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Zoning for who? America has no issue with single family zoning. I’m assuming you’re speaking about middle and high density zoning. Since the issues you're desc

Zoning for who? America has no issue with single family zoning. I’m assuming you’re speaking about middle and high density zoning. Since the issues you're describing are extremely common for those zoning projects.

zbrozek 4y ago
If you're the property owner it should be easy for you to build whatever level of residential density you want and think the market will make profitable. Why is it illegal for me to build townhouses on my land? I'm in an area where it takes, on average, 1.8 acres per single family home. The next town over would put 18 single family homes in that same space. Zoning is restrictive even for single-family homes.
- josephcsible 4y ago
  > If you're the property owner it should be easy for you to build whatever level of residential density you want and think the market will make profitable. Why is it illegal for me to build townhouses on my land? Isn't the entire concept of externalities in economics that things aren't that simple? Presumably you agree that your neighbor shouldn't be able to build a sewage treatment plant next to your house.
  - imtringued 4y ago
    From what I can tell most economists will actively go out of their way to ignore externalities. For some externalities there are even market based methods for getting rid of them yet curiously almost no economist is interested in these types of institutions.
  - zbrozek 4y ago
    Sewage treatment plants are not residential construction.
- yummypaint 4y ago
  Move to Texas and you can literally do this. There is no zoning. Go ahead and build those townhouses on your land. Your next door neighbors might build a strip club or pesticide manufacturing plant, though. Even if you luck out with your current neighbors, the addional risk will lead to worse terms for you if you need investors to finance the project.
- rsj_hn 4y ago
  I don't think that's a particularly representative example. Zoning is determined locally in the U.S., and taking the most extreme locality doesn't really shed light on what's going on in the country as a whole, and isn't a useful avenue to approach this problem. Try instead to work with averages and representative localities. The U.S., like any area, has urban, suburban, and rural areas, with a continuous gradient in between. No point in discussing rural or near-rural areas when complaining about zoning, since the real issue is that people in urban areas need access to jobs. People living on the horse farms or rural ranches are not the problem here, and liberalizing zoning in Asheville isn't going to make housing more affordable in Austin or San Francisco, which is where the pain of restrictive zoning is felt.
- manfre 4y ago
  Zoning density is based partially on supporting infrastructure. If low density suddenly becomes higher density, will the roads be able to handle the additional vehicles/trips? Probably not, so who will cover costs to improve the roads so individuals can build multiple townhomes in their property?
  - zbrozek 4y ago
    This is precisely what impact fees are for when applying for building permits.
- BuckyBeaver 4y ago
  - BuckyBeaver 4y ago
    Modded down by developer shills and clueless Bernie bros who lash out at facts they don't like... for whatever reason. Maybe they lack the confidence or gumption to believe that they'll ever succeed, so why should anyone else enjoy what he worked decades for? GIMME GIMME GIMME. Up yours. Get a job.
    - imtringued 4y ago
      People have jobs but very often these mega corporations moved them into a specific location and now everyone must live there which is why they complain about housing.
  - iggldiggl 4y ago
    > Not to mention the lack of public transportation in most areas, so now you're creating more traffic. That's a somewhat of a circular dependency, though, because public transport requires a certain amount of density in order to be viable.
  - theGnuMe 4y ago
    Denser cities use less water.. Biggest consumer of water is agriculture. There are natural places to increase density as traffic increases. So think of a main road, along that main road and some of the nearer side streets can be densified. You see a lot of this along El Camino for example in the Bay area. Take a bunch of these 1950s and earlier small 2bdrm houses and build multifamily housing.
    - BuckyBeaver 4y ago
      Like I said: You want to live in density, move to the dense urban centers. But covering 100% of the land with concrete and giant edifices is unsustainable and inexcusable. "Main roads" are main roads for their original levels of population. They quickly become impassable if you exceed their design capacity; in fact, a great many of them are already there. And... no. Why destroy houses and yards with concrete blocks, while giant already-concrete edifices sit empty? You totally ignored that.

zbrozek 4y ago

If you're the property owner it should be easy for you to build whatever level of residential density you want and think the market will make profitable. Why is it illegal for me to build townhouses on my land? I'm in an area where it takes, on average, 1.8 acres per single family home. The next town over would put 18 single family homes in that same space. Zoning is restrictive even for single-family homes.

josephcsible 4y ago
> If you're the property owner it should be easy for you to build whatever level of residential density you want and think the market will make profitable. Why is it illegal for me to build townhouses on my land? Isn't the entire concept of externalities in economics that things aren't that simple? Presumably you agree that your neighbor shouldn't be able to build a sewage treatment plant next to your house.
- imtringued 4y ago
  From what I can tell most economists will actively go out of their way to ignore externalities. For some externalities there are even market based methods for getting rid of them yet curiously almost no economist is interested in these types of institutions.
- zbrozek 4y ago
  Sewage treatment plants are not residential construction.
yummypaint 4y ago
Move to Texas and you can literally do this. There is no zoning. Go ahead and build those townhouses on your land. Your next door neighbors might build a strip club or pesticide manufacturing plant, though. Even if you luck out with your current neighbors, the addional risk will lead to worse terms for you if you need investors to finance the project.
rsj_hn 4y ago
I don't think that's a particularly representative example. Zoning is determined locally in the U.S., and taking the most extreme locality doesn't really shed light on what's going on in the country as a whole, and isn't a useful avenue to approach this problem. Try instead to work with averages and representative localities. The U.S., like any area, has urban, suburban, and rural areas, with a continuous gradient in between. No point in discussing rural or near-rural areas when complaining about zoning, since the real issue is that people in urban areas need access to jobs. People living on the horse farms or rural ranches are not the problem here, and liberalizing zoning in Asheville isn't going to make housing more affordable in Austin or San Francisco, which is where the pain of restrictive zoning is felt.
manfre 4y ago
Zoning density is based partially on supporting infrastructure. If low density suddenly becomes higher density, will the roads be able to handle the additional vehicles/trips? Probably not, so who will cover costs to improve the roads so individuals can build multiple townhomes in their property?
- zbrozek 4y ago
  This is precisely what impact fees are for when applying for building permits.
BuckyBeaver 4y ago
- BuckyBeaver 4y ago
  Modded down by developer shills and clueless Bernie bros who lash out at facts they don't like... for whatever reason. Maybe they lack the confidence or gumption to believe that they'll ever succeed, so why should anyone else enjoy what he worked decades for? GIMME GIMME GIMME. Up yours. Get a job.
  - imtringued 4y ago
    People have jobs but very often these mega corporations moved them into a specific location and now everyone must live there which is why they complain about housing.
- iggldiggl 4y ago
  > Not to mention the lack of public transportation in most areas, so now you're creating more traffic. That's a somewhat of a circular dependency, though, because public transport requires a certain amount of density in order to be viable.
- theGnuMe 4y ago
  Denser cities use less water.. Biggest consumer of water is agriculture. There are natural places to increase density as traffic increases. So think of a main road, along that main road and some of the nearer side streets can be densified. You see a lot of this along El Camino for example in the Bay area. Take a bunch of these 1950s and earlier small 2bdrm houses and build multifamily housing.
  - BuckyBeaver 4y ago
    Like I said: You want to live in density, move to the dense urban centers. But covering 100% of the land with concrete and giant edifices is unsustainable and inexcusable. "Main roads" are main roads for their original levels of population. They quickly become impassable if you exceed their design capacity; in fact, a great many of them are already there. And... no. Why destroy houses and yards with concrete blocks, while giant already-concrete edifices sit empty? You totally ignored that.