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A Tale of Two Densities

I was catching up on posts over at The Old Urbanist, and came across his astute analysis of setbacks that many of you probably saw a while back. Focusing on the requirement for large front lawns in many towns across the country, Charlie Gardner writes: Whether this reflects a continuing market preference is unclear, since nearly all municipal zoning codes in the United States require large setbacks (see, e.g.,Charlotte), depriving homeowners of any choice in the matter.  The pattern has been replicated so relentlessly across the North American continent that alternative single-family residential designs may simply have been scrubbed from the collective imagination. Gardner and others attribute this bland landscape in large part to Frederick Law Olmsted, and he certainly did support increased greenery in urban areas and lawns that run seamlessly across property lines. However, I think it’s important to distinguish between Olmsted’s vision and the land use regulations that have imposed some version his ideal on American suburbs. Olmsted did promote planned communities, but only local governments have had the authority to make his vision law. In thinking of Olmsted’s planned communities of communities built in Olmsted’s style, Baltimore’s Roland Park immediately comes to my mind. This turn-of-the-century neighborhood was one of the country’s first suburbs. Of course Roland Park is far from an urbanist neighborhood, and it’s easy to fault Olmsted for overlooking the crucial civic aspect of drawing neighbors to the sidewalks and streets for spontaneous interaction. However, (and I realize this may be a minority opinion), I think that it is a lovely neighborhood, and it’s even relatively pedestrian friendly. Clearly, it has little in common with the “snout house” suburbs that Gardner discusses in relation to setback requirements. Part of Roland Park’s charm is that it achieves the feeling of being a green enclave because it lies among denser […]

When does local industrial policy succeed?

Here’s something to keep in mind when you hear mayors making plans for things like designated green energy zones or tech clusters: Q: Has anything surprised you about downtown’s recovery? A: This was always a financial center. Now we have a lease for a million square feet from Condé Nast. That is a change. The diversity has been a surprise to me. That’s from a Crain‘s interview with Larry Silverstein, whose firm is building the 1 World Trade Center. It’s going to be a big building, no doubt, but it’s not a neighborhood. If Larry Silverstein couldn’t predict what kind of company would be the anchor tenant in this one tower, how can we trust cities to pick the futures of entire neighborhoods? Some of the plans – call them neighborhood industrial policies – can be quite elaborate. Vancouver Mayor Gregor Robertson’s Greenest City 2020 Action Plan, for example, calls for a “technology centre” with a “food processing enterprise incubator.” But how often does this sort of government urban-industrial planning work out? Silicon Valley (computer technology) and Singapore (biotech) both had their genesis in state-funded universities, though Singapore’s biotech sector was much more intentional than Silicon Valley’s tech industry. Financial hubs like London and Delaware and trade hubs like Hong Kong also required a certain amount of government foresight, in the form of good – i.e., laissez-faire – financial regulations and trade policies. But Vancouver isn’t a city-state, and Mayor Robertson can’t found a university or opt out of Canada’s federal patent laws. Most of these sorts of zones are implemented solely on the local level, which generally means targeted tax breaks, subsidies, and zoning set-asides. But while these might make great ribbon-cuttings and talking points, they are tepid policy tools at best, and I don’t believe any major agglomeration has […]

Before there were stimulus projects

In his new book, Railroaded: The Transcontinentals and the Making of Modern America, Richard White explores the financing of railroads in the American West and the political process behind it. In history books, this accomplishment is often looked on as a heroic feat of engineering and perseverance, but White offers a contrasting perspective of the abuse of tax dollars and manipulation of public opinion. I have not had a chance to read his book yet, but White offered a very interesting interview on Morning Edition. He explained: Western railroads, particularly the transcontinental railroads, would not have been built without public subsidies, without the granting of land, and more important than that, loans from the federal government … because there is no business [in the West at that time], there is absolutely no reason to build [railroads] except for political reasons and the hope that business will come. Unlike the railroads of the Northeast where Vanderbilt made his fortune, private financiers were uninterested in the West, where rails would not be making a foreseeable profit. If the expected benefits of an infrastructure project outweigh the expected costs, private financing will be available in the absence of public funding. Only when costs are expected to exceed benefits do infrastructure projects require subsidies. Historically, the argument that infrastructure is a public good that must be paid for by taxpayers has been proven false by private infrastructure projects ranging from highways to lighthouses, canals, and city streets. The transcontinental railroad, the largest public works project of its time, marked a shift toward American policy of relying principally on federally funded infrastructure rather than on entrepreneurs to supply these goods. In the 20th century, the Federal Highway Act of course dwarfed the scale of the transcontinental railroad, and today publicly provided infrastructure is claimed to […]

