Background

The good news is that more Americans own their home than ever. The bad news, according to some, is that many of those homes are located in large new suburban developments, the result of sprawl. As people live farther and farther away from urban centers and older suburbs, environmentalists say more problems are created--previously undeveloped land is gobbled up by developers for housing tracts and shopping centers, and residents of these new suburbs must drive longer distances to both go to work and to complete their errands.

Sprawl is on politicians' minds. Vice President Al Gore has railed against "ill-thought-out sprawl hastily developed around our nation's cities (that) has turned what used to be friendly, easy suburbs into lonely cul-de-sacs, so distant from the city center that if a family wants to buy an affordable house they have to drive so far that a parent gets home too late to read a bedtime story." Sprawl in on the minds of the electorate as well. In a recent survey on residents biggest concerns about their communities, respondents said that that sprawl and traffic tied with crime as their primary concern.

Some communities are adopting "smart growth" policies, which regulate the development of open spaces to ensure land isn't completely consumed by housing tracts and strip malls and create land-use policies to preserve farmland. But critics of smart growth say it is unfair to restrict land use and that people have a right to build and develop land where they can afford to do it.

On One Hand...

The thirst for more houses farther and farther away from established urban centers poses a grave threat to the environment and our quality of life. Greedy developers consume acres upon acres of open space and jam in as many cookie-cutter houses or "big box" stores like Wal-Mart as possible. The result is less open space, including farmland, the destruction of older communities, and more traffic congestion. Large discount stores force smaller businesses to close up shop--the corner hardware store cannot compete with Home Depot's massive purchasing power and lower prices.

On the Other Hand...

Sprawl is about the right to choose where we want to live. And as home prices in major metropolitan areas such as Boston and San Francisco soar, living farther away from the city and older suburbs is the only choice for many families. People move to the suburbs to get more bang for their housing buck, send their kids to better schools, and to live in safer areas. It is unfair to characterize all developments as soulless tracts of house after house. Housing developments work hard to build a sense community and many succeed.