THE SPRAWL PROBLEM
Myths, Solutions, and Action

Paradise Lost

Many of us remember sitting on our back porch on a nice summer day, gazing into a picture-perfect view of rolling farmlands and fields. But today, for many of us that picture is dramatically different. Farms and fields are gone, replaced by look-a-like suburban tract houses, skyscrapers, sewage plants and highways to accommodate our nation's burgeoning population-- now growing by nearly 3 million per year.

It is impossible to ignore the sprawl that is consuming the United States. Rarely do you find a corner of the country that is untouched by the effects of sprawl, and our citizens are increasingly rootless in this maze of plasticized suburbia. The environmental consequences of such fast-paced development are staggering, with no end in sight....

Paving Over America

Since 1950, the U.S. population has soared from 150 million to more than 275 million in 2000. This has been accompanied by an unprecedented wave of development. Every year in the United States, we pave over or otherwise convert to human uses an area equal to the state of Delaware, including approximately 400,000 acres of irreplaceable arable land which is lost to make way for more people. In the process, our parks, forests and wetlands are being destroyed. Plant and animal habitat, pasture, and farmland are replaced by houses, strip-malls, and highways.

Growing numbers of people inevitably place increasing demands on our natural and social environment. For example, the approximately three million new people added to the U.S. population every year require the construction of about 1.3 million new housing units annually. Each new house requires the addition of approximately $33,000 of infrastructure, for which established residents are taxed. Increased pollution, resource depletion, crowding and traffic congestion are just some of the further damaging effects that population growth and sprawl have on the physical and cultural environment of the U.S. Our carrying capacity* is being depleted at an alarming rate due to population growth, and this is further accelerated by sprawl.

Treat the Cause, Not Merely the Symptoms

Most people agree that we must address the negative impacts of sprawl, yet few proposed solutions address the primary cause: population growth. Catch phrases such as "Smart Growth," "Growth Management," "Green Belts," and "Land-Use Planning" have become popular ostensible "solutions" to the sprawl problem for both pro-growth proponents and some pro-growth-limits environmentalists. In fact, while these approaches may temporarily mitigate sprawl, in the long-run they will not end sprawl and may even facilitate further uncontrolled growth. Eventually, if our population continues to grow, these newly created "infills" and developments will fill up and spill out. Growth advocates also assume that unabated population growth is beneficial to society, yet they ignore the social, economic and environmental consequences that result.

High-density development is not and cannot be a long-term solution to the difficult problems which accompany population growth and development. More people inevitably increase the demands on our carrying capacity, whether they are packed into high-density areas or not. This fact is illustrated by "ecological footprint" analysis, showing that a city such as Vancouver, B.C. actually uses the resources and waste disposal sink of an area many times greater than its size. Thus, with very limited benefits to the environment, high-density building could reduce us to a society of crowded urban tower-dwellers, like rabbits packed in a high-rise warren.

A fundamental rule of nature is that to solve a problem, one must first identify and then treat the cause. The only way to solve sprawl in the long-run is to address overpopulation. In the following pages, various myths of popular approaches designed to eliminate the sprawl problem are explained and, finally, a description of the only effective, lasting solution – population stabilization.

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* Carrying capacity refers to the number of individuals who can be supported without degrading the natural, cultural and social environment, i.e., within resource limits and without reducing the ability of the environment to sustain the desired quality of life over the long term.

MYTHS

BALANCE’s SOLUTION -- POPULATION STABILIZATION

Overpopulation is the fundamental cause of the urban sprawl occurring across the United States, and it is the ultimate threat to our country's environment. To preserve our quality of life and safeguard our carrying capacity we must focus our efforts on stabilizing U.S. population as soon as possible. To stop sprawl, we must stop its main, underlying driving force - population growth.

If current trends persist, U.S. population will skyrocket to 500 million by 2050, with 70% of that growth due to mass immigration (and this percentage is increasing). With a population of 275 million and growing by three million a year, we can ill-afford any delays in implementing an effective national population policy. Our nation faces numerous cultural and environmental problems, and stabilizing our population is the only rational, achievable, long-term solution to all of them.

A national policy of population stabilization will allow us to do the following:

We must act now to maintain our current replacement-level fertility rate of 2.1(which we have maintained since 1974) and to achieve a replacement-level immigration ceiling by dramatically reducing legal immigration from its current level of over one million per year. Both of these are logically necessary to stabilize our population. The most effective way to do this is to enact a 5-year moratorium on all immigration in excess of 100,000 immigrants (including refugees and asylees) per year. After the 5 years, immigration rates could be increased to a ceiling of a replacement-level 200,000 per year or less. These are the highest numbers that will result in population stabilization. The long-term carrying capacity of the U.S. can support only so many people, and evidence suggests that we have already exceeded that number.

