Scenes from Around the Garden State: Radburn

Radburn is a planned community in Fair Lawn, New Jersey. Not planned in the sense of mass produced developments featuring McMansions with "great rooms" and 3 car garages. Not planned in the sense of "communities" with faux chic names spelled with and extra "E" (i.e Pointe) or that pay homage to the landscape and wildlife they destroyed ( i.e. "Colt's Run").

Rather, Radburn was developed with the idea of maximizing green space, back in a day and age where housing was often crowded, and open space an afterthought. Neighbors and houses were linked by pedestrian paths, rather than roadways. Radburn is within walking distance to the a train station on NJ Transit's Bergen Line. Stores are with in walking distance too, although since it's inception, major retailers have moved further out towards the strip malls on soulless stretches like Fair Lawn's Broadway (also known as Route 4).

While it was developed in 1929 as a "town for the motor age", the auto crazed suburbanite of today would be sadly disappointed in Radburn. While cul-de-sacs are an integral part of Radubrns' design, they are on a much smaller scale than today's typical suburb. Trucks will not be turning around in Radburn's cul-de-sacs, as would be the case in most of white American suburbia.