Suburban Lifestyle Research Articles

Suburban camouflage in urban neighbourhoods: new building typologies and their impact on social life of residential streets

ABSTRACT Centre-city neighbourhoods is where residents expect a diversity of residents and an active social life, along with numerous amenities. This study investigates the relationship between the transforming morphology of Over-the-Rhine – a historic centre-city neighbourhood in Cincinnati, Ohio – and its urban social life. Detailed observations and morphological analyses of four new residential projects reveal that typologies that on the face appear urban, in fact promote a suburban lifestyle that prioritizes independence and seclusion and focus on private domestic life, in an urban context. We conclude with a set of strategies to increase the interaction between the private and the public realm.

Spatial imbalance in the digital era: how the digital economy affects urban sprawl in China

ABSTRACT Economic and social activities in the digital age have changed business forms and spatial relations, and identifying evolution of the urban form in the digital age is the key to sustainable urban governance. Based on data from prefecture-level cities in China from 2010 to 2021, this study explores the impact of the digital economy on urban sprawl and the path to its realization, thus providing policy implications for urban governance in the digital economy era. The empirical results show that the digital economy significantly promotes urban sprawl and that the urban sprawl effect caused by the digital economy has regional and scale heterogeneity. Western and medium-sized cities show greater sprawl trends under the influence of the digital economy. Digital economy development can significantly affect residents’ lifestyles and lead to urban sprawl, such as encouraging green, digital, and suburban lifestyles. In addition, the digital economy significantly affects the demand for urban land space, such as the industrial division of labour patterns, urbanization processes, and industrial virtual agglomeration, which are indirect factors leading to urban sprawl.

Suburbanization within the city? Exploring suburban lifestyles in the inner-city of Leipzig (Germany)

The long-prevailing image of a clear delimitation between core city and suburbs has been increasingly questioned in research. New qualitative approaches are necessary to describe the urban-suburban relationship based on a sociocultural heterogenization of suburbs and the spread of suburban lifestyles into inner cities. The concept of inner-city suburbanization is one approach to define spaces as urban or suburban regardless of geographical location. Drawing upon this concept, the present paper explores suburban lifestyles in the inner-city area of Leipzig and their role in the socio-spatial urban transformation. For this purpose, we identify and map owner-occupied middle-class family housing estates in central urban locations. Using qualitative individual and focus group interviews with the residents, complemented by site observation, we explore to what extent these single-family houses resemble traditional suburbs in terms of morphology and social structure in four different case studies. All of the cases show how suburban qualities, such as homeownership and socio-economical homogeneity, go hand in hand with the benefits of their urban locations. This hybrid character reflects the dissolution of the classical place-specific distinctions between urban and suburban environments and patterns. Simultaneously, dynamics of upgrading and social exclusion from housing unfold in the residential areas, where middle-class family housing estates emerge. Thus, we raise the question of the interrelation between inner-city suburbanization processes and gentrification trends in Leipzig.

ТРАНСФОРМАЦІЇ ГРОМАДСЬКИХ ПРОСТОРІВ СУБУРБІЇ НА ПРИКЛАДІ СЕЛИЩА КОЦЮБИНСЬКЕ

The purpose of the study is to evaluate the modern public spaces of the suburbs of Kyiv on the example of the village of Kotsiubynske, Buchanskyi district, Kyiv region, and to formulate practical recommendations for the development of community centers in the village. Methodology of work. The research involves the presence of theoretical and applied blocks. The first is aimed at defining the essence of the suburb as a modern dominant type of suburban spaces of large cities, researching the theory and methodology of transformations of suburban spaces, the formation of public centers, the evolution of their function, weight, etc. The application block provides a description of modern practices of the suburban lifestyle of residents on the example of the village of Kotsiubynske, an assessment of the results of a sociological survey regarding the prospects for the transformation of public spaces in the village. The research is based on general scientific methods, namely, analysis and synthesis, descriptive, analytical methods. Among the special methods, the method of comparative geographical analysis, cartographic, sociological (survey method) were used. Scientific novelty. The essence and content of the concept of public spaces are highlighted, their structural forms and types are defined, the general requirements for planning decisions of public centers are considered, the public centers of the village of Kotsiubynske, Buchanskyi district, Kyiv region are defined and characterized, and their transformations are revealed on the basis of the conducted monitoring studies of self-organization on the suburb level. Practical meaning. The research has a clearly delineated applied nature, since the results of the work form proposals for the transformation of each public space of the city from the standpoint of its importance for the residents of the village, comfort and accessibility.

