Big-ideas, governance, megacities, sense of place 337buildings were mostly eliminated, and people basically lived either in industrial
collectives (large towns/small cities), agricultural collectives (villages), or scat-
tered historic villages. Analogously, hedgerows and small wooded areas were
mainly eliminated, leaving essentially two types of land, extensive field areas
and large forest patches (see Color Figures 8, 10, and 23).
During almost the same period in the USA, government policy produced
arepeated land-use pattern around most American cities. US policy was sort
of a non-overt-policy or laissez-faire market control, together with numerous
indirect incentives and subsidies. This pattern produced around cities covering
50 degrees of longitude and 20 degrees of latitude is widely called American
sprawl (Chapter2). In essence, for several decades two huge nations, the USA
and USSR with a deep policy divide, each repeatedly stamped itself all over with
asingle cookie-cutter imprint, but the contrasting imprints used produced two
lone giants unrelated to anyone or to each other.
Finally, given this breadth of settings for urban regions, let us briefly explore
the possibilities forregional governanceusing the USA as an example. Both local
government and national government create and finance considerable policy
focusing on land use (National Research Council 1999, Irazabal 2005, Babbitt
2005).However regional thinking and initiatives have been sporadic. Local gov-
ernment particularly has little incentive to think regionally. State government,
at the intermediate level, could be a force for regionalism, but typically consid-
ers it to be a threat. States are often at odds with large-city governments, and
only occasionally establish policy for regions within a state.
So what can be done for urban regions? Typically the basic approach is to
establish a regional organization with legal responsibility and political authority,
either in a narrow somewhat-technical domain (e.g., water, recreational trail
systems, airports) or in a broader domain relative to land use. Six alternatives
might be suggested (Burchellet al.2005):
(1) Voluntary confederations:norealpower,but can highlight issues and pro-
vide information for the public.
(2) Public--private coalitions:similar to the preceding, but can also draw up
alternative plans for evaluation by policymakers and the public.
(3) Federally created regional agencies:specialized functions, e.g., air quality,
transportation, or biodiversity, with power and money to implement
policies.
(4) Regional bodies with broad authority:established by state legislatures,
though difficult to sustain reauthorizations and funding (e.g., Portland).
(5) Regional governments established by merging municipalities/counties:local gov-
ernments are replaced by a regional one (e.g., Indianapolis, Miami/Dade
Co.).