Back in December,
The Atlantic Cities ran
an article discussing the effects suburban settlement patterns has on climate change. The article, entitled
The Missing Link of Climate Change: Single-Family Suburban Homes, discusses how smarter land use planning can drastically cut greenhouse gas emissions. Suburban developments are often built away from industrial and commercial centers, which creates the need to travel longer distances (compared to more mixed use or urban settlement patterns) for everything from commuting to work to buying groceries. As you can see in the chart above, energy use is much greater in suburban single family homes mainly due to transportation needs. The overarching message of the article may best be summarized by this excerpt:
...what if we could also simply reduce the miles
people drive by in a sense pushing their many destinations closer
together?
