“American cities, New York is the best example, are designed to accommodate immigrants, poor descendants of prior generations of immigrants and the rich. The first two groups send their children to public schools while the third group send their children to elite private schools where their future place in society is secured. The middle and upper middle classes usually get a better deal in the suburbs where the cost of living is lower and the public schools are far, far better. This, coupled with the fact that the U.S. is land rich, has an individualist culture and a significant disparity in incomes across the population means that America’s urban regions spread out. Joel Kotkin is simply observing the reality on the ground in the U.S.
Japanese cities on the other hand, Tokyo is the best example, are designed to accommodate the average Japanese person. There are few immigrants to speak of, relatively few are poor and relatively few rich. Most people are therefore average, that is, in the broad middle class. In addition, most good jobs are located in city central areas since Japanese want to work in an environment where they can spend the day working with colleagues and their evenings drinking with them. Not surprisingly, public schools are consistently good to a standard most everywhere and public transport (especially high density rail) is of the highest quality.
The result is that, even as the national population stagnates, the urban centers of cities like Tokyo and Osaka have been experiencing robust population growth for the past decade. Unlike America, young Japanese want to live near city centers and have urban amenities at their fingertips.
All of this points out that central city growth trends are cultural in origin. Joel Kotkin correctly points out the dichotomy between American cultural reality, the wide open spaces of America (in spite of population growth) and and “progressive” notions of urban idealism.”
