Sprawl as Strategy

Abstract

The extent to which the nuclear arms race may have played a role in the development of postwar urban form in the United States is explored through an examination of planning literature and government documents from the 1940s and 1950s. The project to disperse the urban form for civil defense reasons is followed from its emergence in the literature to the adoption of these principles by both the American Institute of Planners and the U.S. federal government. The ramifications of this movement, and the role it played in the social history of the cold war, are discussed.