gjfuelling's review against another edition
5.0
1. Read this
2. Become radicalized
3. Become my friend
4. ???
5. Profit
2. Become radicalized
3. Become my friend
4. ???
5. Profit
jessgock's review against another edition
4.0
I read Suburban Nation because of an endorsement from a friend. It's a book about the virtues of traditional, community-oriented town planning as contrasted with the current American tendency toward sprawl and single-use developments (i.e., big houses in one place, big office parks in another place, big shopping centers somewhere else).
I'm not quite sure how to assess the book, because in some ways I loved it, yet in other ways I felt like it kept repeating the same point ad nauseam and that it couldn't make up its mind who its audience was. I especially loved the discussions about the layout of pedestrian-and-community-friendly towns, because they made me realize how good I had things in the town I grew up in (I could walk everywhere I needed to go, and was able to ride my bike all over town too), and helped me critique the suburban towns my two colleges were in (both were semi-pedestrian-friendly but also had some intimidatingly wide, busy streets interrupting the flow of the community, and a tendency toward shopping centers). The book also enabled me to articulate reasons for why I'm more comfortable in some parts of Chicago than others, not because of crime statistics or creepy people on the street corners but just because of the way the streets and buildings are designed and placed. My new neighborhood feels a lot more like home than my previous one did, and it meets more of the characteristics of a well designed neighborhood as laid out in this book.
However, most of the details that made me look at my different residences with new understanding showed up pretty early on in the text. After that, I felt like the same ideas kept being stated over and over again, and by the last couple of chapters I was questioning whom the authors were writing for, exactly, as they waver between addressing architects and laypeople. I also got a little irritated with the authors' tendency toward cutesy acronyms, like "Nimby" (a person who says "not in my backyard" when faced with new development ideas) and "Lulu" (locally undesirable land use, such as a sewage treatment plant or a homeless shelter, which everyone agrees is necessary but no one wants nearby).
Overall I'd say I learned quite a bit about town planning, land usage, and the ways physical environment influences community and behavior, and I'm being more attentive to the built environment around me. However, while I eagerly devoured the earlier chapters of the book, by the end it seemed to be dragging on, and I felt like the authors were just stating and restating the obvious.
I'd definitely recommend the book for someone interested in how the physical environment can and does influence people's behavior and sense of community. If nothing else it will have you looking a little more closely at streets and houses you've passed by hundreds of times before.
I'm not quite sure how to assess the book, because in some ways I loved it, yet in other ways I felt like it kept repeating the same point ad nauseam and that it couldn't make up its mind who its audience was. I especially loved the discussions about the layout of pedestrian-and-community-friendly towns, because they made me realize how good I had things in the town I grew up in (I could walk everywhere I needed to go, and was able to ride my bike all over town too), and helped me critique the suburban towns my two colleges were in (both were semi-pedestrian-friendly but also had some intimidatingly wide, busy streets interrupting the flow of the community, and a tendency toward shopping centers). The book also enabled me to articulate reasons for why I'm more comfortable in some parts of Chicago than others, not because of crime statistics or creepy people on the street corners but just because of the way the streets and buildings are designed and placed. My new neighborhood feels a lot more like home than my previous one did, and it meets more of the characteristics of a well designed neighborhood as laid out in this book.
However, most of the details that made me look at my different residences with new understanding showed up pretty early on in the text. After that, I felt like the same ideas kept being stated over and over again, and by the last couple of chapters I was questioning whom the authors were writing for, exactly, as they waver between addressing architects and laypeople. I also got a little irritated with the authors' tendency toward cutesy acronyms, like "Nimby" (a person who says "not in my backyard" when faced with new development ideas) and "Lulu" (locally undesirable land use, such as a sewage treatment plant or a homeless shelter, which everyone agrees is necessary but no one wants nearby).
Overall I'd say I learned quite a bit about town planning, land usage, and the ways physical environment influences community and behavior, and I'm being more attentive to the built environment around me. However, while I eagerly devoured the earlier chapters of the book, by the end it seemed to be dragging on, and I felt like the authors were just stating and restating the obvious.
I'd definitely recommend the book for someone interested in how the physical environment can and does influence people's behavior and sense of community. If nothing else it will have you looking a little more closely at streets and houses you've passed by hundreds of times before.
myrto229's review against another edition
3.0
This is a good introduction to the concept of sustainable community design. It's not in-depth or detailed, so wouldn't be a good choice for trained designers or architects who are already familiar with the community design literature.
My favorite parts of this book were the ones that explained how Americans stopped building towns and started building "developments" in the 1970s and 1980s. These authors demonstrate, with historical examples, that this method of growth and expansion wasn't inevitable, but rather the result of a constellation of events that all conspired to change the look and feel of towns.
It's a sort of depressing book, in a way. It contains example after example of towns that could have chosen to develop and grow in sustainable communities, but instead chose to contribute to the "pod" oriented suburban sprawl by building "McMansions" on tiny plots of land.
I learned a lot about why and how the standard new housing developments are designed and built (which is why I chose to read this in the first place), as well as something I'd never considered before: how road/traffic planning contributes to neighborhood design and vice versa. I also learned a lot about the kinds of people who live in different kinds of neighborhoods.
The photographic examples in the sidebar are nice, and help to illustrate the points in the text.
