When Marc Heilson saw the Sierra Club’s rankings of
the cities most afflicted by suburban sprawl, the Salt Lake City
member called the national office and demanded, “How could you do
this to us?” reports the Salt Lake Tribune. He was upset because
The Dark Side of the American Dream: The Costs and Consequences of
Suburban Sprawl failed to include Salt Lake and many seemingly
deserving Western cities. Only Seattle, Las Vegas and Denver made
the list of cities most threatened by sprawl, while San Diego, Los
Angeles and Phoenix come in for “dishonorable mentions.” The report
details how uncontrolled growth swallows up wild and rural land
while draining resources from cities. It also suggests strategies
for halting sprawl, from drawing urban growth boundaries to
encouraging cluster developments and investing public money in
older cities and towns. The Sierra Club’s rankings snubbed Western
cities because its calculations focused on people moving from a
city’s dense urban core to outer suburbs. But many of the West’s
worst sprawl offenders never developed a dense core, having
sprawled since birth. Club officials say future editions of the
report may use adjusted criteria or concentrate on all-sprawl
cities.
For a free copy of the 29-page report,
contact Larry Bohlen at the Sierra Club’s Challenge to Sprawl
Campaign, P.O. Box 1227, College Park, MD 20741 (301/445-1548), or
www.sierraclub.org/transportation.
* Gabriel
Ross
This article appeared in the print edition of the magazine with the headline Look who’s sprawling now.
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