ABSTRACT
The chapter identifies the mechanisms that played the role of path dependencies by fostering the formulation of car-oriented suburban model and assuring its proliferation and perpetuation. It introduces the societal context and the specific decisions that have defined dispersed suburbanism and encouraged its proliferation. The chapter identifies the features of the dispersed suburban model, highlights its evolution over time. It turns to critiques of dispersed suburbanism and recent attempts at departing from this form of development. The chapter proposes three scenarios depicting possible futures of the suburb, and assesses their respective likelihood in light of the path-dependence perspective advanced, first, business-as-usual scenario, the second scenario assumes that dispersed suburbs are transformed along the lines of the recentralization model advanced within the planning community, third, the possible impact of new technologies. It examines how a form of urban development, which marked a radical departure from the prior evolution of cites, came into being and then proliferated across North America.
