Urban Sprawl of American Cities

A significant amount of American Cities contain characteristics of Urban Sprawl. Because of the excessive degree of Urban Sprawl, this has caused some spillover effects. The studies and data used are available below.

Health

Zoning

Infrastructure

Michigan farmland loss

Housing vs Transport Costs
Social
Does urban sprawl hold down upward mobility? - ScienceDirect
Housing vs Transport Costs
Renting affordability

[justanotheryoutubechannel]

I grew up in the UK and we were taught all about Urban Sprawl in school, but the version of urban sprawl we were taught about in the UK is very different to this, here it was stuff like London expanding out and building houses without proper zoning codes, leading to factories near houses and lack of green space, and luckily we mostly put a stop to this with the green belt systems and making planned cities like the place I grew up in. On the other hand, the sprawl in the USA seems just unanimously bad. I’m not entirely against suburbs or anything as I live in a UK suburb myself, but the way they make them in the US are so inefficient, in my town with 127, 000 people we have a density of 5670 people per square mile, that’s nearly 3 times as much as some US suburbs, which typically have 1, 800-2, 200 per square mile, and despite that it doesn’t feel like a busy urban area, the Victorian parts of town near the 3 train stations have a mix of small semi and fully detached homes that are smaller than US homes but still big for houses here, the medieval remnants of the original 3 villages this town is built on in the mostly pedestrianised historical high street are usually detached or terraced Tudor-esque houses, and the 60s new build areas like where I live are a brilliant mix between terraced and semi detached houses, including flats, but it’s almost all low rises and it fits together greatly, in my close we have 3 blocks of flats but you wouldn’t know easily as they fit in really well and look like they’re part of the terrace.

I wouldn’t be that against more suburbs like mine being built in my country, since we need new housing and my town is very well designed, there’s local shopping parades within 10 minutes of every house, which usually comes with a school, a pub, and a church, and for my house it’s only 5 minutes away and it’s genuinely faster to walk than it is to drive because every close has paths that lead onto nearby streets and other closes, while cars need to take a less direct route, and there’s even areas of houses only connected directly via pavement, and within 20-30 minutes of every house there’s train stations, shopping areas, leisure centres, and secondary schools and colleges, with bus lines to help people get around longer distances, the best lines go to schools, the town centre, the airport, and the train stations, and they’re often used.

[knightblueyan]

Access to good public transportation is ESSENTIAL to escape poverty

[donyahya]

I've experienced living in suburban US and now in a high rise apartment in an urban center in Asia. While US suburbs do look charming at the first glance (who doesn't love the manicured lawn so typical of US suburbs), I now much prefer the latter: I could just take the elevator down to the convenient store at the lobby to buy most daily necessities. I could walk to the mall for shopping, cross the street to go to hospital, etc. In the US suburbs, I had to drive everywhere even just to buy a carton of milk. More efficiency, more time for family, less gas. I think one condition for a good high density apartment living would be having solid concrete walls between units to make sure neighbors noises don't go through your unit.

[rockfire]

People in one breath say “i want more roads, but don’t allow anything but cars on them” and then wonder why traffic happens

[sharegreats]

Good video. It proves to me that it is not essential to appear personally on the screen in order to do a good film. It is sufficient to show good material and explain everything well and understandably by speaking plainly and slowly. Thank you. Subscribed.

[Basta]

Nobody is saying we shouldn't build single family car dependent suburbs. Just that we don't make the car the center of our land use policies. If we eliminate single use zoning, and minimum parking requirements, the free market will do the rest in creating the diverse housing options that will benefit more people.

[destronger]

I'd like to see a change in our zoning. I work from a van as a commercial hvac tech. If less people were on the road then those like me who work from their vehicles could get to jobs quicker and less idling. During 2020, the roads and highways in the bay area were nearly empty.

[nexusoflife]

This is a great video and illustrates the point beautifully.

[thecoolannishatk.]

This is an excellent video. I am so glad to live In nyc with public transit and all, but the rest of the country has to catch up. The feds keep prioritizing the Highways and single use homes but they could make things wayyy better if they stopped doing that. To solve the housing problem we oughta tear up most parking lots and highways first in favor of train lots and Homes;

[kenhunt]

Great pre and post production work.
Important piece.

[wWvwvV]

This is so professionally made and it's so informative. It's a shame it gets so little attention.

A question I have, how is it possible to tear down downtown to build new parking lot deserts and highways that are cutting through? Little to no tax income from that, and you destroy your own history. That might be another reason why people are fleeing from US downtowns.

The other thing is the single-family house zoning rule, as explained in the video. It's inefficient because of the sprawl. You are depended on a car to go somewhere. Children are prisoners in their homes. They are dependent on their parents to do anything.

Me as a 10yr old boy and my friends living in a larger city (200k+ citizen) were out every weekend to explore the nature outside the city … by foot. Our parents didn't know where we were. We left home and were away. We also walked through the whole city on foot. Normally we would take the public transportation at that age. But one day we were adventurous and went back home on foot. It wasn't that a big deal.

[invisableobserver]

I despise developers, builders and realtors.

[C.Zacarias-Main]

The trend is simple. If you are Middle Class and notice that the crime in your area is going up, move out to the suburbs or another more wealthier city. If you got the $$ and an automobile, you would get out of the Downtown as soon as possible. Also, the housing in the burbs are cheaper, you own the house, and your wealth goes up about 200%. Major cities in Canada and the United States are experiencing this urban sprawl.

My proposal for ending urban sprawl is the reduction of crime, expanding the transit system, allowing regular people to own apartment, and increasing the density in the City.

[curtishohman]

Wow, that was a good video. Nice job. Stop urban sprawl!

[gregducati]

I love suburban sprawl, you have your own house detached from you neighbours, you have space for your cars and other toys such as boats and motorcycles, to me a house is freedom and a apartment is a lose of freedom

[andre]

It’s impossible to buy a house. Now try and buy a house in a place that you can actually want to live.

[nolin]

1:35 this graph is straight up misinformation. Just looking at a few examples, some cities seem to be judged by looking at their entire metro area, while other cities are judged strictly by their city limits.
Mumbai is particularly egregious, the only way to get anywhere close to >350/hectare is if you took the entire extended metro population, but used the city limits as your denominator.

[jean-claudelol]

I love American cities! I don't want to live in communities with industrial and commercial centers. I like living in quiet, safe, family-oriented suburbs. You get to build wealth in your home investment, and you get to pass that wealth on to your children or grandchildren to give them a head start in building their own financial future when you are no longer around. Crowded, noisy downtown cities are fine for shopping or work, but I don't want to live there. Suburbs also create many jobs for people like plumbers, electricians, builders, remodelers, landscapers, etc...

[KevinDavis]

Sorry but I don't want to live in some concrete jungle.

[UltimaOmega]

Maybe it's because I grew up in a small town (~1200 population) and moved to a city, but I prefer the suburbs to compact urbanized areas. Those areas are fun to visit at times, but I couldn't live there. Too crowded, not enough open space, and yes, I like the freedom of my car and not being dependent on public transit. How do people who don't have cars travel anywhere that's not a city?
I personally think cities can have both dense urban areas and the more open suburban areas and let people choose. Stop trying to force urban life on those who don't want it.