Suburban Sprawl in Houston, TXEvery now and again I’m struck by a cultures ability to rid itself of hundreds of years of organic knowledge. Western society seems particularly inclined to career forward in the pursuit of the new, the now. But, as the promise of the new comes up short, people come up for air, look around and realize that the past has much to offer for guidance going forward.

A rendering of the future of Portsmouth, NHNew Urbanism is a concept borne on the shoulders of hundreds of years of human habitat creation. At a particular point in the post WWII United States, the tried and true concepts of community living, walkable streets and easy affordable public transportation were cast aside in service of a new American dream: My piece of the American Pie topped with a house, a lawn a car and wide fast highways linking me in the ‘country’ to my work in the city. Fueled by cheap oil and cheerlead by the automotive sector, this version of the American Dream has persisted for better than 50 years. But as oil approaches $5.00 a gallon, commute times on the highway continue to climb as gridlock spreads, and people search for a community they know should exist but for some reason doesn’t in the leafy suburbs, the hunger for a different kind of life grows.

Enter the New Urbanists: People who are trying to build a better way forward have looked back and found that the cities of Europe and the early Americas continue to be culturally relevant and serve their residents on a community and commercial level in a way that the American Suburb could only dream of. In a certain sense, there is nothing new about New Urbanism. It’s really just urbanism (small u) planned and executed by developers instead of springing up organically as a response to the needs of the community. Community’s need connection and interaction to be cohesive. Getting people out of their cars and onto sidewalks and into gathering places mixed into the world where people live and work helps create the interactions that bond a community on multiple levels. South Main is Buena Vista’s most advanced New Urbanist project and is growing into the mix of houses small and large, commercial spaces, galleries, restaurants and communal amenities that towns of old used to create on their own.

I took a walk down South Main last night to see the beginnings of a few friends homes and was truly struck by the diversity of buildings and usage, all wrapped up in one place. The project is still in it’s infancy but a stroll down through even now really gives a sense of what the place will be in the near future: a place to walk, talk and bump into your friends and neighbors on the porch, in the cafe and on the river walk trail.

ChannelBV’s last Ted Talk night included the following video from one of New Urbanism’s most outspoken advocates. His style is aggressive and he can come off as a crass individual. But James Howard Kunstler’s points cannot be ignored. If you watch the video, know that he is not insulting the choices that you or I have made. He’s merely pointing out certain ideas in our suburban culture that are, upon sober reflection, ludicrous, unsustainable and unhelpful for the growth of the American community (or any community that might try to emulate our ideas). I found him to be wildly entertaining. Similar ideas to his are available from ‘The Newshour with Jim Lehrer’ @ PBS in a much more academic form (but I think you’ll find Kunstler much more entertaining).

I enjoy thinking about the ideas that New Urbanism is trying to foster and appreciate that we have such a great example of the concept here in Buena Vista, Colorado.

(PG-13 language warning)

(Disclosure: South Main is a sponsor of ChannelBV.net)

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