income nations the phenomenon is manifest in ‘edge-city’ shanties often physically
desolate, yet invariably socially coherent.
32 The radiating-away designs for Tema Manhean, in Ghana and Islamabad in Pakistan
have the disadvantage, which exacerbates over time, of increasing congestion at the
tight, sharp centre of the urban arc – the main advantage being an exponentially
increasing availability of land as the outer arc radiates further away from the centre.
33 In the United States ‘small towns’ are centres of up to 10,000 population, being settle-
ments of lesser population (under 6,000) in the other Anglo settler nations.
34 One perception of the ‘new urbanism’ movement is that it is, at base, a harking back
to the community ideals recalled from small-town living.
35 The small towns known to myself harbour all manner of practical horticultural, build-
ing, manufacturing, professional and commercial skills within the ranks of the ‘retired’
and the ‘unemployed’.
36 Although small in terms of population numbers, the Kerikeri town and district
(populationcirca6,000) is hardly the archetype New Zealand ‘small town’. Family
sources have counted ‘around 150’ groupings of interest for land and water active and
passive recreation, for indoor leisure and pastime pursuits, sporting clubs, and com-
munity interest groups replicating in terms of accessibility the social, cultural and
sporting venues to be found in an average city.
37 The ‘country’ connotation excludes the special cases of mining, logging and hydro-
construction towns built for utility, for which there is often no viable residual function
to turn to in their afterlife.
38 Small towns, dormitory to larger towns and cities, buck the ‘low fertility cohort’ trend.
39 Whence ‘leaving one suburban home, the holiday-maker went 100 miles to another at
the beach’. Morton, Thom, Locker 1973.
40 Along the popular Californian Coast, for example, public ownership from the seaward
side extends usually to the high-water limit, which is the general situation through-
out mainland USA. In urban New Zealand, by contrast (with minor exceptions) a space
20 m inland from spring tide high-water mark is universally accessible to the public.
41 Referred to historically as the Queen’s Chain – about 20 m, which is also the length of
a traditional cricket pitch, reflecting British origins.
42 ‘Despite the buzz surrounding the concepts of ecovillages and eco-neighbourhoods
surprisingly few are as yet being realised, and this reflects the inertia of public
and private agencies.’ Hugh Barton and others Sustainable Communities(2000: 84
quoted here) found a list of 55 examples, worldwide, of eco-neighbourhoods: many
conjectural.
43 My first sighting of Suburban Nationwas in mid-2002. Box 5.1 (Urban social arrange-
ment and style) and box 5.2 (Basic residential componentry) are of a ‘do this’ charac-
ter and remain unaltered; but the diligent reader is recommended to refer also to the
Appendix ‘A’ checklist given in Suburban Nation.
44 Realistically allow for up to double the conventional capital outlay, incurred for each
unit of accommodation provided in eco-village contexts.
45 The ‘circle equivalent’ is notional. The desired train-station or trunk road connection
would usually be positioned tangential to the layout.
46 Implicated in this rough reasoning is some ab initio consideration as to whether there
is to be enough three-bedroom family household units to support a primary school.
This matter of the population needed to support a primary school was the basic issue
determining population density and neighbourhood size in British New Towns, not,
of course, that urban greenfield villages are anything like new towns in concept or
size.
Notes to pp. 217–26 293