9 ms·

For god's sakes, just let property owners do what they want with their property (within limits of safety). If they want to keep it empty or a small 1 family hou

For god's sakes, just let property owners do what they want with their property (within limits of safety). If they want to keep it empty or a small 1 family house, let them, and don't let their neighbors or city government bully them into building larger. If they want to build (or sell to someone who will build) a large apartment building, let them do that too. You'll gradually get more density and less traffic this way over time, assuming that's what people want (and if it's not, they'll get what they want instead) The root of the problem is the impulse to be disgusted by your neighbor's choices, and wishing to harness violent force (government rules) to force your neighbor to conform to your wishes. Enough already.

mjevans 10y ago
Sure, but also TAX the property based on it's /potential/ value. A land owner close to where the city is now shouldn't be able to squat on that land at the cost of the opportunity it can provide to the neighborhood(s) around it.
- wozniacki 10y ago
  Please elaborate. Should we also TAX vacant or idle storefronts that seem to have zero foot traffic any given hour of any given day? (SF seems to have dozens of those every city block. One wonders if those are some kind of fronts for illicit activities. They seem to never change ownership even with skyrocketing rents for office space nearby.) Should a street level business that serves a large number of residents, get TAX BREAKS? Like a grocery store that vends fresh produce as opposed to a boutique book store that specializes in first editions? Should they also get favorable lease terms, mandated by the city? Should businesses that, by nature, serve out of town-ers be forced to move to designated neighborhoods? Should empty storefronts be forced to take up tenants who could serve the needs of the residents? Is TAXING even the solution to any of these problems?
  - mistermann 10y ago
    It's probably very complicated, but I would answer yes to many of these questions. I think it would be worthwhile investigating a model where every home has a mini-grocery with affordable prices within 2 blocks of every home in these neighborhoods - and to achieve affordable prices, there may have to be some tax breaks involved, with some accompanying price limits on "staples" (bread, milk, etc). Difficult, yes; impossible, no; worth it, I think so.
    - crooked-v 10y ago
      "Every two blocks" is a bit much for anything but the densest of high-density areas. Even the convenience stores aren't clustered that closely in my city's downtown.
    - adrianN 10y ago
      Come to cities in Germany. Everwhere I lived the next supermarket was less than fifteen minutes walking away. Price and density are inveresly proportional.
  - jfoutz 10y ago
    Subsidize what you want and tax what you don't is 101 level economics. Distort the market to match what neighborhood wants. There are other approaches, but macro is pretty well understood.
  - dangjc 10y ago
    Yes you should tax empty land, just by taxing all land. The land owner always has the option to sell the unused land. It encourages property use, and the tax rate actually decreases the more built up the property is. This is not rocket science. Land taxes are well established in economics literature.
- kspaans 10y ago
  You can capture this by assessing the value of the land (regardless of what's build on top). Downtown detached houses are more valuable because the land they sit on is near other stuff, and people want to be near stuff. They are not valuable because the owner installed a new marble counter-top.
- breischl 10y ago
  To a large extent this already happens, and is one of the major complaints about gentrification. The rising value of the land & property causes rising rents, which can become a hardship on the lower-income people who were living there before the place became trendy/valuable. Not to say it shouldn't be done, but there are definitely two edges to that sword.
- jabl 10y ago
  Something like https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Land_value_tax https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Land_value_tax ? Yeah, makes sense IMHO. Unfortunately it doesn't seem so popular politically..
Retric 10y ago
There is an inherent contradiction in this idea. Part of being able to do whatever you want is setting up a homeowners association which are defeat the goal of freedom.
- galdosdi 10y ago
  That's fine, as long as a propertyowner not currently in a HOA cannot be forced to join a HOA, not even if 99% of their neighbors voted to join. You can still go somewhere where there isn't a HOA or there is a competing HOA. In many US cities today, there is no option, because zoning is municipal, not a HOA rule.
  - tropo 10y ago
    There are cities where the zoning only allows houses in an HOA. Viera in Florida is an example of this. These days, builders always create an HOA. The options to avoid an HOA are very limited. You can settle for something really old. In theory you can become a builder yourself, but buying 30 acres and putting in streets and storm drains and... is a huge investment and a huge amount of time and effort. Even then, there are places where you simply can't do it due to zoning.
omegaworks 10y ago
If the rest of us get burdened by the cost of providing services to said property owner in perpetuity, we do have a right to have a bit of say over what things get built. We can build win-win for the property owner and the community, it is possible to align incentives. When you bulldoze black neighborhoods to build the expressway that serves your suburb of single family homes, that's when there is a problem. When the tax base of poor neighborhoods subsidize the burden of infrastructure support of affluent neighborhoods, that's when there is a problem. [0] 0. https://www.strongtowns.org/journal/2017/1/10/poor-neighborhoods-make-the-best-investment https://www.strongtowns.org/journal/2017/1/10/poor-neighborh...
