Smart Growth is essentially a means to make more sustainable development choices in an effort to create vibrant urban centres, sustain a strong economy, ensure a healthy environment and combat urban sprawl.

The explanation of sprawl extends beyond demography and economic restructuring, however--policy has also played a significant role. Six policy areas, particularly, have contributed to increased urban sprawl, including:

• fiscal disparities between cities and towns;
• fragmented local governance;
• infrastructure subsidies that favor outlying locations and encourage the contruction of surplus housing and business space;
• disincentives against reinvestment in cities;
• exclusionary zoning in many towns; and
• limitations on the ability of incorporated jurisdictions to annex.

Urban Sprawl: A study of more than 200,000 people in 448 U.S. counties found that those living in low-density suburban communities spent less time walking and weighed 6 pounds more on average than those living in densely populated areas. Suburbanites were also found to be as likely as cigarette smokers to have high blood pressure. The average U.S. adult now spends 72 minutes a day behind the wheel, often alone.

Between 1966 and 1986, more than 3,000 square kilometres of rural land, mostly prime agricultural land, was lost to urban sprawl. It costs more to accommodate growth by building new roads, electrical lines, sewer and water infrastructure for new subdivisions and shopping centres, than to integrate people into existing areas.

Urban sprawl will cost Greater Toronto $69 billion in the next 25 years, unless steps are taken to make the city more compact, to improve transportation, and to ameliorate air quality. Gridlock alone costs Greater Toronto $2 billion per year in lost productivity

A recent [U.K.] Parliamentary Urban Affairs Sub-Committee concluded that: tall buildings are not an essential part of the urban renaissance and are not needed to curb urban sprawl. Developers can achieve high-density offices and housing in medium- and low-rise schemes in urban centres without all the disadvantages of high rise buildings .

The MPs went on to stress that transport capacity must be a major consideration in deciding whether a proposal for a tall building, or for any high-density development, is given planning permission. In London the lack of capacity poses a serious problem.