BROADACRE CITY

Frank Lloyd Wright, "Broadacre City," 1932

Especially living in New York, I think all of us understand why there has been a never ending debate on the merits of the city versus the country. It is embedded with arguments of logic and the more subjective (and arguably more important) lifestyle preferences. We have seen how both the logical solution of growing up shown in Le Corbusier's "Radiant City" has allowed for concentrated poverty and how Frank Lloyd Wright's "Broadacre City" has justified sprawl that has led to almost irreversible environmental consequences. And yet, as someone who is ready to move out of the city, yet bound to the employment and opportunities I have here, I am still interested in finding that balance of a country lifestyle and city opportunities. Broadacre city has this overarching communist utopia that every resident receives an acre of land. In "Town and Revolution," it speaks of deurbanists as those who want "individual homes...in unspoiled natural surroundings." I love this line...

"Therefore the city must be smashed into ten thousand pieces and scattered across the countryside, in the woods, in the meadows, so that the houses will be in the heart of nature itself."

It is hard to imagine this operating with the division of labor that we have created in our societies today. We have come so far from the subsistence living that requires a little knowledge about everything, that it may be hard to get back to that, despite being "near the sources of raw materials." And yet, I see this trend gaining momentum in places like Vermont, where the youth are looking to acquire the skills that allow for subsistence living. Are we on the back swing of the pendulum? How will the youth today raise their children, what lifestyle and where?