Death and life in a changing neighborhood

A controversy in DC’s Columbia Heights neighborhood exemplifies the common clash between NIMBYism and the achievement of Jane Jacob’s ideals. Some residents are opposed to a new proposed diner, Margot’s Chair, that would be open 24 hours a day. The owners already have three well-loved restaurants in DC, but passionate protestors wrote an inflammatory letter disparaging the change the diner will have on the neighborhood: While 11th Street has a host of small, unique, charming and creative business’s that give our neighborhood its own unique mystique – scaling up to a 24 hour business and a capacity of 1/4 of one thousand inside (not including outside – that permit will be applied for later) is pushing the envelope of the small Hip Strip we as residents have come to enjoy [sic]. As a former resident of this “Hip Strip,” I agree that the diner would continue the pattern of change that gentrification has brought to the neighborhood, a change which is of course subjective. However, a 24-hour restaurant would bring improvements to public safety that are about as objectively positive as changes to urban development can be, in line with the development that Jacobs advocates in The Death and Life of Great American Cities. Her work clearly refutes three of the protestors’ criticisms of the project. 1) While this area already has several restaurants and bars, a 24-hour diner would fill a different market niche and attract a different crowd, particularly in the mornings. Jacobs explains that one of the most important safety features a neighborhood can have is a mix of homes and businesses that lead people to be on the sidewalks at different times of the day. This diner would provide “eyes on the street” in exactly the hours when they are most needed in a neighborhood that struggles with crime […]

Setting the right transit safety standards

Two years ago, two trains on Metro’s red line collided killing nine people in DC. In response to this tragic accident, Metro is spending $1 billion to improve the system’s safety. WMATA’s interim General Manager told the Washington Post: “The system is absolutely safer than it was a year ago,” said Sarles, who was brought in on an interim basis in spring 2010. “We’ve adopted an attitude of we’re going to change the safety culture to one that’s going to prevent accidents.” Despite this accident, traveling by Metro is much safer than traveling by car in the DC region. The Coalition for Smarter Growth provides data on injuries and deaths on Metro compared to driving in DC and demonstrates that while eight passengers were killed on Metro from 2003-2009, 2,057 people died in car accidents from 2003-2008 in the DMV area. Per passenger vehicle mile fatalities are not available for the DC region, which would allow us to see these numbers in context. However, nationwide, heavy rail transit (Metro) averages 0.8 deaths per billion passenger miles compared to 7 for passenger vehicles, according to the same study. Last week, Senator Barbara Mikulski reintroduced the National Metro Safety Act last week which would require increased national regulations for all transit systems that operate on heavy rail. Figuring out how to pay for these safety measures would presumably be left up to localities, but at least some of the costs will likely be met through increased fares. At the margin, this will lead some riders to choose the more dangerous travel option of driving, perversely decreasing public safety. I’m not suggesting that Metro’s safety improvements are not money well-spent, but providing a guarantee of safety on public transportation would be infinitely expensive. In a world of finite resources, risks to human life […]

Rent Control: Trying to Make a Bad Policy Worse in NYC

NYC Rent Control

In New York, lawmakers are currently debating a compromise between New York City and upstate interests to change the policies that shape residents’ housing costs. New York City lawmakers are fighting for an extension and expansion of current rent control laws, while Governor Cuomo wants to tie this extension to a two percent cap on yearly property tax rate increases. Legislators voted against a temporary extension of the current policy on Wednesday. The Wall Street Journal reports: The Senate Democrats had been urged by tenant advocates to reject even a short-term extension in an attempt to ratchet up attention on their efforts to expand protections for existing tenants. “Our members have said from the start: extension is not enough—we need to strengthen regulations,” said Austin Shafran, a spokesman for the Senate Democrats. Senate Republicans, meanwhile, blamed the Democrats for the defeat, noting that they are acting against a bill pushed by Gov. Andrew Cuomo, a Democrat who supports expanding regulations. City lawmakers ignore that in fact rent control laws make housings costs more expensive for many residents and would-be residents in order to appease the fervent interest group of tenants who currently live in apartments priced below market rates. In 1972, the Swedish socialist economist Assar Lindbeck famously wrote, “In many cases rent control appears to be the most efficient technique presently known to destroy a city – except for bombing.” Why then, are New York City politicians  — politically to the right of Lindbeck — fighting to protect rent control today? Rent control policy is detrimental to all those unable to find housing at rent stabilized or controlled prices as well as landlords. Rent control has not had the dire impact in New York that it has in other cities because the number of apartments that are fully rent-controlled is […]

The Price of Parking in India

In Triumph of the City, Ed Glaeser offers a very insightful analysis of density restriction in India, home of some of the fastest growing cities in the world. He explains that while land use regulations are detrimental to economic growth in the United States, the consequences are much greater in developing countries. In particular he examines the strict FSI (floor space index, equivalent to FAR) limits in Mumbai and the ramifications for business there. This week at India Lives in her Cities Too, Karthik Rao-Cavale offers and in-depth analysis of the impact of parking requirements in India. In New Delhi’s Khan Market, one of the most upscale shopping destinations in India, business owners are fighting against fees for parking, which the Environmental Pollution Authority has mandated. The case is currently at the High Court, and could have significant bearings for the future provision of parking in India. The Times of India reports on the specifics of the case. The New Delhi Municipal Council that owns the garage wants to begin to start charging for use of the garage, but the traders at the market propose they could begin compensating the council to maintain free revenue for their customers. The court has ruled that parking will remain free for customers for now, with the market’s businesses paying a fee to the NDMC. Currently, parking mandates play an important part in new development in India’s cities. The Urban Development minister supports requiring parking for all new buildings. This is on top of the extreme FSI limits in some Indian cities (1.33 in Mumbai for new construction). Rao-Cavale suggests that instead of providing parking at no cost, the NDMC should sell its garages: The task of providing parking primarily belongs to the private sector. The government can permit paid on-street parking where the […]

