Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
observers claiming it to be a shallow development of style, inauthentic, cookie-
cutter architecture, or excessively cute (Grant
2006
; Till
1993
). Others point to the
artificial character of the buildings, which often include fake dormers, windows,
water towers, bell towers, and so forth, that create a type of make-believe quality,
what Frantz and Collins (
1999
) called an 'exercise in studied nostalgia' in Celebra-
tion, U.S.A., a NU style community developed by Disney.
2.7.4
Privatopia and Social Cleavage
The public realm emphasis is a cornerstone of NU design principles. Advocates of
NU see contemporary suburban developments as being dominated by private space.
They regret the demise of the older view of the importance of creating a public
realm in communities, and see great value in its return. Developments designed to
act as a public spaces appear as the centre-pieces of the planning and design of most
NU communities, so public squares, benches, pedestrian paths, civic centres, parks,
gazebos, bandstands, and so on abound. As Frantz and Collins (
1999
) demonstrate
in the development of Celebration U.S.A., these public spaces are seen as integral
to the lifestyle of new urban community residents. However, while these are touted
as public space, they are often far from it. Many NU developments are private com-
munity developments, where all homeowners must belong to homeowner associa-
tions, and are bound to comply with numerous restrictive covenants that may cover
everything from the colour of houses, to curtain styles, to exterior adornments and
uniformity of appearance, and even to behavioural controls within the supposed
public realm (Frantz and Collins
1999
; Bartling
2004
). These communities are simi-
lar to many other kinds of developments that fall within the more general rubric of
'common interest developments' (CIDs), which include the rapid proliferation of
gated communities since the 1980s. They represent a form of 'privatopia' (McKen-
zie
1994
), in which the so-called public space is really a commodified form of 'club
good' (Webster
2002
). The privatization of urban space in American cities in partic-
ular is gaining momentum and in these areas it is not uncommon for access to these
communities to be controlled. So the nominally 'public' areas are actually restricted
to residents and guests, creating an insider-outside dichotomy that underlies their
conceptualization of public space. Hence it has been argued that this generates what
amounts to a 'geography of otherness', one that enhances, rather than diminishes
the social distance between groups. In extreme cases, such as the town of Celebra-
tion, residents must also submit to high levels of security and surveillance, such as
via closed circuit cameras, and even behavioural controls and sanctions in their use
of the area (Frantz and Collins
1999
; Bartling
2004
). Hence some critics see these
essentially private communities as providing only a fake sense of the public realm,
one integrally linked to lifestyles of stylish materialism, even though they claim to
emphasize public space (Knox
1992
; Till
1993
).
This privatization is also at odds with other NU principles, since NU has criticized
the contemporary suburb as being socially homogeneous, segregated according
