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    Sprawl
    Quick Facts About Urban Sprawl
    Our Goal: To improve the livability of Florence through public education and community involvement.
     
    Quick Facts About Urban Sprawl
    (Source: Environmental Media Services - www.ems.org)
  • Sprawl is usually defined as scattered, poorly planned development, such as large-lot subdivisions spreading across rural areas and commercial strips along roadways. It provides little open space and poor accessibility between residences and other destinations.

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  • When development is spread out at low densities, the cost of public services to accommodate it increases - with more roads, sewers, garbage trucks and water lines needed to serve a spread-out population. Sprawl can also require more police cruisers, fire departments and schools  to cover a farther flung population base. The tax base from residential housing rarely pays for the services it costs municipalities. For more information, read the Sierra Club report, "Sprawl Costs Us All."

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  • Sprawl contributes to the decline of cities, since people moving out means lower population bases  for urban areas. It also concentrates poverty in urban areas; the poverty rate in cities rose 50 percent from 1970 to 1993 - from 14.2 percent to 21.5 percent, according to the Sierra Club.

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  • The vehicle population has grown six times faster than the human population in the U.S. since 1969. There are now the same number of vehicles as there are drivers - 176 million.

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  • Between 1970 and 1990, vehicle miles traveled increased 98 percent, while the population grew just 23 percent, according to the Federal Highway Administration.

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  • The average family in America spends one-sixth of its budget on transportation - more than food, clothing or healthcare, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

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  • Research by Professor Rolf Pendall of Cornell University -- unveiled in 2001 by the Sierra Club -- analyzed suburban sprawl over the course of the 1980s in 282 metropolitan areas and found that population growth explains only 31 percent of urban sprawl. Poor planning and government subsidies are other contributing factors.

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  • The Trust for Public Land found in a June 1998 study that land conservation improves the quality of life in a community and also gives a boost to its bottom line. The Economic Benefits of Parks and Open Space says that investment in land conservation has added up to billions of dollars for communities across the country.

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  • The source of the following is Once There Were Greenfields: How Urban Sprawl is Undermining America's Environment, Economy, and Social Fabric, a book by the Natural Resources Defense Council and the Surface Transportation Policy Project:

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  • Census Bureau figures show that in 1920, the average density of urbanized areas (which includes cities, suburbs, and towns) was 6,160 persons per square mile. In 1990, the number had diminished to 2,589.

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  • Between 1960 and 1990, the amount of developed land in metro areas more than doubled, while the population grew by less than half.

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  • In most metropolitan areas, developed land has grown far faster than the population. Between 1970 and 1990, greater Cleveland lost 11 percent of its population, yet developed land grew by 33 percent; greater Chicago gained 4 percent in population but 46 percent in residential land; Los Angeles' population grew by 45 percent while its developed land increased by 300 percent.

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  • Cities, especially those in the South and West, have been growing at astronomical rates. Phoenix, for example, is reported to be developing land at a rate of 1.2 acres per hour.

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  • Suburban population has grown 10 times faster than central-city population in the largest metro areas. |

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  • As of 1990, 60 percent of the population in U.S. metropolitan areas lived in suburbs.

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  • Retailing has changed to favor large stores located in suburban areas. In 1994, more than 80 percent of all new stores built in the United States were "big box" superstores.

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  • Between 1982 and 1992, the United States lost an average of 400,000 acres of farmland to development every year. This translates into 45.7 acres per hour every day.

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  • Between 1990 and 1995, property taxes increased by 43 percent in the 10 fastest-growing towns and by only 27 percent in the 10 slowest-growing towns.

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  • Open space and farmland provide a fiscal surplus for local governments (every $1 in revenue requires $0.31 in services), whereas residential developments provide a fiscal loss (every $1 in revenue requires $1.11 in services).

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    Florence, Oregon 97439
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