It IS in the interest of the city. This does not translate into policymaking because of the intersection of these realities: 1) The 'special interest' effect —

It IS in the interest of the city. This does not translate into policymaking because of the intersection of these realities: 1) The 'special interest' effect — where narrow groups of highly-motivated individuals become more politically organized and effective than the rest, whose interests are at odds with the minority group but whose members are, on an individual basis, not affected enough to take political action. This is especially true when the special interest group is highly-resourced. 2) The USA system of deciding what gets constructed where is slow, bureaucratic, and tends to have lots of nucleation sites for local special interest groups to assert their political power. 2) NIMBYs are, by definition, landed gentry, and therefore more highly-resourced than young renters.