Public spaces in suburbia and tourism destinations: Comparing New Jersey to the Netherlands

Public spaces in suburbia and tourist destinations have been strongly criticized in the 1990s. In this dissertation, I have evaluated the quality of three suburban spaces—a shopping mall, an office park and a regional park—and three spaces in tourist destinations—a theme park, a heritage site and a beach—both in New Jersey and the Netherlands. My aim was to answer the following three questions: (1) What are the important characteristics of public space? (2) How public are the spaces in suburbia and tourist destinations? (3) Are public spaces in suburbia and tourist destinations more public in the Netherlands, famed for its attractive cities and urban public spaces, than in New Jersey, renowned for its suburbs and sprawl? To answer these questions, I have used a combination of qualitative and quantitative techniques in a quasi-experimental design.; Based on an extensive survey of the literature on public space, I created a set of six characteristics. (1) Public access means that a space must be easily accessible by the relevant modes of transportation given the distance traveled, and people must have the right to enter it. (2)  Public use requires that categorical strangers are present, i.e. people who don't know each other and look different. (3) Use restrictions should accommodate as many people as possible, respect diversity while hindering the least and protect political rights. (4)  Public governance requires that at least the people governing a space are accountable to the public who uses it. (5) Public property requires a space to be in the hands of the government. (6)  Public history requires that a good public space be at least older than one generation and not be deceptively inauthentic.; The best public spaces analyzed in this study were beaches and suburban regional parks; the worst were theme parks, shopping malls and office parks. The two heritage sites were also good public spaces, but these conclusions cannot be generalized. Each of the case studies studied fulfilled a different combination of characteristics, indicating that this set of characteristics allows for a nuanced understanding of public space.; The only consistent difference between New Jersey and the Netherlands was that the Dutch spaces were better served by public transport and more easily accessible on foot and by bicycle. A larger share of households own a car in New Jersey, which compensates to some extent the bias caused by the lack of public spaces with good non-automobile access. Despite the large differences between cities in New Jersey and the Netherlands, their public spaces in suburbia and tourist destinations were strikingly similar.