From Suburbia to Superbia

Image Gallery EYEWIRE

by Dan Chiras

The classic American suburb is an assemblage of homes connected by concrete and asphalt highways to offices and malls. This arrangement fosters a dependency on the car and discourages strolling, walking or mingling with neighbors. One of the social costs of this car culture is isolation and loneliness. Homes and yards are often sequestered behind privacy fences, making isolation more prevalent; many suburbanites enjoy little contact with neighbors. Returning home from work at night, commuters tap on their automatic garage door openers and are swallowed up into the inner sanctum of their homes, not to be seen again until morning, when the ritual reverses itself.

As new suburbs pop up ever farther from the workplace, suburbanites spend more and more of their lives in their cars. According to the Centers for Disease Control, the average American commuter now spends 443 hours a year behind the wheel—the equivalent of 11 work weeks—often bumper to bumper on crowded highways, breathing exhaust fumes and polluting the air with noxious chemicals while waistlines expand and blood pressures rise.

The average American commuter now spends 443 hours—11 weeks—behind the wheel each year.

On the environmental front, the seemingly endless expansion of the suburbs is devouring open land. Verdant fields, lush forests, rich wetlands and productive farms that once fringed our cities and towns are replaced with housing developments that memorialize them in name only: Meadow View, Indian Forest, Running Springs. Today, Americans lose about 1.3 million acres a year to development—much of it clue to the construction of new houses, highways and shopping centers.

SUBURBAN REVOLUTION

Do the suburbs truly spell the end of an authentic civil life? With a little effort, I believe they could be transformed in ways that nurture the human spirit, becoming vibrant communities instead of just places to sleep. Suburbia can become Superbia!