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WILLIAMSBURG - "Laughable" is what Wendell Cox calls some potential land use and transportation solutions generated from "smart growth" studies like The Grand Vision.

Cox, author of "War on the Dream, How Anti-Sprawl Policy Threatens the Quality of Life," presented "Smart Growth and The American Dream" Friday, Sept. 26 at The Creekside of The Williamsburg Showcase Dinner Theater.

Smart growth is defined as development policies that aim to prevent urban sprawl and pollution. Such policies generally emphasize denser development in certain areas, while protecting other areas, according to Webster's online dictionary.

In his opinion, a major flaw of smart growth development policies is that they often fail to consider economics, Cox said.

"Urban planning that takes no account of economic reality is a real danger," he said.

An international consultant for demographic urban policy and transport, Cox is also a visiting professor at Conservatoire National des Arts et MŽtiers in Paris (The National Conservancy of Arts and Crafts). His clients include government agencies, public policy institutes and industry organizations, according to his Web biography.

Cox began the presentation by saying its purpose was to address recent research and studies on land use and to encourage citizen involvement in government.

The main point or "thesis" of his presentation, Cox said, was to communicate that the typical middle class American life would not exist were it not for the suburbanization, which occurred after World War II. He specifically referenced the contributions of the American car industry. Cox argued that smart growth programs have potential to actually threaten The American Dream, not maintain it, in their efforts to minimize detached housing areas and suburbs.

Cox added that in their planning, smart growth proponents favor less automobile use, and cite that more automobiles mean the creation of excess green house gas emissions. According to statistics cited in Cox's presentation, it is slower moving traffic that has been shown to increase air pollution.

He called a potential Traverse City transit system discussed at an area Grand Vision planning session, "a laughable solution," in dealing with growth and pollution, adding that he suspected consultants of the program weren't acknowledging the difference between Portland, Chicago and Traverse City.

Cox said the mobility provided by the American car industry post World War II has been a means to income and wealth for many Americans. It also has been a way that women have been liberated in many parts of the world, he said.

Cox is familiar with issues of transportation, having served terms on the Los Angeles County Transportation Commission and the Amtrak Reform Council.

As Cox continued his presentation, he listed other characteristics of the smart growth initiative, and further discussed the tendency for smart growth proponents to be against suburbs.

Smart growth also attempts to strategize urban growth boundaries and to impose costly development fees among other "onerous" land use limitations, according to Cox.

The Northern Michigan Community Network sponsored Cox's visit, and consists of grassroots groups from various townships throughout northern Michigan interested in issues of zoning and planning.

Cox also offered his take on big box stores, an issue of interest to several members of groups from the various townships in attendance.

He said big box stores fight poverty in many towns by adding more jobs to the area. To Cox, fighting against big box stores would therefore promote poverty, an idea Cox said he considers "immoral."

Cox also said smart growth planners often will argue that they are seeking to protect or preserve farmland. The argument "is really pretty childish" Cox said, considering his statistics show that less than three percent of farm land is actually under development in the United States.

Also, despite what smart growth planners say, their policies do have an impact on the pricing of housing, according to Cox. Land use regulations affect home prices and the more the regulations, the more the pricing problems, he said.

Smart growth planners need to facilitate how people want to live, not dictate how they should live, he added.

Cox said when smart growth supporters use the phrase "housing choice" it doesn't always mean the house in which people would choose to live, but the housing choice planners make for them - often a more expensive choice.

At the end of Cox's presentation, he displayed a picture of a building where planners had placed an adjoining cement walkway.

Directly across from the walkway was the well-worn dirt path that appeared to receive more use. He used it as an example of how planning is a difficult task and how it is hard for all parties to see eye to eye.

Russ Harding, director of the Property Rights Network at the Mackinac Center for Public Policy and a former director of the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality, closed the program and told attendees smart growth types of planning can have a serious impact on personal freedom.

"We have to get our legislature to do the job we paid them to do," Harding said. Harding added that he believed the environment wasn't really the focus of recent smart growth planning sessions.

"The kind of things that are going on now have nothing to do with the conservation of natural resources," Harding said.

He encouraged attendees to keep their eyes focused on local governments and their individual ordinances as opposed to being concerned about the planning exercises of The Grand Vision.

Megan Taylor can be reached for question or comment at mtaylor@michigannewspapers.com or by calling 231-264-9711.