6 ms·

Why shouldn't land owners be able to build whatever they want on their own property? It's not your backyard, it's your neighbors property

enraged_camel 8y ago
Playing devil's advocate here (which is my way of saying "bring on the downvotes"): because what they build can still generate negative externalities that affect their neighbors. So even though a 50-story building might be in compliance with zoning laws, it still blocks neighbor's access to a valuable, albeit non-essential resource (sunlight, cool ocean breeze, etc.) that probably factored into the price the original owner paid for their property. In other words, you are free to build whatever you want on your own property, as long as its effects don't negatively impact the value of mine. (I personally will never block developments, but I think I would have a right to be pissed off as hell if something like that happened, still.)
- baddox 8y ago
  > In other words, you are free to build whatever you want on your own property, as long as its effects don't negatively impact the value of mine. That is nowhere near a good enough rule. What if I buy commercial retail property in a bustling district, but over a few years the bustling industry shifts half a mile away, leaving my district with less foot traffic and thus negatively impacting the value of my property? Have those developers harmed me in a way that should be illegal? You may be tempted to say “well, no, obviously that’s different.” And indeed, it is obviously different. But the challenge is coming up with a rule that actually works without needing you or someone to decide on a case by case basis what is “obviously” an exception.
- upzone 8y ago
  So first of all, you don’t have a right not to live in a shadow. Millions of people in cities all over the world deal with it every day. It’s not that bad (tbh it probably helps AC bills too). You have certain rights when you buy property, but “a view” isn’t one of them. If you want scenery, move to the country. It’s gorgeous! Second, it’s frustrating that people only think of themselves. “What about my view?” What about the hundreds or thousands of people who can’t live near their jobs or their kids’ schools because of your precious view? What about the people who will be forced to drive in and get stuck in traffic, people who probably can’t bike because they’re forced to live in another town only reachable by a long highway trip? What about the people who are forced to pay higher and higher rents because everyone blocks development everywhere in the city? Screw your view, honestly.
  - dack 8y ago
    I can understand this point of view, and I don't own a house so I'm not really "defending" anything here. I'd love for housing to be cheaper and for more people to build in SF. However, think about how you'd feel if you bought a house and spent most of your life savings on it (like most are forced to), only to find that it drops in value dramatically putting you underwater on the payments. It's not just about their "view". They paid for amenities which (whether we like it or not) include the view and environment. I don't even have a solution - but it's not so simple as "give up your view so more people can live near their jobs".
    - upzone 8y ago
