Levittown

Levittown is the name of several new towns in New York (Long Island), Pennsylvania, New Jersey^[1] and Puerto Rico, which were developed by William J Levitt in the late 1940s and 1950s; the Pennsylvania development was the largest planned community in the United States created by a single developer, providing over 17,000 family homes and community facilities on a 5,500 acre site. The homes were inexpensive and appealed to young couples or young families. Levittowns came to symbolise post-war American suburbia (the name was used as a generic term for privately developed suburban districts), and were criticised for providing a sterile environment and conformist atmosphere, in which a uniformity of age range, occupational habit and political allegiance (assumed to be Republican) would stifle diversity of thought. However, subsequent sociological studies of post-war suburbs have shown these assumptions to be incorrect.

Notes[edit]

1. ↑ The New Jersey development has reverted to the area's original name, Willingboro

External links[edit]

• http://server1.fandm.edu/levittown
• http://tigger.uic.edu/~pbhales/Levittown.html
• http://geography.about.com/od/urbaneconomicgeography/a/levittown.htm