If it weren’t for widespread urban sprawl, getting a carectomy would be a fairly painless operation. Mom and Pop would put Big Box out of business, and we could park our cars permanently in favor of walking, pedaling, or taking public transit to pick up groceries. We’d prefer this to driving a dozen miles for a gallon of milk (which has probably been trucked in from a farm far, far away, and pumped with hormones for flavor). Everything we’d need would be right there, at our fingertips–not fifteen exits down the freeway.
“We found that the areas where sprawl increased the most were in the exurban areas – out beyond even the suburbs,” said Elena Irwin, co-author of the study and associate professor of environmental economics at Ohio State University.
The study looked for evidence of fragmented land use – areas where housing was juxtaposed with agriculture or forested areas, for example. That’s one of the basic hallmarks of sprawl.
Results showed the level of peak land-use fragmentation was 60 percent greater in 2000 as it was in 1973, and shifted outward from the central cities to a distance of 55 miles in 2000, up from about 40 miles in 1973.
Fragmented land use increased the most in non-urban areas located about 80 miles from the nearest city, the researchers found.
“People are moving further and further away from the center of cities and increasingly more people are living on larger lots,” she said. “That’s increasing the level of sprawl.”
“We find lots of evidence for increases in sprawl further out, but very little evidence for infill development closer to the central city,” she said. “It contradicts the basic idea of an orderly development process.” [my emphasis]
“The results reflect the diminished pull of city centers,” Irwin said. More people have jobs in suburban areas, or are telecommuting, and no longer have the need or desire to live close to the major cities, she explained.
Photos via flickr by by Billy V & Potjie.
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Thanks for the link!
Every time I check the Bike There rss feed, they’ve got something new happening. I looks like their cause is picking up some steam and despite my prior pessimism I couldn’t be happier for them!
Great that such systems arise througout the world!In my country (Holland) volunteers (mainly) from the Dutch Cyclists Organisation (www.fietsersbond.nl) have created a route planning system only for cyclists. It works very well in two out of twelve provinces now, other provinces following soon. You can select the fastest, greenest, most comfortable and most interesting (siteseeing) route from any chosen place to the other. It estimates distance, cycle time and even the amount of carbon you can save and the amount of callories to be used. You can load it on to your GPS or print a detailed route desciption.
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