The notion of living in pastoral splendor, in lage many-gabled homes on large, manicured lots, is well entrenched. People who grew up with it raise a clamor any time anyone proposes building utilitarian retail nearby. The concepts of mixed-use development and walkable neighborhoods threaten the ideals they, their parents, and possibly their grandparents have come to equate with proof of worthiness and achievement.

Even though the suburbs and exurbs greatly increase overall infrastructure costs, those costs are often spread uniformly across the community, with property owners in dense, long-established urban neighborhoods carrying an unfair share of the direct and indirect excess costs generated by suburban and exurban development.