Before Tennessee, no other state in the South would ever institute anything so sweeping. It shows that even the most entrenched attitudes are changing. Consequences Besides the general sense of irritation over lost vistas, open areas, and quality of life, the activism is being driven by a growing awareness that certain local, state, and federal policies are having unintended consequences. Urban tax rates are often higher than suburban ones, for example. Federal property-tax reductions give people a subtle incentive to buy bigger houses on bigger lots.
States spend more money building newer roads than on fixing old ones.
Environmental regulations for building on abandoned urban sites are often more complicated than those for building in suburban areas. The building boom And build they have - at the rate of 3.2 million acres per year nationwide from 1992 to 1997. The rate between 1982 and 1992 was 1.4 million acres per year. The antidote, say observers, is citizen activism. A July nationwide survey of local and state decisionmakers by the American Institute of Architects reflects the growing concern.