- galdosdi 10y ago
  Why should the rest of us get burdened? I'm not in favor of that at all. If you build something that requires more water/electricity and thus requires more maintenance/building more pipes or something by the city, then you should be the one to pay for that, or else you continue to get the same old service as before. That's what I propose anyway. Yes, I am very aware of what a big problem we've had in the 20th century with private developers colluding with municipalities to take land from the poor, use it to build things for the wealthy, and get taxpayers to pay for as much of the related infrastructure as possible.
  - dcosson 10y ago
    The same old service as before is an ongoing cost for everyone - loans are taken for municipal projects that the city pays back with taxes, pipes break and have to be repaired, if there's a natural disaster outside funds will repair the service, etc. To some extent you pay the utility provider for your use, but not always. There are even more things you definitely don't and can't pay for your own use - fire stations, police, the salaries of the DMV employees that regulate drivers licenses so someone who doesn't know how to drive doesn't crash into your house. There's a huge long-tail of public goods that serve everyone in every urban or suburban area, no getting around it.
    - galdosdi 10y ago
continuational 10y ago
The whole point of government is to ensure that your neighbors don't act like oricks. Obviously you don't want the neighbor to build something high that puts your property in permanent shadow, or otherwise ruin your property.
- galdosdi 10y ago
  "The right to swing your fists ends where another man's nose begins" should be the motto to follow here. (And not "The right to swing your fists ends a statutory 3 meters away from any places that may contain noses") If there is a specific noise/shadow or other detriment that is clearly caused to an adjoining property, then OK, the adjoining neighbor should be able to stop it (or sell the right to complain as an easement if they wish). If there isn't, and it just "looks ugly" and "isn't normal" then there is no meaningful detriment and they should be allowed to build
  - cortesoft 10y ago
    The problem is that there is a wide disagreement on what a 'clear detriment' to your neighbors property is. We all have different definitions. If you think about it, zoning and land use laws are just the codifying of things that are detriments to your neighbors. Obviously, no one is going to agree with all of them, but they are what society has deemed worthy of forbidding.
    - galdosdi 10y ago
      OK, then I guess all I'm saying is I think my definitions are right and others' are wrong. My definition is: Pretend there is a dark shroud covering away all boundaries of your property line. Whatever elements, whether noise, shadow, smell, smoke, etc enter into your property volume, you are allowed to complain about. Anything outside of that, you are not. How damned hard is that?
      - cortesoft 10y ago
        I think almost all zoning laws actually meet your definition; there are very few zoning laws (that I know of) that specify what colors or shapes you can use on your property. They all deal with things that 'leak' outside your property. Do you have any examples of zoning or land use laws that don't fit your definition of 'things we are allowed to regulate'?
throwaway91111 10y ago
This seems like it would result in the consolidation of real estate (and therefore policy) by the wealthy. People still live there.
hasbroslasher 10y ago
Well obviously they're still "allowed" to do whatever they want - (usually) no one's forcing you to sell the quaint victorian and move into the new Gulag of an Apartment complex. Everyone essentially agrees with you. The problem is that when ONE of these people wants to build the next Trump Tower on top of grandma's old cottage, the "live and let live" ethos goes out the window - everyone's at city council decrying mixed zoning or whatever else they think is "ruining" their neighborhood! There's a reason the term NIMBY exists, there's a reason we don't like living next to Sriracha factories or concert venues and don't just let people turn their houses into one of them at will. We live in a society and the law is a reflection of it, especially in cities where a lot of people with different needs and desires have to get along. If you want to literally do whatever you want on your property, there's lots of places (in Alaska) that you can do that. Hell, I actually agree with you, and that's why I'm eventually going to move somewhere where I don't get woke up by traffic every morning, where I don't get stuck in traffic, where I can play music as loud as I want, and celebrate Pagan holidays with massive bonfires until 7am. But until then, I won't live under any illusion of living in a libertarian paradise, because it's just not a viable outcome for city dwellers.
- galdosdi 10y ago
