Given the increasingly divided political climate as well as the continuing patterns of privatization and exclusion, perhaps we will see suburbs take on two different trajectories. One type of suburb may take the current residential gated community lifestyle to greater lengths, providing all necessary services and goods within the confines of the community and allowing residents to never leave their comfort zones. In contrast, other suburbs may be more communal, with shared walkable spaces and mixed land uses to allow residents to interact freely and often. 

Emily C

Suburbs blending into nature and each other

Suburbs in 2050: The lines between cities and suburbs will likely get progressively blurrier as new modes of transportation and infill development at a wide variety of densities make it almost impossible to tell where one zone starts and another stops. Lines between the built environment and the natural one will likewise get less definite as the widespread adoption of simple techniques like bioswales and green roofs result in a human landscape which does its best to mimic the natural one. Pre-existing suburban and exurban environments which do not fit into this new paradigm will probably continue to be occupied so long as present highway and mortgage subsidies continue unchanged; once faced with economic conditions, cultural preferences, or simple structural obsolescence (at least one of which is likely to come into play by 2050), many neighborhoods may simply be abandoned and left to be slowly reclaimed by the natural environment which surrounds them.

Above: a Seattle Hope VI project demonstrates an urban environment which looks much more natural than its predecessors. From http://www.moresitephocus.com/search/label/stormwater.

-Daniel

I actually don’t think the suburbs are going to change as rapidly as we believe. Even if people are desiring of more walkable urban spaces, the city environment, etc. it seems that a variety of social, economic, and political factors may inhibit this. Overall, social mobility has decreased, as has the availability of jobs that may entice people to move.

For young people, I see three factors that may keep people in the suburbs even if they want to move: financing, housing values, and aging parents. On the financing side, not only is bank lending harder to come by, but many young adults are saddled with debt that they cannot pay off on current wages. True, these adults may rent in the city for the time being, but I don’t see that as a permanent life-style change. When these adults decide to start having a family I think the temptation will be to return to the suburbs, where financing is a little safer for lenders (and prices on once unattainable homes have fallen to potentially management levels), and where desirable characteristics (such as good schools) are more prevalent. As long as policy continues to tie educational financing with property values, this trend will be hard to buck. Additionally, depending on how our society addresses concerns of the elderly, these young adults may find themselves more in caregiver roles than imagined 5 years ago. This may lead to an incentive to stay close to their parents—or in the ‘burbs.

Overall, I think that the desire of people to move to the urban core may remain high, but I see these factors as placing real-world restrictions on ability to do so.

- Brittany

zoning

As metropolises develop so fast, I believe the suburbs of them will not just be a place for people to live. It is very possible that suburbs will be divided to several areas with different functions and all the functions serve the center city. For example, some suburban areas provide agricultural products, some areas provide industrial products and some areas provide education resources and so on. The city center will act as a commander to distribute and manage all these kinds of resources.

Qi

Suburbs and nature, suburbs and motility

Contrary to the common sense that suburb is more natural friendly; in fact it’s an ecological damage in the current form. Many scientists, economists and planners believe cities are greener places to live because of the higher accessibility and energy efficiency. If in the future climate change and environment degradation do threaten us as severely as scientists claimed, I think suburbs will develop into the form more or less resembling cities, at least have such features as compactness and higher density. To reduce the disastrous effects of auto-dependence people may also increase the walkable, bikable, and transit possibilities for suburbs, and create more human-scale pedestrians than car-scale highways. 

Tianzhe Wang

More ecologically friendly?

Research is currently being done to look at inserting ecosystem services into rural development (“exurbia”)—things like water filtration for nutrient capture and carbon storage. Studies show that if a whole neighborhood has a “green” look to its landscaping, people are more willing to have these innovative, ecologically friendly yards. So…more rain gardens, native plants and prairies?

-Rachel

Suburbs - Present v. Future

What will change? Transportation connections within MEGA-regions (i.e. high-speed rail), in order to create more resilient regional economies (also, increase in T.O.D.).  Income and Education levels will deteriorate in suburban areas, unless affordable housing measures are successfully implemented in urban areas. The model for suburban malls and strip malls will change to more walkable & “downtown-like” mixed-use areas with residential.  Alternative energy sources will help transportation access.

What will resemble 2011? Hyper-consumerism drives commercial aspects of public spaces and brand immersion (i.e. Ads everywhere).  Personal transportation will remain in demand, but will differentiate itself from today’s automobile (i.e. Google experimenting with self-drive cars).  Businesses will still continue to locate in suburban areas unless municipalities regionalize (also adhering to idea that CEOs often locate companies closer to their suburban homes as time passes).

-Taylor Traub

Farming/Permaculture Systems in the Suburbs. 

- Food grown at home. 

- Things will happen organically, not from policy or planning. 

- It’s easier for people in the suburbs to adapt to an energy crisis, compared to those in high density apartments. 

