Does This City Make Me Look Suburban?

22 September 2010 - 2:00pm

Travel + Leisure magazine confuses suburbs with small cities in a recent article called "Coolest Suburbs Worth a Visit." The New Urban Network shows how they got it wrong.

The article sets up the premise that suburbs are becoming cool:

"Americans have a love-hate relationship with the ever-sprawling communities outside the country's big cities...Hollywood hasn't helped the suburban profile, typically portraying these communities as boring, conformist places, spiced up by a few desperate housewives here and there. Yet a number of suburbs around the country blow up the stereotype and are worth a visit on your next trip."

New Urban Network took a look at the 10 "suburbs" cited in the article:

"Only trouble is that seven of the ten suburbs are incorporated cities — Evanston, Illinois: Lakewood, Ohio; Bellevue, Washington; Roswell, Georgia; Alameda, California; Birmingham, Michigan; and Ashland, Oregon. Bellevue became a city most recently — in 1953. Of the three remaining, one is a town, West Hartford, Connecticut, and another is a township, Montclair, New Jersey — both have the density and street grids of small, traditional cities."

Source: New Urban Network, September 21, 2010
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If hundreds of people in your community raised reasonable concerns about a planning program you developed, how would you respond? Perhaps you might call a community meeting, or ask community elected officials to reach out to community leaders.