Redefining The Suburbs

Downtown Naperville, IL

Yesterday, Aaron Renn of the Urbanophile reported on the recent Census Bureau’s release of metropolitan area population estimates for 2011.  This followed his recent article on the Census Bureau’s release of data on urbanized areas for 2010. 

The preliminary analysis from Aaron is that yes, metro area population growth slowed from 2010 to 2011, with growth particularly slowed in Census Bureau-designated “exurban” counties.  As a result, many urbanists and “back to the city” types are hailing the decline of the far-out suburbs and touting the new growth of cities.

As Lee Corso might say on ESPN’s College Football GameDay, “Not so fast, my friends.”

The truth is far more complex than that, and that leads to misinterpretations on all sides.  Urban boosters tend to believe there is a battle between core cities and exurban areas; suburban boosters say it’s the opposite.  I think it’s a false choice – the distinction between city and suburb is not one of distance from the core, but of age of development.

In older regions like Chicago, there are many suburbs that are as urban in character as Chicago neighborhoods.  Chicago border communities Evanston and Oak Park quickly come to mind; however, there are numerous others that fit the bill (Park Ridge and Des Plaines in the northwest burbs, Cicero and Berwyn in the west burbs, Blue Island and Harvey in the south burbs).  What do they generally have in common?  Although they are all suburbs, they were platted and developed prior to the Great Depression and World War II, and done so at a scale very similar to the nearby large city.  I’d even take this argument a little further and say that suburbs platted and developed pre-1960 could be considered more urban than suburban, as they also have a development pattern more similar to the large city (at least in Chicago’s case).  Take a look at many inner ring suburbs, and they are indistinguishable from the city neighborhoods on the other side of an artificial boundary.

What’s driven the growth of the suburban development pattern has been the individual desire to obtain something new, not simply to move further out.

With that in mind, I think Aaron is spot on in his description of what is happening on the suburban fringe:

“I think a chunk of the fringe migration was from very low end home builders skipping out beyond established jurisdictions into unincorporated territory with few buildings restrictions. They threw up dirt cheap homes there and often sold them to people with marginal credit and income who had no business buying homes, using a variety of gimmicks to do so. (I know someone who sold homes for one of these builders, so I heard about some of these). Loose credit policies and government guarantees fueled this. The housing crash killed this market. Now that subsidies for this type of growth aren’t available, that market is probably never coming back.”

I also agree with Aaron’s view on future city growth:

“With the difficulties of building in urban areas, there’s no way to accommodate just the new growth even if everybody wanted into the city. In other words, there’s just no way there is going to be some massive back to the city movement.”

But if I were to take a stab at an explanation of what is happening in our metro areas, I’d say a reordering has started.  A look into my crystal ball reveals the following:

·         Core cities are becoming the destination of young and educated singles and couples, and of empty-nesters – demographics with disposable incomes and a desire for city amenities.  They will largely replace the immigrant and working-class residents that traditionally populated our core cities.  Think San Francisco, Manhattan, and Washington, D.C.

·         Intermediate areas of metros – inner ring and second ring suburbs – will become the favored locale for young and middle-age families.  Their housing stock will diversify as they seek to provide more housing options for residents, and as a result they will experience an increase in density and become much more “city-like”.  Intermediate areas that have strong job centers, or good access to them, will fare better than those that don’t.

·         The suburban fringe, the areas that grew most rapidly over the last twenty years, will suffer most.  They will lose the young and middle-age families who will move to the intermediate areas, who will grow tired of long commutes and increasing fuel costs.  They will suffer from having a huge inventory of vacant large single-family homes, or – even worse – large undeveloped subdivisions that went bust after the housing crash.  The rental-homeownership mix will shift quickly and dramatically, and the strip malls and lifestyle centers will feel the pinch and lose tenants.  Again, those with a strong job center or good access to one will fare better than those that don’t.

We are beginning to see a transformation in our metro areas, and the areas we have traditionally called suburbs may be in for the greatest change.  The redefinition of the suburbs is well underway. 

Muncie on the Move? Finally?

I saw Richard Longworth’s recent blog article about Muncie, Indiana’s Muncie Action Plan (MAP).  Approved by the Muncie City Council and Delaware County Board in 2010, it continues to live on through annual reports and a nonprofit organization tasked with implementing its recommendations. 

Muncie is what first drew me to the plight of Midwest midsize industrial cities.  I moved there in the ‘80s and lived there throughout my college years.  It was there that I first saw how different things could be from Detroit, but still quite the same.  It appears Longworth saw and heard many of the same impressions I had of “Middletown”:

“The Plan lays out Muncie's problems in stark prose-- disinvestment, a brain drain, lost jobs, vacant houses, growing gaps between the rich and poor, an aging population. This had added up to a civic malaise, a tendency by residents to bad-mouth their town, an assumption that any kid with gumption will go somewhere else…”

“many of the persons I met volunteered that Muncie is split by class, by income, by neighborhood, by race. The north and south sides don't talk with each other, and neither do whites or blacks.”

Sounds like Muncie is still much like it was when I left it 25 years ago.

But I am heartened to see that they did a plan and are working hard to implement it.  Muncie circa 1985 readily believed that, any day now, manufacturing jobs would return and so would its prosperity.  It never happened.  Meanwhile, the city never developed its relationship with Ball State University, a major university that has the ability to be a true catalyst for development in east-central Indiana.  I think finally city leaders have wisened up to the need for some direction.

Longworth hones in on the weakness of the plan:

“Does Muncie today have talents or resources that can be used to create new industries? It clearly has to earn its way in the world, but how will it do that? Any worker applying for a job presents a résumé: what is Muncie's résumé?

Beyond that, the Plan virtually ignores the impact of globalization on Muncie or the fact that the town is now in a global competition. I'd argue that we don't understand our city, or our state, or even the Midwest these days until we understand where it fits into the global economy. There's a global niche out there for Muncie, but it has yet to find it.

More seriously, the Muncie Action Plan treats Muncie as an isolated community, totally disconnected from the towns and economies around it. If Muncie has a future, it's as part of a thriving and prosperous region that can only be built by others in the neighborhood: after all, it rose originally as part of the Auto Alley, declined with the rest of the auto industry, and will recover only if this region also recovers.

Despite this, the Plan doesn't mention Anderson, its twin town, equally distressed, 20 miles away. Nor Indianapolis, the region's biggest economic engine, 60 miles down the Interstate, nor Dayton just across the Ohio state line. Nor does it look north to South Bend, another beat-up old manufacturing town with an aloof university, Notre Dame, that is finally taking some responsibility for its community: it seems to be that Muncie and South Bend would have much to say to each other, but this thought apparently hasn't occurred.”

Again, Muncie is a community for which communication has been difficult, so answers to these questions may take a while to develop.  However, I think Muncie does have an opportunity to be a city that builds its university and health care base, and emerge as an affordable alternative to nearby larger cities like Indianapolis, Fort Wayne and Dayton (all within a 1 ½ hour drive of Muncie).  I think the model for Muncie is Kalamazoo, MI or Bloomington/Normal, IL.