Communities are learning
to build compactly by mixing
housing, stores, and offices …
but outmoded zoning and other
obstacles must be overcome.
The LongRoad to
4 ON COMMON GROUND SUMMER 2004
n the Internet, the
O Census Bureau operates
a “population clock” that
gives an up-to-the-minute esti-
mate of how people are living in
the United States (www.census.
gov/cgi-bin/popclock). On April
15, the clock counted 293,026,388
people on U.S. soil—140 million
more than in 1950. Every 13 sec-
onds another person is added.
This near-doubling of the
nation’s population in a little
more than half a century—
compounded by the tendency of
Americans to demand more liv-
ing space per person, drive more
miles per person, and consume
more goods per person than they
did in 1950—is forcing policy
makers to face an important
question: How should our com-
munities grow?
Smart Growth By Philip Langdon
In the 1,000-square-mile Highlands region that stretches from eastern
Pennsylvania across northern New Jersey to New York’s lower Hudson Valley and
northwestern Connecticut, nearly 100 square miles have undergone development
during the past two decades. The spread of houses, roads, offices, and shopping
centers has exerted a mostly harmful impact on agriculture, wildlife, and sources
of fresh drinking water. Meanwhile, in the Rocky Mountains and the Far West,
development is penetrating areas that used to be far off the beaten path. In much
of the United States, countryside is giving way to “rural sprawl.”
What’s the answer? Part of it can be summed up in two words: Smart Growth.
“Smart Growth first and foremost is plain old good planning,” says Don Chen,
executive director of the national advocacy group Smart Growth America. “It
means improving on what we’ve already built, rather than throwing away old
neighborhoods and leaving scars in the landscape so that we go chew up the next
field or forest.”
SUMMER 2004 ON COMMON GROUND 5
The goal of Smart Growth proponents is to steer walking distance of gathering places such as
development to the most suitable places and parks and cafes and to have sociable streets and
organize it into better-connected, more compact sidewalks, “is growing as never before,” says
forms. If that can be done, people can live well on Robert Steuteville, editor of the national
less land. In fact, they can live better—because newsletter New Urban News. A survey complet-
their communities will be more walkable and gen- ed in December 2003 by the Ithaca, New
erally more convenient. The environment will be York–based newsletter identified 648 neighbor-
less degraded by miles of strip commercial build- hood-scale New Urbanist communities that are
ings and parking lots. being developed or are in phases leading up to
Here’s a quick rundown on what’s happened development. That’s a 37 percent increase over
so far: the year before. “For the last seven years, the
average increase has been 28 percent per year,”
• Smart Growth has captured public attention. Steuteville points out. New Urban News defines
David Goldberg at Smart Growth America says “neighborhood-scale communities” as those
that 23 governors talked about Smart Growth in covering at least 15 acres, featuring an intercon-
their 2003 State of the State addresses, or made nected network of streets and a mixture of hous-
comments or initiated policies that apply smart ing types, and at least one central gathering
growth principles. Those governors include place. “The placement of parking and buildings
Democrats Phil Bredesen in Tennessee and and the design of streets must create a pedestri-
Jennifer Granholm in Michigan, and an-friendly character,” Steuteville emphasizes.
Republicans Mitt Romney in Massachusetts and
• Economic benefits have been substantial. A
Mark Sanford in South Carolina. The appeal of
March 2004 study by Mark Muro and Robert
Smart Growth cuts across party lines.
Puentes for the Center on Urban and
• New Urbanism has gained momentum. This Metropolitan Policy at the Brookings Institution
movement, which calls for homes to be within determined that compact development patterns
In much of the United States, countryside
is giving way to “ rural sprawl.”
6 ON COMMON GROUND SUMMER 2004
The goal of Smart Growth proponents is to
steer development to the most suitable
places and organize it into better-connected,
more compact forms.
can cut road-building costs nationally by $110 • Smart growth ideas have been incorporated
billion, or nearly 12 percent, over 25 years. They into laws and government policies. Nineteen
can reduce water and sewer costs over the same states have growth management laws and 10
period by $12.6 billion, or nearly 7 percent. They have smart growth laws, according to Smart
can shave $4.2 billion, or nearly 4 percent, from Growth America. In addition, regions such as
the annual costs of operations and services metropolitan Portland, Oregon and municipali-
delivery. ties such as Fort Collins, Colorado have adopted
smart growth principles.