Decarbonising suburbia: Homeowners’ perspectives on home retrofits and travel mode shift in Perth, Scotland

Abstract Suburban neighbourhoods pose challenges to decarbonisation, due to high car-dependency and relatively large and energy inefficient homes. Home ownership dominates suburbia, thus putting responsibility on households to adopt measures to decarbonise their domestic lives and transportation. This paper examines household perspectives on the feasibility of such measures. We ran a survey and focus groups in Perth (Scotland) during the energy crisis. Whilst we found high levels of concern about climate change, energy costs, and growing engagement with cleaner technologies (e.g. heat pumps), most residents felt decarbonisation options were limited. Barriers like technologies’ up-front costs, worsened with the cost of living crisis. Participants had low familiarity with sharing economy approaches like car clubs. Despite high (non-electric) bike ownership and prevalence of storage space (garages), cycling was more perceived as a leisure activity than a regular transport mode. There were shared views that the state should take a stronger role in coordinating and implementing systemic changes required for energy transition, including measures affecting residents directly, like reducing car traffic into the city centre. We conclude that despite the economic privilege of high home and car ownership in suburbia, few felt financially able to decarbonise and most seem locked into high-carbon suburban lifestyles.

Mood Albums

Mood Albums

For Modern Children

For Modern Children

Heterogeneous residential preferences among millennials and members of generation X in California: A latent-class approach

The millennial generation, the cohort born from 1981 to 1996, lives in large cities or denser parts of metropolitan areas more than preceding generations did at the same age. Studies have theorized that a combination of temporary economic hardship, long-term societal changes, and changing preferences and attitudes have been responsible for Millennials’ unique residential choices. This study examines a less-explored question about the presence and significance of heterogeneity in residential preferences across and within generations. In doing so, this study employs a latent-class choice model on a commuter subsample of Millennials and members of Generation X (n = 729) of the California Millennials Dataset, which collected a rich set of variables on various dimensions in Fall 2015. Using randomly-generated unlabeled choice sets at the US Census block group level, this study identifies three latent classes. The Younger, Pro-Urban Class (53% of our dataset; 66% of its millennial cases and 42% of its Gen Xers) behaves as the stereotypical Millennials in popular media, preferring urban amenities; the Affluent, Highly-Educated Class (32% of our dataset; 25% of its millennials and 38% of its Gen Xers) appears to pursue lifestyles and high socioeconomic status over homeownership or good school districts; and the Middle-Class Homeowner Class (15% of our dataset; 8% of its millennial cases and 21% of its Gen Xers) presents more traditional family-oriented suburban lifestyles. After the examination of shares of the three classes by age and neighborhood type, we provide suggestions for future research and effective planning responses.

Enduring Features of the North American Suburb: Built Form, Automobile Orientation, Suburban Culture and Political Mobilization

As any social phenomenon, the evolution of suburbs can be seen as at the confluence of two contradictory sets of forces. There are first forces of change, which propel suburbs in new directions. Much of the present literature on suburbs highlights suburban transitions in the form of social and economic diversification, and of new forms of development. The article attempts to rebalance the discourse on suburbs by emphasizing forces of durability. It does not deny the importance of observed suburban transitions, but argues that there is, at the heart of North American suburbs, an enduring automobility-induced transportation dynamic, which reverberates on most aspects of suburbs. The article explores the mechanisms undergirding suburban durability by linking the suburban transportation dynamic to the self-reproductive effects of a suburban lifestyle and culture and their political manifestations. These forces impede planning attempts to transform suburbs in ways that make them more environmentally sustainable. To empirically ground its argument, the article draws on two Toronto region case studies illustrating processes assuring the persistence of the durable features of North American suburbs: the layout of large suburban multifunctional centres and the themes raised by Rob Ford during his successful 2010 mayoralty electoral campaign.

