Life Imitates Hollywood: The Rise of “Movie-Set Urbanism”
14th February 2020
Something funny has happened since the rise of New Urbanism as an architecture and design movement in the 1980s and 1990s. The New Urbanists’ resurrection of traditional pre-WWII American built forms—the walkable neighborhood main street with shops along the sidewalk and apartments above; the narrow, shady residential streets; the foursquare home with a quaint front porch—proved popular with the public. People gravitate to traditional design, not only for nostalgic reasons but because it follows principles evolved to meet humans’ basic psychological needs.
What hasn’t proven so popular among developers is actually challenging the basic spatial logic of suburbia, in which different land uses are strictly separated and everyone drives everywhere, on wide stroads that connect one pod-like “development” to another. This logic is wired into our zoning codes through things like parking minimums and subdivision regulations.
And so, the look and superficial feel of New Urbanism is increasingly just co-opted by developers of run-of-the-mill suburbia to make consumers feel like they’re being sold something other than run-of-the-mill suburbia. Call it Movie Set Urbanism.
Sometimes the old ways are best.