TAKE ACTION AGAINST SPRAWL:

• Spread the word! Contact civic organizations, newspapers, other activists, etc. that are concerned with sprawl and make sure that they address population growth as the main cause. Let them know how sprawl is destroying our environment, depleting our carrying capacity, and reducing the quality of life for all Americans. Urge them to support the only viable, long-term solution to sprawl – Population Stabilization – achieved through replacement-level fertility and replacement-level immigration (200,000 or less per year). Call BALANCE at (202) 955-5700 to let us know of your efforts to mobilize support for this most pressing issue.
• Call, write, email, or fax your Representatives and urge them to cosponsor The Mass Immigration Reduction Act (HR 41) sponsored by Representative Bob Stump (R-AZ) with amendments to include an all-inclusive, firm cap of 100,000 immigrants per year.
• DONATE TO FIGHT SPRAWL! Your contribution will allow us to further our sprawl awareness initiative to pressure organizations, local governments and Congress to address population growth as the main cause of sprawl (see enclosed insert). Our lawmakers must realize that the only way to end sprawl and protect our quality of life is through the cessation of population growth.
• Support BALANCE’s Moratorium Now! campaign. Your donation is essential to the success of our campaign. In order to generate more grassroots support for an immigration moratorium, it is necessary that we continue to produce educational materials and provide activists like you with the tools necessary to work on a solution, together. With your help, we will be able to intensify our efforts to achieve population stabilization.

Contact Congress Today

MYTH: Sprawl is primarily a result of high consumption and/or poor land-use planning patterns.

The U.S. has the highest per capita consumption rate of the industrialized world and we should reduce land-consumptive building techniques which create sprawl. However, to classify consumption as the main cause of sprawl, or to suggest that we only have to reduce consumption through high-density or better planned construction to solve the sprawl problem, is inaccurate and misleading.

With our population continually increasing, it is impossible to greatly reduce consumption (or emissions) without reducing the standard of living. In fact, adding more people will likely increase total consumption while degrading families’ standard of living and quality of life.

Regardless if you live in a two-acre farm home or a high-rise apartment building, you contribute to the burden on carrying capacity. And even if the politically difficult task of voluntarily decreasing per capita consumption could be accomplished, it would only buy time to allow an increasing population to reach its limits.

Effective land-use planning is a necessary, but not sufficient, condition for solving the problem of sprawl. Protecting our national parks, forests, and wetlands is an attainable goal, but this cannot be accomplished with land-use planning alone. The key to determining the optimal population size of a particular region is carrying capacity, not land area. It is essential that local governments develop a long-term strategy to deal with sprawl, and land-use issues should be incorporated into their plan. However, since respected ecologists suggest that the United States has surpassed its long-term carrying capacity limits already, any proposed solution to sprawl must first be based on halting U.S. population growth. Concentrated efforts of conserving our natural resources and protecting our environment are futile if we allow our population to grow. For example, between 1973 and 1990, in response to the oil embargo and sharp fuel price increases, Americans reduced their per capita energy consumption by about 1% per year, but total energy demand still increased by 25% as a result of a rising population. Energy experts estimate that 93% of the increase in energy consumption was driven by population growth. We will have worsening energy and other problems if our population continues to grow at current rates.

If decreasing per capita consumption itself solved sprawl, one should expect that the current energy crisis would have yielded less sprawl, fewer cars, no new road construction and no new development. But our nation's many newcomers need shelter, food and clothing, and the infrastructure that provides them, and thus contribute to increasing sprawl.

When immigrants (responsible for 70% of U.S. population growth) come to the U.S., it is often for the express purpose of adopting the American standard of high resource consumption. There is an immediate need to reduce total consumption levels in the U.S. and the most effective, long-lasting way to do this is to stabilize our population.

Myths  Solutions  Action

MYTH: All population growth is beneficial to society.

While the profits of growth are received by a select few, the costs of growth are borne by the whole society.

Another great myth touted by unlimited growth proponents is that population growth is always beneficial. Developers and related businesses do, in fact, benefit from population growth, as do employers who profit from holding down wages. However, the "costs" of growth are borne by the whole society and by the natural world. Advocates for unlimited growth will push until there is no place left to build and/or until water, energy and other resource limits are reached.

New development triggers higher economic, social, and environmental costs for the U.S. The Carrying Capacity Network Report, "Beyond Sprawl: The Cost of Population Growth to Local Communities" shows that existing residents of a community pay on (national) average $15,378 for each resident added to their community. Besides the ensuing traffic congestion, pollution, and overcrowding associated with population growth, the demands for more government services, paid for with tax dollars, put an additional financial strain on our taxpaying citizens.

