Why plague people with trash talk when they’ve got worries enough?

Forget about manicured front lawns, white picket fences and the sound of children at play. According to a growing legion of pundits and “peak oil” theorists, the tidy suburbs of today are the forsaken slums of tomorrow.

A recent article in The Atlantic Monthly by Christopher Leinberger argued that once-idyllic cul-de-sacs are about to become the domain of poverty, social disorder and physical rot.


More recently, Smart Growth B.C., the Vancouver-based not-for-profit with a focus on creating “more livable communities in British Columbia,” made the link between sprawling, auto-friendly suburbs and the grim spectre of childhood obesity.

Given sky-high gas prices, the new carbon tax and a growing number of “for sale” signs popping up in family subdivisions, there’s no doubt that B.C. suburban dwellers are facing a financial and psychological squeeze these days.

But writing them off as the doomed villains of the peak oil or global-warming stories is not only mean-spirited, it is also irresponsible.

That’s because moving to the city core for many Lower Mainland families is, for starters, financially impossible. The price tag for a three-bedroom apartment in Vancouver’s West End neighbourhood, for example, starts at a whopping $750,000 –out of range for even high-income earners.

And only a small fraction of the highrise condos built in downtown Vancouver over the past decade have been designed for families.

Vancouver Province