Instalando la ciudad del consumo: el palimpsesto urbano del primer shopping mall chileno en el fundo San Luis, Santiago

Analogous to a historical palimpsest, urban and economic policies leave footprints in cities and build discourses about urban imaginaries. Built on the ex San Luis Estate between 1979 and 1982, Parque Arauco Shopping Center was promoted as an accomplished promise of the economic progress brought by a new government, and as a model for a suburban lifestyle inspired by mass consumption and motorization. Parque Arauco’s significance in urban history holds relation with the discursive articulation of its imaginaries about modernity, its polemic installation in ideologically polarized times, and its localization in a site that was loaded with previous projects. The installment process of Parque Arauco can be studied as a symbolic act, which proclaimed and materialized the ideological turn in a city that is now defined by consumption as a productive force of urban space.

Instalando la ciudad del consumo: el palimpsesto urbano del primer shopping mall chileno en el fundo San Luis, Santiago

Como un palimpsesto histórico, las políticas urbanas y económicas dejan huellas en la ciudad y construyen discursos sobre imaginarios urbanos. Construido en el que fue el fundo San Luis entre 1979 y 1982, Parque Arauco Shopping Center fue presentado por los medios y sus promotores como una promesa cumplida del progreso económico traído por un nuevo gobierno, y como un modelo de vida suburbano inspirado en ideales de consumo de masas y automobilización. La relevancia de Parque Arauco en la historia urbana tiene que ver con la articulación discursiva de sus imaginarios sobre modernidad, su polémica instalación en tiempos de polarizaciones ideológicas y con su localización en un predio cargado de proyectos anteriores. El proceso de instalación del primer mall chileno puede ser estudiado como un acto simbólico que proclamó y materializó el giro ideológico de una ciudad hoy marcada por el consumo como una fuerza productora del espacio urbano.

Closed Loop Temperature Control System Design Using Conventional and Advanced Intelligent Controller

Requirement of energy demand growing rapidly around the world due to modern suburban life styles and tendency for indoor comfort. These energy stipulation leads to design of intelligent control strategies to make the system energy efficient. Design an efficient room heater to make it energy proficient using intelligent control is an attractive research topic today. This article proposed a design of temperature controller with the purpose to sense the temperature of a room and maintain it to a fixed desired value. Conventional Proportional Integral (PI) controller as well as modern Artificial Neural Network (ANN) based PI controller have been used as the control strategies when a model of PI controller based on ANN with Levenberg-Marquardt learning algorithm has been introduced in this article. The simulation report of projected design has been shown and it has been concluded that the proposed control strategy is very advantageous due to its small overshoot, fast response, and high precision. All designs and simulations have been done in Simulink of Matllab platform.

