Fighting Suburban Sprawl

New Urbanism Members Meet in Durango to forge Southwest Chapter

By Ken Wright, 5-05-06

Soon residents of the Four Corners states concerned about the direction and style of growth in the region will have a new path to input and action. Members of the Congress for the New Urbanism are holding a three-day meeting at Fort Lewis College in Durango this weekend to take the first steps toward forming a Southwest Chapter of the non-profit embodiment of the New Urbanism movement.

New Urbanism is a response to the suburban automobile culture that reshaped urban life in the U.S. after World War II. Those seeking to recreate the tight, integrated communities lost in that sprawling cityscape organized in Chicago in 1993, with the creation of the Congress for the New Urbanism. The group now has some 2,000 members around the country.

CNU members work to influence development planning and design to create aesthetic urban spaces that encourage walking and community interaction. Through seminars, workshops and other events, the group seeks to educate the public, professionals, and political entities about this kind of planning. It also sponsors “congresses,” annual idea-sharing conferences about New Urbanism methods.

The group’s charter states:

"The Congress for the New Urbanism views disinvestment in central cities, the spread of placeless sprawl, increasing separation by race and income, environmental deterioration, loss of agricultural lands and wilderness, and the erosion of society's built heritage as one interrelated community-building challenge. We stand for the restoration of existing urban centers and towns within coherent metropolitan regions, the reconfiguration of sprawling suburbs into communities of real neighborhoods and diverse districts, the conservation of natural environments, and the preservation of our built legacy."

In 2004, CNU began forming chapters to spread the movement’s message and increase its influence on the local level. Once a chapter has incorporated and acquired enough local members to support itself, it functions independently under the shared flag of CNU. At present, there are four chapters in operation around the country, with efforts to organize underway in more than 15 other areas.

At the Durango meeting this weekend, says meeting organizer Katie Shelby, the 30 or so people on the organizing committee for the fledgling Southwest Chapter – which will encompass Colorado, New Mexico, Arizona, Utah, and Nevada -- will meet with local CNU members to set the organization’s goals, plan the steps needed to become a full chapter, and schedule events to help the get word out.

The meeting is not open to the public, but Shelby urges those interested to be on the lookout for upcoming Southwest Chapter events.

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