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Urban[ism] Legend: Density is Bad for the Environment

This is a topic I want to cover more thoroughly, but for now I present a one hour documentary video on green buildings for you leisurely viewing. I came across the snagfilms website from a recent Wall Street Journal article. Most of the documentary videos lean towards “progressive” tastes, but hopefully they’ll add some free-market content such as Friedman’s “Free To Choose” videos. Through quick browsing, this video seemed to be the only one that had relevance to Market Urbanism. I think it does a decent job dispelling the Urbanism Legend that high density is bad for the environment. However, some of the commenters seem to fall for the myth that further government intervention will somehow solve the problem. They all seem to forget that progressive government meddling in transportation and land use has done much to cause the problems of sprawl and auto-dependency that modern progressives are now trying to fight with more intervention. [Watching it a second time, I wanted to point something out. One commenter stated that European and Japanese developers plan for a 50 year life-cycle of buildings, while in the US only 12 months. This is absolutely false. Developers usually use a 10-year discounted cash flow model, but still incorporate a sale value of the property based on projected incomes in the 11th year. That sale value could be calculated on the cash flow of the next 10 years and so, on, but they usually use a more simple calculation for the 10th year sale. They could use 50 year models, but they wouldn’t give much better information than the standard 10-year model. European developers use the same methods as the US. Anyone who says otherwise is trying to decieve you.]

Neighborhood Walkability Scores

A recent Wall Street Journal blog post refers to a website called Walk Score. Walk Score will let you know the walkability of a neighborhood based on the address you type in. The site also features ranking of cities and neighborhoods. Here are the city rankings: 1. San Francisco, CA 2. New York, NY 3. Boston, MA 4. Chicago, IL 5. Philadelphia, PA 6. Seattle, WA 7. Washington D.C. 8. Long Beach, CA 9. Los Angeles, CA 10.Portland, OR I assume San Francisco beat New York, because New York City includes the less walkable areas such as Staten Island. I can brag that I have lived in 3 of the top 4 most walkable cities: New York, Chicago, and Boston. (although I actually lived right accross the river in Cambridge, which I think still counts) I was also pleasantly surprised at how many of Milwaukee’s neighborhoods ranked above 90. How It Works Walk Score helps people find walkable places to live. Walk Score calculates the walkability of an address by locating nearby stores, restaurants, schools, parks, etc. Walk Score measures how easy it is to live a car-lite lifestyle—not how pretty the area is for walking. What does my score mean? Your Walk Score is a number between 0 and 100. Here are general guidelines for interpreting your score: 90–100 = Walkers’ Paradise: Most errands can be accomplished on foot and many people get by without owning a car. 70–89 = Very Walkable: It’s possible to get by without owning a car. 50–69 = Somewhat Walkable: Some stores and amenities are within walking distance, but many everyday trips still require a bike, public transportation, or car. 25–49 = Car-Dependent: Only a few destinations are within easy walking range. For most errands, driving or public transportation is a must. 0–24 = […]

Cuba Grants Limited Property Rights to Farmers

Cuba reforms turn to state land Cuba is to put more state-controlled farm land into private hands, in a move to increase the island’s lagging food production. Private farmers who do well will be able to increase their holdings by up to 99 acres (40 hectares) for a 10-year period that can be renewed. Until now, private farmers have only been able to run small areas of land. The BBC’s Michael Voss, in Havana, says this is one of President Raul Castro’s most significant reforms to date. Since the 1959 revolution, some Cubans have been allowed to run small family farms. But most agriculture has been placed in the hands of large, state-owned enterprises. Our correspondent says these have proved highly inefficient – half the land is unused and today Cuba imports more than half its needs. Rising world food prices will cost the country an extra $1bn this year. The presidential decree was published in the country’s Communist Party newspaper, Granma. In it, co-operatives are also allowed to add an unspecified amount of additional land for 25 years, with the possibility of renewing the lease. Grants cannot be transferred or sold to third parties.

Reason.org’s Staley Not in Favor of Property Rights if…

That is, he argues that private property should be subject to government planning restrictions if a developer building densely on its property creates a traffic burden on government roads. Wooten points out that any solution to Atlanta’s traffic congestion has to focus on roads, not transit or land use. In a more interesting twist, he takes local policy makers to task for approving higher density zoning without making the commitment to improving the road network to support it. Hmmm… Interesting point of view from a so called free-market organization that claims to support individual property rights over government planning. I think I’ll remove them from the blogroll. click, click, done Add Staley to the list of Free-Market Impostors.

