Suburbia and the Public Realm
Payton Chung
A few months ago, I was walking around
Chicago's Gold Coast neighborhood with a friend visiting from out of town.
When we stopped to examine the million-dollar rowhouses pictured in a real
estate brokerage's window, she nearly gasped.
"Why would anyone want to pay that much money to live here? It's so
crowded! There's no privacy, no parking, no open space. So much noise and
crime. And it's so expensive - a million dollars buys you four bedrooms?"
I thought at first that her breakfast hadn't gone over very well, but her
comments were understandable. Many Americans -- especially those millions
who have had only a passing acquaintance with large cities -- have
preconceived notions about city life: it's noisy, it's crowded, it's
dangerous, it's inconvenient. Why, they ask, would anyone choose that when
leafy, spacious suburbs are just a short drive away? Well, by suburban
standards, city life can be awfully crowded and expensive. Parking and
wooded lots are rather scarce. But life in city has its joys, as well, and
I think they outweigh the occasional standing-room-only train or bum on
the street.
First of all, there's the location. People who live in the Gold Coast have
unparalleled access to everything that's great about Chicago. Their
neighborhood -- one of the densest in America -- has the density to
support dozens of fine shops and restaurants, a thriving nightlife, and a
wide array of specialized services. At the neighborhood's doorstep is
Lincoln Park, with over a thousand acres of lawns, groves, beaches,
trails, athletic fields, museums, harbors, even a theater, a zoo, and a
conservatory. Immediately to the south, the Loop and Near North areas
house more offices, theaters, shops, restaurants, museums, and galleries
than anywhere else in America outside Manhattan.
Gold Coast residents might not have the biggest or prettiest houses
around, but what they lose in private space (and even the flats are pretty
darn spacious, probably renovated a few years ago with all the amenities
of modern living - including elevators) is more than made up with plenty
of active and engaging public space. Instead of sitting in front of the
tube on Saturday mornings like the rest of America, they're likely
enjoying the passing parade (and lattes) from sidewalk seats at cafés
along Rush Street, or jogging down the lakefront, or taking in a dance
performance at the Museum of Contemporary Art. All these diversions are an
easy five-minute walk away.
Of course, this life isn't for everyone -- but Americans have largely
forgotten about public realms entirely. We've traded away a vibrant public
realm, the social fabric and zeal for association that de Tocqueville so
admired, for 'lots more stuff' -- choosing double garages over train
stations, half-acre lots over parks, highways over public squares, TV
dinners over cafés -- and we hardly know what we're missing. In doing so,
we've all become Citizen Kanes: we'll die alone with a lot of stuff,
unhappy with our memories and endlessly searching for social connections.
I think that the radical subjectivity of the (post)modern age has gone too
far; the endless search for profits has led us to plunder our stock of
social capital. It's time we redistributed some resources back, in my
opinion.
(Active participation in the public realm is by no means exclusive to
cities, or impossible in suburbs. High-rise condos are often as heavily
guarded as suburban gated communities; voter turnout is often higher in
suburbs than in cities. However, the forced propinquity of city life and
the greater physical accommodations for public life -- the walking streets
and squares, the parks and libraries left by an earlier generation --
greatly enhance the possibilities for public discourse.)
There are little things, too, that differentiate urban from suburban life.
One is groceries: whereas suburbanites buy a lot of groceries once a week
(or even less often), city dwellers usually get fewer groceries more
often. I rather like this, as I can get freshly baked bread and fresh
produce several times a week, and I don't feel particularly beholden to
any one grocery (my pasta and cookies, for instance, come from an Italian
grocer near where I work; my staples from a supermarket two blocks from
home). And the densities of urban living allow groceries to pop up every
few blocks, instead of every few miles as in suburbia. Indeed, the
exclusionary zoning and disconnected streets of most suburbs means that
it's almost impossible to walk from home to stores, even when they're
(relatively) close together.
The city is, granted, often a noisy place. The noise levels in one's
residence has a lot to do with building construction, but also with some
outside factors. In most places (besides airport zones), traffic is the #1
contributor to ambient noise levels. The Gold Coast and Lincoln Park areas
are so densely populated that few residents find it necessary, much less
convenient, to own cars. (Parking spaces are so dear -- easily $20-30,000
for a garage space -- that only a third of lakefront Chicagoans own cars.)
Thus, most of the residential streets in these neighborhoods are
breathtakingly serene: there's almost no traffic to stir the air. Many
side streets in urban neighborhoods are much the same, just as side
streets in suburbs (away from the freeways and mall-lined arterials) are
quiet.
And although many of us would like to live in the countryside, you have to
realize that not all of us can -- if we did, there wouldn't be any
countryside left! The value of open space (especially in terms of
biodiversity) increases exponentially: an acre might shelter squirrels and
sparrows, but a hundred thousand acres can support multiple ecosystems. If
true wilderness is what we're looking for -- and if we are to accept that
access to nature is a fundamental human right -- it's best to share that
right with all, not to atomize the countryside.
Many have tried and failed to combine features of city and countryside
over the past century or so. The latest attempt, the auto-dependent
suburbs of the past half century, haven't just failed at providing their
residents with a satisfactory combination of urban camaraderie and rural
isolation. In many areas, these suburbs have irreparably harmed city and
countryside -- bulldozing pristine forests, fields, and marshes into
fenced-in Tudors and taco takeout joints; transforming vibrant city
neighborhoods into rivers of traffic or abandoned moonscapes. It's time to
stop trying to mix city and country: like sugar and salt, both are
pleasures best tasted pure.
Payton Chung is an activist and urban
policy consultant in Chicago.