Traveling in Europe recently made me realize something interesting about American cities: We’ve tried to combine the country with the city with disastrous results.
There's always been a space/time paradox of cities. In order for many people to live in close proximity and get the serendipity of city life, you can't have as much personal space. If you want to live with a large amount of personal space, you had to live outside the city. When we developed cars we thought we could break the paradox by atomizing the city: spread out large parcels over a wide area, make each property a self-contained private thing with no relation to the properties around them, connect it all with our personal transporter pods. We each get a lot of personal space, but retain the proximity, right?
I think mid-century people just could not imagine the crushing traffic and travel times that everyone would incur when everything was spread out like this, nor how anti-social it would be to replace walking from place to place with driving from non-place to non-place.
Portland hasn’t done itself any favors in the last 10 years. The problem is America doesn’t value its embodied energy like Europe does and we are so far down the suburban growth model that we can’t get out now.
I agree with a lot of this. I’m not an expert, but I found Alain Bertaud’s critique of urban growth boundaries in Order Without Design pretty convincing. He says it reduces the supply of land, therefore driving up prices. It also drives up prices because infill is more expensive than greenfield development.
I’d also imagine people who can’t afford to live within the boundary would have to live farther afield and travel across the farmland areas to get to jobs and amenities in the city. He mentions Hanoi as a place where there is a green boundary of rice paddies. A lot of people commute across the rice paddies, resulting in longer commutes, and a lot of people live in the green zone illegally.
He mentions cities that have geographic constraints, like NYC and SF, as examples of naturally occurring urban growth boundaries where land prices are high, and housing prices are high relative to income. Of course they also have overly restrictive zoning.
I wonder if better urban planning practices you mention, and solutions like transit oriented development, congestion pricing, and gas taxes, could achieve good urban forms while allowing cities to grow outward over time. I won’t hold my breath for those solutions in the US.
Great comment. I read part of that book. It's really interesting and applicable to how U.S. cities wreck affordability (and walkability) with useless regulations. Example: In Barcelona I saw a variety of housing types in the city's core. New construction, historic buildings, big apartments and very small apartments. All different styles and pricing points.
In most U.S. cities, there are only 2 choices due to regulations and a lack of "missing middle" housing: An expensive condo/apartment in the core, or a single family detached house in the suburbs. And both are usually unaffordable.
The Greenbelt in Ontario has had exactly this effect. I like the Greenbelt. It preserves a lot of permeable land and protects source water (and golf courses upon which one’s mileage may vary).
It has also helped fuel a wicked housing crisis because the obvious solution of permitting a mix of higher density housing gets fought by existing homeowners who have made out like bandits over the last two decades.
Great article. I especially appreciate your point about parking mandates. That’s something I have to read more about. I hate seeing giant empty parking lots. Always have. Even as a kid I remember thinking, “what a waste of space… put something cool here!”
Here’s a grass roots crash report I did for our Legacy Hwy in SW suburban Chicagoland where we have a dangerous misaligned intersection w an unmarked crossing that leads to a Metra Station, Park w Municipal Pool, a Post Office, and two major area trail systems:
Great piece - the best synopsis that I've seen of the problems with America's built environment. Never knew so much land was cleared to make way for the arch in St Louis (my hometown).
This is a great piece, it's harrowing to read about what they did to St. Louis. I'm wondering if you've ever come across a book called Outrage by Ian Nairn? It's about something he brands Subtopia, which is another way of describing what you're talking about here with the city failing to combine with the country.
All true. This is something the E-Transport Revolution can work against. It's what I will be following more closely at my Opa Fiets blog in the New Year. Meanwhile thanks for the inspiration
It has been designed to fill the middle housing gap, with a wide variety of housing types, including retail below, apartments, condos, townhomes, ADUs for multigenerational, etc.
Integrated retail, parks, walkways, bike paths, community amenities. The only thing missing is MAX, a rapid transit stop. But parking for homes is mostly tucked into lanes behind streets, like in the old days. Small footprints and low maintenance yards.
PS—The former farmland was a grain field pocket mostly already surrounded north, east and west by a mix of single family homes and commercial properties.
"The planning profession has lost the plot. Planners no longer dream big, and they’re not encouraged to dream big, either. They’re expected to follow the rules and regulations written by other planners of a bygone era who seemed to hate cities, the countryside, or both."
Have you ever considered Arkologies? Fully 3D cities with 3D roads?
There's always been a space/time paradox of cities. In order for many people to live in close proximity and get the serendipity of city life, you can't have as much personal space. If you want to live with a large amount of personal space, you had to live outside the city. When we developed cars we thought we could break the paradox by atomizing the city: spread out large parcels over a wide area, make each property a self-contained private thing with no relation to the properties around them, connect it all with our personal transporter pods. We each get a lot of personal space, but retain the proximity, right?