Some notes on slums and free markets

Recently I’ve been seeing a lot of articles about slums (the NYT on Gurgaon, India, and the Guardian on Cairo), and inevitably the phrase “free market” gets thrown around. And as it should – so-called “slums” often have very minimal active governance, and as a result they often have very dynamic economies and upwardly mobile citizens (something even the New York Times and Guardian, two very liberal papers, recognize). But it’s lazy to equate them with the free market, and unfortunately I see a lot of people doing that. One problem with slums, from a free market point of view, is that only certain investments are secure. People and their houses (well, at least the owner-occupied ones) are the safest, especially in democracies like Brazil and India. Though of course there are stories of people’s homes in slums being demolished or taken by the government without compensation, it’s my understanding that this is becoming rarer as slum dwellers grow in number and political power. Residents are likely to get titles in some Hernando de Soto-inspired regularization scheme, so people invest in their homes. Residential areas harden as sheet metal turns into bricks, houses get proper roofs, and we start to see two- and three-story structures. Infrastructure, however, is another story. While many newspapers I think generally exaggerate the lack of services (I refuse to believe the Times’ assertion, for example, that Gurgaon only has employer-funded mass transit – there must certainly be share taxi/small bus services, or at least motortaxis), there does appear to be a real lack. The poorer areas often have open sewers, and running water in homes is rare. Many critics take this as evidence that infrastructure – paved roads, mass transit, electricity, waste collection, water – will not be adequately provided for in a free market, which […]

Where have I been?

I (Stephen) have been focused on trying to find a job recently (speaking of which – if anyone’s got any freelance or permanent work or knows of anyone who might, I’m interested! [email protected]), so as you can see, posting has dropped off. Adam also hasn’t been posting much lately, but, as you may have noticed, we have a new blogger – market urbanists, meet Emily Washington! She’s already posted a few articles, and hopefully we’ll see many more. As for me, you can still read my writing, but you’ll have to accept it in 140-character chunks. Adam gave me the password to the Market Urbanism Twitter account (@marketurbanism) a few weeks ago with the idea that I would post links there and then collect them every few days in a post. I started tweeting a lot more than I though I would, though, and have been too lazy to collect them in a post. But, since I post about a dozen links a day there’s a lot of content, and even if you don’t use Twitter you can still check it out. Unfortunately, though, the webpage and RSS feed include what are sort of conversations with other users – basically any message that starts with an “@” sign, though not things that start with “RT @” – so you’ll get a lot of tweets that are just my half of the conversation with someone else. I don’t have a solution for this in the RSS feed (anybody know how to filter them out of the RSS feed, as Twitter would if you were following them?), but if you sign up and make a Twitter account and “follow” @marketurbanism, you’ll see the tweets on your twitter.com homepage as they were intended, without all the annoying half-crosstalk – it’s free and easy, […]

Irrational, or responsive to incentives?

In the Washington Post Brad Plumer editorializes on the choice of many Americans to accept longer commutes by car in exchange for larger homes far from their workplaces. He says that consumers are unable to accurately calculate the cost of their commutes, including time spent driving, leading them to make “irrational” choices about where to live. However, Plumer downplays the policies that encourage consumers to buy homes rather than rent and that allow them to partially externalize the costs associated with driving. Plumer asserts that when buying a house, consumers think they will value additional space more than they do, but he gives no convincing reason that their subjective valuation of home size is incorrect. If in fact if consumers did undervalue the time they spend commuting in relation to home size when they purchased a home, he gives no reason why they would not eventually realize this error and improve their situation by moving to a smaller home closer to a city center. His piece is written in response to Congressman Earl Blumenauer’s recent report on the topic of shielding Americans from volatility in the oil market. Blumenauer does credit the policy environment dating back to the 1944 Federal Highway Act for shaping the car-centric culture that many Americans live in today, and he supports policies that provide incentives for decreased reliance on cars. Blumenauer asserts, “For too long, the Federal government has disproportionately subsidized highways at the expense of other modes, reducing consumer choices.” Rather than moving away from determining transportation and urban development through legislation, he provides policy prescriptions at the federal, state, and local level to decrease consumers’ dependence on oil. For example, Blumenauer suggests that mortgage lenders should be encouraged to take transportation costs into account, making it easier for those living close to their […]

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