In recent years there has been an influx of new housing developments on the Main Line, including in Wayne. Among the latest is 'Whitegate,' a new community in Wayne on the edge of King of Prussia. The land, near Martin's Dam, was farm land until very recently. 'Whitegate' is being built by Bentley Homes, which has built similar large communities in Bryn Mawr, Newtown Square and Devon. The names given to these communities are supposed to sound similar to the names of the grand estates of the Main Line's past, though they should not be likened to these older estates in any way.

It is true that the neighborhoods of North and South Wayne just about invented the business that Bentley is making money from. Bentley Homes comparable in many ways to the firm of Wendell & Smith, who constructed both of the large neighborhoods in Wayne before moving on to Overbrook Farms. These late 19th Century builders moved from former farm to former farm much like today's developers. However, time has changed this industry. Today's builders advertise designs which are supposed to evoke the sense of older homes, with stone facades and dormer windows. Yet their construction techniques and quality of materials cannot be compared to Victorian, or even early 20th Century homes. Older houses often have real oak staircases instead of plywood, stone which was taken from local natural quarries instead of made in factories, and real wood shingles instead of factory made strips-that-look-like-single-shingles or cheap stucco. Despite the apparent lack of quality of homes such as those at 'Whitegate,' they still tend to sell for much more than older homes. And they are selling, too.

Bentley's website says "Classic architecture and the preservation of natural settings is the trademark of Bentley Homes ... " If that is truly the case, then why are the homes designed to fit modern cost-cutting standards and why are they turning the "natural settings" they speak of into artificially sculpted and landscaped communities simply for their profit? I suppose this is progress; what happened to Wayne 100 years ago is now happening to areas such as Lancaster County, and 100 years from now it might be predicted that all the farmland there will be enveloped as well. The fact is that Wayne is losing all remnants of its agrarian past as we speak, which, although unfortunate in many ways, is probably inevitable in this world of urban sprawl.