'Anti-Urban' City: The End of Suburban Dreams?

The 'suburban frontier' is rapidly closing for the nation's first suburban city.

1 minute read

July 9, 2002, 7:00 AM PDT

By Abhijeet Chavan @http://twitter.com/legalaidtech


"Los Angeles is the only big city built on the promise of the suburban dream...the genius and fundamental weakness of Los Angeles is that you rarely feel obliged to be part of anything. Nothing short of cataclysmic events like riots, earthquakes or a Lakers championship can ignite a strong sense of civic unity...It was a suburban city decades before America became the first suburban nation... Even as Los Angeles evolved into an expansive and decentralized Western city, its cultural elite still took its cues from more traditional Eastern cities... But half-century-old stereotypes do not do justice to America's contemporary suburban reality. Once scorned for being racially homogenous, economically parasitic and culturally vacuous, suburbia is now more likely to be mixed, viable and vital."

Thanks to Abhijeet Chavan

Monday, July 8, 2002 in The New York Times

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I love the variety of courses, many practical, and all richly illustrated. They have inspired many ideas that I've applied in practice, and in my own teaching. Mary G., Urban Planner

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