  Assuming the noise or smell was somehow contained, what's wrong with living next to a concert venue or sriracha factory? I should merely have a right to my property being as smell, noise, and shadow free as it was when I bought it. I should /not/ have a right to anything more than that. Enshrining a right to only live next to other residences is how we end up in this problem of boring neighborhoods that require lots of travel just to get to where you want to go. In old large eastern US cities and in towns of any size in other countries I've been in (Mexico, Japan) there is MUCH more mixed use. You might see a motorcycle repair shop in between a couple of regular single family homes. Nobody seems to mind. I don't get why we're special and weird like this. Most of lower Manhattan, which is so valued now, could not be built legally today. It was built before zoning codes. I'm not against mild zoning codes that merely slow down rather than block change. For example, rather than a named maximum height, say that no building can be built more than twice the average building height in the area within a certain radius. Or, the percentage of nonresidential uses within an area cannot increase by more than 2% per year, or something. This way in the short term, a neighborhood cannot be transformed overnight. But, it can be transformed slowly over decades towards what the market will bear, ie what people actually want and are willing to pay for. This isn't a libertarian fantasy, it's just how towns used to work in the US before zoning and how they work in many other less backwards parts of the world...
beefsack 10y ago
I'd suggest living in southeast / east Asia for a while if you think anarchical development is a good idea. It all falls apart when you need to build, maintain and provide basic services (electricity, water, sewage.) You've probably misdiagnosed the root of the problem; some extended family had a shoe factory built directly next to their home and it greatly impacted their quality of life, and I don't think I'd suggest it's their fault for being unhappy about it.
- Dylan16807 10y ago
  You can easily have taxes and utilities without zoning laws.
- oskarth 10y ago
  > I'd suggest living in southeast / east Asia for a while if you think anarchical development is a good idea. It all falls apart when you need to build, maintain and provide basic services (electricity, water, sewage.) "It all falls apart"? I beg to differ. It is a continuum of cities being differently developed, yes. But many cities (Bangkok, Hong Kong, Taipei) are not all that far from many European cities, and they are often far more vibrant (think Manhattan or Paris). In fact, it is more of an uneven development, where things like subways, street food and internet might be much better, but sewage and smog is worse. It is mostly just different and depends on what you focus your attention on, seeing the bad things that are different or the good things.
  - lacampbell 10y ago
    Yeah I have no idea what's wrong with East Asian cities. Taipei can be ugly, but damned if it isn't convenient to get around. The transport network there puts any western city I've been to of similar to size to shame. As for Hong Kong, not only does it have great public transport as well, but it's also strikingly good looking. Can't speak for Bangkok though, but Taipei and Hong Kong have incredible transport systems.
    - emodendroket 10y ago
edblarney 10y ago
"For god's sakes, just let property owners do what they want with their property" We need to have zoning laws. "You'll gradually get more density and less traffic this way over time, assuming that's what people want " Once a city has been structured, it's nary impossible to 'unstructure'. "The root of the problem is the impulse to be disgusted by your neighbor's choices, " We live in a community and we have no choice but to have rules & laws - they just need to be done intelligently. Cities like Frankfurt and Munich are very close to ideal. They have 'just right' urban density, good Trams, Subways and Trains - and it works extremely well. You can get where you need to quickly, there's not a lot of traffic - and ample choice for those who want to have a 'big house' vs. 'smaller home' vs. 'urban flat'. North Americans really screwed up - and it has a lot to do with builders, bad zoning etc. If people were actually 'given the choice' of semi-dense urban living + easy commute to slightly more dense suburbs - they would usually take it. In North America - people 'have less choice' and 'less options' because one of the key ingredients: public transport (i.e. trams, trains and subways) requires some degree of collective organization, as well as some foresight with respect to urban planning. It seems a little 'anti choice' to opt for a Euro-style city, but really, there is a lot of 'choice' and the effectiveness of basic public transport is so awesome for people that I can't imagine anybody would want to opt out. For example, I don't think anyone in all of Europe would opt for 'less' transit services, they are usually great and used heavily - and you can still drive if you want.
- hueving 10y ago
  >and ample choice for those who want to have a 'big house' vs. 'smaller home' vs. 'urban flat'. As long as you don't actually want a big property and cars at a middle class cost. In the many US suburbs, you can get a 3000 Sq ft home with a two car garage (not included in the area calc) for less than $200k and be within a half hour drive from a major city center. So those German cities are only 'ideal' if you have different priorities.
  - edblarney 10y ago
    You can definitely buy a 3000 Sq foot home in Germany, it's just a little further out. Also - Germany is quite a bit smaller than the US so property prices are an issue. There's no reason there couldn't be a 'Frankfurt, Maine' - with large homes a little further out - and still cheap.
shados 10y ago
god forbid people want to sleep at night...
thevardanian 10y ago
Meanwhile, Japanese zoning gives much more flexibility to builders, private promoters but also school boards and the cities themselves. So the need for hyper-competent planning is much reduced, as Japanese planning departments can simply zone large higher-use zones in the center of neighborhoods, since the lower-uses are still allowed. If there is more land than needed for commercial uses in a commercial zone, for example, then you can still build residential uses there, until commercial promoters actually come to need the space and buy the buildings from current residents. So there is a more healthier and lenient alternative to city planning which does not result in total chaos. I think many people here are stuck in between two extremes. The anarchistic what ever goes crowd that's sick and tired of the bureaucratic mess, and what we currently have. However there is I think a healthier synthesis between the two ideas that we need to really consider. We know what the problem is, we know why there's a problem, and we even have plenty of solutions, but as has been pointed out the problem is in implementation. That's the real problem. Here's the full post: http://urbankchoze.blogspot.ca/2014/04/japanese-zoning.html http://urbankchoze.blogspot.ca/2014/04/japanese-zoning.html
