Prior to post-WWII housing boom, most of the deed restrictions expired after 25- to 35- years. What this means is that in Houston's oldest, gridded neighborhoods, virtually all land is unrestricted. What happens to an established neighborhood with no land-use controls? Fine-grained, Jane Jacobs-style urbanism. Areas like the Heights, the Montrose, and the Third Ward exemplify this; a single “long block” may have a variety of structures spanning 100 years, with multiple uses. Clubs and coffeehouses operate on “backstreets” amidst garden apartments, and townhomes nestle against bungalows and stately old southern mansions. (It should be noted that there was always a loophole which allowed tiny-lot townhomes inside Loop 610, in defiance of the larger lot size restrictions that controlled development in the greater Houston sprawl.)

Also: One of the significant differences that *does* exist between Houston sprawl and other Texan or Midwestern cities is that Houston has a lot more land devoted to commercial/multifamily uses. In Dallas, Atlanta, or Kansas City, there are many high-traffic streets which are zoned purely residential, whereas in Houston, land deed-restricted to single family tends to nestle on the interior of the arterial superblocks, while most arterial frontage is retained as “unrestricted reserve,” to be developed into apartments or commercial pads. This pushes down rents, and also leads to other quirks, like an abundance of restaurants – Houstonians eat more meals out than the denizens of any other major American city.

Whichever is the better approach, they shouldn’t play both sides.

And yeah, I did neglect to mention Houston’s uncommonly large streets, which Lewyn also discusses in his paper. I guess I just felt that those were too much entrenched and difficult to change going forward, so I’d concentrate on the more malleable things. But reading about plans for redevelopment in Tysons Corner, where they want to make more city-like blocks, I guess I shouldn’t have been so hasty in ruling out re-gridding Houston’s streets as a way to encourage denser development.

Though actually, that brings up an interesting possibility – what if developers were given the rights to chop up blocks that they own, and put in either public streets or use the space as a private driveway, cafe seating area, or whatever? I’d be interested to know what barriers there are already to making that happen, and if the barriers were taken away, would it actually happen, or could it never actually be profitable?

When did the interests of developers become the test of free markets anyway? The developer is a very modern institution created, ironically, by the municipal marketplace.