(like in other Mexican cities, Reynosa’s downtown is centered on a pedestrian plaza filled with people, music and commerce / Scott Beyer)
1. This week at Market Urbanism
Shane Phillips points the finger to a major culprit in LA‘s affordability problems: Keep Los Angeles Affordable By Repealing Proposition U
Of the 29,000 acres zoned for commercial and industrial uses throughout LA, 70 percent saw their development capacity sliced in half, from a floor-area ratio (FAR) of 3.0 to 1.5. Since the city allows housing to be built in many of these zones, it didn’t just mean less office, retail, and manufacturing space, but fewer homes as well.
Emily Washington contributed to New Urbs at The American Conservative: Family-Friendly Cities Start With Schools
But where I depart from Schwarz is that public policy, not economic forces or renter preferences, is largely responsible for the lack of children in American cities. Specifically, education policy.
2. Where’s Scott?
Scott Beyer took a writing break this week to wander around Texas, visiting the towns of Cuero, Victoria, Corpus Christi, Kingsville, Brownsville, McAllen, and the Mexican border city of Reynosa. He has since returned to Dallas, and will be flying this week to Boulder, CO, for the first annual YIMBY conference. Tickets for the event are still available.
3. At the Market Urbanism Facebook Group
Alden Wilner creates a Wikipedia stub for Market Urbanism, Russ Nelson adds to it. We’d love to see the hive mind expand the page!
Adam Millsap‘s latest: What The Boom And Bust Of Williston, ND Teaches Us About The Future Of Cities
via Jonathan Coppage at New Urbs: Rescue Cities for Families
Shanu Athiparambath wrote, Indian Cities Need Private Fire Stations
Matt Robare sums up the Massachusetts zoning reform, which passed the Senate
Alex Bernstein wants to know the best objective and unbiases books to start reading
Asher Meyers suggest the benefit of Universal Basic Income extends to urban issues based on Charles Murray‘s editorial
via Krishan Madan: L.A. County Is Proposing To Tax Millionaires In Order To End Homelessness “Anything but building more housing.”
via Krishan Madan: Santa Monica No-Growth Measure Probably Going to Be on November Ballot
via Jeff Andrade-Fong: San Francisco’s Housing Crisis Is Solvable With One Law “someone trying to get enough sigs for a ballot measure to force a re-write of SF zoning code”
via Stephen Smith: If Cox & Kotkin think overbuilding means demand was mythical, what does that say about exurban growth in the 2000s?
via John Morris: Depressing example of how stringent historic preservation codes often harm reuse.
via Krishan Madan: Minimum Wage Workers Can’t Afford Rent Anywhere In The Country “More construction would help”
via Krishan Madan: New auto dependent sprawl could be avoided if the existing suburbs were upzoned.
via Nick Zaiac: New paper shows the effect of subways on urban growth. “Subways are, indeed, a luxury good that effects discretionary trips rather than commuter travel.”
Bjorn Swensen wants to make a case for redeveloping bungalows into attached homes
via Krishan Madan: City to withhold One Water Street’s certificate of occupancy over affordable housing units [Philadelphia]
Krishan Madan asks, “are the wages of sunbelt cities low and the wages of coastal cities high because the export industries in coastal cities are more productive, or because the high rents of coastal cities create constrained labor markets?”
Michael Lewyn is curious about the price difference between differing tower heights
via Krishan Madan: Politicians who keep ban of SROs get mad at short term rentals
via Krishan Madan: Strong Towns, We Are All Detroit
via Adam Hengels: Houston Chronicle counters the Market Urbanist argument about Houston
Thomas Christiansen notes, “On top of zoning and height restrictions, growth boundaries and government ownership of/set asides land near cities also serve to make housing less affordable.”
via Asher Meyers: Neighbors Clash in Silicon Valley “It’s not always just NIMBYism, but also municipal finances that may hinder attempts to increase density.”
Adam Hengels responds to a reddit inquiry: Can someone explain to me what market urbanism is?
via Anders Mikkelson: McDonald’s: you can sneer, but it’s the glue that holds communities together
via Todd Littman: City Observatory, Achieving Scale in Affordable Housing
via John Morris: New TxDOT downtown Dallas plan includes a scenario with a freeway’s demise
4. Elsewhere:
Change to [New York] state law could make way for megatowers by allowing the city to permit higher-density residential towers (Crains)
National Review: Following Austin’s Uber ban, an informal ridesharing service sprouts up online
A blog post that links to Market Urbanism: Blue Moon Realty: the City, Not the People
Aaron Renn‘s podcast: The Long Quest for Congestion Pricing in New York (with Gridlock Sam Schwartz)
WSJ: Influx of Younger, Wealthier Residents Transforms U.S. Cities
via Ryan Holeywell “Where do Houston’s renters live? These maps give us a new way of thinking about the city.“
A Miami-area township uses zoning to ban front-yard gardens
5. Stephen Smith‘s tweet of the week:
Houston’s parking requirements act as de facto use zoning, making it tough to redevelop small resi lots into retail https://t.co/VbfmJKd037
— Market Urbanism (@MarketUrbanism) June 9, 2016
