Suburb

==== Housing ====
[[File:Locust St Upper Darby.jpg|thumb|upright=1.1|[[Terraced house]]s in [[Upper Darby Township, Pennsylvania]], an inner-ring suburb of [[Philadelphia]].]]
[[File:Suburbia by David Shankbone.jpg|thumb|upright=1.1|A suburban neighborhood of [[tract housing]] in [[Colorado Springs, Colorado]], United States; [[Dead end (street)|culs-de-sac]] are hallmarks of suburban planning.]]
Very little housing had been built during the Great Depression and World War II, except for emergency quarters near war industries. Overcrowded and inadequate apartments was the common condition. Some suburbs had developed around large cities where there was rail transportation to the jobs downtown. However, the real growth in suburbia depended on the availability of automobiles, highways, and inexpensive housing. The population had grown, and the stock of family savings had accumulated the money for down payments, automobiles and appliances. The product was a great housing boom. Whereas an average of 316,000 new non-farm housing units were constructed from the 1930s through 1945, there were 1,450,000 constructed annually from 1946 through 1955.<ref>U.S. Bureau of the Census, ''Historical Statistics of the United States '' (1976) series H-156</ref> The [[G.I. Bill]] guaranteed low-cost loans for veterans, with very low down payments, and low interest rates. With 16 million eligible veterans, the opportunity to buy a house was suddenly at hand. In 1947 alone, 540,000 veterans bought one; their average price was $7300. The construction industry kept prices low by standardization—for example, standardizing sizes for kitchen cabinets, refrigerators and stoves allowed for mass production of kitchen furnishings. Developers purchased empty land just outside the city, installed tract houses based on a handful of designs, and provided streets and utilities, while local public officials raced to build schools.<ref>Joseph Goulden, ''The Best Years, 1945–1950'' (1976) pp 135–39.</ref> The most famous development was Levittown, in Long Island just east of New York City. It offered a new house for $1000 down and $70 a month; it featured three bedrooms, a fireplace, a gas range and gas furnace, and a landscaped lot of 75 by 100 feet, all for a total price of $10,000. Veterans could get one with a much lower down payment.<ref>Barbara Mae Kelly, ''Expanding the American Dream: Building and Rebuilding Levittown'' (SUNY Press, 1993).</ref>

At the same time, African Americans were [[Second Great Migration (African American)|rapidly moving north and west]] for better jobs and educational opportunities than were available to them in the segregated South. Their arrival in Northern and Western cities en masse, in addition to being followed by race riots in several large cities such as [[1964 Philadelphia race riot|Philadelphia]], [[Watts riots|Los Angeles]], [[1967 Detroit riot|Detroit]], [[1968 Chicago riots|Chicago]], and [[1968 Washington, D.C., riots|Washington, D.C.]], further stimulated white suburban migration. The growth of the suburbs was facilitated by the development of [[zoning]] laws, [[redlining]] and numerous innovations in transport. Redlining and other discriminatory measures built into federal housing policy furthered the racial segregation of postwar America–for example, by refusing to insure mortgages in and near African-American neighborhoods. The government's efforts were primarily designed to provide housing to White middle-class and lower-middle-class families. African Americans and other people of color largely remained concentrated within decaying cores of urban poverty creating a phenomenon known as [[white flight]].<ref name="Rothstein, Richard 2017">Rothstein, Richard: The Color of Law. A Forgotten History of How Our Government Segregated America, Liveright, 2017.</ref>

After World War II, the availability of [[FHA loan]]s stimulated a housing boom in American suburbs. In the older cities of the northeast U.S., [[streetcar suburb]]s originally developed along train or [[tram|trolley]] lines that could shuttle workers into and out of city centers where the jobs were located. This practice gave rise to the term "[[commuter town|bedroom community]]", meaning that most daytime business activity took place in the city, with the working population leaving the city at night for the purpose of going home to sleep.

Economic growth in the United States encouraged the suburbanization of American cities that required massive investments for the new infrastructure and homes. Consumer patterns were also shifting at this time, as purchasing power was becoming stronger and more accessible to a wider range of families. Suburban houses also brought about needs for products that were not needed in urban neighborhoods, such as lawnmowers and automobiles. During this time commercial shopping malls were being developed near suburbs to satisfy consumers' needs and their car–dependent lifestyle.<ref name="Beauregard, Robert A 2006">Beauregard, Robert A. When America Became Suburban. Minneapolis, MN: University of Minnesota Press, 2006.</ref>

Zoning laws also contributed to the location of residential areas outside of the city center by creating wide areas or "zones" where only residential buildings were permitted. These suburban residences are built on larger lots of land than in the central city. For example, the lot size for a residence in Chicago is usually {{convert|125|ft|m}} deep,<ref>{{cite web|title=Zoning Requirements for Standard Lot in RS3 District|url=http://chicago47.org/zoning-requirements-for-standard-lot-in-rs3-district/|website=47th Ward Public Service website|access-date=27 April 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140814060758/http://chicago47.org/zoning-requirements-for-standard-lot-in-rs3-district/|archive-date=14 August 2014|language=en|url-status=dead}}</ref> while the width can vary from {{convert|14|ft|m}} wide for a row house to {{convert|45|ft|m}} wide for a large stand–alone house.{{Citation needed|date=February 2007}} In the suburbs, where stand–alone houses are the rule, lots may be {{convert|85|ft|m}} wide by {{convert|115|ft|m}} deep, as in the Chicago suburb of [[Naperville, Illinois|Naperville]].{{Citation needed|date=February 2007}} Manufacturing and commercial buildings were segregated in other areas of the city.

Alongside suburbanization, many companies began locating their offices and other facilities in the outer areas of the cities, which resulted in the increased density of older suburbs and the growth of lower density suburbs even further from city centers. An alternative strategy is the deliberate design of "new towns" and the protection of [[green belt]]s around cities. Some social reformers attempted to combine the best of both concepts in the garden city movement.<ref>[http://www.library.cornell.edu/Reps/DOCS/howard.htm Garden Cities of To-Morrow]. Library.cornell.edu. Retrieved on 22 November 2011.</ref>

In the U.S., 1950 was the first year that more people lived in suburbs than elsewhere.<ref>England, Robert E. and David R. Morgan.  ''Managing Urban America'', 1979.</ref> In the U.S., the development of the skyscraper and the sharp inflation of downtown real estate prices also led to downtowns being more fully dedicated to businesses, thus pushing residents outside the city center.