• The building and development industry is
growing more receptive. Harry H. Frampton, “While in some areas Smart Growth initially
chairman of the Urban Land Institute, which was motivated by worries over the destruction of
serves developers, said his organization has farms and natural areas, it has gone far beyond
“helped Smart Growth gain enough traction to that now,” says Chen of Smart Growth America.
move into the mainstream.” “People are making the connection between
SUMMER 2004 ON COMMON GROUND 7
spread-out, disconnected development and the minimum density of 3.5 dwelling units per acre in
need to spend so much of our lives in traffic. One- new residential projects. If a county designated a
size-fits-all subdivisions just aren’t working for a Priority Funding Area, it also had to be consistent
population that is aging, deferring children and with the county’s 20-year growth projections.
having fewer of them, and forming single-person Since construction of schools in outlying areas
households faster than any other type.” often entices families to move to the suburban
fringe, Glendening increased state school spend-
How communities respond ing and focused more of its construction and ren-
A number of governments have decided to chan- ovation budget on older, more built-up communi-
nel development into existing towns and cities and ties. In 1996–97, 43 percent of Maryland’s school
other areas where new construction makes the construction and renovation funds went to older
most sense from a regional perspective. Under communities. When Glendening left office in
Democratic Governor Parris Glendening, January 2003, schools in older communities
Maryland established “Priority Funding Areas”— received 80 percent of those funds.
areas designated for growth. Land outside those Glendening’s Republican successor, Robert L.
areas is ineligible for state financial support, Ehrlich Jr., has since backed off on some elements
including road-building and other projects intend- of Smart Growth, such as using state funds to
ed to accommodate growth. (One exception is acquire open space, but he too is focusing on bol-
schools. To forestall opposition from rural legisla- stering older communities. “The idea is to spend
tors, schools were omitted from the Smart Growth money renovating and fixing up these existing
law, but Glendening took other actions to concen- town centers and historic Main Streets,” says
trate school construction dollars in built-up areas.) Chuck Gates, spokesperson for the Maryland
Maryland’s program designated the state’s 157 Department of Planning.
municipalities and all the communities inside the “It has made a significant difference,” Gates
Washington and Baltimore beltways as Priority says of Maryland’s effort over the past eight years.
Funding Areas. Many counties are beyond the On Baltimore’s west side, large condominium tow-
beltways and have no municipalities. Every coun- ers have been springing up. “Throughout older
ty was allowed to designate additional Priority parts of our communities, we see new life and
Funding Areas, but those areas were required to increasing property values,” says Dru Schmidt-
have water and sewer lines, and had to achieve a Perkins, executive director of 1000 Friends of
Smart Growth
seems to work
best when it
encompasses an
entire metropolitan
area.
8 ON COMMON GROUND SUMMER 2004
Maryland. On the other hand, Gates notes that if
homebuyers want to live in more remote areas and
are willing to pay a premium for that privilege,
developers will heed the market and continue
building at the fringe. Smart Growth, as practiced
in Maryland and many other places, does not pre-
clude outward development; it does, however, across the Columbia River in Washington State is
eliminate many of what effectively were govern- exempt from Metro’s growth controls. Motivated
ment subsidies for sprawl. by the disappearance of prime farmland, Portland
Smart Growth seems to work best when it has been thinking regionally since the 1970s,
encompasses an entire metropolitan area. Before when Governor Tom McCall and the state legisla-
Maryland embarked on its smart growth efforts, ture took steps to control outward development.
some counties acted on their own, with mixed Oregon law requires Metro to keep a 20-year
results. Baltimore County, which surrounds supply of land available for development within
Baltimore City, restricted development in some the growth boundary. Since the late 1970s, the
rural areas, such as the horse country north of boundary has moved about three dozen times,
Baltimore, where the landed gentry live. That usually not far. The most recent expansion, in
inadvertently encouraged residential develop- December 2002, added a substantial territory—
ment to leapfrog to Harford County to the north- 18,638 acres, enough for 38,657 housing units and
east and Carroll County to the northwest. “Both thousands of jobs. Rather than expanding around
those counties have experienced enormous sprawl the fringe, Metro concentrated two thirds of the
problems,” says Gates. The lesson is that restric- growth in one area: Damascus/Boring. “The
tions in one area sometimes shift development intent,” says Metro principal planner Raymond
into more distant places. Valone, “is that it be all planned together as a com-
About as close as any urban area in the United plete community.”
States has come to a comprehensive approach is Portland-area housing prices have risen consid-
Portland, Oregon. Portland’s directly elected met- erably in the last decade. How much of the price
ropolitan government, known as Metro, oversees increase resulted from the growth boundary is an
expansion in a three-county area. Only the area open question. Some areas of the U.S. with no
SUMMER 2004 ON COMMON GROUND 9
ensure that housing of various kinds can be pro-
duced in a range of locations. “Any corner lot in a
If Smart Growth is to single-family residential zone in Portland is enti-
tled to be converted to a duplex,” notes Robert
achieve substantial Liberty, former executive director of 1000 Friends
of Oregon. “All local governments [in the region]
results, efforts must be must authorize accessory apartments.” While sub-
urbs in many sections of the United States have
made at both regional become less dense over the years, Portland’s sub-
and local levels. urbs have become denser.
The 2000 Census found that greater Portland,
unlike most American metropolitan areas, does
not concentrate poor families in the city. People
with modest incomes were able to disperse
throughout nearly all of the Portland suburbs
because every municipality and county is required
to zone for a sizable number of apartments. In
2000, for the first time, more poor people in the
three-county area lived in the suburbs than in
Portland itself, Betsy Hammond reported in The
Oregonian. The result, in the view of Bruce Katz,
director of the Brookings’ Center on Urban and
Metropolitan Policy, is that social problems are not
compounded by concentration. Nor are the central
city and the older suburbs emptying out, dragging
down the metro area.
