Oh god please make this law. If the myopic zoning commissions in the central valley continue to let farmers pave over some of the richest cropland in the world to build McMansions for suburban breeders we're going to run out of food. And you can't get that land back.

This is one of the hugest issues with the CAHSR that nobody wants to talk about. By making Fresno, Bakersfield, Modesto and Sacramento hubs in a state-wide transit network, we're going to be creating sprawl in those towns. That is, if we don't enact some sort of anti-sprawl ordinances.

On another note, electric cars are coming, and when they do, it's going to be DIRT CHEAP to drive. The initial cost of the vehicle will be high, but the incremental cost of driving 40 miles a day instead of 20 is going to be non-existent.

If you think traffic is bad now, wait till it costs $2 to fill up your volt. We need smart urban planning to deal with this now while people are still stinging from $4/gallon gas.

Here's a few examples of absurd laws, in Pasadena CA:

The number of floors in new residential buildings is limited to 3.

Each new building has to come with a parking lot that can accomodate as many cars as there are people fitting into the building.

As a result, you have low-density urban areas with 50% of the land occupied by guess what? Parking lots. If buildings were 10 floors tall and there would be less parking spots, people would be forced to move close to work, reducing traffic.

Smart planning? We've never tried that before.

I often wish I lived in CA.

I don't understand what sprawl is. Am I participating because I live in a suburb of San Diego? What if I told you I take the ferry to work every day?
I am 100% unwilling to give up my detached house; I like my garden, I like my grill, I like my yard, I like the safety and anything less would be unliveable for me, I moved to San Diego to get out of Manhattan. I think people in the suburbs can live green lifestyles they just need to try harder. But I think this is just going to make Southern California more expensive to live in and more crowded. Public transportation in California already does work, people just don't use it.

It's great California is doing this, considering they have so much sprawl in Los Angeles. I would love for my state to do this because the sprawl is downright outrageous, even in the time of high gas prices I still know people who want to live in Little Rock but want to work 40-50 miles away in a little suburb.
I hate Arkansas so much, I'll be glad once I save up enough to leave. Arkansas is going to be left behind in the post-carbon and post-oil world.

First anti-sprawl law? What about Oregon's almost 40 year old mandatory statewide land-use program that requires every city to establish an "urban growth boundary." It's certainly not perfect. Elected officials grant exemptions too easily, but most observers agree that it has been relatively successful in preventing egregious sprawl and "keeping Oregon green" over the last several decades. See http://www.lcd.state.or.us/LCD/goals.shtml

Every state in the U.S. should have a mandatory program addressing urban sprawl! How is it that the rest of the U.S. didn't follow suite with Oregons' state land-use program as Doug Heiken stated above? Where is the quality of life? Who wants to live like Sardines in a can? I sure don't! Why is it that our Representatives in all the states excluding Oregon are not aware of this monumental problem? This law should have been implemented forty years ago just like the state of Oregon had done! Everyone living in the U.S. should know why there is an urgent need for having boundaries and limits placed on new construction and new development concerning raw land. We have mandatory postings for maximum capacity limits that are on elevators, pools, buildings, bridges etc. and the reason for this is for everyone's safety and for structural reasons as well. So why is it that most Americans are not concerned about urban sprawl and why are our Representatives not adamant to keep land development in check? I believe it is because of greed, corruption and power. The three evil traits of the Human race! How arrogant of the Human race to force population control on animals when we don't even care to control our own numbers!!!! Birth control and family planning should be free for everyone in the U.S. and also the rest of the world. In the long run it would be cost effective for us, healthier for the planet and we would have a better quality of life for us and for the future generations to come. Who really wants to live on a planet that is almost completely covered by asphalt? I would rather live in harmony with nature than not!

Speaking of urban sprawl, Peter Newman, Professor of Sustainability at Curtin University in Perth, Australia, talks about how the current economic turmoil originiated in part from high capacity roads, peri-urban scatter and large fossil fuel-hungry houses. He offers solutions to the crisis based around new technologies (such as Transit Oriented Development, reduced dependance on oil and fossil fuels) and a shift away from "propping up of the old systems": http://blog.islandpress.org/241/peter-newman-resiliant-cities-and-the-crash