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A Better Place to Live Reshaping the

American Suburb

By: Philip Langdon

Jason M BootheMay 3, 2001

UP 365


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In A Better Place to Live Reshaping The Modern American Suburb, Philip

Langdon, criticizes the way that the modern American Suburb has been shaped. His

criticisms basically state that we, as Americans, have lost our sense of community by

creating these so-called ultramodern suburbs. His criticisms can be placed into six

different categories, street design, marketing, control of the neighborhood, the loss of the

town feel, housing, and commercial centers/ mass transit.

The design of the street layout in new suburbs deeply troubles Langdon, in that

todays street layout in new suburbs does not promote a well-formed sense of community

contact, instead it detracts from the neighborhood basis of the community makeup. First

off Langdon presents that todays suburbs follow a hierarchal set of standards in their

type and design, starting from the limited access highway and going to the minor streets

to where people will most often live, creating a funneling effect on traffic patterns. Also

he argues that the layouts of the streets promotes a disconuinty between the

neighborhoods in a development, in that to travel from one neighborhood to another one

must exit out to the arterial then travel back inwards, instead of using more direct roots as

found in traditional communities. He also bring up the idea of cul-de-sacs being a

psychological block in the social development of neighborhoods, and how that the use of

these circular roads also causes confusing in people trying to travel these neighborhoods.

Another problem that Langdon addresses is that of the marketing of these new

communities. In how that marketing is manipulative in that instead of giving what people

want it gives the perception of what people need and convincing them that is what they


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want, under minding their own ideals and preconceived notions. Giving the notion of that

Americans want the newer-better, where the newer might not always be the better.

Also within this ideal Langdon criticizes the way that marketers have their hands

in the pockets of planners, architects, landscape architects, and others who are involved in

the design of and the layout of communities and houses in the new suburbs. Creating

neighborhoods in which might have their own character but are all in made in a

conformists type of way. An ideal in which each dwelling is part of a larger scene

painting, called scenography. These communities are then marketed as the newer-

better, the ideal communities in to which live, though, according to Langdon, may who

live in these communities are no more satisfied with them then they were in the

communities that came from, though they cant really explain why.

Neighborhood associations are another problem and criticism that Langdon has

with the new suburban communities of today. Langdon finds that neighborhood

associations are too intrusive in the lives of homeowners, epically in that way that which

to make their homes into their own homes. This all-leading back to the issue of

conformity, and how community associations prevent a homeowner from creating a

distinctness and uniqueness in the process of making their homes feel like their own, thus

creating another psychological barrier, distancing neighbors from one another and putting

them at odds.

Housing is another problem that Langdon has with the new communities in the

suburbs of America. First off Langdon says the idea of car-centric society has went from

the street to the house. In that the way we transport ourselves is car-centric so is the way

we live. This has to do with the design of housing in these new neighborhoods. IF you


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look the way that housing is now built is the garage first way, in that the front 2/3 of

houses are usually designated for multi-car garages, instead of the traditional porch or

frontal portal design. This has also lead to a disconnection of communities and

neighborhoods in that people no longer sit out front on their porches but are more

inclined to stay indoors or in their spacious blocked of back yards.

Langdon is a New Urbanists, and his ideas, for the most part conform to the

ideas of New Urbanism. One of those ideas is that of the integration of multiple uses in a

neighborhood, commercial and residential in the same area. This town center concept that

Langdon proposes would create a less car-centric community and a more pedestrian

oriented community.

This also brings up the idea of the use of mass-transit as a viable mode of

transportation between the outer suburbs and the central cities and even the other

surrounding suburbs. This progression of transit use would proliferate the acceleration of

the reduction of the uses of personal vehicles, epically in the area of short trips in which

Langdon says that the use of personal vehicles is grossly overused.

All of this leads to the ideal of the loss of town feel, in which the present day

design of communities lacks. Most of what Langdon goes into is the psychological

aspects of this lack of connection of people to one another by the way the communities

have been situated, all related several other points that Langdon has made. In that because

of this lack of town feel, there is an utterly problematic social upheaval underway,

making people feel not so comfortable in there so called perfect communities.

Now as much as Langdon goes in and criticizes these ideals he does propose some

changes of the legal sense to help improve of these community problems. First off he is


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an advocate of zoning changes. He proposes that zoning should be more inclunesive, in

that we should adopt multi use zoning standards, in so that we can eliminate the zoning

standard that have been used over the decades, separating uses of land, this is most

epically profound in the idea of commercial residential areas. Also with zoning

Langdon proposes that higher density zoning be used, but Langdon is a proponent single-

family homes.

Also Langdon brings up the idea of limiting the power that community

associations can have over a community. His proposals bring upon a more liberalized

community associations, a community association that can still have an influence over

what the shape of a community can have but by not impeading opportunities for personal,

and individual grow so that persons can fulfill human growth. But so long that that

growth enchroach on the rights of others or comprise the integrity of the community.

Some of the other ideals that Langdon proposes would work well with the idea

comprehensive planning. What Langdon proposes is that communities should have a set

of design standards, epically in that of the layouts of communities, epically in that

individual communities need to be integrated with one another and not these separate

entities that they are today. Comprehensive planning would lead to a more regional

approach of planning, that way communities would know what one another were doing,

and better plan for future growth around them.

Some of the ideas that Langdon also proposes could fall into categories such as

tax breaks and abetments, in which some communities in his case studies use, for the

guiding of development of communities, making them more pedestrian friendly and


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