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Location: New Albany, Indiana (Greater Louisville)
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Several reasons
1. There are very few to no new developments built in a traditional style on the outskirts of a city like you see often in Europe. A person in the US wanting to live in safe area in the outer parts of a city has no choice but sprawl
2. Wealth protection. Many suburbs and surrounding rural counties have lower taxes, meaning wealthy newcomers keep more of their money to themselves. In addition, many suburban areas (but not all) have less threat of crime, which means wealth and capitol are safer from harm.
3. Many Americans lack any community oriented will power - in other words, when their neighborhood begins having problems (crime, slum lords, traffic, etc) they would rather leave than use resources such as police, local gov, or community action to solve them. In their eyes, moving to the edge of the city is a much better solution.
From my experience it pretty much comes down to one issue: the schools. Here in Little Rock, the city school district is percieved as violent. Most people who live in the city are either poor, young professionals without kids, or white collar professionals who make enough money to send their kids to private school. Nearly all of the middle class growth is flocking to the suburbs and rural communities because of the better public schools.
I witnessed the same thing when living in Oklahoma City. Luckily, far south OKC is part of Moore school district and NW OKC has its own school district separate from the OKC school district. This has allowed much of the growth to remain within city limits. If you look at a map of OKC, you can almost tell the borderline between OKC schools and suburban schools because the development just stops.
From my experience it pretty much comes down to one issue: the schools. Here in Little Rock, the city school district is percieved as violent. Most people who live in the city are either poor, young professionals without kids, or white collar professionals who make enough money to send their kids to private school. Nearly all of the middle class growth is flocking to the suburbs and rural communities because of the better public schools.
I witnessed the same thing when living in Oklahoma City. Luckily, far south OKC is part of Moore school district and NW OKC has its own school district separate from the OKC school district. This has allowed much of the growth to remain within city limits. If you look at a map of OKC, you can almost tell the borderline between OKC schools and suburban schools because the development just stops.
I think it is so interesting how much a school district with a bad rep can actually effect population growth and development in a city! I've seen this in so many places!
Seems like a lot of the time (at least in Iowa) they try to put a segregation plan into action for open-enrollment thinking this will keep the white people in the district, however, I think it just encourages people to move out of the city in whole and just move into the district they want to attend.
One other subtle factor that needs to be remembered - the United States is a geographically large country. Unlike the European countries, many of which are no bigger than some of the individual U.S. states, the United States has had an almost inexhaustable amount of land to work with. The mindset of many Americans, especially those who were born and raised here, is that land conservation is not an issue, because there is plenty more land even if some of the land is developed. This perception of land among many Americans plays a role not only in why many like suburbia or sprawl, but more importantly why it is accepted and even encouraged in many cases.
I remember before I moved to Seattle I checked all these cheap apartments in the southern suburbs of King County in my apartment guide. When my cousin came to take me to look at apts I showed him what I thought would be nice. He looked briefly at everything I checked and tossed the book in the trash. I ended up on Capitol Hill in Seattle in the heart of everything. Months later I purchased a home in the Mount Baker section of Seattle. Great neighborhood, great schools, kids, parks, a nice yard with a garage and most of all a walkable, convenient neighborhood where I could walk to everything. Nice single family homes with great amenities are found in every major city in the country, not just the suburbs. 2 or 3 of metro Seattle's top crime cities are suburban cities.
Old style suburbs are great. Gridded streets and nice little shopping districts are wonderful places to raise kids.
cul-de-sacs are alien to me. I don't understand their appeal.
I agree with you 100%. Those old suburbs were built along trolley lines, and the little commercial areas were clustered around trolley stops. It made perfect sense. People left work downtown, hopped on the streetcar, got off a few blocks from home, ran into the drugstore, bakery, or grocery to pick up a few things before walking home. On sidewalks, no less.
I think it was a sad day when our cities scrapped their trolley systems and encouraged more people to hop in their cars. I'm cautiously optimistic that the current trend of building urban rail systems will encourage more people to come back to town.
I remember before I moved to Seattle I checked all these cheap apartments in the southern suburbs of King County in my apartment guide. When my cousin came to take me to look at apts I showed him what I thought would be nice. He looked briefly at everything I checked and tossed the book in the trash. I ended up on Capitol Hill in Seattle in the heart of everything. Months later I purchased a home in the Mount Baker section of Seattle. Great neighborhood, great schools, kids, parks, a nice yard with a garage and most of all a walkable, convenient neighborhood where I could walk to everything. Nice single family homes with great amenities are found in every major city in the country, not just the suburbs. 2 or 3 of metro Seattle's top crime cities are suburban cities.
I love reading stories like yours. I hope more people will realize what you have discovered, that city living can be wonderful and even more healthy. Maybe as gasoline gets more and more expensive, people will realize that living in a neighborhood where you can walk to your errands and take public transportation to work is a good thing.
Being someone who unfortunately grew up in one of those suburban subdivisions where you had to drive everywhere to get anywhere (which is terrible for a kid; he/she can't go anywhere!), I hate those type of developments with a passion. However, as I stated above, it is fairly easy to understand why some people like those kind of developments, especially if they have kids - people living there have more private space. A lot of people like having a decent-sized chunk of private space, even if that is not my cup of tea (because I value the amenities cities/towns can offer within walking distance).
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