The Future of Suburbia

This is definitely an interesting contest.

I love the fact that so many of these ideas involve repurposing certain spaces for agriculture. We have a great deal of underutilized space in this country, and our current food systems are only viable under conditions of cheap and plentiful energy. Generally speaking, I think it's very important for planners to start thinking about food, which most of us have (inexplicably) ignored until the last few years.

I also like the Urban Sprawl Repair Kit. A book called Retrofitting Suburbia has some helpful design tips along these lines.

I should note that most of the ideas are good (build in underutilize parking lots, plant native plants in for stormwater management, use the energy from electric cars to power the grid at night, etcetera). None of the good ideas, however, are particularly novel; I've seen them all before. The truly radical ideas, while interesting exercises, are completely unworkable.

I've done extreme, impractical exercises for group projects in grad school. It can be a good learning experience. But most of the "best practices" in our field are not particularly...fanciful. We need good, simple, sustainable, high-quality built environments more than extreme ideas which showcase the brilliance of their designers.