I found myself skimming parts of the book, since it does tend to repeat itself. I agree with one goodreads reviewer, who said that the book can be condensed into a few key points: learn from others' mistakes, think of the future, and work hard for change.
Note that this book was published ten years ago. I'll have to look into some of the more recent literature, possibly published by one of these authors, in the New Urbanism movement to see if their viewpoint has changed. The landscape where I live sure hasn't.
My favorite parts of this book were the ones that explained how Americans stopped building towns and started building "developments" in the 1970s and 1980s. These authors demonstrate, with historical examples, that this method of growth and expansion wasn't inevitable, but rather the result of a constellation of events that all conspired to change the look and feel of towns.
It's a sort of depressing book, in a way. It contains example after example of towns that could have chosen to develop and grow in sustainable communities, but instead chose to contribute to the "pod" oriented suburban sprawl by building "McMansions" on tiny plots of land.
I learned a lot about why and how the standard new housing developments are designed and built (which is why I chose to read this in the first place), as well as something I'd never considered before: how road/traffic planning contributes to neighborhood design and vice versa. I also learned a lot about the kinds of people who live in different kinds of neighborhoods.
The photographic examples in the sidebar are nice, and help to illustrate the points in the text.
I found myself skimming parts of the book, since it does tend to repeat itself. I agree with one goodreads reviewer, who said that the book can be condensed into a few key points: learn from others' mistakes, think of the future, and work hard for change.
Note that this book was published ten years ago. I'll have to look into some of the more recent literature, possibly published by one of these authors, in the New Urbanism movement to see if their viewpoint has changed. The landscape where I live sure hasn't.
wmhenrymorris's review against another edition
You should most definitely not read this book*. It will only make you angry, and I'm not casting that in liberal vs. conservative terms because if you really, really are committed to the creation and/or preservation of community and core democratic values then it should be obvious to most that sprawl is not the ideal situation, and the beauty of this book is that it doesn't vilify developers and it recognizes the need to make money and create value and it respects, even encourages, private ownership and enterprise, but if you think that's has happened and is going to happen by just letting market forces, well, you're wrong because there are always codes and hoops to jump through and the problem isn't so much the developers who, after all, just want to make money and maximize their investments nor is it with the consumers who pretty much universally want more community-oriented places to live, but rather the problem is that we have the wrong codes and the wrong solutions and that's why gobbling up land hasn't work and why traffic just gets worse and what we really need are neighborhoods that are mixed use, built on grid systems, walkable, with building close to the street, because the pods (here's a bunch of family homes, here's retail, here's an office park, here's the government center) plus feeder roads doesn't accomplish much of anything positive and there's nothing that dampens crime like lights and activity and keeping stuff for the eldery and youth to be able to get to without cars helps them both. And architects are too much in to theory, and traffic engineers shouldn't be city planners, and emergency services don't really need as wide of roads as they say then need because they bought the big trucks so they could brag rather than what's really needed to effectively serve the community.
* Unless you live in Georgetown or Seaside or Kentlands or Celebration, Fla. or North Berkeley and then you can read this book and feel all smug about your community-oriented, nicely designed (even when a bit chaotic) neighborhoods.
* Unless you live in Georgetown or Seaside or Kentlands or Celebration, Fla. or North Berkeley and then you can read this book and feel all smug about your community-oriented, nicely designed (even when a bit chaotic) neighborhoods.
analyticali's review against another edition
4.0
I'm sorry that I waited so long to read this book. It provides a broad overview of what makes the parts of America that bothers me so bothersome. I almost didn't believe that such extreme and extremely bad sprawl existed, but reading this book while flying over Texas (twice) showed me just how urgent this message is for rapidly growing areas. This boo also made me all the more grateful that I live not just in Massachusetts, but in a walkable neighborhood near my job where I can see good development and non-automotive connections come to life all the time.
dingopgh's review against another edition
4.0
Awesome book about why suburban sprawl happened (and is happening), how urban and suburban planning has been shaped by our excessive car use, how we've totally messed up parts of our cities by thoughtless planning, and why this all really, really sucks. The authors also offer ways we can begin to fix our problems.
I read this as a follow-up to "The Death and Life of Great American Cities" by Jane Jacobs.
If you're not already an advocate for traditional neighborhoods, public transit, and highway reduction, you will be!
I read this as a follow-up to "The Death and Life of Great American Cities" by Jane Jacobs.
If you're not already an advocate for traditional neighborhoods, public transit, and highway reduction, you will be!
ashleymarie6's review against another edition
4.0
This book was so full of really fantastic information - I learned a TON and found myself reading sections aloud to my husband, taking notes, and nodding emphatically. It connected a lot of dots about development and quality of life and such. It was a little dense - like a really readable textbook.
Highly recommend if you're in the mood to learn and are even slightly interested in development of urban, suburban, and rural areas - why it matters, best practices, and all kinds of really interesting things.
Highly recommend if you're in the mood to learn and are even slightly interested in development of urban, suburban, and rural areas - why it matters, best practices, and all kinds of really interesting things.
hmdarr's review against another edition
5.0
“Given that most time in public is spent driving around in isolation chambers, it is no surprise that social critics are witnessing a decline in the civic arts of conversation, politics, and just simply getting along.”