6 ms·

American zoning prohibiting shops in residential zones but allowing a drone hub just 800ft from residential buildings is a special kind of irony

Schiendelman 2y ago
When you learn more about the history of zoning - it's allll about keeping neighborhoods wealthy. Not allowing lower classes in. A lot of weird things make sense when you look at them through that lens.
- jeffbee 2y ago
  American zoning in theory: we will keep noise and pollution away from homes. American zoning in practice: the only place homes are permitted is within 50 meters of freeways.
  - Schiendelman 2y ago
    Ha! So true. It's fascinating, zoning in practice just has nothing to do with any of its stated goals.
  - lesuorac 2y ago
    > American zoning in theory: we will keep noise and pollution away from homes. I think you misunderstood the parents comment. The origins of zoning is to prevent the mixing of blacks and whites. It's not about noise pollution; it's about segregation.
    - mistrial9 2y ago
      this is misinformation -- zoning is complex; basically it appears that "if zoning was ever used to separate minority neighborhoods" then it becomes "zoning is to prevent mixing of races" Let's be perfectly clear -- racial segregation is illegal in the USA; zoning has many implementations, many uses, many pressures and has baggage from historical situations
      - jeffbee 2y ago
        We're discussing the origins. The origin of zoning clearly is racial segregation. It was an explicit response to the supreme court decision that outlawed racial covenants.
        potato3732842 2y ago
        The "zoning was done by the racists" along with "white flight was what destroyed the cities" is a dumb just-so narrative that the modern analogues of those people peddle so that they may distance their analogously poor sighted idea, movements, advocacy and politics from the mistakes that the The fundamental problem is that a large part of the population feels entitled to use government to micromanage things that are better off just not managed at all. It is none of your business what your neighbor puts on their property whether it's a homeless shelter or luxury apartment or a bodega or a fancy coffee shop. Real estate development is something market solves very well if people mind their own business and not other people's business.
        jeffbee 2y ago
        That zoning was invented for racial exclusion is not hypothetical. These guys were on the record with their motivations.
        potato3732842 2y ago
        The whole race thing is a distraction from the fact that the evil motivations to use the force of government to micromanage others for the most petty and frivolous of reasons (a category that "wrong skin color" would surely fall into) persist to this day.
        jeffbee 2y ago
        I agree, because I hold vanilla libertarian beliefs about property rights. Unfortunately 99.12% of American libertarians are using the word to mean "selfish asshole" and as soon as you suggest that zoning is a government taking, they abandon the whole platform to defend zoning.
    - deleted 2y ago
      [deleted]
- AlgorithmicTime 2y ago
  [dead]
- FeloniousHam 2y ago
  I went to Disney World for a long vacation. I stayed in multiple Disney properties, just for the novelty. The cheapest "resort" (really just a large motel complex) was one experience, the most expensive a very different one. I preferred the expensive one. I don't hate the poors.
- onlyrealcuzzo 2y ago
  Except when zoning intentionally destroys the value of neighborhoods where undesirables live - how the highways were built, red lining, etc.
  - Schiendelman 2y ago
    Neither of those were zoning. It's easy to conflate a lot of these actions together, but they are very different legal structures.
- insane_dreamer 2y ago
  is there a book that chronicles that history accurately? interested (I know there's been a lot written about redlining specifically, but I'm talking more broadly of the development and history of zoning.)
  - Schiendelman 2y ago
    "The Color of Law" gets into some details, though it's not explicitly about zoning. Other books about zoning are... strangely supportive.
rcpt 2y ago
Here in Los Angeles we have honest to God oil derricks on public school grounds and in the middle of our neighborhoods but you can't build an apartment or open up a new corner store because of zoning.
- bradchris 2y ago
  In *some parts of Los Angeles. The city is getting better district by district, if only incrementally. The east side of Los Angeles (Los Feliz Silver Lake, Atwater Village, Echo Park, Highland Park, Eagle Rock, Glassell Park) has managed to replace most of its neighborhood councils with YIMBY-sympathetic types that are pushing for mixed use and density along their arterials. Not that it’s the end-all-be-all solution, but compared to the west side where I have family, it’s a breath of fresh air to see neighbors generally cautiously enthusiastic about new development rather than immediately trying to figure out how to stop it by default
jimt1234 2y ago
I grew up in Middle America Suburbia, with big yards, cul-de-sacs and strict zoning laws. I thought it was normal that, for anything you wanted to buy, you had to get in a car and drive to it. I was told it was because of zoning laws, and it was meant to keep the neighborhood "peaceful". Well, in college I dated a girl from East LA, and she once took me to visit her family. The neighborhood had zero zoning enforcement. Every house was basically a residence and a small business - hair salons, taco shops, car repair shops, etc. It totally shocked me, like "How could people live like this?" And then we walked the neighborhood. I was shocked again how everyone knew one another so well, and all the little businesses served one another. It was a full-on bartering system, like, "Here's some fresh tortillas. Tell your Mom I'll be by next week with my daughter to do her hair for her quinceanera." I lived my entire childhood in the same house in Suburbia, and I still don't know most of my neighbors' names. The neighborhood was "peaceful", because of zoning laws, but it was boring as shit, and most of all, I'm not so sure having to get in a car and drive just to get a box of cereal was a good thing.
- ToucanLoucan 2y ago
  To borrow a line from Marvel's Ultron: "I think you're confusing peace with quiet." Don't get me wrong, I like my quiet suburb too. That said it's become increasingly apparent to me and I feel to society at large how incredibly atomized and alienated our society is with itself. All of us have "community" on the Internet, which is both not as good, and also is insanely catered to your individual desires and wants, and this is, frankly, unhealthy. A little social friction with people you live and work amongst is a good thing, it teaches you how to resolve conflicts, how to express difficult feelings, and how to negotiate your way through the world. I'm reminded of the book "Life in Code" by Ellen Ullman: “…the ideal of the internet represents the very opposite of democracy, which is a method for resolving difference in a relatively orderly manner through the mediation of unavoidable civil associations. Yet there can be no notion of resolving differences in a world where each person is entitled to get exactly what he or she wants. Here all needs and desires are equally valid and equally powerful. I’ll get mine and you’ll get yours; there is no need for compromise and discussion. I don’t have to tolerate you and you don’t have to tolerate me. No need to care for my neighbour next door when I can stay with my chosen neighbours in the ether, my email friends and the visitors to the sites I visit, people who think as I do, who want what I want. No need for messy debate and the whole rigamarole of government with all its creaky bothersome structures. There’s no need for any of this, because now that we have the World Wide Web the problem of our pursuit of happiness has been solved! We’ll each click for our individual joys, and our only dispute may come if something doesn’t get delivered on time. Would you rather be at home?” And what is this if not the core essence of Suburbia? Tiny kingdoms for tiny kings, each answerable only unto itself, and utterly beside itself with rage any time that authority is questioned by... anything, from Neighborhood Associations to building codes to the local city.
potato3732842 2y ago
Independent businesses can't pay to kiss the ring in the form of all manner of local permits and hoops that must be jumped through to the benefit of various parties who otherwise have no stake in the matter. Amazon can. Chain stuff can. That's a large part of why every good school district that's inevitably full of bad people winds up looking exactly the same.

