OVERVIEW-----URBAN SPRAWL

Simply defined, urban sprawl “refers to both the outward spread of commercial, industrial, and residential development into open spaces located on the fringes of urban centers and the detrimental side effects that this kind of development pattern imposes upon citizens,” (Williams 2000, 247). Sprawl itself is a problem composed of many related sub-problems, and is, as Herbert Girardet points out, “ a result of the routine use of the car,” (Girardet 1999, 47). As a matter of fact the problem did not begin until the 1920’s, when the car became a viable transportation option. We cannot begin to understand urban sprawl until we look at the history of the phenomenon, and realize how exactly we have arrived at this problem.

History of Sprawl

Donald C. Williams offers up a history of how urban sprawl developed in his book, Urban Sprawl. In the 1920’s the advent of the car in everyday life caused people to move away from the city center transportation like streetcars, railway terminals, and trolley stops. As a result of this new roads and highways were constructed. People began to move out to these new areas, and businesses relocated here to try to capture the newly created commuter market. These areas were to become the very first suburbs. With the move out of the city expansion of utilities became necessary, and were underwritten by property taxes under the assumption that expanded roads and utilities benefited all.

During the 1930’s there was a lull in the building up of the suburbs, and urban centers made a move to try to annex the newly created suburbs. The suburbs wholeheartedly refused because they did not want any part of pollution, noise, corruption, and immigrant populations that seemed to typify the big city that they had moved away from.

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