[SustainableTompkins] Suburbs - the next slums?

[George Frantz]

  A timely article on the decline of the suburbs and return to the cities in the Atlantic Monthly:
   
  http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/200803/subprime
   
  The trends discussed by Christopher Leinberger in the following article from The Atlantic Monthly have been apparent in the older suburban areas of many American cities for the past two decades.  In some Rust Belt cities entire blocks of the suburban fringe are disappearing under weeds and brush as the houses are abandoned deteriorate and either burn, collapse or are simply demolished as public safety hazards.
   
  Christopher B. Leinberger is a visiting fellow at the Brookings Institution, a professor of urban planning at the University of Michigan, and a real-estate developer. His most recent book, The Option of Urbanism, was published by Island Press in November.
   
  Of course the cities experiencing a renaissance as a result of the re-awakening amongst Americans of the benefits of urban life and environmental paybacks also have the progressive zoning regulations necessary to permit the renaissance, something sorely lacking throughout Ithaca and Tompkins County.
   
  George