...vulnerable urban encroachment emerged that transcends the traditional political boundaries of cities. In response to this change in the American scene, concerns have been expressed from various quarters of society regarding the sustainability of quality of life, preservation of resources, and the integrity of the environment. The relationship of sprawl and growth has become a topic of research and study among researchers, politicians, and citizens alike during the post-World War II period, much of which is beyond the scope of this paper (see, for example, Burchell et al. 1998; Ewing 1994; Gordon and Richardson 1997; Black 1996; Lindstrom and Bartling 2003). Since the 1970s, many states, "recognizing the inability of local government to effectively manage their growth, have taken a stronger role in mandating and coordinating planning and growth management activities" at various levels of government (Nelson and Duncan, 1995, p.19) and have passed growth management acts. As Weitz (1999) noted, over the past two decades of rampant land development in the Sun Belt and the Pacific Northwest, special attention has been focused on land use planning in "mitigating problems of undesirable growth patterns.... Washington developed a ... program that enunciated the goal of preventing sprawl" (Weitz, 1999, p. 36). In 1990, the Washington State legislature passed a comprehensive growth management act (Laws of Washington 1990, 1st Ex. Sess., Chapter 17). One of the key planning goals of the act is the reduction of sprawl by the prevention of "inappropriate conversion of undeveloped land into sprawling low-density development" (1990, p.1973). A 1991 amendment to the 1990 Growth Management Act or GMA (Laws of Washington 1991, 1st Sp. Sess., Chapter 32) states:

Comprehensive plans Urban Growth Areas: Each county that is required ... shall designate an urban growth area or areas within which urban growth shall be encouraged and outside which growth can occur only if it is not urban in nature. Each city that is located in such a county shall be included within the urban growth area. An urban growth area may include territory that is located outside of a city only if such territory is characterized by urban growth or is adjacent to territory already characterized by urban growth (1991, p. 2921).

In accordance with the law, the designation of an urban growth area (UGA) for a period of twenty years is critical for planning and regulating land use. "Too much" or "too little" land within the UGA might lead to sprawl or inflation in housing prices respectively (Knaap and Hopkins, 2001, p. 314).

This paper focuses on the management of urban growth and the prevention of sprawl. The questions addressed are: what has been the recent pattern of sprawl development within the metropolitan area beyond the boundary of the urban growth area (UGA)? Can we consider low density residential expansion to be indicative of sprawl? How do we measure "low" density? Our research is designed to capture a short-term macroscopic view of the impact of the GMA and the spatial pattern of urban sprawl in the case of Bellingham, a small but rapidly growing metropolitan city in the Puget Sound Region of Washington State (Figure 1).

[FIGURE 1 OMITTED]

The Concept of Sprawl: A Brief Note

Sprawl is a recurrent theme in the literature on urbanization, yet, as Galster et al. (2000) pointed out, it remains an "elusive" concept primarily due to the lack of a commonly accepted operational definition and measurement criteria. In an effort to provide a "clearer conceptual and operational definition" of sprawl, Galster et al. (2000) proposed that sprawl be measured "as a condition of land use" depicting low value in one or more of eight dimensions of density, continuity, concentration, compactness, centrality, nuclearity, diversity, and proximity. Density appears to be the most frequently noted indicator in this multidimensional construct of the sprawl phenomenon (p.7). In a comprehensive study of sprawl, Burchell et al. (1998) undertook an analysis of the linkages between sprawl's "defining traits" and its positive and negative impacts. Burchell established a set of two matrices indicating the relative degree of linkages of a trait to its impacts (1998, pp.125-127). Leapfrogging (jumping from one area to another detached or non-contiguous area) and low density are the two elements that ranked high (1 and 2 respectively) in order of importance among the ten elements of sprawl as "a...

NOTE: All illustrations and photos have been removed from this article.



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