[StudentStuff]

Basically, in suburban sprawl areas where a 3 story building is a rare site, we generally have a lot of infrastructure for a small population. This costs money to maintain, and the tax base is nowhere near large enough to fund such upkeep.

Part of this is caused by parking minimums requiring half or more of any commercial lot be paved (forcing buildings further apart and causing excess parking to be built, and in residential settings this is caused by zoning and minimum lot and building size regulations.

All this causes a magnitude more infrastructure to be built to service this sprawl, from roadways to water, gas, power and sewer pipes.