Chatham Square, Manhattan
Matt Yglesias, Kevin Drum, and Ryan Avent have been discussing the political economy of anti-density regulations, and I have a lot of comments, but I’m not sure I have the time (or, really, the patience) to air all of them. So, we’ll see how long this post gets.
First of all, I think all this talk of federal policy is misguided. Writing about the federal government sells well in journalism since it reaches the widest audience, but even taking into account the feds’ massive power grab over the last century, the real action is still at the local level. Local property tax distortions favoring single family homes are widespread and egregious, but orders of magnitude more ink gets spilled about the relatively ineffectual mortgage interest tax deduction. Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac’s refusal to fund mixed use developments is unfortunate, but it’s nothing compared to the almighty parking minimum. So while obviously the rural-biased Senate isn’t doing urbanism any favors, the nation’s Greatest Deliberative Body is next to meaningless when compared to lowly municipal governments.
Secondly, I think that historically speaking, Ryan Avent is starting his analysis a few decades too late. He cites the Great Migration(s) of blacks out of the South and the law-and-order backlash as a reason that American politicians fear density, but the real anti-density legislation began around the turn of the century, decades before the black boogeyman hit the scene. And while the federal highway projects that Ryan cites were bad for cities, they were really the final nail in the coffin – urban business associations welcomed them as a cure for decentralization. In other words, cities were already in decline by the time the interstate highways started papering over neighborhoods. The real germ entered the system decades earlier.
In my opinion, at least, the original sin was the refusal of turn-of-the-century cities to accept elevated rapid transit systems. Huge cities like New York and Chicago got theirs before the anti-el sentiment really set in, and Philadelphia and Boston got barebones networks, but by the time this revolutionary technology reached the rest of America, public opinion was already decidedly against the private rapid transit networks. Though everyone loved the subway (well, sort of), burying rapid transit is much more expensive than building it above streets and alleyways, so few cities ever mustered up the funds to build subways. (This cannot be emphasized enough: Elevated lines were(/are?) cheap and profitable enough to be built by relatively apolitical private enterprise, whereas subways were not.) From this lack of els came horrible street crowding and congestion as people piled into overburdened at-grade streetcar lines. From this congestion came height limits, and from these height limits came sprawl, and from sprawl came the automobile and parking lots, and by the Great Depression, development pretty much ended. In the decades afterward the city was really running on vapors, a dead man walking, only being propelled by the formidable momentum built up during the greatest period of urban expansion that America has ever known. This explains why people like Kevin and Ryan seem to be concentrating on the post-WWII period, but it’s something they’re going to have to get over if they ever want to truly understand what happened to density in America. (Note: Much of my knowledge from this period comes from Robert Fogelson’s Downtown, which I’ve promoted on this blog incessantly.)
But even the anti-el animus requires an explanation. This is a much more philosophical debate, but I believe that it’s simply human nature to want the government to provide goods (and sprawl – “light and air” – are definitely goods; as much as I love the city, of course my money-is-no-option ideal would be to live in a sprawling mansion in the middle of Central Park) that the state really has no business providing. (Now, I recognize that this might be hard for the liberals engaged in this debate to accept, since they don’t seem to see the question of private vs. public as particularly relevant.) The question then becomes, why did Europeans and Asians resist the temptation to subsidize sprawl, with the US only now vaguely coming to its senses? The reason, I think, is twofold: a) we have a lot of physical space to sprawl, and b) we are a very prosperous nation with a lot of wealth for the government/suburban constituencies to leach off of. After WWII, Europe and Japan were devastated and could not afford to bear the cost of subsidized sprawl. Later in the century we could leach off of our tech sector (think: Silicon Valley, the Research Triangle, and Route 128) to sustain the sprawl. Eventually I think that will come to an end and we’ll have to scale back (land will never be a constraining factor for us), but unfortunately, I’m not sure that I see that in the near future. Yes, there are rumblings now, but we’re still too rich of a nation to be forced to reconsider these wealth-sucking policies in any serious way.
(Also, a side note to Kevin Drum: That rural vs. urban chart you showed leaves out the suburbs entirely, lumping them instead in the “urban” column. This has always been a pet-peeve of mine. I understand why researchers do it, because it’s difficult to disaggregate “cities” from “suburbs,” but if that’s the best we can come up with, it’s probably better to just leave it out of the debate entirely.)
