Urban Development, Suburbanization, and the Built Environment

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Urban Development, Suburbanization, and the Built
Environment

• Soc 205Y
• 3 October 2007

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Todays class

• Urban Development, Suburbanization, and the Built
  Environment
• Should have read 1 journal article, 2 book
  chapters, and a wikipedia entry
• We will watch part of the film The End of
  Suburbia in hour 2
• Test 1 on November 14 in class

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Readings for Today

• Wirth, L. (1938). Urbanism as a Way of Life.
• Fishman, Robert. "Megalopolis Unbound." from
  Metropolis Center and Symbol of our Times.
• "Introduction" in Sorkin, Michael, ed. Variations
  on a Theme Park The New American City and the
  End of Public Space. New York Hill and Wang,
  1992. (CR)

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Urbanism as a way of life

• Classic piece in urban sociology
• Urban lifestyle
• Function of population density, size,
  heterogeneity
• Characterized by what?
• Chicago school of Urban Sociology
• Focused on forms of cities, their development,
  and the outcomes of people competing for unequal
  spaces
• Park
• McKenzie
• Burgess
• Have urban areas passed these modern conceptions
  by?

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Megalopolis Wikipedia

• Megalopolis (city type), an extensive
  metropolitan area or a long chain of continuous
  metropolitan areas
• First used by Jean Gottman in 1957 to describe
  the U.S. Eastern seaboard from Boston to
  Washington, D.C.
• Megalopolis are the result of fundamental changes
  in work and social habits

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Chapter Megalopolis Unbound

• Decentralization Foresight of Frank Lloyd Wright
• Megalopolis?
• Unbound?
• How did it get this way?
• Implications for city life, experiences, and
  outcomes for urban dwellers?
• Is the megalopolis different in Canada?

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Variations on a theme park

• Anywhere is everywhere
• Commodization of space
• Style, Signs, and substance
• Increasing segregation and emphasis on security
• Source of information and culture is
  fundamentally transformed
• Designer communities intended to particular
  demographic groups with particular interests

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Other Relevant Books

• Fantasy city (Hannigan)
• Learning from Las Vegas (Venturi)
• Community Safety and Security in an Insecure
  world (Bauman)
• Metropolitics (Orfield)
• City Form and Everyday Life Torontos
  Gentrification and Critical Social Practice
  (Caulfield)
• Heat Wave (Klinenberg)