- galdosdi 10y ago
  I'm with you, a reasonable middle ground like that is a great way to go. I visited Nagoya and Tokyo and was very positively impressed with the kinds of neighborhoods generated by that kind of zoning. In a way, the typical pattern actually generated more diversity YET more solitude and peacefulness than I see in the US. Here in the USA, only the older parts of the old pre-zoning cities have a shot at being nice like that, and even that may have been ruined in many cities. I think we artificially have an obsession with preservation in the USA, because current zoning means that many building forms are unbuildable today so the only way to get them is to preserve something old. These nice old sorts of buildings and neighborhoods can be destroyed but not created, but that's only an artifact of zoning. With more Japanese-style zoning, preservation would be less important
lr4444lr 10y ago
Oh yeah? How'd you react if you scrimped up to save, and then this was built next door? https://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/03/nyregion/on-a-block-of-single-story-homes-a-monstrosity-in-queens-draws-ire.html https://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/03/nyregion/on-a-block-of-si... Check out the front-side picture. What do you think would happen to resale value? If you think property owners will continue to buy houses and give up any hope of actionable damages in the race to the bottom of this tragedy of the commons, you're delusional.
- nosuchthing 10y ago
  Move somewhere else, probably somewhere with a home owners association where you can rest peacefully knowing your neighbors are not planting gardens [1][2] and painting their house improper shades of beige. It's not on your property and it was built up to local code and zoning regulations. [1] http://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2013/12/16/249342738/in-florida-a-turf-war-blooms-over-front-yard-vegetable-gardening http://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2013/12/16/249342738/in-... [2] http://www.kshb.com/news/region-missouri/new-city-ordinance-forces-family-to-destroy-their-vegetable-garden http://www.kshb.com/news/region-missouri/new-city-ordinance-...
  - emodendroket 10y ago
    Gee, that might be difficult, given that you probably have to sell the house for close to what you bought it to do that so easily (plus even if the house sold for the exact same price you're out a ton of money in closing costs for both deals).
    - hueving 10y ago
      I think the point was that if you are that worried about that scenario, move into an hoa controlled area in the first place.
      - emodendroket 10y ago
        Well my point is that it is a completely impractical solution to the problem since by the time the problem arises it is too late to do it.
bsder 10y ago
> For god's sakes, just let property owners do what they want with their property (within limits of safety). Houston is the counterexample to your thesis.
- msandford 10y ago
  Houston is getting taller, though. 3-4 story townhomes, 4-8 per former single family home lot are taking over lots of old, rundown neighborhoods. Maybe that's not your optimal amazing perfect development. But it doesn't count as not going up. Of course, it's also growing out at a tremendous rate as well.
  - bsder 10y ago
    Houston is growing outward WAY faster than it is growing upward. Of course, Houston is not helped by having weather not terribly conducive to walking year round.
dcposch 10y ago
> If they want to keep it empty or a small 1 family house, let them, and don't let their neighbors or city government bully them into building larger i really like this alternate universe where you have to fight govt in order to build smaller -- here in the bay area it's the exact opposite. between zoning [1], height limits, Discretionary Review, CEQA and "environmental impact" reviews, it is unbelievably hard to build density here. projects are delayed in unpredictable ways ranging from weeks to years, often while a developer pays rent and property tax on a vacant lot. the resulting artificial scarcity inflates rents, which is great for incumbent property owners. boomers who have owned property for really long time are often essentially exempt from property tax due to Prop 13. [2] [1] i made a map: https://dcpos.ch/yimby/zoning https://dcpos.ch/yimby/zoning [2] example: https://twitter.com/hanlonbt/status/769662484936429569 https://twitter.com/hanlonbt/status/769662484936429569 -- the city kinda wallows in its own bureaucracy. back in 2004, they won funding to build a rapid transit bus line on Geary St. volunteers knocked on doors, voters voted, a ballot initiative passed. just weeks ago, it passed "Environmental Impact Review". http://sfbamo.com/news/after-13-years-geary-rapid-bus-project-moves-forward/ http://sfbamo.com/news/after-13-years-geary-rapid-bus-projec... it was stuck in EIR for 13 years.
RobertoG 10y ago
"You'll gradually get more density and less traffic this way over time, assuming that's what people want (and if it's not, they'll get what they want instead)" That's not how it works. Aggregate preferences doesn't, necessarily, give you the best of worlds. All kind of local minimums and nasty equilibriums are possible.
vtlynch 10y ago
>and wishing to harness violent force (government rules) aaaaand I can safely ignore everything you say.