I think mid-century people just could not imagine the crushing traffic and travel times that everyone would incur when everything was spread out like this, nor how anti-social it would be to replace walking from place to place with driving from non-place to non-place.
Exactly.
Portland hasn’t done itself any favors in the last 10 years. The problem is America doesn’t value its embodied energy like Europe does and we are so far down the suburban growth model that we can’t get out now.
I agree with a lot of this. I’m not an expert, but I found Alain Bertaud’s critique of urban growth boundaries in Order Without Design pretty convincing. He says it reduces the supply of land, therefore driving up prices. It also drives up prices because infill is more expensive than greenfield development.
I’d also imagine people who can’t afford to live within the boundary would have to live farther afield and travel across the farmland areas to get to jobs and amenities in the city. He mentions Hanoi as a place where there is a green boundary of rice paddies. A lot of people commute across the rice paddies, resulting in longer commutes, and a lot of people live in the green zone illegally.
He mentions cities that have geographic constraints, like NYC and SF, as examples of naturally occurring urban growth boundaries where land prices are high, and housing prices are high relative to income. Of course they also have overly restrictive zoning.
I wonder if better urban planning practices you mention, and solutions like transit oriented development, congestion pricing, and gas taxes, could achieve good urban forms while allowing cities to grow outward over time. I won’t hold my breath for those solutions in the US.
Great comment. I read part of that book. It's really interesting and applicable to how U.S. cities wreck affordability (and walkability) with useless regulations. Example: In Barcelona I saw a variety of housing types in the city's core. New construction, historic buildings, big apartments and very small apartments. All different styles and pricing points.
In most U.S. cities, there are only 2 choices due to regulations and a lack of "missing middle" housing: An expensive condo/apartment in the core, or a single family detached house in the suburbs. And both are usually unaffordable.
The Greenbelt in Ontario has had exactly this effect. I like the Greenbelt. It preserves a lot of permeable land and protects source water (and golf courses upon which one’s mileage may vary).
It has also helped fuel a wicked housing crisis because the obvious solution of permitting a mix of higher density housing gets fought by existing homeowners who have made out like bandits over the last two decades.
Yea. Growth boundaries only work if there's enough housing capacity within the boundary.
Great article. I especially appreciate your point about parking mandates. That’s something I have to read more about. I hate seeing giant empty parking lots. Always have. Even as a kid I remember thinking, “what a waste of space… put something cool here!”
Here’s a grass roots crash report I did for our Legacy Hwy in SW suburban Chicagoland where we have a dangerous misaligned intersection w an unmarked crossing that leads to a Metra Station, Park w Municipal Pool, a Post Office, and two major area trail systems:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/11KXIIzfHFQ_QEjQ1Q0YWH4PZw3zjW3dx/view?usp=drivesdk
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1S0v8jnJ_pqAwd-JQyqIQz2OGaqXXQFiG/view?usp=drivesdk
Great piece - the best synopsis that I've seen of the problems with America's built environment. Never knew so much land was cleared to make way for the arch in St Louis (my hometown).
This is a great piece, it's harrowing to read about what they did to St. Louis. I'm wondering if you've ever come across a book called Outrage by Ian Nairn? It's about something he brands Subtopia, which is another way of describing what you're talking about here with the city failing to combine with the country.
All true. This is something the E-Transport Revolution can work against. It's what I will be following more closely at my Opa Fiets blog in the New Year. Meanwhile thanks for the inspiration
Mark, you’ll probably be interested in a Portland suburb developed on expanded urban growth boundary former farmland: Reed’s Crossing.
https://www.prweb.com/releases/reeds-crossing-in-hillsboro-oregon-closes-2025-with-strong-home-sales-and-continued-market-momentum-302637635.html
It has been designed to fill the middle housing gap, with a wide variety of housing types, including retail below, apartments, condos, townhomes, ADUs for multigenerational, etc.
Integrated retail, parks, walkways, bike paths, community amenities. The only thing missing is MAX, a rapid transit stop. But parking for homes is mostly tucked into lanes behind streets, like in the old days. Small footprints and low maintenance yards.
PS—The former farmland was a grain field pocket mostly already surrounded north, east and west by a mix of single family homes and commercial properties.
"The planning profession has lost the plot. Planners no longer dream big, and they’re not encouraged to dream big, either. They’re expected to follow the rules and regulations written by other planners of a bygone era who seemed to hate cities, the countryside, or both."
Have you ever considered Arkologies? Fully 3D cities with 3D roads?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DhfSrCpwbuI