On my way home today from an event, I passed the site of an upcoming subdivision. The cornfield and its topsoil have been scraped away, and the maze of cul-de-sac roads is starting to go in.
There were three huge signs around the property, announcing that it will be a "Complete Community!" They were "Complete Community - Schools," "Complete Community - Nature," and "Complete Community - Parks."
That ain't complete, says I.
A complete community enables people to do more -- to shop and, if at all possible, to work. On one hand, we bemoan the fact that our roads are stuffed to capacity, our air is filled with vehicle exhaust, and people spend hours of each day commuting. And on the other hand, we create these sprawling "horizontal apartments," where a car isn't a luxury but an absolute necessity. On this side, we're telling the auto companies to make tiny cars to help save the environment. And on that other side, we do absolutely nothing about improving the environment, every time we scrape another farmer's field down to the raw clay, and put up a self-contained ghetto in its place.