Cluster development could preserve communal open space at no density loss or added cost.

Evidence

In his Life article, Whyte also argued briefly for a second approach – what would soon be known as cluster or planned unit development – to preserve open space within subdivisions, not just between them. The nation’s zoning laws should be revised to allow subdivision builders to create large communal tracts of open space by clustering homes on smaller-than-standard lots. The developers would gain with such a layout because they would spend less per home on streets, land clearing, and utility hookups. The residents would also benefit – by giving up a bit of their yards, they would be able to enjoy a meadow, a hilly woodland, or a creek. Indeed, the cluster layout would turn potential annoyances into amenities. If a stream gully runs through a subdivision, Whyte explained, “it will not be chopped up into a patch of back lots that will only be a headache for the owners to keep up. Instead it will be left as a whole so that all the residents can use it. The density of the development will be the same as under the conventional pattern, but a lot more space will be created – and at less cost to the community, to the developer, and to the residents themselves.” — Adam Rome, The Bulldozer in the Countryside, 522

Categorization

• XREF: Cluster/planned unit development is a forerunner of today’s conservation subdivisions and smart-growth — connects to the land-use course and to the ongoing theme of open space as socially ‘consumed’ by homeowners only when it is a shared amenity. — connects to: Open-space preservation could proceed through purchase without touching property rights. — Adam Rome, The Bulldozer in the Countryside:…, 521