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Here’s the reason: In the United States, zoning is controlled almost exclusively by local city councils. Voter turnout in local elections is extremely poor. T
by BenFranklin100 4y ago
Here’s the reason:
In the United States, zoning is controlled almost exclusively by local city councils. Voter turnout in local elections is extremely poor. The only people who vote are A. older and B. homeowners. The young and renters scarcely show up. Thus, local city councils by and large represent homeowner’s interests. These older homeowners adamantly oppose new development like apartments, bike lanes, and mass transit. They fear developments might affect the value of existing homes, change the ‘character of the neighborhood’ (read: attract the wrong type of minorities), increase traffic, compete for existing parking, etc… the list goes on. In general, homeowners are opposed to any type of change that might affect the value of their home or mildly inconvenience their lives.
Local politicians are loathe to cross homeowners. They will be voted out if they do. Further, these politicians are usually homeowners themselves and are complicit in maintaining homeowner’s best interests at the expense of the broader public.
The only solution is that cities be stripped of their absolute control over zoning and power shared at the federal and state level.
- pif 4y agoI am not from the USA and I don't live in the USA. I've read about this issue several times, and I'm not sure whether I understand why it is an issue. > zoning is controlled almost exclusively by local city councils What's wrong with it? People opposing the status quo usually look to imply that every citizen of the USA should have the right to go and live where he likes the most, at the price and at the conditions it prefers. Why should I be able to force, for example, San Francisco to build cheap homes for me to move there? If I can't afford San Francisco, I'll go live elsewhere. Instead, if I live in San Francisco, I will participate in the local political life and vote according to my preferences.
- bluGill 4y ago> > zoning is controlled almost exclusively by local city councils >What's wrong with it? it excludes people who would live there but the zoning doesn't allow it. On the scale of a single town this doesn't matter, but on the scale of an entire metro area all these little zoning groups make it impossible to anything anywhere in the entire area and so it destroys the whole. zoning is good for any one small area, but across the entire metro area the sum total is bad.
- pif 4y ago> it excludes people who would live there but the zoning doesn't allow it. Let me be cynical: so what? They'll go and live elsewhere. > it destroys the whole. There is a huge difference between slowing the growth (or even stopping the growth) and destroying a city. A usual problem with successful cities is they attract more people, which attract more business, which attract more people and so on. It's time we learn how to keep the economy in good health without our cities turning to anthills.
- BenFranklin100 4y agoYou compare people seeking a better life in a high opportunity city to insects. There’s a fine line between NIMBYism and misanthropy and you just crossed it.
- bluGill 4y ago> so what? They'll go and live elsewhere. What is you get San Franciso where you cannot find enough people who can afford to work in your city to take care of the basic jobs.