Glaeser on Affordability of NY vs Houston

Harvard Economist Ed Glaeser wrote an opinion piece in the New York Sun about the differences in housing affordability and other costs of living between Houston and New York. New York is naturally more expensive than Houston because the geographical constraints force higher density development, which is more expensive to build. New York’s highly regulated land use and zoning process adds more constraints that exacerbate this problem. On the flip side, Houston has few geographical constraints and relatively loose regulation, allowing the market to allocate housing more efficiently. In conclusion, Glaeser recommends that New York could do much to improve affordability by loosening it’s many regulations. NY Sun – Houston, New York Has a Problem Why is it so much more expensive in New York? For one, supplying housing in New York City costs much, much more — for a 1,500-square-foot apartment, the construction cost alone is more than $500,000. Also, part of the reason is geographic: an old port on a narrow island can’t grow outward, as Houston has, and the costs of building up — New York’s fate, especially in Manhattan — will always be higher than those of building out. And the unavoidable fact is that New York makes it harder to build housing than Chicago does — and a lot harder than Houston does. The permitting process in Manhattan is an arduous, unpredictable, multiyear odyssey involving a dizzying array of regulations, environmental, and other hosts of agencies. A further obstacle: rent control. When other municipalities dropped rent control after World War II, New York clung to it, despite the fact that artificially reduced rents discourage people from building new housing. Houston, by contrast, has always been gung ho about development. Houston’s builders have managed — better than in any other American city — to make the […]

Amateur Economist: Zoning Hurts Housing Affordability

G.L.C. at Amateur Economist wrote an informative article on zoning, an issue which always gets attention at Market Urbanism – Why Zoning Laws Are No Longer a Benefit to U.S. Home Buyers Virtually every town in the United States has zoning laws which affect land use, lot size, building heights, density, setbacks, and other aspects of property use. Zoning laws are government regulated restrictions on how a particular piece of land can be used – residential, commercial, industrial, agricultural, and recreational. They impose many use restrictions, such as the height and overall size of buildings, their proximity to one another, what percentage of the area of a building lot may contain structures, and what particular kinds of facilities must be included with certain kinds of uses. G.L.C. goes on to discuss how zoning restrictions, such as height and density restrictions, constrain the supply of housing nationwide. These supply restrictions causes prices to be higher than they would be without restriction. The article also cites data from research by Ed Glaeser and Joe Gyourko: Edward Glaeser of Harvard and Joe Gyourko of the University of Pennsylvania studied this problem and attributed the error on the supply side to zoning restrictions. They studied the data from over two dozen American cities and concluded that zoning restrictions kept the housing prices high and did not allow competitive forces to correct the supply and demand position.

Rangel Now Only Hoards Three Rent Controlled Apartments

[flickr photo: aznatca68] Democratic Congressman Charlie Rangel has announced that he will vacate the rent controlled apartment he has been using as a campaign office. This apartment is just one of four rent controlled apartments he is hoarding in the Lenox Terrace apartment building in Harlem. NY Times – Rangel to Relinquish Apartment Used as Office: Representative Charles B. Rangel has decided to move his campaign office out of one of four rent-stabilized apartments he leases in Harlem, his spokesman said on Monday. One of the units — a one-bedroom apartment that he paid for with money from his re-election fund and from a political action committee — had been used as a campaign office, despite city and state guidelines that require rent-stabilized apartments to be used solely as a primary residence. Because that apartment is rent-stabilized, Mr. Rangel paid $630 per month, while similar market-rate units in the building rent for $1,700 a month and higher. Under House ethics rules, a gift is defined as any “gratuity, favor, discount, entertainment, hospitality, loan, forbearance, or other item having monetary value.” And some suggest that the difference between what Mr. Rangel pays for the second, third and fourth apartments and the market rate could fit that definition. . But Mr. Rangel said that it was ludicrous to consider the rent-stabilized apartments a gift because he paid rent for them. He also said that two of the units were combined by a previous tenant. Rangel should either resign or return every penny he saved by hoarding this apartment while using it as a campaign office. For this apartment alone, that should be $1,000 per month for as long as he has used it as a campaign office. Also: Reason – Rangel’s Down, But He’s Not Out

Congressman Rangel Legally Plunders $30,000/year in Four Rent Controlled Apartments

