Megaburbs

Abstract

Demographic data tell us that most of America lives in suburbs. But suburbia has quietly transformed itself into something the suburbanites of the 1920s or even the 1950s might find almost unrecognizable. The ingredients are the same, such as the leafy cul-de-sacs. The place names and political boundaries that once defined the small-scale, older bedroom suburbs may remain. Places like Petaluma and Cupertino, in California, may be dozens of miles apart, but growth or decline depends much more on the fate of the entire Bay Area than on actions each takes individually. In metro areas around the country, similarly once-separate communities have become mere components in an economically integrated, wealth-producing and wealth-consuming machine. I call it a megaburb.