Edgeless Cities: Exploring the Elusive Metropolis

by Robert E. Lang

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Edgeless cities are a sprawling form of development that accounts for the bulk of office space found outside of downtowns. Every major metropolitan area has vast swaths of isolated buildings that are neither pedestrian friendly, nor easily accessible by public transit, and do not lend themselves to mixed use. While critics of urban sprawl tend to focus on the social impact of ""edge cities""—developments that combine large-scale office parks with major retail and housing—edgeless cities, despite their ubiquity, are difficult to define or even locate. While they stay under the radar of critics, they represent a significant departure in the way American cities are built and are very likely the harbingers of a suburban future almost no one has anticipated. Edgeless Cities explores America's new metropolitan form by examining the growth and spatial structure of suburban office space across the nation. Inspired by Myron Orfield's groundbreaking Metropolitics (Brookings, 1997), Robert Lang uses data, illustrations, maps, and photos to delineate between two types of suburban office development—bounded and edgeless. The book covers the evolving geography of rental office space in thirteen of the country's largest markets, which together contain more than 2.6 billion square feet of office space and 26,000 Atlanta, Boston, Chicago, Dallas, Denver, Detroit, Houston, Los Angeles, Miami, New York, Philadelphia, San Francisco, and Washington. Lang discusses how edgeless cities differ from traditional office areas. He also provides an overview of national, regional, and metropolitan office markets, covers ways to map and measure them, and discusses the challenges urban policymakers and practitioners will face as this new suburban form continues to spread. Until now, edgeless cities have been the unstudied phenomena of the new metropolis. Lang's conceptual approach reframes the current thinking on suburban sprawl and provides a valuable resource for future policy discussions surrounding smart growth issues.
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Genres: Urban Planning

154 pages, Paperback

First published February 1, 2003

Reviews

[Carlos · Rating 5 out of 5]

It seems appropriate to write this after my scathing (not actually scathing) review of Garreau. You know, sequels get a bad rap. The sour taste the worst have left in many’s taste buds overshadow the genuinely creative and passionate sequel projects that manage to capture the spirit of the original while adding much needed innovations to cement the legacy of their series (e.g. Empire Strikes Back, Stranger Things S2, Pokémon Gold/Silver). Well that’s what we got here. Robert Lang has managed to create a genuinely interesting (if a bit cryptic) concept that stands out on its own and constructively reformulates Garreau’s original definition.

Let’s be clear though, the comparison is not super fair. Garreau wrote a lengthy journalistic exposition on a series of observations he’s made about America’s metros from the 70s-90s he packaged under the new zeitgeist of “edge city”. Robert Lang creates a careful pamphlet describing the prescience of a different new urban form, situating it within the broader urban studies literature as well as a bevy of urban areas of displaying such an urban form to different degrees. Yes, Lang here is humble, he openly admits how unlikely the term Edgeless City will takeoff (he ultimately places it on a long laundry list of other urban studies vocab from scholars far more bullish than he). However, I feel the term is far more accurate to both the lived experiences and statistics of the new and strange places Americans are increasingly residing in.

I use vague terminology here because, as Lang points out, there is not one term that works. His discussion of centrists vs decentrists (lol) debunks the notion of a grand unified theory of urbanism. The Burgess model was certainly accurate for the few large cities if it’s time, but American urbanism has postmodernized far too heavily to have any one universal model. The multinucleated model, the multi sector model, the hub and spoke model, and the spaghetti models are all helpful pieces of solving the great urban puzzle of the present. Lang makes a convincing case for the salience of Edgeless Cities over others, but he rightfully emphasizes that this is not, and cannot, be the full picture.

Edgeless Cities themselves are fascinating to think about. In many ways, it’s clearly a concept that one could only derive from someone spending far too much (some would say just right amount) of their time looking at urban maps. For sure, there are population knots with lots of typical (and edge city) urban activity, but much of our metro areas are defined more by the strings doing the tying (if that makes sense). Edgeless cities are the spaghetti to City meatballs. Tapering through landscape gobbling up any and all spaces irregardless of geography, density, context, or whatever else. These are the bread and butter of late-20th century developments.

Given the descriptive nature of this short book, there is more to be desired for the “why” of these Edgeless cities. Lang gives us some teasers here and there regarding federal policy; changing suburbanizations; and practical realities, but there is still much to be understood here.

I think a bigger question I have with this term, as well as Edge Cities, is why we should consider them “cities”. Lang offers us a frank definition, defined by office space (used interchangeably with “commercial space”). The definition comports with the spirit of Garreau’s Edge City definition, but I don’t think it justifies its claim to a “city”. For sure, there are concerns throughout the book (primarily sensationalized New Urbanist viewpoints) about the merits of these places, but should we still consider them cities?

I will be generous to Lang, this is not meant to be a deep dive as much as an introduction to an underrepresented urban form, but I assume he wants us to accept the “cities” label because they define the American landscape. The famous Breezewood, PA shot (aka every American city ever) is a quintessential Edgeless city. It may not appear like a city, but it has the functions and millions live/work in them, regardless of their ideological agreement with the merits of the Edgeless. Still, it is worth thinking about the different components of these terms and how much they reflect reality versus trying to create their own reality/narrative.

Lang spends a not insignificant amount of time here reflecting on the dilemma of definitions and terms, and how regardless of personal motivations/intentions, the aggregate can reveal the major themes of contemporary urbanism. This term may not have caught on, but it’s existence certainly helps clarify a depressing reality few have truly grappled with. There is no rural-urban divide, the fabrics of the inner city have long been unraveled, draped across the American landscape like a house being TPed. Look outside from any airplane; go on Google Earth; take a drive, the Edgeless is the reality. This book’s greatest strength is providing us a framework for beginning to grasp the ungraspable that is contemporary America.

[DW Rowlands · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was a frankly amazing response to Joel Garreau's Edge City: Life on the New Frontier. Although shorter, it is much more academic than Garreau's work, and does a very good job of applying data and statistics to demonstrate differences in the distributions of office jobs in different American cities, in the process showing that Garreau significantly overstated his case.

Unfortunately, the story that Lang ends up telling is quite depressing: many American cities are becoming much more decentralized in terms of jobs, as "edgeless city" non-clustered urban office space supplants both traditional downtowns and "edge city" job clusters.

A number of the techniques and ideas that Lang discusses seem likely to be useful in the Master's project in human geography I'm currently working on.