Dead Space—Third of Three Parts

In the 1950s, at the start of the large-scale migration to the suburbs, few thought of problems like the environment and water runoff. Now they have become crucial, both for the present and for the future. How should we plan and build for the future? And how can we reclaim the acres of dead space that surround us?

Planning for the future is easier to envision. We have to change, and in at least these specific ways:

• We need to end the practice of building single stores or malls in the center of large surface parking lots. The era of the standalone shopping mall or big box store is coming to an end, whether we like it or not. In a world with limited space and resources, acres of surface parking—one of the characteristics of standalone shopping—will no longer be possible. Nor will they be desirable.
• We need to connect shopping, work, and living space. Stores and work within walking distance or an easy transit ride of where people live were once the norm. Suburban-style shopping is a historical aberration, brought on by zoning codes that separate living from shopping and working, and by our reliance on cheap fossil fuels. Fossil fuels are no longer cheap, either for consumers or for the environment. And the drive from home to school to store to work to mall and back and around has become increasingly burdensome as traffic has increased. The old-style zoning codes have failed. They need to change so that we can once again walk to work and to the shops.
  
• We need to revise building codes to require new homes, stores, and offices to be as sustainable as possible. In the long run, green buildings are cheaper to operate than traditional ones, and they are often more pleasant places to live and work.
• Planners and the community—not developers alone—must take responsibility for what happens to a neighborhood in the long term. If a mall or housing tract project fails now, responsibility for converting the land to new uses rests with those who own the land. Failure to reuse the land, however, has consequences for the whole community. Ownership of land may be private, but the fate of the land is a legitimate public concern that planners and the community (which should be part of the planning process) must consider when approving development projects.
• We need to start building in ways that deliberately allow for the needs of wildlife, and that allow more wild species to continue on the land. Preserving wild (or nearly wild) space is vital both for the environment and for the spirit. (Thanks to Marshall Massey for his suggestion in a comment.)
  

Following these four principles will not end problems with land use, but taken together they provide a more creative approach than the kind of development we now see in our suburbs.

As to the future of our current dead spaces, green rehabilitations like the Forensic Science Center in Philadelphia give some guidance. Sadly, many shopping malls and big box stores are not very good buildings and may not be salvageable. Nearly all of them, however, are located on tracts of land that would provide good mixed-use development. The shopping mall and the big box store provide an abundance of products; mixed-use development can provide an abundance of life. In the long run, we must move away from the mall and the big box and back toward communities and real neighborhoods.