Market urbanists such as myself tend to believe that if a place suffers from absurdly high housing prices, there is probably not enough new housing being built to accommodate rising demand.A recent paper argues that inadequate supply is not a significant part of the problem in high-cost … [Read more...]
what about singles?
Both smart growth supporters and sprawl apologists focus on the needs of families with children: sprawl defenders argue that only suburbia can accommodate the desires of parents, while some smart growth types argue that cities should require lots of two- and three-bedroom units downtown because … [Read more...]
The absence of gentrification causes displacement
Some progressives believe that gentrification causes displacement of poor people, that new market-rate housing causes such gentrification, and thus that new housing must be kept out of low-income neighborhoods.The first of these claims is based on the assumption that absent gentrification, … [Read more...]
Mini review: Suburb, by Royce Hanson
Suburb: Planning Politics and the Public Interest is a scholarly book about planning politics in Montgomery County, a (mostly) affluent suburb of Washington, D.C. The book contains chapters on redevelopment of inner ring, transit-friendly areas such as Friendship Heights and Silver Spring, but also … [Read more...]
Mini review: Vanishing New York, by Jeremiah Moss
I recently read a highly publicized pro-NIMBY book, Vanishing New York. The author, who goes by the pen name "Jeremiah Moss" tells a simple story: throughout New York, gentrification and chain stores are on the march, making the city rich and boring. The story has an element of truth: obviously, … [Read more...]
High Rents: Are Construction Costs the Culprit?
(cross-posted from planetizen.com)I have argued numerous times on Planetizen that increased housing supply would reduce rents. I recently read one counterargument that I had not fully addressed before: the claim that no amount of new housing will ever bring down urban rents because housing in … [Read more...]
Does Density Raise Housing Prices?
My last post, on urban geographic constraints and housing prices, led to an interesting discussion thread. The most common counter argument was that because dense cities are usually more expensive, density must cause high cost. But if this was true, cities would become cheaper as they became less … [Read more...]
Urban[ism] Legend: The “Geographically Constrained Cities” Fantasy
![Urban[ism] Legend: The “Geographically Constrained Cities” Fantasy](https://i1.wp.com/marketurbanism.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/10/geographical-constraints-e1514101076674.jpg?fit=700%2C466)
One common argument against building new urban housing is that cities are geographically constrained by their natural and political boundaries, and thus can never build enough housing to bring prices down. This claim rests on a variety of false assumptions.The first false assumption is that the … [Read more...]