ABSTRACT
From 1950 to the present day, the US metropolis witnessed two main trends. The first, from 1945 to about 1980, was marked by a steady suburbanization of population and jobs to the extent that the US became an overwhelmingly suburban nation. Over this 35-year period, the dominant trend was an outward decentralization from the central city and toward the suburbs. Then, in about 1980, other trends became apparent in some, but not all, metropolitan areas: a move back to the city as well as continued exurban expansion. In this second phase, there was a more complex pattern of flow and counterflow, sites of urban growth as well as suburban decline. This period was marked by a metropolitan complexity of urban renaissance as well as urban collapse, and suburban growth as well as suburban decline. In the process, the US became a metropolitan nation.
