MORE EVIDENCE THE SUBURBS WERE NOT BUILT TO A FINISHED STATE?

Strong Towns contributor Jeff Lemieux considers Greenbelt, Maryland, one of the New Deal prototype residential communities.

Greenbelt, Maryland, was born in the 1930s. We are one of three “green belt” towns planned to create employment and provide housing during the Great Depression. The town design was more utopian than traditional, with sweeping sidewalks and pedestrian underpasses leading from houses to the community core.

During World War II, the town expanded to provide housing for defense workers; in the 1950s, the federal government sold the whole town to its residents, who continue to own the homes as a cooperative. The landscaping has now matured into a tremendous canopy of trees, and much of the original green belt surrounding the historic town center has been set aside from development as a forest preserve.

Greendale, Wisconsin, the westernmost of the concept communities, was farther from a smaller city center, and its downtown was not as built up as Greenbelt.  Unlike in Greenbelt, the shopping centers and the stroads developed on the periphery of the original town center, and there was space between that town center and the county's extensive network of parks and parkways for the tract houses to be built.

Both such suburbs, however, have some potential for additional evolution, although the usual Strong Towns mind-set is: not easy.  "Greenbelt as a whole is far from a traditional, walkable design. Many parts of Greenbelt are not suitable for easy incremental redevelopment. As a result, we will need to watch our maintenance expenditures very carefully and keep a close eye on state and county funding streams."  That's likely true almost everywhere, and it's a situation that's likely to continue as long as the prevailing wisdom for urban forms is that rapid transit, whether by bus or some sort of rail, must be sustained out of farebox receipts, whilst general tax revenues maintain the roads.