Is Sprawl Universal?
8 November 2005 - 10:00am
Witold Rybczynski reviews Robert Bruegmann's new book, Sprawl: A Compact History.
"What this iconoclastic little book demonstrates is that sprawl is not the anomalous result of American zoning laws, or mortgage interest tax deduction, or cheap gas, or subsidized highway construction, or cultural antipathy toward cities. Nor is it an aberration. Bruegmann shows that asking whether sprawl is "good" or "bad" is the wrong question. Sprawl is and always has been inherent to urbanization. It is driven less by the regulations of legislators, the actions of developers, and the theories of city planners, than by the decisions of millions of individuals."
Source:
Slate, November 7, 2005
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Rybczynski's trend fallacy
Rybczynksi's argument runs:
Premise: Europe is becoming more like America (Thus)
Conclusion: American-style sprawl is inevitable.
The flaw in this argument is that despite any trends to the contrary, Europe is not (at least not yet) just like America. Are there European cities as deserted, dangerous and decrepit as Detroit? Are there European cities as automobile-dependent as Oklahoma City (where the buses don't even run after 6:00 or so?) I don't know, but I suspect not.
Rybczynski is relying on a trend- but a trend in one direction (here, the direction of sprawl) is not an indication that the trend will continue ad infinitum.
For example, let's suppose that in virtually crime-free Japan, crime has risen over the past decade or so. (I have no idea whether this is the case; this assertion is just a thought experiment). Does that mean that Japan's crime rates will eventually equal those of Detroit, and thus that Detroit-like crime rates are inevitable? If you adopt Rybczynski's implicit assumption that current trends always continue, it would- obviously an idiotic result.
Indeed, a reliance on recent trends could lead to conclusions very different from Rybczynski's. In recent months, transit ridership in America has been rising due to increased gas prices. If you followed trend-worship, you would inevitably have to conclude that America will eventually become just as transit-oriented as Europe.
Moreover, Rybczynksi's apparent conclusion that sprawl is the inevitable result of the free market assumes that no European public policies favor sprawl. I don't know that this is the case; I assume that most European cities have highways and commuter rail lines extending out into suburbia, so I suspect that the opposite is true.