mjevans 10y ago

Sure, but also TAX the property based on it's /potential/ value. A land owner close to where the city is now shouldn't be able to squat on that land at the cost of the opportunity it can provide to the neighborhood(s) around it.

wozniacki 10y ago
Please elaborate. Should we also TAX vacant or idle storefronts that seem to have zero foot traffic any given hour of any given day? (SF seems to have dozens of those every city block. One wonders if those are some kind of fronts for illicit activities. They seem to never change ownership even with skyrocketing rents for office space nearby.) Should a street level business that serves a large number of residents, get TAX BREAKS? Like a grocery store that vends fresh produce as opposed to a boutique book store that specializes in first editions? Should they also get favorable lease terms, mandated by the city? Should businesses that, by nature, serve out of town-ers be forced to move to designated neighborhoods? Should empty storefronts be forced to take up tenants who could serve the needs of the residents? Is TAXING even the solution to any of these problems?
- mistermann 10y ago
  It's probably very complicated, but I would answer yes to many of these questions. I think it would be worthwhile investigating a model where every home has a mini-grocery with affordable prices within 2 blocks of every home in these neighborhoods - and to achieve affordable prices, there may have to be some tax breaks involved, with some accompanying price limits on "staples" (bread, milk, etc). Difficult, yes; impossible, no; worth it, I think so.
  - crooked-v 10y ago
    "Every two blocks" is a bit much for anything but the densest of high-density areas. Even the convenience stores aren't clustered that closely in my city's downtown.
  - adrianN 10y ago
    Come to cities in Germany. Everwhere I lived the next supermarket was less than fifteen minutes walking away. Price and density are inveresly proportional.
- jfoutz 10y ago
  Subsidize what you want and tax what you don't is 101 level economics. Distort the market to match what neighborhood wants. There are other approaches, but macro is pretty well understood.
- dangjc 10y ago
  Yes you should tax empty land, just by taxing all land. The land owner always has the option to sell the unused land. It encourages property use, and the tax rate actually decreases the more built up the property is. This is not rocket science. Land taxes are well established in economics literature.
kspaans 10y ago
You can capture this by assessing the value of the land (regardless of what's build on top). Downtown detached houses are more valuable because the land they sit on is near other stuff, and people want to be near stuff. They are not valuable because the owner installed a new marble counter-top.
breischl 10y ago
To a large extent this already happens, and is one of the major complaints about gentrification. The rising value of the land & property causes rising rents, which can become a hardship on the lower-income people who were living there before the place became trendy/valuable. Not to say it shouldn't be done, but there are definitely two edges to that sword.
jabl 10y ago
Something like https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Land_value_tax https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Land_value_tax ? Yeah, makes sense IMHO. Unfortunately it doesn't seem so popular politically..

Retric 10y ago

There is an inherent contradiction in this idea. Part of being able to do whatever you want is setting up a homeowners association which are defeat the goal of freedom.

galdosdi 10y ago
That's fine, as long as a propertyowner not currently in a HOA cannot be forced to join a HOA, not even if 99% of their neighbors voted to join. You can still go somewhere where there isn't a HOA or there is a competing HOA. In many US cities today, there is no option, because zoning is municipal, not a HOA rule.
- tropo 10y ago
  There are cities where the zoning only allows houses in an HOA. Viera in Florida is an example of this. These days, builders always create an HOA. The options to avoid an HOA are very limited. You can settle for something really old. In theory you can become a builder yourself, but buying 30 acres and putting in streets and storm drains and... is a huge investment and a huge amount of time and effort. Even then, there are places where you simply can't do it due to zoning.

omegaworks 10y ago

If the rest of us get burdened by the cost of providing services to said property owner in perpetuity, we do have a right to have a bit of say over what things get built. We can build win-win for the property owner and the community, it is possible to align incentives. When you bulldoze black neighborhoods to build the expressway that serves your suburb of single family homes, that's when there is a problem. When the tax base of poor neighborhoods subsidize the burden of infrastructure support of affluent neighborhoods, that's when there is a problem. [0] 0. https://www.strongtowns.org/journal/2017/1/10/poor-neighborhoods-make-the-best-investment https://www.strongtowns.org/journal/2017/1/10/poor-neighborh...

