You might consider what happens, however, when government mandated high-density islands of infill destroy the ambience of existing semi-rural suburbs, and greenbelts prohibit development concentric to the city and suburbs. What happens, and this has been demonstrated, is “exurbs” grow much faster. So it happens, ironically, that trying to legislate high density can actually have the opposite effect, and destroy the quality of life for millions in the process.

You speak of high speed trains but the cost for these train in enormous and they only serve people in a small range near the train terminals. Your low-density residential sprawl would cover to great of an area to make this mass transportation fiscally feasible. So then a reliance on private transportation becomes inevitable and this requires a great infrastructure of roads and highway and greatly contributes to noxious emissions. Retail would suffer due to needing a such a large area to create enough of a consumer base to support the businesses.

If you truly want to create lower home and land prices, reduce environmental impact, reduce pollution, and reduce area temperatures, then create more and higher density urban environments. By creating Higher-density, “well designed” (Keyword), green residential near urban/commercial centers this can reduce the need for private vehicles thereby reducing pollution, reducing home prices by create more supply than demand, and leaving more area for Rural areas. The biggest hurdle is the poor design of current cities makes it extremely costly to rebuild these areas to accommodate more efficient housing units. Again you want a yard for you children to play in then a well designed Urban apartment could utilize the roof space to provide a playground/park area for this purpose. And would facilitate your children to be able to play with their friends. By using proper building security then you can actually make these “parks” safer for you children then a back yard in a suburban neighborhood.

In your “low-density suburban” scenario you would not be able to get enough families together in a reasonable space to get a good enough cross-section of people for your children to find friends without having to travel 2 or 3 miles to get to their house. And instead of using two acres to have two homes for only two families, a properly designed apartment can house 30-40 families in the same space and make it easier to get to schools, shopping, and employment. By using proper urban planning, proper design of housing units, and efficient public transportation we can reduce our need to private transportation and make urban landscapes beautiful and welcoming. My design would utilize apartment homes of 2000 -2500 sq ft, roof tops that are utilized for either parks or solar installations, densely packed near bus/train lines that would link to another nearby area that would contain the commercial districts that would also be densely packed to make use of nearby bus/train terminals. Reducing commuting time, reducing pollution, reducing land prices by utilizing the land area more efficiently. The only true way to reduce land prices is to use the land area more efficiently. For the most part the land is not getting any bigger, but the population is still growing. The only true solution is to go up and build high-density urban living units and not sububan sprawl.

My point is that land values are distorted, where land within some politically determined “urban service boundary” is worth $300K per acre, and land just outside this arbitrary line is worth $30,000 per acre. What I want is to see land prices increase based on actual value, not political inventions. That, plus fiscal reform of the public sector, would make homes affordable again.

Nobody is saying we shouldn’t have areas we protect for wildlife. But treating all open space as sacred and cramming people into ultra high density housing arrangements is cruel to anyone who prefers to have a yard. Plenty of people prefer high-rise living, but those of us who don’t should not have to be super rich to have a decent sized yard for our children to play.

To be really smart hear is to create high-density urban areas. Remove the need to drive your cars for hours every day. All electric cars are still many years away, eco-energy is still decades away. And did you realize the extent that the human population is growing. If every lived on a couple of acres of land then you would have to create a huge infrastructure of roads as you would have to travel farther and farther to get to the urban center to get to the jobs.

Urban sprawl kills wildlife by destroying ecosystems to build your manicured lawns. You want a backyard; how much time do you spend in your backyard? An hour or two a day? Couldn’t a high-rise apartment have a park that would take care of those needs and for a greater number of people in a much more efficient manner? How about green buildings. Put a park on the roof of the high-rise, you get many people in a small land area with greenspace, water retention, and the cooling effect of green on top. High density urban areas are not suburban areas they are high-rise apartment homes with mixed-use architecture.

Your argument seems derived from aristocratic snobbery, bent of having a pretty yard and getting rid of all those nature things that irritate your BMWs. Are you a real estate developer who wants to make sure they get to build cheap homes at outrageous prices to create huge incomes for yourself? Stop writing this drivel and go get an education. Help the world’s population explosion and CO2 creation. Take yourself out of the equation. You want a nice big piece of property to live on. Try the moon.