As sprawl moves across the landscape, it creates patterns of impact. These include quite visible changes in land use and in vehicle traffic on our roads, along with subtler shifts in the economies and the social composition of our cities and towns.
Sprawl is, overall, more than a phenomenon of road and building development.
Its long-term impacts can range from lengthening the distances that many Vermonters travel to reach their jobs, to widening the physical separation between people of lower and higher incomes. These and other effects may be altering the social and economic character of many Vermont communities, and of our state as a whole. This sixth and concluding publication in a series of research reports by the Vermont Forum on Sprawl presents some key indicators that begin, at least, to suggest the wider impacts that sprawl brings to Vermont's land and communities. Traditional Centers - cities, regional centers, town centers and some villages that are home to concentrations of residential population, and offer services to surrounding communities. New Growth Towns - communities that have shown high shares of their counties' population growth over the past 30 years.