The Next Slum?

Atlantic Monthy magazine has an interesting article on future development trends in suburbs. The article is entitled "The Next Slum?" and is written by Christopher B. Leinberger, who is a fellow at the Brookings Institute, an urban planning professor at the University of Michigan and a real estate developer. He discusses the current subprime mortgage crisis and some of its impacts on neighborhoods but emphasizes that it is only the tip of the iceberg of changes that are impacting suburban development.

He notes that surveys in Boston and Atlanta indicate that about of third of respondents prefer close-knit walkable neighborhoods with services as opposed to another third who prefer conventional large lot development that requires driving to access services with another third with mixed feelings. He notes that while households with children constituted more than half of all households when baby boomers were growing up, they were only about one-third by 2000 and will decline further to about a quarter by 2025. Furthermore, the number of households with children in 2025 will be about 4 million more than in 2000, but more than 10 million single family homes have already been built. He speculates that the demand for large lot suburban housing on the fringes of metropolitan areas will decline and the some of the "McMansions" being built there today will be divided into apartments and become the slums of the future as urban living becomes more desirable. He says that suburbs with mixed use, walkable Town Centers will also remain desirable.