When designing or re-generating a city to make it more sustainable it is not just environmental issues that should be considered. Making a city more sustainable is just as much about ensuring that the residents’ quality of life is sustainable. New Urbanism has claimed to be an answer to providing a higher quality of life for people living in urban areas. As Day (2003) [1] explains, New Urbanism claims to achieve compact design and the creation of a greater sense of community.
The idea of creating a greater sense of community is undoubtedly attractive. If people feel that they are part of a community they are more likely to be happy in their environment. As Grant (2006) [2] explains, when a greater sense of community is achieved people are more likely to share resources, therefore reducing the demands on the environment. New Urbanism designs spaces that are walkable and relatively self-contained, thus reducing the need to drive everywhere. An example of this is the first New Urbanism designed urban area, Seaside in Florida, which was designed by the architects Andres Duany and Elizabeth Plater-Zyberk. Seaside was designed to combat the growing emphasis on ever-sprawling suburban developments by embodying pedestrian friendly streets, which are well connected, shared communal space and a village centre with shops. This layout is argued to promote community participation, which is thought to reduce levels of crime and create a greater sense of community [2]. Seaside’s website goes as far as claiming that the community they have is a complete one [3].
While arguably achieving a greater sense of community is desirable and could lead to a better quality of life, it is questionable whether such a created form of community is fully attainable. As Harvey (2001) [4] explains, when a sense of community is developed, a form of exclusion can also be created for those who don’t fit in with the sense of community that has been created. Community can act to fuse together those with social differences, thereby excluding those who choose to keep their social differences [1]. Arguably, to create a truly sustainable city, social diversity should be celebrated and fostered.
New Urbanism may have begun with the ideology of social inclusion, but it is debatable whether it has developed into that. Some have argued that the communities created are ones of selective choice, which is not accessible to everyone. This can be seen in the price of residential properties in New Urbanist communities. For example, small cottages in Seaside have been sold for $600,000, which is by no means accessible to everyone. Is there a risk that New Urbanism becomes an elitist option? To avoid this, New Urbanism needs to ensure that there are subsidies for low-income households and a range of property prices [1]. If property prices escalate to levels which are only open to those with higher incomes, then profitability may become a main driver of new urbanism and the principles of sustainability are lost [5].
Community is undoubtedly an important part of a sustainable settlement, but caution must be taken not to construct a sense of community which is just that, constructed and not natural. Social diversities should blend, but not to the exclusion of those who do not fit in with that blend. Whether New Urbanism is the answer to sustainable communities is still highly debatable.
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References
[1] Day, Kristine (2003) New Urbanism and the Challenges of Designing for Diversity. Journal of Planning Education and Research, 23, 83-95.
[2] Grant, Jill (2006) Planning the Good Community: New Urbanism in Theory and Planning. Routledge, London
[3] Seaside Institute (2009) [Online]. Available at http://www.seasideinstitute.org/
[4] Harvey, David (2001) The New Urbanism and the Communitarian Trap, MIT Press [Online]. Available at http://www.gsd.harvard.edu/research/publications/hdm/back/1harvey.pdf
[5] Talen, Emily (2008) New Urbanism, Social Equity, and the Challenge of Post-Katrina Rebuilding in Mississippi. Journal of Planning Education and Research, 27, 277-293.