The center, with its MAX light-rail line and a
new streetcar line, is thriving. The light-rail line
connects towns on the east side to those on the
west. Mixed-use development has clustered close
to MAX stops like Orenco Station—a popular cen-
ter where residents can walk from home to coffee
shops, restaurants, and commuter rail.
If Smart Growth is to achieve substantial
results, efforts must be made at both regional and
local levels. In metropolitan Washington, D.C., the
best development over the past 25 years owes its
growth boundaries have experienced sharply existence to the regional Metro rail system and to
escalating house prices. “In Portland, the housing local initiatives. A prime example is the profusion
supply is expanding in a fashion that corresponds of housing, offices, stores, restaurants, and ser-
very well with the population,” says Gerrit Knaap, vices within walking distance of five Metro sta-
executive director of the National Center for Smart tions in the Rosslyn-Ballston corridor of Arlington
Growth Research and Education at the University County, Virginia. What had been an aging, low-
of Maryland. In part because of restrictions on density commercial road corridor in the 1960s has
outward expansion, plenty of private redevelop- become “the economic engine of Arlington
ment is occurring in the city. The population with- County,” according to James Snyder, supervisor of
in the city’s boundaries has grown to 539,000 from the county’s Planning Section. Since 1979, when
366,000 in 1980, partly through annexation but Metro opened its Orange Line in the corridor,
also through an embrace of apartments, town- 18,000 houses and apartments, 14 million square
houses, and other, denser forms of housing. feet of offices, and 21.5 million square feet of retail
Housing has been built on former parking lots, have appeared. “Things are compact and dense,”
above stores, even atop a public library. Haggard- Snyder says. The corridor, containing 7.6 percent
looking neighborhoods have improved. “There’s of the county’s land area, generates 33 percent of
no blight in Portland,” Knaap says. “That’s really its property tax revenue. It allows Arlington to set
stunning.” its property tax rate lower than other major juris-
As Smart Growth has become the norm, gov- dictions in northern Virginia.
ernments in the Portland area have taken steps to Greater Atlanta, the biggest metropolis in the
10 ON COMMON GROUND SUMMER 2004
Southeast, is now trying to combine regional and ing; and developers tend to specialize in only one
local action, both of which are badly needed after or two kinds of projects. “Compared with the chal-
decades of uncontrolled sprawl made commuting lenge at hand—fundamentally transforming how
on the region’s clogged highways maddeningly our communities grow—the strides that have been
slow. In 1999, the 10-county Atlanta Regional made are quite modest,” says Smart Growth
Commission launched the Livable Centers America’s Don Chen.
Initiative, providing $5 million over five years for There is no doubt that compact, mixed-use
communities to devise ways to build mixed-use development with extensively interconnected
and residential construction with access to transit. streets, pedestrian convenience, and access to
The resulting community plans are eligible for a transit is increasing. The question is whether it
share of $350 million in transportation improve- will become widespread enough, fast enough. “In
ments. One such plan calls for turning Perimeter my perspective, the ‘smart growth movement’ has
Center—a suburban mall and office center with been most successful at sparking a national con-
three MARTA rail stations—into a transit village. versation about why places matter,” says John
Another calls for building mixed-income housing Shepard, a long-range planner with Larimer
on what had been parking, near an underused County (Fort Collins), Colorado. That’s an impor-
MARTA station in Decatur. In Midtown Atlanta tant beginning. But much more will have to be
near the Georgia Tech campus, extensive develop- done, as Hank Dittmar, president of the advocacy
ment integrating offices and housing is taking group Reconnecting America, acknowledges.
place. Dan Reuter, chief of the Commission’s Land “Our challenge,” Dittmar says, “is to scale up, and
Use Division, calls Midtown “a national success to take down the regulations, codes, standards,
story.” and habits that shackle the marketplace.”
In most of the United States, Smart Growth is
still the exception to the rule. Impediments are Philip Langdon is senior editor of New Urban News, a
many: zoning codes discourage mixed uses; finan- national newsletter on New Urbanism and community
design.
ciers resist integration of offices, retail, and hous-
B
ozeman, Montana, population 27,509, is one city that practices Smart Growth on a small
scale. “We’re encouraging residential infill, taking underutilized residential lots and
bumping up the density through accessory dwelling units,” says Jody Sanford, associate
planner. Often the new, small units are above garages along alleys. They’re especially popular
with students at Montana State University. “Most of the designs are quite nice,” Sanford says.
In older parts of the city, owners are allowed to
divide large lots in two to create additional hous-
ing. The more people who live in a neighborhood,
the better the nearby shops and eating places
fare. Along with residential additions to existing
neighborhoods, small-scale commercial infill
development is encouraged. A custom cabinet-
maker and a maker of custom bicycle frames
have built apartments above their shops. The
city’s policy of trying to improve and augment
what already exists is paying off in the attractive-
ness and vitality of the center. Says Sanford:
“Downtown has experienced quite a renaissance
in the past 10 years.”
SUMMER 2004 ON COMMON GROUND 11