The urban frontier: Re-defining the satellite city
Description
Expansion of large metropolitan areas has rapidly increased at such a rate that development has begun to spill over original city boundaries. Almost every large city in the United States has accumulated smaller satellite cities on the periphery of the metropolitan area. These satellite cities house resources that exist because of their proximity to a larger urban core allowing them to harbor communities of people looking for inexpensive yet accessible housing close to a strong job market. The satellite city's location, stuck between a dense urban core and suburbia, lends itself to an identity that can be determined as neither urban or suburban. This confusing identity has resulted in high density urban infrastructure that is independent of an identifiable urban core, therefore spread out and sparse. As both the desire to live in major city centers and the cost of living in these city centers grows, satellite cities are becoming a destination where people within the city can escape huge expenses and suburban families can achieve urban living at an affordable cost. In turn, the future of satellite cities is a frontier to affordable urban living. One such city is Harrison, New Jersey; a city just a twenty-minute subway ride away from downtown Manhattan. This commuter city has become a bridge between the suburbs of New Jersey and Manhattan's central business district. Every day people drive into Harrison with the intent to switch to rail transportation into downtown Manhattan. Because of this role in daily commuting patterns and accessibility to resources from New York City, Harrison is growing at an extremely rapid rate with over 8,000 residential units proposed to be built in the next ten years1. This remarkable growth has resulted in cheaply built and loosely planned city infrastructure ignoring key factors in the city's expansion. Subsequentially, Harrison's city fabric has become victim to residential sprawl with many missing pieces, having failed to take advantage of the potential in the centrally located commuter city transit infrastructure. As developers continue to propose high profit residential housing scattered throughout the city, they fail to meet the demands of growing density, parking, and public amenities. The centrally located transit accommodations that exist allow Harrison to be a lucrative city with an identifiable city center that can provide housing communities to people looking for inexpensive yet accessible housing close to New York City. With these existing circumstances, there is possibility to improve Harrison's physical environment and its residents' quality of life by introducing a transit oriented development plan surrounding public transportation hubs located in the core of the city. Establishing a connection between existing parking structures, housing, and public amenities will create a satellite city typology that can adapt to the drastically changing habitation throughout a typical work day. As the push towards a new urbanization becomes more prevalent in our future, satellite cities like Harrison can be designed to adapt to growing numbers of urban residents and their transportation patterns and ultimately brand themselves with a new identity and role in sustainable urban futures.