The Future of the Suburban City Lessons from Sustaining Phoenix
As a Phoenix native, the author argues that the suburban city, which grew up based on the automobile and the single‑family home, needs to dramatically change and evolve in an era of climate change. He shows how this is possible, and that many suburban cit
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The Future of the Suburban City Lessons from Sustaining Phoenix
The Future of the Suburban City
The Future of the Suburban City Lessons from Sustaining Phoenix
Grady Gammage Jr.
Washington | Covelo | London
Copyright © 2016 Grady Gammage Jr. 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. Keywords: Air conditioning, air quality, annexation, climate change, global warming, haboob, Hohokam, light rail, residential density, single-family home, suburban city, suburban sprawl, sustainability, shopping center, solar energy, Sun Corridor, Sunbelt cities, urban heat island, urban resilience, transportation, water management Library of Congress Control Number: 2015953755 Printed on recycled, acid-free paper Manufactured in the United States of America 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
Contents
Chapter 1. Chapter 2. Chapter 3. Chapter 4. Chapter 5. Chapter 6. Chapter 7.
Prologue: Getting through the Haboob Acknowledgments
ix xiii
Suburbs, Sprawl, and Sustainability Just Add Water Coping with Heat Transportation and the Suburban City Houses, Shopping Centers, and the Fabric of Suburbia Jobs and the Economy of Cities in the Sand Politics, Resilience, and Survival
1 23 55 75 93 125 153
Afterword: Planning to Stay Notes Index
167 171 185
Prologue: Getting through the Haboob
Ahwatukee is a suburb of a suburban city. Nestled against the back side of South Mountain, it is now part of the City of Phoenix, annexed in the late 1970s after a skirmish with Tempe. It was developed as a low-amenity, early-generation master-planned community. Ten miles from Tempe and fifteen from downtown Phoenix, it seemed “far out” when it was first built and so was initially marketed to retirees. The first houses that were built there are deed-restricted to people over 50 and were initially priced “from the $50s.” Today, Ahwatukee is a quintessential slice of suburban America. It has a broad variety of single-family homes, not very many jobs, an increasing number of apartments, a few decent restaurants, and a bunch of empty big-box stores. The schools are decent but underfunded, and the parks are crowded with sports teams but few trees. Ahwatukee is where I live. My wife, Karen, and I built a custom house there in the 1980s and raised our kids; now we’re empty nesters. My swimming pool doesn’t get much use, but filling it in would disrupt the aesthetic of the backyard. I struggle to keep a small patch of grass green. The trend is to put in artificial turf, but it’s shockingly expensive and still looks tacky, even when it includes fake “thatch.” I haven’t installed solar panels yet; they would look out of place sticking above the parapets on my low, Santa Fe–style house. My backyard looks south of the City toward the Gila River Indian Community and the farmlands of Pinal County
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