galdosdi 10y ago
Why should the rest of us get burdened? I'm not in favor of that at all. If you build something that requires more water/electricity and thus requires more maintenance/building more pipes or something by the city, then you should be the one to pay for that, or else you continue to get the same old service as before. That's what I propose anyway. Yes, I am very aware of what a big problem we've had in the 20th century with private developers colluding with municipalities to take land from the poor, use it to build things for the wealthy, and get taxpayers to pay for as much of the related infrastructure as possible.
- dcosson 10y ago
  The same old service as before is an ongoing cost for everyone - loans are taken for municipal projects that the city pays back with taxes, pipes break and have to be repaired, if there's a natural disaster outside funds will repair the service, etc. To some extent you pay the utility provider for your use, but not always. There are even more things you definitely don't and can't pay for your own use - fire stations, police, the salaries of the DMV employees that regulate drivers licenses so someone who doesn't know how to drive doesn't crash into your house. There's a huge long-tail of public goods that serve everyone in every urban or suburban area, no getting around it.
  - galdosdi 10y ago

continuational 10y ago

The whole point of government is to ensure that your neighbors don't act like oricks. Obviously you don't want the neighbor to build something high that puts your property in permanent shadow, or otherwise ruin your property.

galdosdi 10y ago
"The right to swing your fists ends where another man's nose begins" should be the motto to follow here. (And not "The right to swing your fists ends a statutory 3 meters away from any places that may contain noses") If there is a specific noise/shadow or other detriment that is clearly caused to an adjoining property, then OK, the adjoining neighbor should be able to stop it (or sell the right to complain as an easement if they wish). If there isn't, and it just "looks ugly" and "isn't normal" then there is no meaningful detriment and they should be allowed to build
- cortesoft 10y ago
  The problem is that there is a wide disagreement on what a 'clear detriment' to your neighbors property is. We all have different definitions. If you think about it, zoning and land use laws are just the codifying of things that are detriments to your neighbors. Obviously, no one is going to agree with all of them, but they are what society has deemed worthy of forbidding.
  - galdosdi 10y ago
    OK, then I guess all I'm saying is I think my definitions are right and others' are wrong. My definition is: Pretend there is a dark shroud covering away all boundaries of your property line. Whatever elements, whether noise, shadow, smell, smoke, etc enter into your property volume, you are allowed to complain about. Anything outside of that, you are not. How damned hard is that?
    - cortesoft 10y ago
      I think almost all zoning laws actually meet your definition; there are very few zoning laws (that I know of) that specify what colors or shapes you can use on your property. They all deal with things that 'leak' outside your property. Do you have any examples of zoning or land use laws that don't fit your definition of 'things we are allowed to regulate'?

throwaway91111 10y ago

This seems like it would result in the consolidation of real estate (and therefore policy) by the wealthy. People still live there.

hasbroslasher 10y ago

Well obviously they're still "allowed" to do whatever they want - (usually) no one's forcing you to sell the quaint victorian and move into the new Gulag of an Apartment complex. Everyone essentially agrees with you. The problem is that when ONE of these people wants to build the next Trump Tower on top of grandma's old cottage, the "live and let live" ethos goes out the window - everyone's at city council decrying mixed zoning or whatever else they think is "ruining" their neighborhood! There's a reason the term NIMBY exists, there's a reason we don't like living next to Sriracha factories or concert venues and don't just let people turn their houses into one of them at will. We live in a society and the law is a reflection of it, especially in cities where a lot of people with different needs and desires have to get along. If you want to literally do whatever you want on your property, there's lots of places (in Alaska) that you can do that. Hell, I actually agree with you, and that's why I'm eventually going to move somewhere where I don't get woke up by traffic every morning, where I don't get stuck in traffic, where I can play music as loud as I want, and celebrate Pagan holidays with massive bonfires until 7am. But until then, I won't live under any illusion of living in a libertarian paradise, because it's just not a viable outcome for city dwellers.

galdosdi 10y ago
Assuming the noise or smell was somehow contained, what's wrong with living next to a concert venue or sriracha factory? I should merely have a right to my property being as smell, noise, and shadow free as it was when I bought it. I should /not/ have a right to anything more than that. Enshrining a right to only live next to other residences is how we end up in this problem of boring neighborhoods that require lots of travel just to get to where you want to go. In old large eastern US cities and in towns of any size in other countries I've been in (Mexico, Japan) there is MUCH more mixed use. You might see a motorcycle repair shop in between a couple of regular single family homes. Nobody seems to mind. I don't get why we're special and weird like this. Most of lower Manhattan, which is so valued now, could not be built legally today. It was built before zoning codes. I'm not against mild zoning codes that merely slow down rather than block change. For example, rather than a named maximum height, say that no building can be built more than twice the average building height in the area within a certain radius. Or, the percentage of nonresidential uses within an area cannot increase by more than 2% per year, or something. This way in the short term, a neighborhood cannot be transformed overnight. But, it can be transformed slowly over decades towards what the market will bear, ie what people actually want and are willing to pay for. This isn't a libertarian fantasy, it's just how towns used to work in the US before zoning and how they work in many other less backwards parts of the world...

beefsack 10y ago

I'd suggest living in southeast / east Asia for a while if you think anarchical development is a good idea. It all falls apart when you need to build, maintain and provide basic services (electricity, water, sewage.) You've probably misdiagnosed the root of the problem; some extended family had a shoe factory built directly next to their home and it greatly impacted their quality of life, and I don't think I'd suggest it's their fault for being unhappy about it.

