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Oh hush. You’re the barking up the wrong tree with this ‘beautiful housing’ thing. If we want to reform zoning, it’s not going to be by winning over NIMBYs abo

Oh hush. You’re the barking up the wrong tree with this ‘beautiful housing’ thing. If we want to reform zoning, it’s not going to be by winning over NIMBYs about beauty standards. The way to reform zoning is to win over younger, upwardly mobile folks who are currently priced out of the housing market. There are many, many of them. They need to be educated that too little construction leads to supply shortages, and thus high prices. We also stand a chance of winning over labor/blue collar workers who will benefit from plentiful construction. Business owners, both small and large, are also natural allies as high home prices make it difficult to find and keep employees. All these people care about something much nearer and dearer to their hearts than pretty architecture: MONEY. The focus on aesthetics is a distraction at best. In practice, it plays straight into NIMBY hands by granting that beauty standards is a hurdle that must be overcome in order to build.

llamaimperative 2y ago
And yet… here we are with all those incentives aligned and nothing getting built… curious ain’t it? By the way, you are aware that development nearby increases a current landowner’s value, right? The “money-monomaniac” theory is disprovable through basic observation of what prices do during and after development.
- BenFranklin100 2y ago
  Yes I am aware that new development/upzoning often increases nearby land values while at the same time putting downward pressure on market rents. See Mast et al’s work from the Upjohn Institute. I am very aware that homeowners (at least those that outright own the land underneath their house i.e not condo owners) stand to financially benefit by selling to developers who put in higher density housing. My remarks about money were not directed at them. Existing homeowners simply oppose new housing of all sorts. Please reread. Look, I live in Boston. I have also lived in Rittenhouse square. I know the buildings you speak of intimately. I suggest you do something that I have personally have done several times: go to local city council meeting about a beautiful new housing development proposal. Observe how vehemently neighbors oppose the construction of this gorgeous new multifamily housing development. They complain about parking, too much traffic, too much noise, a burden on the school system, the wrong sort of people, blah, blah, blah… it never ends. These people simply don’t want new homes near them. See Katherine Einstein’s “Neighborhood Defenders” to get an overview of this phenomena. As I said, your focus on aesthetics is a distraction. The road forward is either to appeal to the personal economic interests of the three groups I mentioned, or pray the SCOTUS overturns Euclid vs. Ambler.
  - llamaimperative 2y ago
    Are you deliberately ignoring the content of my comments? I am not denying that these people exist and they hold outsized power. I am claiming that we need to build a coalition to defeat them, and that is impossible to achieve when we keep building hideous bullshit. The people we actually need to activate are the vast majority of people who have no equity stake in their neighborhoods but have significant stake in the lifestyle their neighborhoods support. Appealing to the personal economic interests of those three groups has demonstrably not worked. The masses (with no equity stakes) are more easily mobilized by NIMBYs/landed interests against big evil developers because big "evil" developers visibly degrade neighborhoods. The non-equity-growth argument for more development is totally nonexistent, so non-equity holders (again the vast majority of people in high COL areas) have zero motivation to join your side. +1 on overturning Euclid, but I don't see a path to that.
    - BenFranklin100 2y ago
      You obviously I have not been very involved in the housing discourse over the last two decades. Good night, I ending this discussion.
      - llamaimperative 2y ago
        Seems to me you’ve perfectly illustrated my point. “The most extreme people go to planning meetings and successfully overrule several aligned interests against them, but no we don’t need a broader coalition.” You don’t need to convince the people at the planning meetings. You need to convince the people who are not at the planning meetings. Anyway, excellent work over the last two decades, I guess.

llamaimperative 2y ago

And yet… here we are with all those incentives aligned and nothing getting built… curious ain’t it? By the way, you are aware that development nearby increases a current landowner’s value, right? The “money-monomaniac” theory is disprovable through basic observation of what prices do during and after development.

BenFranklin100 2y ago
Yes I am aware that new development/upzoning often increases nearby land values while at the same time putting downward pressure on market rents. See Mast et al’s work from the Upjohn Institute. I am very aware that homeowners (at least those that outright own the land underneath their house i.e not condo owners) stand to financially benefit by selling to developers who put in higher density housing. My remarks about money were not directed at them. Existing homeowners simply oppose new housing of all sorts. Please reread. Look, I live in Boston. I have also lived in Rittenhouse square. I know the buildings you speak of intimately. I suggest you do something that I have personally have done several times: go to local city council meeting about a beautiful new housing development proposal. Observe how vehemently neighbors oppose the construction of this gorgeous new multifamily housing development. They complain about parking, too much traffic, too much noise, a burden on the school system, the wrong sort of people, blah, blah, blah… it never ends. These people simply don’t want new homes near them. See Katherine Einstein’s “Neighborhood Defenders” to get an overview of this phenomena. As I said, your focus on aesthetics is a distraction. The road forward is either to appeal to the personal economic interests of the three groups I mentioned, or pray the SCOTUS overturns Euclid vs. Ambler.
- llamaimperative 2y ago
  Are you deliberately ignoring the content of my comments? I am not denying that these people exist and they hold outsized power. I am claiming that we need to build a coalition to defeat them, and that is impossible to achieve when we keep building hideous bullshit. The people we actually need to activate are the vast majority of people who have no equity stake in their neighborhoods but have significant stake in the lifestyle their neighborhoods support. Appealing to the personal economic interests of those three groups has demonstrably not worked. The masses (with no equity stakes) are more easily mobilized by NIMBYs/landed interests against big evil developers because big "evil" developers visibly degrade neighborhoods. The non-equity-growth argument for more development is totally nonexistent, so non-equity holders (again the vast majority of people in high COL areas) have zero motivation to join your side. +1 on overturning Euclid, but I don't see a path to that.
  - BenFranklin100 2y ago
    You obviously I have not been very involved in the housing discourse over the last two decades. Good night, I ending this discussion.
    - llamaimperative 2y ago
      Seems to me you’ve perfectly illustrated my point. “The most extreme people go to planning meetings and successfully overrule several aligned interests against them, but no we don’t need a broader coalition.” You don’t need to convince the people at the planning meetings. You need to convince the people who are not at the planning meetings. Anyway, excellent work over the last two decades, I guess.