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...potentially degrading your urban environment in the process. My point is that, if a particular housing market is experiencing a shortage of supply due to a
by tmnvix 9y ago
...potentially degrading your urban environment in the process.
My point is that, if a particular housing market is experiencing a shortage of supply due to a speculative boom, but has sufficient housing to actually house people, then you have two options: tackle the supply side by building more houses, or tackle the demand side by addressing the cause of the speculation (e.g. tax incentives could be encouraging this non-productive, speculative investment).
- davidw 9y agoPart of the "degradation" happens because we forgot that we can build up, as well as out, in much of the US https://www.strongtowns.org/journal/2015/1/7/americas-suburban-experiment https://www.strongtowns.org/journal/2015/1/7/americas-suburb...
- sliverstorm 9y agoI don't think we "forget", I think developers are after the quick buck and buyers are after most-sqft-per-dollar. Building up or down is more expensive.
- davidw 9y agoDevelopers just build places for people to live and work. Like the house you live in. They could build a lot more in places like San Francisco and Palo Alto. Yes, it's a bit more expensive, but that's a pretty minimal component of the price at 2/3/4 stories. The real problem that prevents building up and in is rampant NIMBYism.
- AnimalMuppet 9y agoIs it? Assume that land is expensive. If I build up, I can create a lot more units for the same land cost (at the probable price of higher building cost per unit). For some land price, there's probably an optimal height to build to that decreases total cost per unit.
- sliverstorm 9y agoWell, it really depends on where. When much of Silicon Valley was built, I believe land was not really that expensive, and that continues to be the case in many parts of the country.
- stale2002 9y agoBuilding taller buildings isn't degradation. I would argue that it makes the urban environment better, no worse, even if you ignore the housing supply benefits. This is because newer, taller buildings are almost always going to be higher quality than the old shit that was already there.