Landscape architecture professor Lance Neckar has been tinkering with the "genetic code" of suburban growth, unearthing practical alternatives to classic auto-dependent sprawl.

Neckar shared his vision with two dozen transportation professionals, policymakers, and researchers, including representatives from the Minnesota Department of Transportation and the Metropolitan Council, at a Transportation and Regional Growth Study workshop sponsored by the Center for Transportation Studies at the University of Minnesota in April.

Neckar, the principal investigator for one facet of the six-part TRG Study examining urban design, transportation, and the environment, titled his presentation "Commuter Rail-Oriented Design: New Suburban Patterns."

The main transportation emphasis of the study, which examines the Red Rock/Highway 61 corridor, is to generate new alternatives for an area that will be served by commuter rail in the near future, possibly as early as 2005. The Red Rock/Highway 61 corridor extends north from Hastings to St. Paul, including the suburbs of Cottage Grove and Woodbury.

The work also focuses on hydrologically sensitive, subdivision-scale growth developed around commuter rail. The transit-oriented project, which turns traditional notions of the suburbs upside down, specifically aims to reverse the trend of increased vehicle-miles traveled by considering mixed land uses, increased population density, better-connected streets, and connected public lands.

"The myth of suburbia," Neckar said, "combines the promises of safety, freedom of movement, green fields, good schools, access to jobs, and affordability of housing."

In reality, he contends, the suburbs tend to perpetuate a "labyrinthine, disconnected pattern" of streets and roads that offer few transportation choices. In addition, jobs and other important places are typically distant, and natural systems are often disrupted. Water, in particular, frequently drains into rivers because development practices still favor channeling it away instead of replenishing aquifers by letting it soak into the ground.

Lance Neckar

"Environmental quality, once taken for granted in suburbia, now finds itself threatened by the very nature of growth," Neckar added.

By contrast, Neckar proposes the creation of design models and strategies that address infill, redevelopment, and greenfield development. Analysis of transportation system impacts as well as environmental impacts on water quality and surface water runoff also needs to be incorporated into designs.

Neckar pointed out that most development tends to benefit a few. Smart-growth development, however, could benefit a greater number of people and still yield high returns to developers receiving the proper incentives and willing to assume some risks, he added.

"This is a very tricky game," Neckar said, describing possible approaches for implementing the new ideas. "I'm an incrementalist."