Smart Growth is an urban planning idea to reorganize how cities grow and develop in the future. City sprawl has become a major problem among urban and regional planners for many reasons. One of the major reasons for the problems caused by urban sprawl is that people have the tendency to move further away from work the more they make. This causes several issues such as increased traffic, suburbia where walking or local amenities are miles away and etc. Smart growth seeks to correct that by putting boundaries on city growth, redeveloping the city to be more mixed use, and having other alternatives to driving. But are these ideas too little, and too late. Have we already sprawled too much to make a major impact on the sustainability of the system?
Let’s first mention the problems caused by urban sprawl. The first problem is that urban sprawl creates communities that rely on one mode of transportation, the car. The automobile industry is sort of dependent on how much people depend on cars. Designing cities and town growth so that people don’t have to use cars is ultimately detrimental to industry witch accounted for 33% of the nations carbon dioxide emissions in 2008. Another problem with urban sprawl is that people still demand necessities like water and energy. In Illinois along there are 11 active nuclear plants with 9 of them within 70 miles of Chicago, and 31 coal plants. The nuclear and coal plants provide the an equal 48% each of the energy Illinois uses despite the pollution caused by burning coal and the dangers posed by nuclear power. Water also becomes an issue as many counties in Illinois rely on ground water which needs time to recharge.
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| Map of Nuclear Power Plants in Illinois |
But can smart growth solve this problem. Smart growth seeks to limit growth by placing boundaries on city growth and refocus on redeveloping urban areas for mixed residential urban use. Also connect areas with alternatives transportation modes like trains, bus, and bike. These modes of transport reduce the amount of fuel consumption needed for long distant single passenger travel. One of smart growth most beneficial aspects is that it focuses on the problem in the context of maintaining growth. Cities still grow but they grow with a keener eye towards sustainability, but this is ultimately why smart growth is too meager. Smart growth focuses on the minimum required to maintain growth instead of a shift in values. Smart growth can be just as inefficient as it is today. People will use fewer cars but then people will demand cheaper urban living meaning more energy draining buildings which also use about third of the energy supply. So in a sense we are exchanging one demon for another. Also Smart Growth requires planning from the start in order to have any significant benefits. Most of the criticism of smart growth is that the policies are ineffective or unable to measure the reduction in traffic congestion and fuel emissions.
In order to become more sustainable we need to attack the problem at its source. We need to focus on reducing pollution and restoring the environment so that it can support the planet for centuries to come. Everything else will adapt to those changes. If carbon fuel prices were too high, people would start commuting less, start living closer together, working more efficiently, and do everything smart growth purports to do. In essence the goal of smart growth is a favorable one, but the theory’s means lacks the ability for meaningful change in the way of improving society's sustainability.
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