424 Urban Geography, 2011, 32, 3, pp. 424–447. DOI: 10.2747/0272-3638.32.3.424 Copyright © 2011 by Bellwether Publishing, Ltd. All rights reserved. 424 SUBURBS IN DISGUISE? EXAMINING THE GEOGRAPHIES OF THE NEW URBANISM 1 Dan Trudeau 2 Department of Geography Macalester College Patrick Malloy Department of Housing Preservation and Development City of New York Abstract: Critics of the New Urbanism assert that it contributes to sprawl and produces exclusive enclaves. However, these assertions have not been carefully evaluated. We address this critique by examining neighborhood-scale New Urbanist projects in the United States. Our research suggests these critiques oversimplify the New Urbanism in practice, yet they have some basis in reality. Most New Urbanist projects represent infill development and therefore contribute to increased regional density. At the same time, some metropolitan regions have a high proportion of greenfield development. Our case study of New Urbanist projects in the Minneapolis–St. Paul region also suggests that the exclusivity critique applies to some, but not all projects. Some proj- ects in our sample have built environments that support a social mix well, others do it poorly, and others fall between these extremes. We therefore argue for seeing a continuum of New Urbanism in practice. [Keywords: exclusivity, New Urbanism, sprawl, suburbs.] The New Urbanism is a much discussed—and critiqued—urban design movement that seeks to influence the shape of the built environment of cities in the United States (Fainstein, 2000; Grant, 2006a). Proponents champion the movement as a viable way to correct negatively perceived characteristics of modern cities, including sprawl, destruc- tion of natural environments, segregation, and deterioration of the public realm. The movement prescribes changes at a variety of spatial scales, yet its construction of mixed- use, pedestrian-oriented neighborhoods is arguably its most well-known and influential product. However, the New Urbanism has attracted many criticisms of its own. Several center on the movement’s neighborhood-scale development projects and originate from different quarters (for an extended discussion of these critiques, see Ellis, 2002 and Talen, 2000). Two of the most forceful critiques are that the New Urbanism (NU) contributes to sprawl and that it generates socially exclusive communities. These critiques have sought to reframe the movement as the “New Suburbanism” and “suburbs in disguise” (Marshall, 1996). This line of criticism has not been systematically evaluated, however, and is the focus of this study. 1 We wish to thank Mark Bjelland for his insightful and timely critique of an earlier draft of this manuscript. We also thank Birgit Muehlenhaus for producing the maps. Elvin Wyly and three anonymous reviewers also provided helpful and constructive comments. Lastly, we appreciate Stephen Filmanowicz and Robert Steuteville for their help acquiring data from the Congress for the New Urbanism and New Urban News Publications, respectively. 2 Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to Dan Trudeau, Department of Geography, Macalester College, St. Paul, MN 55505; telephone: 651-696-6872; fax: 651-696-6116; email: trudeau@ macalester.edu