You could at least spell Ryan Avent’s name right …
Where’s the fun in that?
I’d say the anti-urban bias in America goes back further than any of you have mentioned, and the roots were more cultural before they found their expression in actual institutions or infrastructure. Jefferson considered cities hotbeds of pestilence and immorality and lauded the self-sufficiency of the independent farmer, and he was pretty important. He also wasn’t alone in this thought, especially as Americans sought to define themselves in opposition to Europe for a while. Then consider all of the 19th century sermons evoking Old Testament imagery (Sodom and Gomorrah, Babylon, etc.) to define cities as corrupt places of sin, later secularized into anonymity and break-down of community values. There’s also the fact that the cities of the early industrial revolution really were pretty rough – outbreaks, heavy pollution, actual overcrowding – searing an image into the American psyche that is hard to overcome. All of this before the 20th century started …
I’d say that the issue is not so much that the state has no business providing light and air, but rather that what people want is something that is impossible: for lots of people to have a mansion in the middle of central park. If everyone has that, you’re no longer in Manhattan, you’re in a rural area, minus the farming.
What is your fundamental objection to the state providing sprawl as such (assuming it is a conscious political decision, with a democratic electorate choosing to bear the consequences)? My objection to sprawl is that it is an extremely costly good, resulting in cities that fail to capture most of the benefits of the city. I don’t think a rational, informed body politic would choose it, but I don’t think it would be illegitimate for it to be chosen.
But then why didn’t these anti-urban attitudes prevent the turn-of-the-century urban boom?
I can only speak for myself (Adam), but the reasons you state are examples
of why we should be skeptical of democracy in the face of all the
fundamentalist rhetoric in the US about democracy. (admit it, you probably
felt uneasy when you read “we should be skeptical of democracy”) Sure, it’s
better than autocracy and various other forms of the state, but I don’t
think that an act is legitimate just because a majority prefers it. Just
think of the implication to civil liberties if “the majority rules” were
universally applied to all aspects of life…
Democracy doesn’t always work for everyone when a group of us order pizza
for the Super Bowl – so does it work when determining land use patterns of a
huge land mass? I argue, “no.”
My main problem with sprawl is that it isn’t what people really want. It’s
a land use pattern determined by various forms of intervention. I don’t
have a moral problem with sprawl as a consequence, but have moral problems
with the means that sprawl was achieved. Thus, I see sprawl (and related
efficiency and environmental consequences) as symptom of vast and numerous
government interventions. Take out the moral aspect, and I don’t like it
because it doesn’t satisfy my subjective preference for agglomeration,
efficiency, and aesthetics.
Yup, the “garden city” movement was in full bloom well before 1900. We imported it directly from England, and it’s still the model of suburban development in both countries today. It was certainly never about guiding the development of whole cities (it couldn’t have been, especially at first, because only the wealthy could afford to live that way). That’s why it had little effect on the overall urban boom.
Yup, the “garden city” movement was in full bloom well before 1900. We imported it directly from England, and it’s still the model of suburban development in both countries today. It was certainly never about guiding the development of whole cities (it couldn’t have been, especially at first, because only the wealthy could afford to live that way). That’s why it had little effect on the overall urban boom.
Question: What are the origins of anti-density sentiment?
I think there are a few origins — actually quite a few:
a) As a previous poster mentioned, in the U.S. there’s pretty much always been an anti-city sentiment — and being anti-city is being essentially anti-density. Thomas Jefferson is usually cited as the chief spokesperson for this sentiment.
b) Before the great black migration, there were other great migrations of other impoverished ethnic groups (e.g., Irish, Italians, Jews, etc.), and these immigrants were packed into high-density slums that also fueled an anti-city/anti-density sentiment.
c) The high densities created by industrialization and mass migration intensified the problems that any settlements of the time had (e.g., sanitation), and this too fueld anti-city/anti-density sentiment (and,in particular, help give rise to the Garden City movement).
