Comment on J. Terrence Farris's “The barriers to using urban infill development to achieve smart growth”

Farris's article shows that urban development has changed since the Housing Act of 1949 was enacted more than half a century ago. The problem is that greenfield locations have a competitive advantage over vacant or underused sites in existing urban areas. Only a small percentage of development is constructed on existing urban land. But even as the NIMBY ("not in my backyard") factor plays a major role in driving development out of existing urban locations, greenfields have now sprouted their own NIM‐BYs. Suburbs that were land‐rich a generation ago are land‐poor today, and instead of stealing development from the central city, they must now—like the central city itself—fight to protect their turf from greenfield suburbs farther out on the fringe. Despite his well targeted arguments, Farris misses a larger point about the changing metropolis and what it means for the greenfield‐infill relationship.