I can t name a group of suburban residents asking that their single-use residential district be expanded to allow stores, hotels, gas stations and the like. The call for mixed use in suburbs seem to come from urbanists who have no vested interest in suburbs. I find the example of Main Street in Miami Lakes to be instructive . . . By the early 1970s, this was a kind of ultimate goal for cities, including Minneapolis. I never quite understood why this was a good thing.
People sleep, services are provided, the city refreshes for the next day.
There is a small amount of 24-hour activity in Minneapolis and the suburbs basically grocery stores and gas stations and perhaps we should just quietly retire this as a planning concept. Design is key Trained as an architect, I reflexively think in terms of design solutions. But the fact is, only a tiny minority of Americans place much of an emphasis on design. This does not mean that we should not strive for design creativity, but it does suggest that design-driven theories of community development may not be very effective. Like any development, new subdivisions can look and feel pretty stark.