ABSTRACT
They foreground the national problem of urban sprawl, which has deepened the socioeconomic and political divide between city and suburb, worsened economic distress and segregation in the inner city, and further degraded the environment. The exodus to the suburbs appealed to urban expatriates searching for middle-class privacy and exclusiveness, who were increasingly divested from public commitments to rental and subsidized housing, parks, schools, transit, and other urban services. Meanwhile a new environment of competitiveness among central cities means public officials are favoring new gentrified neighborhoods attractive to the professional-managerial classes amidst long-term decline in the manufacturing workforce. Dreier and his co-authors trumpet the ongoing relevance of cities as “engines of prosperity,” evident in the rise of Sun Belt cities, urban technology and innovation centers, and command centers of the new global economy.