- Big suburban houses will be turned into home offices/workshops/homesteads.

- Suburban streets will become active.

http://www.lagranplazamall.com/en/home.aspx

Dead malls become cultural centers? 

On a Sunday: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y5aMKDXTCWM

will change:

• even greater differentiation between suburbs (wealth, density, vitality, design) both within and across regions.
• a growing gap between suburbs in thriving metro areas and those in declining metro areas.
• for suburbs with high land demand:  higher densities (reurbanizing), with more transit and mixed use, up-zoning, consolidation and conversion of single-family lots into multi-family and commercial uses.
• for suburbs with weak land demand:  many inner-ring suburbs will functionally merge into declining central cities (with the old municipal boundary between struggling city and stable suburb giving way to a blurry boundary between struggling city neighborhoods and struggling suburbs)
• more alliances between suburbs, linking together to share services and collectively protect their suburban interests, including (in some metro areas with weak central cities) inter-suburban transit that bypasses the central city.

more of the same:

• suburbs still perceived as safer, quieter, closer to nature
• suburbs will still be used as a tool of exclusion, serving as a distinct (Tiebout-like) system of providing and funding public services and collective consumption for a specific socio-economic class.
• suburbs will still have more basketball hoops, holiday banners, swing sets, dogs, trees, cul-de-sacs, campers in driveways, lawn ornaments, etc.

X

relationship between suburb and nature

When I think of the future of suburbs, the first thing that comes to mind is the possibility of abandonment and disinvestment that would result in slum suburbs. But, on the other side of the coin, the kind of suburbs in the future that will experience growth and investment may have all their own renewable energy facilities, organic food production, LEED-certified buildings and even neighborhood development, one or more rail stations…so, basically the suburbs of the future may look a lot like new urbanist developments. These places will market themselves as environmentally-friendly places with expertly designed wetlands, habitat/conservation areas, etc. These suburbs would look a lot more natural and that’d certainly be better than the suburbs we have… and hopefully the planners & developers of the future will care about preserving nature and not build these new environmentally-friendly suburbs on greenfield sites. 

-Emily

Secure Suburbs in Brazil

The next step in separating suburban communities from the larger metropolis (beyond the peripheral location and security gates) is to create a separate channel of commuting (bypassing the surface roads).  see: High above Sao Paulo’s choked streets, the rich cruise a new highway (The Guardian, 19 June 2008), “The Favelas and Gated Communities of Suburban Brazil” (global-peripheries.com), Brazil’s Elites Fly Above Their Fears (Washington Post, 2002) and  ALPHAVILLE EXISTS by Chris Darke.  

-SDC

HBS Study Finds Positive Yelp Reviews Boost Business →

From personal experience, a lot of those highly reviewed restaurants can be found in strip malls. The best Mexican/Thai/Middle Eastern/Korean/Turkish/Japanese food in Ann Arbor/Ypsi are in the strip malls, not downtown.

I think this is also a sign that the suburbs will look quite different in the next thirty years. I’m dreaming of the day when I go on a road trip, and pull off at any exit to eat Tacos Al Pastor with friends or family.

Last post,

-Cory

Ellen Dunham-Jones fires the starting shot for the next 50 years’ big sustainable design project: retrofitting suburbia. To come: Dying malls rehabilitated, dead “big box” stores re-inhabited, parking lots transformed into thriving wetlands.

I came to see her and June Williamson speak last year. I was definitely left inspired, but also a bit critical of the inauthenticity or Disneyfication of the projects, but they both acknowledge it and seem to just be happy that these places are more walkable and sustainable. Buzzwords!

-Cory

from The Sprawl Repair Manual by Galina Tachieva. 

I’m just going to copy my current thesis from the paper I’m writing for next Tuesday…

“As city centers continue to gentrify, some predict greater displacement of the urban poor into the inner and outer rings of suburbia. In addition, the increase in immigrant enclaves, and the demand from millennials and baby boomers for denser, more walkable neighborhoods, will transform the suburbs into more compact village-like clusters…”

I’m optimistic about the suburbs future, but I don’t want anyone to think I’m hoping for New Urbanist shopping centers and condos. I’m envisioning a much more chaotic, less traditional, some might say “less pretty”, world of ad hoc buildings, local/ethnic restaurants and grocery stores. We should preserve some of the ugliness of big box stores and strip malls, not only for diversity, but for the affordability and functionality of those spaces. I highly recommend Stewart Brand’s book, How Buildings Learn, in which he praises “low road” vernacular architecture for its affordability and support of entrepreneurship. People don’t mind knocking holes in them, and shaping them into places that serve their function. It was also turned into a documentary series (http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=8639555925486210852). Watch it, or read it, or both.

I’m going to post a few more things because I’m excited about this topic right now, possibly too excited… 

-Cory