      That’s the other thing: real estate is not a guaranteed investment. If you invest money in a house and its value goes down, I’m sorry, but that’s the risk you take. A home is not a guaranteed investment vehicle, despite that being the outcome when NIMBYs vote and craft policy to make it so. Also, I don’t think people’s home values drop all that dramatically when new housing is built. We’ve been putting this off for decades, but we’ve also been artificially inflating housing prices. Maybe your tiny bungalow ISN’T actually worth $500,000. Maybe decades of bad local policy have ballooned the price of your house at the expense of others. And even so, even if building housing makes your house decrease in value, that’s still not a good reason to prevent development. I care much more they cities are healthy and plentiful housing than I do about some Boomers who got lucky with when they bought into the real estate market. The solution is actually remarkably simple: build more housing. We did it before; plenty of other countries with more sensible zoning laws do it. There aren’t enough places for people to live. We can either start killing people, or we can put up some walls. Personally, I’m a fan of buildings. Edit: typos (phone)
      - dack 8y ago
        I agree with you in that I still think the right thing to do is build. I also think it's really easy to say "sorry, you fucked up when you spent all your money on a house" if it's someone else. These aren't all "Boomers who got lucky" - they are also millennials buying their houses today at current rates. I think we have to have more empathy for these people if we want to make progress.
- incadenza 8y ago
  And you’re (Not you personally) free to do what like on your property barring negative outcomes for the entire community. Imposing restrictions on land you don’t own certainly falls in that category. Hence the stalemate I guess.
deleted 8y ago
[deleted]
emodendroket 8y ago
Imagine you owned a home and somebody wanted to put a nightclub on one side of you and an abattoir on the other. Do you think that might affect your quality of life at all? I mean hey, it's their property!
- saagarjha 8y ago
  As long as they follow the noise and disturbance ordinances, then sure.
  - mrep 8y ago
    Are you suggesting that nightclubs should be banned altogether? If not, then where do you suggest to put them since they are inherently noisy?
    - berbec 8y ago
      GP point, I believe, is not to ban them as long as the conform to zoning code. If zone code allows his neighbor to convert to a nightclub, good!
      - emodendroket 8y ago
        "It technically complies with the law"seems like cold comfort. Anyway you're just moving the locus of struggle from the approval process to the zoning regulations, since anyone with their head screwed on is going to demand that the city council use the law to block a development like this.
        saagarjha 8y ago
        Yeah, I understand that zoning is often used as a way to discourage building things that people don’t want built. But my idea was that hopefully there’s a way to make zoning “work”. I have no inherent issues with a nightclub; I just think it would be better from a noise perspective to put it downtown where it’s not going to bother other people.
markdown 8y ago
Because that is in nobody's interest. Your neighbour would also suffer if you decided to set up a poultry farm on your property. You can't live in a happy, healthy community without giving up a little bit of control in favour of the common good.
- adamson 8y ago
  Right, and that's why zoning boards should stop your neighbors from building poultry farms in their backyards.
ckocagil 8y ago
No, why should they?
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]
bww 8y ago
Air rights.
fipple 8y ago
Land ownership is never absolute because it isn’t the product of human endeavor, so owning it means you either violently excluded people from it, formalized that violence through law, or bought it after one of the above had happened. That’s why I can’t build a big laser beam on my land and use it to set your house on fire, among other things.
baq 8y ago
Because that's what most people want. Total freedom is anarchy.

