HIllary,
Having just returned from my kid's wedding in San Deigo, i am still reeling from being exposed to the Juggernaut. A fifty mile wide strip of suburbia four hundred miles long -- all four and six lane roads and low density housing and shopping. Full of cars. It was terrifying even to cross the road on foot - crossing takes so long it almost makes sense to wait for a light. There was something inevitable and unstoppable about the whole Leviathon.
However, thinking about the relationship between cheap oil and the building of suburbs, if i remember right, didn't Mike Davis (in City of Quartz) talk about how most SoCal suburbs up till the 1930s were designed for, and called, streetcar suburbs? I don't remember if it was Davis who said this or not, but i recall reading an historical geog account of dirty tricks local politics and larger scale national dirty politics pursued by the oil and car companies which did things like limit fares so the streetcar companies couldn't upgrade their rolling stock so it became tatty. I believe there was a concerted political campaign to convince everyone that streetcars were old hat, only for the poor, and represented 'old money' and backward looking conservatism. It didn't help that the streetcar companies were also land-development companies (build a line and you get to develop and sell the property which ajoins it).
At any rate, your thoughts prompted, first flash-backs (!), and then the above. Does anyone know of an example where the process has been reversed? Where car suburbs have become effective street car suburbs again? In the UK, as far as i know, all the reinstatement of trams and trolleys is happening in city centres, not burbs.
regards
rhys
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Dr. Rhys Evans
Integrate Consulting
1 Priory Pl
Perth Scotland
01738 560 310
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