Prometheus 6   

So what happens when "white flight" reaches the edge of the earth?

From Naperville to Texas, `megaburbs' hit middle age
By Lee Powell
The Dallas Morning News: Knight Ridder/Tribune

December 6, 2003

NAPERVILLE, Ill. –– Too small to be considered a bedroom community, too big to be a metropolis.[sic]

Boomburbs, megaburbs, edge cities –– those who study them have searched for a label that fits.

They are the Planos, Arlingtons, Irvings, Garlands and Napervilles of the nation. And they're aging.

Nestled next to larger cities, such places have seen dramatic growth in the last few decades. They are home to more than 100,000 people and helped lead the nation's suburban boom of the 1980s and '90s.

But now, the population flood is receding for some, the new–city feel washing away. With that comes worries about blight, the creep of big–city problems people hoped to escape by moving outward.

Urban planners say these suburbs are at a crossroads: Some, through careful planning, will remain the places to be, losing little of their chamber–of–commerce luster. Others won't be so fortunate. Neighborhoods will turn, looking nothing like they did a decade earlier. Once–thriving retail corners will become virtual ghost towns.

These are uncertain times for leaders in such places, as their cities search for sustainability. Few places have grown so big and amassed so much wealth so quickly. And planning experts have no concrete solutions to guarantee success.

"The fact is that no place can or should boom forever," writes Robert Lang of the Metropolitan Institute at Virginia Tech University. "Today's boomburbs are tomorrow's mature cities."