Faktory volby dopravního prostředku – podstatný aspekt proměny současných měst

The aim of the paper is to answer questions related to the explanation of the travel mode choice used by people for regular commuting and what role in their decision making can be attributed to location of their residence, i.e. how the travel mode choice differs in case of traditional urban residents and suburban residents. The reason why to study everyday commuting is the fact that people currently living in western cities spend a lot of time and money commuting and the aggregate of everyday individual mobility generates a significant environmental impact. I study the travel mode choice from two perspectives: a) statistical and b) behavioural. Using the statistical analysis I explain the travel mode choice based on situational constraints and differences between social groups. The statistical analysis, however, is unable to explain how the situational constraints lead to different behaviour in different individuals and also the part of behaviour that cannot be explained using the constraints, thus I add a qualitative study. Summarizing both types of findings, I conclude that the everyday travel mode choice depends to a large extent on constraints that cannot be influenced by individuals: i) the amount of time and money available to the individual, ii) public transport services, civic facilities in the place of residence, and iii) required mobility for job related reasons. In the qualitative study I focus on what type of residence people prefer. Looking into preferred characteristics of people’s place of residence and actual travel behaviour I generate general classification of rationality related to the travel mode choice: 1) travel mode choice rationality based on constraints, 2) a consistent lifestyle including travel mode as well as nature of residence choice, and 3) the travel mode choice as an unreflected habit. According to the three types of rationality we can identify different factors of individual transport development: a) differences in the nature of individual travel modes and their attractiveness related to individual economic and professional constraints, b) real willingness of many people to live in residential locations with a lower accessibility and lower level of services, and c) a habit to drive a car automatically regardless of conditions as a natural part of habitus of economic middle and upper classes. Differentiation of these factors leads to different implications when considering possibilities of overturning the current increasing trend of car transport. Firstly, it is a question of price or other regulation changing attractiveness of the individual alternatives. Secondly, there are factors related to preference of suburban lifestyle including not only normative and cultural patterns but also significant differences in real estate prices in internal cities and suburban locations. In the last case of the habit to use a car regardless of available alternatives as a part of habitus of economic middle and upper classes the discussion about possible changes is the most demanding. However, this study shows that majority of people make their travel mode choices taking into account real possibilities and constraints and thus that it is possible to influence their behaviour through economic and other types of regulation.

Urban living preferences of youth international migrants: an investigation of Asian students in Australia

ABSTRACTThis study investigates changing housing and lifestyle preferences that occur when young people migrate from compact, high-density to low-density, car-oriented environments, through in-depth interviews of East and Southeast Asian university students in Brisbane, Australia. The findings reveal that the majority of international students adapt to their new living environment, and even come to prefer a low-density lifestyle and associated positive features (such as higher affordability, privacy, open space, and peacefulness). While this is positive in terms of their personal adjustment and outcomes, it raises concerns in terms of urban sustainability. It may indicate that given the opportunity most people find a suburban, car-oriented lifestyle desirable, and planning systems need to reconcile majority preferences with sustainability concerns. However, the study also reveals that a portion of the international students continue to prefer a high-density urban form. People in this group dislike the long commutes, spread out services, high transport costs, automobile dependence, quietness, and social isolation associated with a suburban lifestyle, and continue to seek urban forms that are similar to their previous environments in Asia. This demand lends hope to the prospect of further densification and revitalisation of Australian inner city districts.

British Romanticism: Criticism and Debates. Edited by Mark Canuel. London: Routledge, 2015. Pp. xxi+639.

<i>British Romanticism: Criticism and Debates</i>. Edited by Mark Canuel. London: Routledge, 2015. Pp. xxi+639.

Climate Crisis and the Cosmic Bomb: Is the American Dream an Expression of Cultural Trauma?

Abstract By combining key principles from the theories of cultural trauma and developmental trauma and applying them to the collective unconscious from an ecopsychological perspective, America's persistent dysfunctional paralysis in the face of the mounting existential threats and ongoing ecological losses attributable to human-caused climate change can be viewed as a “developmental cultural trauma disorder” rooted in our assertion of dominion over the creative/destructive forces of nature in 1945 and the concurrent use of that awesome power to create hell on Earth. The consumption-driven American Dream itself, with the artificial suburban lifestyle at its atrophied heart, is seen in this shadow-casting light as the product of collectively repressing our natural grief over our lost connection to the natural world, the world soul, and human nature itself. By becoming self-aware of where we are collectively and individually in this suppressed grieving process, and by engaging in some form of truth and recon...

