[LINK] "We're Developing a Problem Here"

[rfmcdonald]

At Acts of Minor Treason, Andrew Barton is decidedly unimpressed with efforts by developers and others to undermine the southern Ontario Greenbelt limiting the expansion of suburbs deep into Toronto's hinterland. Densification is key.

I think that the Greenbelt has a valid and extremely important reason to not only be maintained, but strengthened. Not only does it protect the Oak Ridges Moraine, an ecologically important and vulnerable landform, but it provides a necessary impediment to expansion. Vancouver wouldn't be the city it is today if it wasn't hemmed in by the water and the mountains; aside from the lake, southern Ontario has no similar geographical stumbling blocks, so it's up to artificial ones to do their work. Limits encourage people to solve problems and try new avenues to success - whereas in a situation where everything is straightforward and open, the easy choice is going to be taken every single time. But we have to put in hurdles to those easy choices, or what we're going to end up with is low-density sprawl coating the land like a fungus.

The constant construction of new sprawling subdivisions of single-family residential homes is a windfall to the development industry, sure, but they're the only ones who truly profit by it in the end. Today's suburbs aren't communities but hollowed-out zones to hang one's hat and rest one's head. When I lived in Barrie, I was fortunate that I happened to live in one of the first rings of suburbs... back in 1998, I was only a forty-minute walk from my downtown high school. Thirteen years later, someone living at the fringe of Barrie would be lucky to be able to walk to downtown in twice as much time. Sprawling subdivisions are based on the idea that the automobile brings freedom, but in practice they're practically tools of oppression - if you have to use your car to get anywhere, if you're obligated to fritter away your day behind a steering wheel without any alternative... how free are you, really?

Go, read.