In recent years a new planning movement has emerged popularly known as New Urbanism. This movement has come about in response to typical subdivision design and implementation of single-use Euclidian zoning practices that have been associated with sprawling subdivisions and communities zoned for single uses, and which result in little diversity of income, neighborhoods devoid of any unique character that create a sense of placelessness, increased social isolation and dependence on the automobile, and increased consumption of land and other resources. New Urbanism seeks to mitigate these and other problems through the manipulation of the built environment. Among other solutions, typical New Urbanist communities incorporate mixed use centers, emphasize design of streets and public space as well as parks and open space, provide a variety of housing types, and focus on transit-oriented development. However, as is often the case with "new" or different ways of doing things, implementing New Urbanism can be difficult. As such, the purpose of this study is to identify the barriers to successful implementation of key design characteristics of New Urbanist communities. Also of interest as the research developed were the reasons for the success of some communities in being able to implement important design features of New Urbanism. To do this, a typology of spaces associated with New Urbanism and supported by the literature was established. Two communities in Utah's Salt Lake Valley were then structurally evaluated against this typology. Daybreak and Overlake were the two communities selected, both of which were constructed according to New Urbanist principles. This evaluation informed questions used during interviews with key informants from each community. During these interviews key informants provided information on the original vision of each community, discussed differences between that vision and its implementation, identified barriers to implementing the original vision, and also discussed the gaps identified during the structural assessment.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:UTAHS/oai:digitalcommons.usu.edu:etd-2277 |
| Date | 01 May 2011 |
| Creators | French, Sherri Marie |
| Publisher | DigitalCommons@USU |
| Source Sets | Utah State University |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | text |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Source | All Graduate Theses and Dissertations |
| Rights | Copyright for this work is held by the author. Transmission or reproduction of materials protected by copyright beyond that allowed by fair use requires the written permission of the copyright owners. Works not in the public domain cannot be commercially exploited without permission of the copyright owner. Responsibility for any use rests exclusively with the user. For more information contact Andrew Wesolek (andrew.wesolek@usu.edu). |
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