[update! Rangel Now Only Hoards Three Rent Controlled Apartments] In case you missed it, powerful New York Congressman Charlie Rangel has been hoarding four apartments in Harlem’s Lenox Terrace. Coincidently (perhaps not so coincidently) Lennox Terrace is the same building where New York’s Governor Patterson, Patterson’s father, former Manhattan Borough President, Percy E. Sutton, and Rangel’s Cheif of Staff, Jim Capel hoard rent-controlled (ahem, Rent Stabilized as it’s referred to by NY politicians) apartments. Not only does Rangel have four rent-controlled apartments in the building, but he has been using one of those apartments as a campaign office! [flickr photo: jschumacher] New York Times – Rangel Defends Use of Rent-Stabilized Apartments: The Times reported on Friday that Mr. Rangel has four rent-stabilized apartments at Lenox Terrace, including three adjacent units on the 16th floor overlooking Upper Manhattan, in a building owned by one of New York’s premier real estate developers. (The apartment is featured in “Style and Grace: African Americans at Home,” a book published by Bulfinch Press.) Mr. Rangel, the powerful Democrat who is chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, uses his fourth apartment, six floors below, as a campaign office, despite state and city regulations that require rent-stabilized apartments to be used as a primary residence. Mr. Rangel, who has a net worth of $566,000 to $1.2 million, according to Congressional disclosure records, paid a total rent of $3,894 monthly in 2007 for the four apartments at Lenox Terrace, a 1,700-unit luxury development of six towers, with doormen, that is described in real estate publications as Harlem’s most prestigious address. The current market-rate rent for similar apartments in Mr. Rangel’s building would total $7,465 to $8,125 a month, according to the Web site of the owner, the Olnick Organization. The use of multiple apartments that might […]

Economakis Family Threatened by Friends of Rent Control

The Economakis family has been threatened my some members of the community who planned a protest tonight against their family using their own property as a home. See this truly despicable flyer calling friends of rent control to arms. [image from curbed] Here’s Mr. Economakis’ response: Response to the July 11, 2008 Protest – a threat to my family and property: I have always respected the rights of people to express themselves regarding my desire to make the building I own a home for me and my family. However, the latest expression of certain persons cannot go without comment. Our neighborhood was recently papered with a flyer announcing another protest in front of 47 East 3rd Street. This flyer states it is the work and the expression of a group identifying themselves as “LES” and is offensive on numerous fronts: not only for its profanity (is this really what our neighborhood children should be taught is an acceptable way to express oneself?) but for attributing to me the statement “Let Them Eat Cake”. I never made this statement nor any other like it. I find the statement offensive; and further I find its attribution to me to be threatening. As the statement was invoked to justify the death and destruction that came with the French Revolution, I hope that persons attending the protest do not mistakenly use it to justify the destruction of property. While I respect that people have the right to disagree with my position regarding wanting to make the building I own my home, and while I believe that these persons are allowed to exercise such disagreement through peaceful means, I am disturbed that the tenor of this protest is not only threatening in nature, but is also encouraging protestors to damage the very property they presumably […]

New Research on the Economics of Green Buildings

There is little reliable research into the economic returns of high-performance (green) features of buildings, but Professor John Quigley plans to release his groundbreaking research on the subject this Fall. I am very excited to learn this news, and will certainly look forward to reviewing the results. Especially if implementation could improve my own development practice. Professor John Quigley Discovers Green Building Pays Greenbacks Everyone’s talking about “going green,” but in the building industry, the cost of investment has been difficult to justify – until now. Haas Professor John Quigley has undertaken the first systematic analysis of environmentally sustainable construction and its economic impact on the real estate market. In the working paper, “Doing Well by Doing Good? Green Office Buildings,” Quigley and co-authors Piet Eichholtz and Nils Kok of Maastricht University, Netherlands, determined investments in proven green building practices lead to sizable increases in a property’s market value and effective rent, the average per-square-foot rent paid. Green-certified buildings produced an 8.5 percent increase in effective rent. The additional annual rent for going green amounts to almost $309,000, based on the average size building. Likewise, the incremental value of a green structure is an estimated $5.1 million more than an ordinary building. The study did not calculate the incremental cost of investing in green building practices. When asked why he decided to research the economic value of green-certified buildings, Quigley, the I. Donald Terner Distinguished Professor in Affordable Housing and Urban Policy, replied, “To see if this was hype or real.” While Quigley’s work concludes the resulting profitability is real, he is continuing to research why green commercial buildings produce higher rents and market value by using engineering data from the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). The research focused solely on commercial property. It first identified 694 buildings, green certified by […]

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