Changes to Continuing Landscapes: Industrialisation of Australia’s Productive Rural Lands

Changes in scale and economies of Australia’s productive agricultural lands from small-scale family owned farms of mixed stock/crop production to large-scale agglomerations of vast monocultures especially grains and cotton will be examined. Rural heritage listing is concentrated on nineteenth century colonial rural homesteads, woolsheds and associated processing buildings and estates, mainly the built components of a designed landscape, or on forested lands in national parks and conservation reserves. Heritage landscapes associated with intensive production on small holdings specialising in vegetables, vineyards or orchards are under threat from subdivision for suburban expansion and rural lifestyle or hobby farms with associated development of utilities and access routes. The decline in sheep farming and its replacement in some regions by grain-growing agglomerations and the national spread of cattle raising has led to much abandonment of rural infrastructure. Agriculture has become more productive, but many cultural landscapes have not been identified as such for protection under local planning schemes. How much change should be permitted in small-scale ‘traditional’ rural landscapes and when do large-scale agri-business landscapes become significant?

Self-segregation of the vanguard: Judea and Samaria in the religious-Zionist society

The religious-Zionist settlement movement combines revolutionary national action with a conservative, religious way of life. On the one hand, the leaders of the religious-Zionist settlement movement see themselves as spearheading a national mission with pan-Jewish significance. On the other hand, living in the movement's communities entails a certain degree of segregation from general society. A religious-Zionist settlement is also a community-based tool for Orthodox self-defence against what is perceived by a fundamentally conservative society as different and threatening to its religious way of life and continuity. A selective religious enclave, such as the religious-Zionist settlement, which is not too distant from the centres of employment, commerce, services, and entertainment in central Israel, is also an efficient arrangement for moderating friction with secular society. In addition, Judea and Samaria provide environments for the development of a distinctive suburban lifestyle among the religious-Zionist core populations, enabling them to be part of the new Israeli middle class at a price that young couples and (usually large) religious families can afford.

Between the worlds: Shanghai’s young middle-class migrants imagining their city

Abstract In this paper, I use the case study of Hui, a young woman who lives in suburban Shanghai, to explore the migration experience of educated Chinese youth, who come to live, study or work in this city. A young middle class enjoys privileged access to China’s global urban modernity. They are also increasingly sharing space with the “global classes” of transnational privilege. However, the image of common urban space, in which the aesthetic distinction between global-elite lifestyles and local aspiration is increasingly blurred, does not necessarily translate into common access to this space and to its hierarchies of hospitality and opportunity. Middle-class migrants are aware of their status as outsiders, whose successful integration in the city hinges not only on strategies of emplacement but also on performing the exclusive cosmopolitan repertoire that Shanghai has built for itself. Despite promises of safe bourgeois arrival, they often remain “in-between”, with a sense of vulnerability in a competitive urban environment, and struggle with divided emotional and social attachments. In this paper I look at emerging suburban lifestyles in Shanghai, which are becoming part of the Chinese urban repertoire. Many young professionals are being squeezed out of the housing market in central locations. While some may choose to continue living with their parents to save money for home ownership, others buy apartments further out. Though replicating many of the bourgeois dreams that have informed “Western” suburbia, the urban form that is developing in China is also different and its middle-class imaginaries are less readily connected to the sensorial promises of the Chinese global city.

FOOD: Transforming the American Table, 1950–2000: National Museum of American History, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C.

From farmers� markets to the Food Network, from the emergence of Michael Pollan as a household name to the proliferation of food studies programs, publications, and standing-room-only conference sessions, popular and scholarly interest in food appears insatiable. It is fitting, then, that food is the subject of a new exhibition at the National Museum of American History in Washington, D.C. (fig. 1). FOOD: Transforming the American Table, 1950�2000 opened to the public in November 2012 and is scheduled to remain on display through 2015. The strengths of food as a subject for a historical museum are the same as those that have led to its popularity among scholars, writers, and the public. Food is elemental, one of the main ways we connect to the world around us. On our plates, the labors of those who till the soil become our sustenance. Eating is also a highly personal act, an expression of social and cultural values, ethnic traditions, regional differences, and national identity. By using food to tell the story of life in the United States since 1950, the exhibition�s curators draw connections among a number of historical topics: technological changes and environmental transformations, shifts in rural livelihoods and suburban lifestyles, the health and labor of producers and consumers, and profound social and cultural shifts whose effects continue to reverberate.