Introduction

What is Left after Urbanization?

With this symposium, we raise questions about the current state of rural settlements in the U.S. and explore their relationship to the urban, if such a relationship exists.

As a point of departure, we have identified two processes that occur simultaneously in rural settlements: The urbanization of the rural, and the deterioration of the rural. These are presented as two examples of the many contradictions and processes that exist in areas that are identified as rural environments.

The urbanization of the rural is happening in the form of private development, primarily of large high-end houses, occupied by temporary residents, who are for the most part city dwellers. These inhabitants demand city-oriented products, services and infrastructure for the duration of their stay, which the local community cannot afford or may not have the need for.

The second and simultaneous condition can be described as the further deterioration of the rural. The growth of cities and urbanization aggravates the decline of the rural, leaving fewer opportunities for the inhabitants of rural areas. While the rural population did not significantly decline in terms of numbers, it has stagnated since 2010. Local rural communities in the U.S. typically suffer from high unemployment rate, domestic violence and increased use of drugs and alcohol.

The city and the country, categories which were considered opposites during the industrial revolution, cohabit the same territory. The demand for city services, products and infrastructure, both in kind and quality, pervades places beyond the city. The inhabitants of the seasonal properties are not an active part of the community and its economy. Private development and short term habitation in expensive properties cause an increase in land value, thinning out of the local community and its ability to generate a sustainable economy. The local community and the surrounding landscape become a backdrop, a picturesque scenery for those who seek relief from the urban routine.

Cape Cod presents a particularly interesting case study. A wealthy, thriving region during the summer months, it becomes the opposite during the long harsh winter. The Cape has two modes of operation, one in which the existing infrastructure, both physical and nonphysical (from roads to stores) is barely able to serve the masses, and the other where it is barely able to sustain itself. This extremely unbalanced condition is typical of many rural settlements across the country and challenges what we know as rural today.

At the same time, the Cape is part of a history of modern architecture. Architects like Marcel Breuer, Bernard Rudofsky and Serge Chermayeff worked on questions of settlement, community and privacy. Breuer and Chermayeff explored their ideas of dwelling with the houses they built on the Cape. Chermayeff wrote his book, Community and Privacy, on the Cape, in response to the urbanization of the sixties. 
  
Hence Cape Cod is both a representation of the idyllic countryside and a place where questions of settlement are pertinent, both historically and today. With this symposium on the Cape, we attempt to address the processes of contemporary urbanization outside the city.



Bibliography

Ahern, Jack et al. People and Places on the Outer Cape: A Landscape Character Study, Amherst:
University of Massachusetts Amherst, 2003.
 
Bragg, Mary Ann, “Study:Regional Approach Needed in Rural Areas”, Cape Cod Times, 1.12.2015,
http://www.capecodtimes.com/article/20150112/News/150119880, Last accessed, 4.17.2015.
 
Chermayeff, Serge and Christopher Alexander, Community and Privacy: Toward a New Architecture of
Humanism, New York: Anchor Books, 1963.
 
Cronon, William, Changes in the Land: Indians, Colonists, and the Ecology of New England, New York:
Hill and Wang, 1983.
 
Endless Summer: Managing Character in Coastal Communities, Conference Proceedings, October 6-8,
2004, Provincetown, Massachusetts.
 
Eberhardt et al., “Conservation of Changing Landscape: Vegetation and Land-Use History of Cape Cod
National Seashore”, Ecological Application, Vol 13, No 1 (Feb, 2003): 68-84.
 
Flannigan, Will, “Is Rural America Struggling? Rural population decline reflects impact of recession,”
Farm and Dairy, 2014 http://www.farmanddairy.com/news/rural-america-struggling-rural-populationlosses-
long-term-trend/170820.html. Last accessed 4.17.2015.
 
Foster, David R.,Thoreau’s Country: Journey through a Transformed Landscape, Cambridge: Harvard
University Press, 2001.
 
Koolhaas, Rem , “The Smart Landscape” ArtForum, April 2015 https://artforum.com/inprint/
issue=201504&id=50735. Last accessed 4.17.2015.
 
USDA, Rural America at A Glance, 2013 Edition.
 
Woods Hole Research Center and Cape Cod Commission , “Losing Cape Cod, Saving Cape Cod”.
http://www.capecodcommission.org/. Last accessed 4.17.2015.