Suburbs are Part of the Solution?

Suburbs are part of the solution to the problems of the city, so says Councilman Ed Ford. Before I address that I have to give him a big thank you. Some of his comments on the City Council's Tomahawk Ridge debate last Thursday play like a direct rebuttal of my previous post. (To watch the debate follow this link to the video recording of last week's City Council meeting. In the left column click the link for ordinance number 091071 for the debate on Tomahawk ridge.) Not only has he helped me clarify my thinking about sprawl, his obvious emotion over this issue has made me less cynical about him. That said, I still disagree with the substance of his argument. In Councilman Ford's own words:

"The Northland is a way to help pay. It's the only suburban area other than in the fifth district east of Raytown that provides and helps pay for essential city services. Only if you live in Kansas City are you in effect part of the solution to the cost of urban living."

Councilman Ford referred to the annexation of large parts of our hinterland in the 50s and 60s as a "way to bring in suburban growth to help pay for the enormous cost of the city." I agree that this strategy has been helpful. That's what I was alluding to when I said, the size of yards has been proportional to the affluence of the average resident which has created a rough parity between tax revenue and supported infrastructure. I even agree that the affluent suburbs have been helping support the urban core.

What I disagree with is that we can keep using that strategy. Suburbs that once helped make this strategy work, the very suburbs built during the annexations of the 50s and 60s, are about to become part of the problem. We'll have a better idea what's happening to these neighborhoods when the results of the next census come out. But I don't need statistics to tell me that some first-ring suburban streets are going the way of the urban core.

Meanwhile, the neighborhoods that the suburbs of the 50s and 60s supported continue to deteriorate. Aside from the conditions of many of the houses, some urban neighborhoods have infrastructure problems that I suspect few suburbanites are aware of.

The image at left is one that should have been part of my previous post on this subject. It shows 430 feet of road at 25th and Woodland Avenue. It has the same number of houses as the street at NE 90th Terrace that I showed in my previous post. Yet it was designed to look like 33rd and Charlotte. If the suburbs are supporting the urban core, then it has to be in part because much of the urban core has densities similar to the newest suburbs but without suburban affluence. So what happens to our city budget when we start to tear down blighted houses in the first ring?

I've been accused of wanting to bring all the affluent folk back to the urban core and push out the poor. (Tony, you're the first person in nearly 40 years of life to call me a hipster. Thanks for the compliment.) I have no desire to harm the poor. If I knew precisely how to fix this, I would tell you. I'm confident that continuing the way we are is a dead end.