Jane Jacobs has mentioned this a number of times in her books, including “Death and Life of Great American Cities.” She says that we tend to forget how many problems of the 19th Century city have been greatly ameliorated, and that given the problems of filth, disease, etc. in 19th Century cities, it’s easy to understand the origins of anti-city (and anti-density) sentiments (while disagreeing with the proposed, illogical anti-city solutions). For instance, see her chapter on the automobile — where she points out how automobiles solved some terrible problems that cities used to have with horses. (Basically Jacobs’ point is that you solve a problem [e.g., contagious diseases] by solving it — not by running away from it. And cities — because of the pluses of high densities — are the places where these problems are most likely to be solved.)
d) The rise of railroads (and elevated and subways) made lower density alternatives to the city (trolley car suburbs, railroad suburbs, subway suburbs, etc.) practicable (e.g., main line Philadelphia, Westchester, New York, Queens, New York ). (Garden Cities were, in reality, railroad suburbs). Then the automobile came along and made even lower density alternatives to the city practicable.
e) The invention of the skyscraper, raised the spector of sunless cities, and this was a big impetus to height and set-back regulations that were the forerunners of density regulations.
f) I think the theories of the Chicago School of sociology, particularly the Concentric Ring Theory of Robert Park and Ernest Burgess, have fueled a great deal of anti-city/anti-density sentiment. In particular, there is one set of illustrations that I believe come out of this school that seem to me to be the embodiment of anti-city/anti-density sentiment today. Basically it shows a nice quiet suburban block being slowly transformed over time into a slum. Don’t recall where I saw the illustration, but I believe I saw it in an encyclopedia as a kid.
g) A popularization of this Park/Burgess concept can be found in the children’s book, “The Little House” (1942), by Virginia Lee Burton. Walt Disney (who also was anti-city) made an animated version (1952) of this book.
h) The legendary set (by Jo Mielziner) for the original production of “Death of a Salesman” is another illustration of this anti-city/anti density sentiment. In the “good old days,” when the family first moved into the house, it is a handsome, free-standing “suburban home.” But as time goes on and the lives of the characters darken, you seen ugly six-story, or so, apartment houses closing in on it.
i) More glorifications of suburbia (and implied criticisms of cities) can be found in the “Dick and Jane” readers that baby boomers were taught to read from.
j) Baby boomers also grew up with TV shows that basically glorified suburbia (e.g., “Life of Riley,” “Father Knows Best,” “Leave It to Beaver,” etc.) and that denigrated high-density cities (even if they did so unintentionally, e.g., Jackie Gleason’s, “The Honeymooners,” with its UGLY apartment and urban setting — perhaps the ugliest ever.)
Interestingly (and not totally coincidentally, so it seems to me) New York City experienced its recent revival during a time when more pro-urban density TV shows became popular (e.g., “Friends” and, most particularly, “Seinfeld”).
Benjamin Hemric
Wednesday, Feb. 2, 2011, 9:45 p.m.
P.S. — I hope people will not mind if any future posts of mine in this thread, if there are any, are done as independent comments (ie.., outside the nesting feature).
P.P.S. — Here are some additional items that I think should be added to a list of the origins of anti-density sentiment (both current and past):
k) Hollywood movies — Although some Hollywood films of the 1930s, etc. glamorized cities (especially as places for the well-to-do), I think they more often tended to glamorize suburban living and to denigrate urban living (especially for those who were not well-to-do).
l) “Futurama,” the General Motors pavillion at the 1939 World’s Fair is another oft-cited illustration of pro-suburban/anti-urban sentiment. I didn’t see it, but I did see the 1964 version, and it did seem to me that it was glorifying suburbia and what we would now call, perhaps, exurbia (e.g., modernistic homes nestled into mountains, etc.).
m) Until relatively recently, magazines and newspapers (including Sunday supplements) in general — It seems to me that until relatively recently the “media” in general has almost uniformly tended to glorify low-density suburbia as the kind of living that people should aspire to and to denigrate high-density urbanism as the kind of living that upwardly mobile people should try to escape.
Benjamin Hemric
Wed., Feb. 2, 2011, 11:05 p.m.
The government was too weak and divided to enforce those attitudes. The preferred mode of suburbanization in the late 19th century was building transportation to the suburbs rather than regulation; because of route controversies, NIMBYism, and plain partisanship, it was always slower than the pace of natural urban expansion. Every time a new rail line reached a suburb, it had already been developed with tenements.
