I know music isn’t a common topic for our blog, but occasionally worlds collide and we get a look at public policy through the lens of pop culture. Two things caught my ear recently—one a rallying cry to get the next generation on board with electric vehicles, and the other a love/hate tribute to sustainability’s arch-nemesis: sprawl.
First off, as Grist notes, They Might Be Giants have a new song and video out called “Electric Car.” Ashley Braun rightly notes, “as a general…rule, songs about environmental issues are cringeworthy.” Now, I’m not going to say this song didn’t get under my skin a little. But as far as kids’ songs go, it’s not half bad. And the music video is actually pretty cool. Check out the video below the fold:
Next up, Arcade Fire’s new album, The Suburbs. What first got me was their new music video. Utilizing Google Street View, you plug in the address of the house you grew up in, and shots of that neighborhood are integrated into the video. While it’s not perfect, it’s a very cool notion.
But that’s just the start.
The whole album struck a chord because it’s a product of people—like me—who were raised in the 80s suburbs. While it scorns sprawl (I love the lines: First they built the road, then they built the town/That’s why we’re still driving round and round), it admits a certain nostalgia for the houses we grew up in and the streets where we played. It really zeroes in on the love/hate relationship I have with the ‘burbs.
The album paints a picture of crumbling suburbs—with endless sprawl and dead shopping malls—contrasted by the bright and loud city. It’s not really a condemnation of either, but more of a melancholy tribute to the stomping grounds of a whole generation—if not an anthem to a lost vision of the American dream where everyone has a back yard and a gang of kids to play with in the cul-de-sac.
Putting wistfulness for lost childhoods aside, The Suburbs—and Roger’s recent post on the decline of McMansions—raises a question for me. Maybe I’m being overly optimistic here, but as we move toward more compact, accessible communities (complete with electric cars, of course), what will become of the physical remnants of sprawl?
Matt the Engineer
Just a guess: Assuming peak oil hits us hard, I see the suburbs first becoming a huge drag on personal economies. People have to buy expensive electric cars, or bike long distances to the city. Roads become more expensive without cheap tar for repairs, and turn back to gravel roads everywhere but on freeways and in the city. Eventually as cities are built up to accomodate more families suburbs become the new slums, generally being filled with the retired poor and those on welfare (since they don’t need to travel to work everyday). As our economy recovers we either bulldoze these areas to rebuild farms, or build electric rail and build them back up (though more dense, now that walking has become an important mode of transportation again).
MicheLynne
Maybe we’ll end up going to the suburbs for peaceful weekend retreats, to get away from the “bright and loud city” where we all live, work, and play during the busy week. And maybe we can tend to our “suburban gardens” on the weekends, and share with our urban neighbors back in the city the organic food we grow in those ‘burb gardens.Just a bourgeoning thought. 🙂
Rich Jackman
Michael Lynne’s comment makes me think of the “kolonihaver”—allotment gardens—of Denmark. These are small lots where city people can garden and build little cottages for close-to-the city retreats. Imagine the suburbs miniaturized and you get the idea. In Copenhagen they are easily reachable by train or bike, and many are between the ring of the city and the suburbs because they were built long before the suburbs were.
Nicole Bernard
One of the most striking things about my recent trip through upstate New York was the decay of entire neighborhoods, dozens of cabins and huge resorts in the Catskills that were closed down but never demolished. I saw crumbling houses, some of which had been patched and re-patched since the early 18th c. and are still being lived in. One doesn’t have to go all the way to the East Coast to see a decaying farm house, but it also made me wonder how are we planning for decay in sustainability here in the PNW? Are we making our infrastructure simple enough that it can be replaced and improved for many years to come? Are we learning lessons from our own country’s oldest towns and cities? If we don’t hold on to suburban infrastructure, can we use those houses for “parts houses” or roads for “parts roads”? I don’t have the answers, but I don’t think they’re to be found in ending decay. That doesn’t sound sustainable to me. How do we plan for it?
MicheLynne
Regarding decaying sprawl sites, Grist shares a hopeful entrepreneurial answer:“They’re the bane of urban and suburban areas alike: the vacant, boarded-up K-Marts and Home Depot Expos, squatting like concrete cowpies amidst a landscape of weedy parking lots. But where most people see blight and a waste of space, San Francisco Bay Area entrepreneur Gene Fredericks sees opportunity: to grow food. Lots of food.”