Real Estate Crisis and A little American Studies

This blog was started up to share bits of news concerning suburban America and American Studies more broadly. It eventually became a place to trace the oncoming real estate crisis that is still buffetting America.

Did it achieve its goal? To some extent, yes. The content presented on the blog never really crossed the digital line and became fully integrated into the classroom experience. However, the blog has acquired a quite substantial readership (thanks!).

Quite a lot has changed for author of this blog. In the spring, I commuted from Williamsburg to Fredericksburg to teach a couple classes (insane, I wouldn’t recommend it). This summer my wife and I relocated from Virginia to Columbus, Ohio where my wife is on the faculty at Otterbein College. We went from the suburban sprawl of Williamsburg/James City County to sprawling Franklin County. Fortunately, we were able to find a place in a small town, unfortunately that small town has been swallowed by suburbia. It is a short walk to the school and the local business district. The rest of Westerville is far more car-dependent and nearby Polaris is the epitome of sprawling craziness. I haven’t found much in the way of gated communities . . . yet.

Obviously, the real estate crisis hasn’t come close to abating. My guess is that things won’t get appreciably better until 2010 or so and probably some markets will never recover.

Why did it happen? This was the endpoint of the long national rejection of urban life in favor of a suburban dream. It was connected to widespread hubris among all levels of society connected to the real estate market. It was of a kind with the dot-com bubble. People started with long-held notions about investment and home ownership and then used that to undergird a far more risky regime of unrealistic real estate development. I wish I could say people will flock back to the cities, but I think that most cities have become permantently multi-nodal. I think a more likely development is that we will see a shift toward greater urban-style living near each major commercial and industrial node, while places far from any node and with entirely car-dependent transit will wither over the long term. Transit will likely be the next big investment the nation makes, because it can be electrified far more easily than the car fleet - nuclear, solar, wind, water are all ways of producing electricity not filling the tanks of an automobile. I don’t think battery technology will ever make the electric car a realistic option especially since the environmental costs of car battery production is exceptionally high with the heavy metals that are needed.

I don’t think the future will see such a clear dichotomy between urban and suburban living and culture. I’m not sure what is coming next, but a new synthesis is probably in the making. Race has always been a core part of the suburban ideal, mostly for ill. How that develops over the next few years will have a major effect on how these ideas come together (or don’t).

Why the long post? Well I have a little dissertation to get finished. This has been a great outlet but it has also been an excuse for me to procrastinate. I may drop a link every now and then, but mostly I’m going to let others follow this more closely. You can still find me at Cincy’s Philly Historian and at UrbanOhio. Keep an eye out for groundbreaking work looking at how Philadelphia’s Jews experienced the urban crisis of the 60s and 70s.

Back to the cities!!!

Trackback URI | Comments RSS