Dylan16807 10y ago
You can easily have taxes and utilities without zoning laws.
oskarth 10y ago
> I'd suggest living in southeast / east Asia for a while if you think anarchical development is a good idea. It all falls apart when you need to build, maintain and provide basic services (electricity, water, sewage.) "It all falls apart"? I beg to differ. It is a continuum of cities being differently developed, yes. But many cities (Bangkok, Hong Kong, Taipei) are not all that far from many European cities, and they are often far more vibrant (think Manhattan or Paris). In fact, it is more of an uneven development, where things like subways, street food and internet might be much better, but sewage and smog is worse. It is mostly just different and depends on what you focus your attention on, seeing the bad things that are different or the good things.
- lacampbell 10y ago
  Yeah I have no idea what's wrong with East Asian cities. Taipei can be ugly, but damned if it isn't convenient to get around. The transport network there puts any western city I've been to of similar to size to shame. As for Hong Kong, not only does it have great public transport as well, but it's also strikingly good looking. Can't speak for Bangkok though, but Taipei and Hong Kong have incredible transport systems.
  - emodendroket 10y ago

edblarney 10y ago

"For god's sakes, just let property owners do what they want with their property" We need to have zoning laws. "You'll gradually get more density and less traffic this way over time, assuming that's what people want " Once a city has been structured, it's nary impossible to 'unstructure'. "The root of the problem is the impulse to be disgusted by your neighbor's choices, " We live in a community and we have no choice but to have rules & laws - they just need to be done intelligently. Cities like Frankfurt and Munich are very close to ideal. They have 'just right' urban density, good Trams, Subways and Trains - and it works extremely well. You can get where you need to quickly, there's not a lot of traffic - and ample choice for those who want to have a 'big house' vs. 'smaller home' vs. 'urban flat'. North Americans really screwed up - and it has a lot to do with builders, bad zoning etc. If people were actually 'given the choice' of semi-dense urban living + easy commute to slightly more dense suburbs - they would usually take it. In North America - people 'have less choice' and 'less options' because one of the key ingredients: public transport (i.e. trams, trains and subways) requires some degree of collective organization, as well as some foresight with respect to urban planning. It seems a little 'anti choice' to opt for a Euro-style city, but really, there is a lot of 'choice' and the effectiveness of basic public transport is so awesome for people that I can't imagine anybody would want to opt out. For example, I don't think anyone in all of Europe would opt for 'less' transit services, they are usually great and used heavily - and you can still drive if you want.

hueving 10y ago
>and ample choice for those who want to have a 'big house' vs. 'smaller home' vs. 'urban flat'. As long as you don't actually want a big property and cars at a middle class cost. In the many US suburbs, you can get a 3000 Sq ft home with a two car garage (not included in the area calc) for less than $200k and be within a half hour drive from a major city center. So those German cities are only 'ideal' if you have different priorities.
- edblarney 10y ago
  You can definitely buy a 3000 Sq foot home in Germany, it's just a little further out. Also - Germany is quite a bit smaller than the US so property prices are an issue. There's no reason there couldn't be a 'Frankfurt, Maine' - with large homes a little further out - and still cheap.

shados 10y ago

god forbid people want to sleep at night...

thevardanian 10y ago

Meanwhile, Japanese zoning gives much more flexibility to builders, private promoters but also school boards and the cities themselves. So the need for hyper-competent planning is much reduced, as Japanese planning departments can simply zone large higher-use zones in the center of neighborhoods, since the lower-uses are still allowed. If there is more land than needed for commercial uses in a commercial zone, for example, then you can still build residential uses there, until commercial promoters actually come to need the space and buy the buildings from current residents. So there is a more healthier and lenient alternative to city planning which does not result in total chaos. I think many people here are stuck in between two extremes. The anarchistic what ever goes crowd that's sick and tired of the bureaucratic mess, and what we currently have. However there is I think a healthier synthesis between the two ideas that we need to really consider. We know what the problem is, we know why there's a problem, and we even have plenty of solutions, but as has been pointed out the problem is in implementation. That's the real problem. Here's the full post: http://urbankchoze.blogspot.ca/2014/04/japanese-zoning.html http://urbankchoze.blogspot.ca/2014/04/japanese-zoning.html

