Tracy Hills
Tracy Hills, California
August 2021–June 2024
Tracy Hills is a new master-planned community in the San Joaquin Valley, two hours east of San Francisco, California.
Large freeway billboards indicate the locations of the new villages coming soon on the former dry grazing fields that slope down to the flat desert floor.
The grasslands have been aggressively graded and paved. Cheaply constructed houses with weak beams, thin plywood, and flimsy plastic siding sprawl the landscape. Rolls of artificial turf are piled up, ready to be unfurled into new lawns.
Even in the midst of a climate crisis, rising housing costs are pushing families into these far-flung “exurbs” like Tracy Hills, which are being developed out beyond the suburbs.
Now fifty years since Adams published The New West, what has improved with our current condition? What is the value of “the fruit of our progress”, or lack there-of?
As such, this series does not present only cynicism or disaffection but rather expresses elements of concern for the land and humanity, identifying a different path forward than what is found in Tracy Hills.
Tracy Hills, California
August 2021–June 2024
Tracy Hills is a new master-planned community in the San Joaquin Valley, two hours east of San Francisco, California.
Large freeway billboards indicate the locations of the new villages coming soon on the former dry grazing fields that slope down to the flat desert floor.
The grasslands have been aggressively graded and paved. Cheaply constructed houses with weak beams, thin plywood, and flimsy plastic siding sprawl the landscape. Rolls of artificial turf are piled up, ready to be unfurled into new lawns.
Even in the midst of a climate crisis, rising housing costs are pushing families into these far-flung “exurbs” like Tracy Hills, which are being developed out beyond the suburbs.
Now fifty years since Adams published The New West, what has improved with our current condition? What is the value of “the fruit of our progress”, or lack there-of?
As such, this series does not present only cynicism or disaffection but rather expresses elements of concern for the land and humanity, identifying a different path forward than what is found in Tracy Hills.