For example, in California recent energy shortages have resulted in skyrocketing electric bills. Spiraling electric rates – where demand far exceeds supply – have forced some companies to lay off thousands of workers to absorb the added cost. Others have closed down altogether as the cost of doing business consumes all profit. Drastic measures such as "rolling blackouts," where citizens are involuntarily cut off from electricity for a period of time, have been implemented to ease the drain on the energy supply caused by over- development.

Other costs generated by population growth can be directly attributed to mass immigration. A groundbreaking study performed by Rice University Economist Dr. Donald Huddle on the public costs of immigration found that, after deducting taxes paid by immigrants, the net national accumulated cost to American taxpayers for the decade 1997-2006 for all post-1969 immigration will reach $866 billion. The questionable benefits of population growth pale in comparison to the economic, social, and environmental costs paid for by our citizens.

Myths  Solutions  Action

MYTH: Growth Management or "Smart Growth" will eliminate sprawl.

Many advocates of "Smart Growth," "Growth Management," "Green Belts" and "Land-Use" as complete and adequate solutions to sprawl insist that the cure lies in treating sprawl and related symptoms. They claim that the construction of high-density urban and suburban housing will prevent new sprawl in America.

Promoters of high-density development lobby local governments with proposals to (1) enact growth boundaries to contain growth, (2) implement land-use/zoning policies that specify types of development, (3) initiate compact growth or high-density development to reduce consumption, and (4) project needs and designate an ample supply of land for residential, commercial, recreational and industrial uses.

These approaches have serious flaws because:

1. As long as our population continues to expand, these growth boundaries will not hold, and to further accommodate growth, builders will eventually need to go outside the boundaries. We can only pack so many people in so tight.
2. We must not forget that the criterion for determining that a nation or region is overpopulated is not land area, but carrying capacity. Fundamental carrying capacity "factors" such as potable water, topsoil and energy are limited and/or difficult to increase.
3. High-density living merely shifts consumption to other forms and has increasingly adverse affects on the environment of areas outside the designated "high-density" zones. Some forms of consumption are even increased, such as per capita energy use, not to mention an increase in waste production accompanying each added person’s high density living requirements. Urban areas must import resources and export garbage and other waste material. This two-way transfer requires vast areas of land outside of any given urban growth boundary, typically leaving an increasingly large ecological footprint, thus simultaneously reducing the carrying capacity of outlying areas.
4. Pressure to develop often overwhelms local governments, and some do not fully realize or understand the environmental consequences that result. Land set aside for residential, commercial, and industrial use ignites a vicious cycle of constant development.

When a town experiences rapid building, traffic congestion quickly becomes a major problem. Citizen outrage and demand for relieving congestion will result in the expansion of the highway system. This not only encourages but also facilitates population growth, which in turn overwhelms the expanded system.

As Al Bartlett, Professor Emeritus of Physics at the University of Colorado, notes in his article, "Regionwide Planning Will Make the Problem Worse," planning can provide long-term solutions only if it causes or is accompanied by cessation of population growth.

In sum, "Growth Management," "Smart Growth," "High-Density Living," "Green Belts," and other planning solutions may ameliorate some problems in the short-run, but in the long-run they often facilitate population growth. High-density housing simply generates more pollution in a small area while depleting resources (e.g., water, food, and energy) imported from other areas.

Myths  Solutions  Action

MYTH: High-density development will solve environmental and social problems.

Many supporters of high-density development believe the result will be safer and nicer places to live. Yet, studies show that traffic congestion and overcrowding, pollution and environmental degradation, excessive water and energy use (e.g., high-rises require large amounts of energy to run elevators), and heightened urban tension are just a few of the consequences of high-density development and living.

Traffic Congestion and Overcrowding. Increased congestion on U.S. roadways has resulted in a rash of accidents caused by what expert’s label as "road rage." The increase of people on the road has led to this phenomenon, and it most frequently occurs during rush hours. Lengthy delays on our nation’s roads have resulted in bad tempers, aggressive driving, poor decisions, injury, and even death. In 1997, over 41,000 died in traffic accidents with over two-thirds of those deaths a result of road rage. Studies point to the fact that driving in crowded conditions induces anti-social behavior. The Journal of Applied Psychology reported that drivers take 21% longer to vacate a parking space if they know someone is waiting for it and 33% longer if that person honks. High-density development will lead to more congestion on our highways, and road rage incidents will continue to rise.

Pollution and Environmental Degradation. Air and water quality in American cities has plummeted - or been subject to expensive remediation - as population continues to soar. Industrial wastes and automobile exhaust create a constant cloud of pollution, threatening the health and well-being of residents. High-density development perpetuates this problem, creating environments in the U.S. similar to that of Mexico City, arguably the most polluted city in the world.

Regardless of improved pollution control efforts, every person added to the U.S. population consumes additional resources and creates additional waste.

