NEW URBANISM’S TRUE ROOTS:
GREENFIELD TRADITIONAL TOWN PLANNING OR URBAN INFILL REVITALIZATION
By Steve Wright
As New Urbanism looks back over its first decade-plus of existence, a key question arises: are the movement’s true roots in building new towns such as Seaside and Kentlands, or should they lie in rebuilding Main Street America?
New Urbanism may ultimately have a larger impact in dense urban settings, but its leading proponents say greenfields have to remain high on the agenda.
“From the beginning, the New Urbanism has been dedicated to both the inner city and greenfield development. One is not more important than the other, as the Charter states. However, I think that the greenfield project is the most urgent because that is where 95 percent of the construction in this country is taking place,” said Andres Duany, co-founder of the Congress for New Urbanism (CNU).
“The inner city can be ‘on hold.’ Were the New Urbanism to turn away from greenfield projects, it will have removed the only alternative -- the only friction, that conventional suburban developers have,” Duany said. “The root of the New Urbanism is reform after the failure of the promises of suburbia.”
The principal of Duany Plater-Zyberk & Company, a Miami-based firm famed for planning in more than 250 new and existing communities, is more interested in fusing with environmentalism than debating infill vs. greenfield.
“The New Urbanism is headed toward a fusion with environmentalism. Environmentalism is currently in crisis because it has not made a proposal for the human habitat. Its tendency to ‘green’ everything prevents urbanism. They are crashing because of their limited toolbox. The New Urbanism is entirely symbiotic with the environmental movement. Because the environmental movement is infinitely more powerful politically, we should propel ourselves into a new paradigm that will effectively counter suburban sprawl.”
Tomorrow: John Norquist, president and CEO of CNU
