3 ms·

> This can't change because it's not determined by some governing body. It actually is. Rents are expensive because zoning laws severely limit density and requ

by rtlfe 4y ago

> This can't change because it's not determined by some governing body. It actually is. Rents are expensive because zoning laws severely limit density and require lots of car parking.

seanmcdirmid 4y ago
Even in cities that don’t require that, rents are still expensive (with the exception of Tokyo where you can rent a 2.5 tatami sized apartment, shared toilet, no central heating, for $300/month).
- rtlfe 4y ago
  > Even in cities that don’t require that, rents are still expensive Maybe you've got some good examples from other countries, but here in the US the only major city with reasonable zoning is Houston which has quite affordable homes.
  - seanmcdirmid 4y ago
    I wouldn’t mind living in Tokyo, Houston doesn’t tempt me at all. I assume much of its affordability is related to demand, and the fact that given a lack of zoning it can sprawl forever (also reducing its appeal). I met a homeless person in Seattle from Houston, even the homeless don’t find the city desirable (though it might be due to weather?).
- pc86 4y ago
  In very few places in the US would "no heat and no toilet" be acceptable, regardless of price.
  - rtlfe 4y ago
    No heat seems bad, but I'd bet SROs with shared bathrooms would be extremely popular in NYC if they were legal. I'm not sure what happened to them, but there was a startup trying to do this: https://www.curbed.com/2021/03/brownstone-shared-housing.html https://www.curbed.com/2021/03/brownstone-shared-housing.htm...
    - fennecfoxen 4y ago
      “In the city of New York there were laws passed to push the private sector out of the SRO business [and eliminate SROs] on the theory that SROs were inhumane. Consequently, people sleep on grates outside.” — George McDonald SROs, residential hotels, boarding houses and the like were all banned in the 1950s (and the surviving ones dismantled through the 1980s), a loss of about 100,000 units of affordable housing. Consider this lovely e-book for further reading: https://publishing.cdlib.org/ucpressebooks/view?docId=ft6j49p0wf;brand=ucpress https://publishing.cdlib.org/ucpressebooks/view?docId=ft6j49... Or this lovely Simon and Garfunkel song about the NYC homeless on the streets of SoHo, contemporary to that era. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PCVnPIE3juc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PCVnPIE3juc
  - masonic 4y ago
    "Acceptable"? It wouldn't even be code.
throwaway0a5e 4y ago
The parking requirement is just a symptom. The problem is everyone with some stupid pet interest tries to use the zoning code or other local laws as a backhanded way of legislating a monetary bar to entry. They don't want triple deckers, they want classy luxury apartments. They don't want a distribution center. They want a white collar office park. They don't want industry and jobs, they want high end retail and dining. But you can't go from suburbia to downtown without the middle steps so of course no meaningful development happens. If we just respected property owner's rights to do as they see fit we wouldn't have these problems or not nearly to the same extent.

by rtlfe 4y ago

> This can't change because it's not determined by some governing body. It actually is. Rents are expensive because zoning laws severely limit density and require lots of car parking.

seanmcdirmid 4y ago

Even in cities that don’t require that, rents are still expensive (with the exception of Tokyo where you can rent a 2.5 tatami sized apartment, shared toilet, no central heating, for $300/month).

rtlfe 4y ago
> Even in cities that don’t require that, rents are still expensive Maybe you've got some good examples from other countries, but here in the US the only major city with reasonable zoning is Houston which has quite affordable homes.
- seanmcdirmid 4y ago
  I wouldn’t mind living in Tokyo, Houston doesn’t tempt me at all. I assume much of its affordability is related to demand, and the fact that given a lack of zoning it can sprawl forever (also reducing its appeal). I met a homeless person in Seattle from Houston, even the homeless don’t find the city desirable (though it might be due to weather?).
pc86 4y ago
In very few places in the US would "no heat and no toilet" be acceptable, regardless of price.
- rtlfe 4y ago
  No heat seems bad, but I'd bet SROs with shared bathrooms would be extremely popular in NYC if they were legal. I'm not sure what happened to them, but there was a startup trying to do this: https://www.curbed.com/2021/03/brownstone-shared-housing.html https://www.curbed.com/2021/03/brownstone-shared-housing.htm...
  - fennecfoxen 4y ago
    “In the city of New York there were laws passed to push the private sector out of the SRO business [and eliminate SROs] on the theory that SROs were inhumane. Consequently, people sleep on grates outside.” — George McDonald SROs, residential hotels, boarding houses and the like were all banned in the 1950s (and the surviving ones dismantled through the 1980s), a loss of about 100,000 units of affordable housing. Consider this lovely e-book for further reading: https://publishing.cdlib.org/ucpressebooks/view?docId=ft6j49p0wf;brand=ucpress https://publishing.cdlib.org/ucpressebooks/view?docId=ft6j49... Or this lovely Simon and Garfunkel song about the NYC homeless on the streets of SoHo, contemporary to that era. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PCVnPIE3juc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PCVnPIE3juc
- masonic 4y ago
  "Acceptable"? It wouldn't even be code.

throwaway0a5e 4y ago

The parking requirement is just a symptom. The problem is everyone with some stupid pet interest tries to use the zoning code or other local laws as a backhanded way of legislating a monetary bar to entry. They don't want triple deckers, they want classy luxury apartments. They don't want a distribution center. They want a white collar office park. They don't want industry and jobs, they want high end retail and dining. But you can't go from suburbia to downtown without the middle steps so of course no meaningful development happens. If we just respected property owner's rights to do as they see fit we wouldn't have these problems or not nearly to the same extent.