri-Cities area and Langley in the next 15 years will quietly outstrip Vancouver’s population growth by a factor of seven.
I had the chance to give my views in a ‘Mayor’s Lecture’ as SFU Surrey last year – now up as a Google video:
Gordon, one thing I’m curious about is how the density of our suburbs compares to other large North-American cities.
I’m asking because I have travelled extensively by car all over the States and it seems to me that the kind of cluster of residential highrises that you see for example in Port Moody is pretty unique.
Anyway, if the case is that our suburbs are more dense as I suspect them to be, then Mr. Martin does have a point.
Great point Gilles: Unfortunately, Martin goes on to argue that the suburbs should be left as they are because each individual family could grow their own food in the event of the apocalypse. If the typical family lives in a high rise (or low rise or townhouse, etc.), this argument doesn’t work for Metro Vancouver.
Ya, well Martin is a bit of a quack. Forget the apocalypse, gas at $3.00 a liter will take care of the suburbs no matter how much food you can grow.
I’m a Certified Financial Planner even though I’m not that big a fan of the concept in general. Who wants to live on a diet for the rest of their live? But if there is one piece of financial of advise that I strongly believe in is don’t make yourself dependent of a car. Whether the apocalypse is global in scale or just at within your family unit, if you can live without a car, you can save yourself a lot of financial stress and distress.