While there are those that argue in favor of suburban development and outward expansion, Polanski's Chinatown takes an opposing stance on this epidemic that started in the 1920s and 1930s. Polanski uses filmic techniques in order to represent resistance to the sprawl that, by 1974 (when the film was made), caused the L.A. metropolitan area to grow to epic proportions.
The Historical Sprawl of L.A.
2001, the Southern California Studies Center, University of Southern California, published a comprehensive article discussing the historical sprawl of Los Angeles. In it there exists census data and a look into the detrimental and/or beneficial effects of urban sprawl.
You can read the full report by following this link:
https://www.brookings.edu/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/fullreport.pdf
Description from the video:
Published on Apr 3, 2014
The expansion of built up urban land in Los Angeles, 1877 - 2000. Prepared for the NYU Stern Urbanization Project using data compiled by Shlomo Angel, Jason Parent, Daniel Civco, and Alejandro Blei for The Atlas of Urban Expansion, published by the Lincoln Institute of Land Policy.