enraged_camel 8y ago

Playing devil's advocate here (which is my way of saying "bring on the downvotes"): because what they build can still generate negative externalities that affect their neighbors. So even though a 50-story building might be in compliance with zoning laws, it still blocks neighbor's access to a valuable, albeit non-essential resource (sunlight, cool ocean breeze, etc.) that probably factored into the price the original owner paid for their property. In other words, you are free to build whatever you want on your own property, as long as its effects don't negatively impact the value of mine. (I personally will never block developments, but I think I would have a right to be pissed off as hell if something like that happened, still.)

baddox 8y ago
> In other words, you are free to build whatever you want on your own property, as long as its effects don't negatively impact the value of mine. That is nowhere near a good enough rule. What if I buy commercial retail property in a bustling district, but over a few years the bustling industry shifts half a mile away, leaving my district with less foot traffic and thus negatively impacting the value of my property? Have those developers harmed me in a way that should be illegal? You may be tempted to say “well, no, obviously that’s different.” And indeed, it is obviously different. But the challenge is coming up with a rule that actually works without needing you or someone to decide on a case by case basis what is “obviously” an exception.
upzone 8y ago
So first of all, you don’t have a right not to live in a shadow. Millions of people in cities all over the world deal with it every day. It’s not that bad (tbh it probably helps AC bills too). You have certain rights when you buy property, but “a view” isn’t one of them. If you want scenery, move to the country. It’s gorgeous! Second, it’s frustrating that people only think of themselves. “What about my view?” What about the hundreds or thousands of people who can’t live near their jobs or their kids’ schools because of your precious view? What about the people who will be forced to drive in and get stuck in traffic, people who probably can’t bike because they’re forced to live in another town only reachable by a long highway trip? What about the people who are forced to pay higher and higher rents because everyone blocks development everywhere in the city? Screw your view, honestly.
- dack 8y ago
  I can understand this point of view, and I don't own a house so I'm not really "defending" anything here. I'd love for housing to be cheaper and for more people to build in SF. However, think about how you'd feel if you bought a house and spent most of your life savings on it (like most are forced to), only to find that it drops in value dramatically putting you underwater on the payments. It's not just about their "view". They paid for amenities which (whether we like it or not) include the view and environment. I don't even have a solution - but it's not so simple as "give up your view so more people can live near their jobs".
  - upzone 8y ago
    That’s the other thing: real estate is not a guaranteed investment. If you invest money in a house and its value goes down, I’m sorry, but that’s the risk you take. A home is not a guaranteed investment vehicle, despite that being the outcome when NIMBYs vote and craft policy to make it so. Also, I don’t think people’s home values drop all that dramatically when new housing is built. We’ve been putting this off for decades, but we’ve also been artificially inflating housing prices. Maybe your tiny bungalow ISN’T actually worth $500,000. Maybe decades of bad local policy have ballooned the price of your house at the expense of others. And even so, even if building housing makes your house decrease in value, that’s still not a good reason to prevent development. I care much more they cities are healthy and plentiful housing than I do about some Boomers who got lucky with when they bought into the real estate market. The solution is actually remarkably simple: build more housing. We did it before; plenty of other countries with more sensible zoning laws do it. There aren’t enough places for people to live. We can either start killing people, or we can put up some walls. Personally, I’m a fan of buildings. Edit: typos (phone)
    - dack 8y ago
      I agree with you in that I still think the right thing to do is build. I also think it's really easy to say "sorry, you fucked up when you spent all your money on a house" if it's someone else. These aren't all "Boomers who got lucky" - they are also millennials buying their houses today at current rates. I think we have to have more empathy for these people if we want to make progress.
incadenza 8y ago
And you’re (Not you personally) free to do what like on your property barring negative outcomes for the entire community. Imposing restrictions on land you don’t own certainly falls in that category. Hence the stalemate I guess.

deleted 8y ago

[deleted]

emodendroket 8y ago

Imagine you owned a home and somebody wanted to put a nightclub on one side of you and an abattoir on the other. Do you think that might affect your quality of life at all? I mean hey, it's their property!

saagarjha 8y ago
As long as they follow the noise and disturbance ordinances, then sure.
- mrep 8y ago
  Are you suggesting that nightclubs should be banned altogether? If not, then where do you suggest to put them since they are inherently noisy?
  - berbec 8y ago
    GP point, I believe, is not to ban them as long as the conform to zoning code. If zone code allows his neighbor to convert to a nightclub, good!
    - emodendroket 8y ago
      "It technically complies with the law"seems like cold comfort. Anyway you're just moving the locus of struggle from the approval process to the zoning regulations, since anyone with their head screwed on is going to demand that the city council use the law to block a development like this.
      - saagarjha 8y ago
        Yeah, I understand that zoning is often used as a way to discourage building things that people don’t want built. But my idea was that hopefully there’s a way to make zoning “work”. I have no inherent issues with a nightclub; I just think it would be better from a noise perspective to put it downtown where it’s not going to bother other people.

markdown 8y ago

Because that is in nobody's interest. Your neighbour would also suffer if you decided to set up a poultry farm on your property. You can't live in a happy, healthy community without giving up a little bit of control in favour of the common good.

adamson 8y ago
Right, and that's why zoning boards should stop your neighbors from building poultry farms in their backyards.

ckocagil 8y ago

No, why should they?

deleted 8y ago
[deleted]

bww 8y ago

Air rights.

fipple 8y ago

Land ownership is never absolute because it isn’t the product of human endeavor, so owning it means you either violently excluded people from it, formalized that violence through law, or bought it after one of the above had happened. That’s why I can’t build a big laser beam on my land and use it to set your house on fire, among other things.

baq 8y ago

Because that's what most people want. Total freedom is anarchy.