Designing Suburban Futures New Models from Build a Better Burb
Suburbs deserve a better, more resilient future. June Williamson shows that suburbs aren't destined to remain filled with strip malls and excess parking lots; they can be reinvigorated through inventive design. Drawing on award-winning design ideas for re
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Designing Suburban Futures New Models from Build a Better Burb June Williamson
Washington | Covelo | London
Designing Suburban Futures: New Models from Build a Better Burb
Copyright © 2013 June Williamson All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any means without permission in writing from the publisher: Island Press, 2000 M Street, NW, Suite 650, Washington, DC 20036 Island Press is a trademark of The Center for Resource Economics. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Williamson, June. Designing suburban futures : new models from build a better burb / June Williamson. pages cm Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-1-61091-197-9 (cloth : alk. paper) — ISBN 1-61091-197-0 (cloth : alk. paper) — ISBN 978-1-59726-241-5 (pbk. : alk. paper) — ISBN 1-59726-241-2 (pbk. : alk. paper) 1. Suburbs — United States — Planning. 2. Sustainable development — United States. I. Title. HT352.U6W55 2013 307.740973 — dc23 2013004177 British Cataloguing-in-Publication data available. Printed on recycled, acid-free paper
Design: Thumb, New York Type: Berthold Akzidenz Grotesk, Courier Sans Manufactured in the United States of America 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 Keywords: Bourgeois utopias, Broadacre City, design competition, edge and edgeless cities, Great Recession, Long Island region, infill development, neighborhood design, redevelopment, regreening, re-inhabitation, retrofitting suburbia, suburban sprawl, suburbanization, urban-suburban reciprocity, urban resiliency
For my father.
Contents Preface
viii
Foreword Ellen Dunham-Jones
x
Introduction
xii
Vision: A Role for Design in Suburban Resilience Context for Change
2
Design Culture Responds to Sprawl: 1960s to 2010s
24
Better Suburban Futures
38
Exemplar: Building a Better Burb on Long Island Build a Better Burb 2010: Instructions and Commentary
52
Winning and Noteworthy Competition Schemes Sited in the Setback: Increasing Density in Levittown Upcycling 2.0 AgIsland Building C-Burbia SUBHUB Transit System Long Division LIRR: Long Island Radically Rezoned Noteworthy Competition Schemes
64 72 76 80 86 92 98 106
Conclusion
120
Epilogue: New Roles for Architecture and Urban Design A conversation with Kazys Varnelis
122
Selected Bibliography Credits Index
128 131 132
viii
Preface
ix
My call to action in this book, to design better suburban futures, is not a novel one. Many have preceded me, and others will follow. However, I do hope to have articulated and framed arguments and opportunities in a way that is clear and compelling, by bringing together several strands of research and design propositions, including the vivid examples from the 2010 Build a Better Burb ideas competition for the suburbs of Long Island, richly documented in these pages. The history of suburbanization is long and complex, only skimmed in the overview chapter “Context for Change.” The majority of North Americans — not just those in the middle classes — have spen
