PLAN103 Chapter Notes - Chapter 6: Price Signal, Market Failure, Old Age
21 Dec 2016
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Document Summary
Sprawl is an undesirable and costly urban form. Economists have not focused much on the issue of sprawl. Planning approach frames the problem incorrectly and misidentifies causes and solutions. Economists see urban growth as a market process. The spatial expansion of cities occurs when urban uses pay more for land than do agricultural uses. The reason that urban uses outbid agriculture is that they are the more productive, and the market is simply doing its job of ensuring that resources are put to their most productive uses, guaranteeing efficient allocation (cid:523)(cid:498)(ighest-and-best-use(cid:499)(cid:524). Economists often attribute the spatial growth of cities to three underlying forces: Falling commuting costs (cid:498)flight-from-blight(cid:499) (cid:498)white flight(cid:499) (cid:523)pg. (cid:859)(cid:858)(cid:524) It is possible to have suburbanization and decentralization without sprawl. Sprawl and suburbanization are not always the same or linked. Market failure and distortion can be seen as the key explanations for sprawl. Failure to account for the social value of open space.
