A. GuIpDELINES FoR STATE INVOLVEMENT IN THE DEVELOPMENT OF 
New Communities In Massacuusetts: TowarpD A STATE URBAN 
GrowtTH Po.uicy 
(By Lawrence Elliott Susskind, M.I.T.) 
Editor’s Note: This is an excerpt of Mr. Susskind’s paper; from 
which we include the introduction, Chapters I, III and IV. 
This paper is concerned with establishing guidelines for State 
involvement in the development of new communities in Massachu- 
setts. State planning for urban growth, specifically State involvement 
in the planning and development of new communities must be under- 
taken within a systematic and carefully defined intergovernmental 
framework. State policies and plans expressed in the form of public 
works, the allocation of resources, the use of taxing and borrowing 
powers, the development of transportation linkages and the sum 
total of all actions taken by various State agencies can ‘make or 
break” new community development in the Commonwealth of 
Massachusetts. 
At present no State policy exists which can reconcile the competing 
interests which play a role in directing urban growth in the Common- 
wealth: (1) the developers worried about their ability to control, 
program, and profit from urban development; (2) the residents of 
urbanizing areas concerned about State intervention in local decisions 
relative to community and environmental development, and (3) the 
wider regional interests concerned about the quality, scope and phas- 
ing of development. 
Chapter I offers a definition of new communities and establishes 
the theoretical rationale for the development of new communities in 
metropolitan urban areas as part of a State urban growth policy. 
Chapter II measures the potential for the development of new com- 
munities of approximately 50,000 persons each throughout Massa- 
chusetts, and indicates those areas which are ripe for such develop- 
ment. Chapter III examines three alternative new community devel- 
opment strategies indicating the political and financial feasibility as 
well as the public benefits of each strategy. Chapter IV concludes with 
a discussion of alternative incentive-control systems for guiding 
urban growth, with an outline for an intergovernmental planning- 
implementation framework for new community development and a 
series of questions which need to be considered by State officials and 
the public at large prior to the implementation of a State program 
for new community development. 
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