galdosdi 10y ago
I'm with you, a reasonable middle ground like that is a great way to go. I visited Nagoya and Tokyo and was very positively impressed with the kinds of neighborhoods generated by that kind of zoning. In a way, the typical pattern actually generated more diversity YET more solitude and peacefulness than I see in the US. Here in the USA, only the older parts of the old pre-zoning cities have a shot at being nice like that, and even that may have been ruined in many cities. I think we artificially have an obsession with preservation in the USA, because current zoning means that many building forms are unbuildable today so the only way to get them is to preserve something old. These nice old sorts of buildings and neighborhoods can be destroyed but not created, but that's only an artifact of zoning. With more Japanese-style zoning, preservation would be less important

lr4444lr 10y ago

Oh yeah? How'd you react if you scrimped up to save, and then this was built next door? https://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/03/nyregion/on-a-block-of-single-story-homes-a-monstrosity-in-queens-draws-ire.html https://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/03/nyregion/on-a-block-of-si... Check out the front-side picture. What do you think would happen to resale value? If you think property owners will continue to buy houses and give up any hope of actionable damages in the race to the bottom of this tragedy of the commons, you're delusional.

nosuchthing 10y ago
Move somewhere else, probably somewhere with a home owners association where you can rest peacefully knowing your neighbors are not planting gardens [1][2] and painting their house improper shades of beige. It's not on your property and it was built up to local code and zoning regulations. [1] http://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2013/12/16/249342738/in-florida-a-turf-war-blooms-over-front-yard-vegetable-gardening http://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2013/12/16/249342738/in-... [2] http://www.kshb.com/news/region-missouri/new-city-ordinance-forces-family-to-destroy-their-vegetable-garden http://www.kshb.com/news/region-missouri/new-city-ordinance-...
- emodendroket 10y ago
  Gee, that might be difficult, given that you probably have to sell the house for close to what you bought it to do that so easily (plus even if the house sold for the exact same price you're out a ton of money in closing costs for both deals).
  - hueving 10y ago
    I think the point was that if you are that worried about that scenario, move into an hoa controlled area in the first place.
    - emodendroket 10y ago
      Well my point is that it is a completely impractical solution to the problem since by the time the problem arises it is too late to do it.

bsder 10y ago

> For god's sakes, just let property owners do what they want with their property (within limits of safety). Houston is the counterexample to your thesis.

msandford 10y ago
Houston is getting taller, though. 3-4 story townhomes, 4-8 per former single family home lot are taking over lots of old, rundown neighborhoods. Maybe that's not your optimal amazing perfect development. But it doesn't count as not going up. Of course, it's also growing out at a tremendous rate as well.
- bsder 10y ago
  Houston is growing outward WAY faster than it is growing upward. Of course, Houston is not helped by having weather not terribly conducive to walking year round.

dcposch 10y ago

> If they want to keep it empty or a small 1 family house, let them, and don't let their neighbors or city government bully them into building larger i really like this alternate universe where you have to fight govt in order to build smaller -- here in the bay area it's the exact opposite. between zoning [1], height limits, Discretionary Review, CEQA and "environmental impact" reviews, it is unbelievably hard to build density here. projects are delayed in unpredictable ways ranging from weeks to years, often while a developer pays rent and property tax on a vacant lot. the resulting artificial scarcity inflates rents, which is great for incumbent property owners. boomers who have owned property for really long time are often essentially exempt from property tax due to Prop 13. [2] [1] i made a map: https://dcpos.ch/yimby/zoning https://dcpos.ch/yimby/zoning [2] example: https://twitter.com/hanlonbt/status/769662484936429569 https://twitter.com/hanlonbt/status/769662484936429569 -- the city kinda wallows in its own bureaucracy. back in 2004, they won funding to build a rapid transit bus line on Geary St. volunteers knocked on doors, voters voted, a ballot initiative passed. just weeks ago, it passed "Environmental Impact Review". http://sfbamo.com/news/after-13-years-geary-rapid-bus-project-moves-forward/ http://sfbamo.com/news/after-13-years-geary-rapid-bus-projec... it was stuck in EIR for 13 years.

RobertoG 10y ago

"You'll gradually get more density and less traffic this way over time, assuming that's what people want (and if it's not, they'll get what they want instead)" That's not how it works. Aggregate preferences doesn't, necessarily, give you the best of worlds. All kind of local minimums and nasty equilibriums are possible.

vtlynch 10y ago

>and wishing to harness violent force (government rules) aaaaand I can safely ignore everything you say.