Excessive Water and Energy Use. Often, people don't realize the immediate effect that flipping a switch or taking a long shower has on the environment. The problem is magnified by more people living closer together. In some high-growth states, most notably California, water and electric shortages have risen to crisis levels. Water and electric usage is very difficult to reduce as the population continues to grow.

Rolling blackouts and emergency restrictions are often forced upon our citizens to conserve our dwindling resource base. With population growing at the alarming rate of today, these measures will only become more frequent.

Urban Tensions. Packing an increasingly diverse group of people into a confined area often increases cultural and ethnic tensions. For instance, 800,000 leave California each year (due to overcrowding), only to overcrowd other states. Still, California has gained a net half-million people a year from mass immigration and the higher than average fertility rates of most immigrants (immigration accounted for 96% of California's growth in the last decade). Native-born blacks and non-Hispanic whites are chief among those who flee to places (currently) less affected by immigration, all contributing to urban sprawl.

Disproportionate numbers of newcomers to an area often recreate the problems they are attempting to flee. Creating growth boundaries, a standard "smart growth" tactic, will force a diverse group of people to be in close proximity of one another. Such "planning" is not conducive to gradual assimilation and may well be a catalyst for separation and conflict.

In the stressed-out society of today, our citizens need a place to escape from the daily pressures of work, school, etc. High-density living will not alleviate these stresses. The small apartment in a 20-story skyscraper is contradictory to the American dream of owning a house with a picket fence and a backyard for our children to play in.

To force high-density living on our citizens as a way to treat sprawl fails to consider the total impact that individuals have on the environment which supports them, regardless of how they are distributed within that area, while the problems caused by unremitting increase in numbers remain unsolved.

Myths  Solutions  Action

MYTH: Growth management and "smart growth" alone will result in enhanced quality of life in the long-term.

Proposed solutions such as "Smart Growth," High-Density Living," and "Land-Use Management" are presumed to result in pedestrian-friendly developments and livable communities. However, densely packing people together damages the quality of life for everyone.

For example, in crowded suburbs of Washington, D.C., smart growth worsens an already troublesome traffic situation. Even with an excellent mass transit system in place, traffic is a nightmare and "getting away from it all" means enduring miles of bumper-to-bumper driving.

Where there is no space for a garden, fast-food businesses and gigantic supermarkets proliferate. Throw-away food packages, whose production consumes energy, create greater demands for dumps and possibly toxic landfills. Recycling programs consume space and energy, and are not long-term solutions.

To ignore the main cause of sprawl (population growth) complicates the issue, further hindering an effective solution, and thus reducing the quality of life for all Americans. It is obvious that we must deal with overpopulation. A larger population does not guarantee a higher standard of living. In fact, just the opposite is true - consider India or China. A growing population increases prosperity for only so long. Then, its increasing numbers simply create scarcity as more people compete for limited resources and living space. The earth's and our nation's resources are finite. An increasing population can only lead to smaller and smaller shares per capita.

If the U.S. adopts a national policy of population stabilization now, we will be able to protect our environment and quality of life for ourselves and future generations.

Myths  Solutions  Action

MYTH: Overpopulation is a "global" problem requiring global solutions.

A favorite illusion (or for some, a smokescreen) of some environmentalists is to confuse the population issue by saying it is "global." This is not only inaccurate, but also impedes our ability to produce lasting solutions to the various national, regional, and local population problems existing in the United States and in other countries. The nearly 200 countries in the world have hundreds of different cultures, diverse environmental problems, and varying degrees of overpopulation.

As Garrett Hardin, recipient of the 1989 Humanist Distinguished Service Award, says, "We are not faced with a global population problem, but with numerous national problems." We can make progress on overpopulation only if we address these problems on a national and international, and not global basis. Fertility rates are almost always a result of culture-specific values and incentives – to try to change these in hundreds of cultures in scores of countries would be inadvisable if not impossible.

There are three processes that determine the extent of environmental impact that population has on a particular region: (1) fertility, (2) immigration, and (3) resource consumption. A region characterized by low fertility/high immigration will obviously seek different solutions than a region with high fertility/low immigration.

Globalists also fail to acknowledge that easy emigration opportunities actually raise fertility rates in sending countries. Countries consistently using the U.S. as an outlet to send their excess population often find their own fertility rates remain high.

In sum, overpopulation and related environmental problems can usually be solved only by action at the local, regional, and national levels; no global institution that can develop and enforce effective solutions worldwide exists. Only we can calculate our own optimum and maximum carrying capacity and develop a national population policy to live within it. The U.S. has the highest growth rate (1%) in the industrialized world. This corresponds to a doubling of our population in just 72 years, within our children's lifetime. We must stabilize our population if we are to live within our carrying capacity.

Myths  Solutions  Action