i can't remember where i read it. probably william cronon in a discussion of metropole/hinterlands, but i've sat through a lot of political ecology of the urban/rural (specifically US) divide. suburbia was developed as a reaction to urban "crowding" (capitalist slums, poverty, disease). when rail systems were developing, commuter towns started popping up and there was this attempt to re-create "country living" for urban professionals. "safe" (re: less diverse) places to raise a family. at it's best, the promise was to deliver the conveniences of urban life, but with the clean air and open spaces of rural life. "a best of both worlds", that has of course generally become the worst of both.

even to this day, many of the traditional suburban homes have these vestigal features of country homes, shrunk down to comically unusable proportions (suburban front porches lol) with one big difference: the sides of these homes are nearly blank in terms of windows/views, to obscure the perceived existence neighbors' homes.

but, anyway, i think something that is lost in discussions of rural vs. urban life is the lack of a clear boundary between them and the interrelated processes that re-create them. rural life in america, from the near abandoned coal seems and rail spurs of central appalachia to the tribal lands of the great west are very much products, in character and use, of urban political and social processes. similarly, the world class cities of today are products of rural material and labor of communities, not to mention often populated by former rural families dislocated by the very cities they now call home.