Although the full picture is necessarily complex and many commentators are pointing to signs of re-centralization, population and employment in the 3132 counties of the U.S. continues to decentralize. This is based on an analysis of annual data from the Regional Economic Information System...

This is the first time in U.S. history that an urban planning problem has featured, if peripherally, as a Presidential campaign issue. Never before have academic urban planners been in so much demand for T.V. news programs, radio talk shows, and newspaper op-ed pieces. Why? Because of a raging...

Sprawl issues ought not be a federal issue because land-use control is local. Americans have been moving to both suburban and private communities for many years, an expression of the constitutional right to travel. They seek more direct control over their personal property rights. Both trends...

Smart Growth advocates in the U.S. and elsewhere worry about urban sprawl andtypically advocate new controls on urban growth, including tougher land use planningand regulation. Yet, is auto-oriented development the market's way of meeting widelyheld lifestyle preferences? Or, is it (as some...

Nathaniel Baum-Snow has investigated the impact of the introduction of the interstate highway system in the U.S. on the decline of central city populations. He finds that it is has had a significant effect on central city population decline and increased suburbanization. He suggests that had the...