25 February 2009

Stop Building Suburban Slums

As the suburbs continue to be overbuilt, housing prices decline in many suburban communities. As the prices get low enough, they begin to attract more and more poor people, who previously only lived in the city, near services and transportation.
....In 2005...suburban poverty, in raw numbers, topped urban poverty for the first time.

...America will face a market surplus of 22 million large-lot homes (a sixth of an acre or more), attracting millions of low-income residents deeper into suburbia...

... "Suburbia is overbuilt and yet we will keep on building there. Most policymakers don't see the consequences, and those who do are denying reality."

...suburbia's least desirable neighborhoods - aging, middle-class tract-home developments far from city centers and mass transit lines — are America's emerging slums, characterized by poverty, crime and other social ills. ...

... suburbs are losing favor because they make little sense, forcing people into their cars, limiting social interaction and discouraging racial and socio-economic diversity. ...

The displaced poor find value in the aging, outer-ring tract-home developments that once promised easy living far from the city's hustle and bustle. ...

Miami real estate broker... said he's witnessing the spiral, even within newer tract-home development ... many early middle-class buyers in these transition neighborhoods are desperate to sell but can't.

..."The isolation can be both physical and emotional, the frequency of interaction with neighbors declines, social networks break down...

.... Most of the homes he expects to exist in 2025 have yet to be built. He said planners can reduce that oversupply by crafting long-term growth policies that reflect a careful assessment of regional demands ....What they will find, he said, is a preference among all income groups for denser, mixed-use communities with access to mass transit.

..."I wouldn't add another new road in American today,"...

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Awesome post! My wife and have been saying this. Thanks.