Moving Forward

“Retrofitting suburbia” resonated with me above the other articles for this week in that it took a stance on how to move forward.  Dunnan-Jones and Williamson recognized the issues of suburban sprawl similar to Crawford, Keats, and the interview with Martha Stewart.  They mentioned the inefficiencies of the sprawl, but wrote of retrofitting the areas.  The idea is not to demolish the sprawl that has happened, but go in and rejuvenate the areas that are suffering like vacant strip malls.

If these problems were caused by economic issues as Keats writes in "The Suburbs: The New American Nightmare", how are we to change the patterns of building without going into the government policy to make the change?  It seems like “to extend transit to improve suburban access” or “connecting the dots…to retrofit corridors themselves”we need help from more than just architects (Dunnan-Jones and Williamson).  If it is our responsibility to retrofit suburbia in this revival from the economic crash, do we need to redefine our job as architects or look outside of our discipline for help?