The federally funded highway network was what broke this cycle. The feds were much more unified and coherent, so they were faster than the market. And they began paving rural and intercity highways instead of starting with urban travel, so they were not limited by the extent of the lines the way urban rail was. Afterward cities also stumbled upon Euclidean zoning, soon generalized by the federal government.
Is it that democracy doesn’t work for land use planning, or is it that the American version of democracy has delegated what should be regional or state-level land use decisions to local actors (towns, cities)? If the citizens of city A, population 1 million, want to extend a dense industrial area into a nearby town, population 20,000, but that town is able to exclude that growth by zoning itself entirely for large-lot residential, is that even “democratic” at all? (Approximately the facts of Euclid v. Ambler).
That’s a great question. I think it is beneficial to be skeptical of
democracy and aware of its limitations in all situations. But as a rule of
thumb, it becomes less just and efficacious the more diverse and large the
group is. So, it tends to be worse when decisions are made at the state and
regional-level than at the local level. The problem in land use is,
the political system pits different localities against each other, all at
the expense of the minority stakeholders within the localities.
For example, you say, “If the citizens of city A, population 1 million, want
to extend a dense industrial area into a nearby town…” But we know you
don’t actually mean that there is a consensus. There are certainly
stakeholders within the town whos desires will be thwarted against their
will through the democratic process. So, I would say “yes, it is
democratic.” But is it just for all?
This is why I argue that the marketplace [mediated by dispute resolution
institutions such as insurance, courts, etc.] is a better (more just /
better outcome) method of resolution of diverse desires than democracy or
planners empowered through democracy.
The problem is that we have democratically voted to impose way too many restrictions. It doesn’t matter if height limits and parking requirements are statewide or citywide — either way it ends up stifling the natural evolution of density.
Andres Duany brought up the failure of democracy in land use planning in one of his lectures that’s posted on YouTube (sorry I can’t remember offhand which one that was). He pointed out how in the US the most vocal people (whether for or against a project) are those with a vested interest in them. They’re the developer, the neighbors, the long-time residents, or the city government, and in our system they get the most influence due to their proximity to the project, whether spatially or temporally. This is how NIMBYism gains power, for the vocal minority doesn’t even have to be particularly vocal or large in order to exert a lot of influence, while there’s no general citizens to take an unbiased view of the project.
In other countries that actually understand how the democratic process works (I believe Duany mentioned Australia), they get a random sampling of the population, say from the jury pool, to represent the overall interests of the community. Those people represent the greater good, which is so often lost in the selfishness of American democracy. Those randomly selected people look at the developer and nearby neighbors, who are still welcome to provide input, as a vested interest that must be viewed with skepticism and intense scrutiny. That’s how such countries can get beachside community centers and parks, while here in the US it can be a monumental struggle to get a mere sidewalk to the beach between houses. That’s how they can get comprehensive bicycle networks built, while here we have one or two property owners that can scuttle a project to add bike lanes because it could eliminate the parking space they use once a week. That’s how they can densify areas to improve the tax base and fun new transit, while we end up down-zoning neighborhoods and rerouting buses to keep the riff-raff away.
That’s interesting. I didn’t know that. Although I can see where this
could have its problems, it sounds like a better method for conflict
resolution than the current process that empowers the most vocal NIMBYs at
the expense of others in the community and those who wish to be in the
community.
Hey Ben, like your comments but not using nested is always going to drive me and anyone that used usenet and slashdot in the past spare … basically it’s fine as a strategy for small numbers of comments but when they go beyond about 10 on one post it becomes completely unmanagable.
What I saw Duany mention positively was Singapore, an autocratic country. If you’re a starchitect of any kind, you really don’t like any group of people having power over whom you may not have control.
The way things get done in the better-run European countries is completely different, and is based on consensus. To build a major project, the government agency approaches all of the local stakeholders, spending years on design and on route choice. It will make sure to release realistic cost estimates and stick to them, which means that it maintains high credibility. (The budget for the Gotthard Base Tunnel was released for the 1992 referendum on the project, and so far the actual costs have not run over.)
Isn’t the simple answer here cheap oil? The US had plenty of domestic oil — more than it needed — throughout a good chunk of the 20th century. Doesn’t everything follow from that? Of course a country that had an abundant natural resource would orient itself in a way that took maximum advantage of that resource. The Europeans didn’t have cheap, domestic oil, so they pursued a different path.
Or am I oversimplifying here?