Schiendelman 2y ago

When you learn more about the history of zoning - it's allll about keeping neighborhoods wealthy. Not allowing lower classes in. A lot of weird things make sense when you look at them through that lens.

jeffbee 2y ago
American zoning in theory: we will keep noise and pollution away from homes. American zoning in practice: the only place homes are permitted is within 50 meters of freeways.
- Schiendelman 2y ago
  Ha! So true. It's fascinating, zoning in practice just has nothing to do with any of its stated goals.
- lesuorac 2y ago
  > American zoning in theory: we will keep noise and pollution away from homes. I think you misunderstood the parents comment. The origins of zoning is to prevent the mixing of blacks and whites. It's not about noise pollution; it's about segregation.
  - mistrial9 2y ago
    this is misinformation -- zoning is complex; basically it appears that "if zoning was ever used to separate minority neighborhoods" then it becomes "zoning is to prevent mixing of races" Let's be perfectly clear -- racial segregation is illegal in the USA; zoning has many implementations, many uses, many pressures and has baggage from historical situations
    - jeffbee 2y ago
      We're discussing the origins. The origin of zoning clearly is racial segregation. It was an explicit response to the supreme court decision that outlawed racial covenants.
      - potato3732842 2y ago
        The "zoning was done by the racists" along with "white flight was what destroyed the cities" is a dumb just-so narrative that the modern analogues of those people peddle so that they may distance their analogously poor sighted idea, movements, advocacy and politics from the mistakes that the The fundamental problem is that a large part of the population feels entitled to use government to micromanage things that are better off just not managed at all. It is none of your business what your neighbor puts on their property whether it's a homeless shelter or luxury apartment or a bodega or a fancy coffee shop. Real estate development is something market solves very well if people mind their own business and not other people's business.
        jeffbee 2y ago
        That zoning was invented for racial exclusion is not hypothetical. These guys were on the record with their motivations.
        potato3732842 2y ago
        The whole race thing is a distraction from the fact that the evil motivations to use the force of government to micromanage others for the most petty and frivolous of reasons (a category that "wrong skin color" would surely fall into) persist to this day.
        jeffbee 2y ago
        I agree, because I hold vanilla libertarian beliefs about property rights. Unfortunately 99.12% of American libertarians are using the word to mean "selfish asshole" and as soon as you suggest that zoning is a government taking, they abandon the whole platform to defend zoning.
  - deleted 2y ago
    [deleted]
AlgorithmicTime 2y ago
[dead]
FeloniousHam 2y ago
I went to Disney World for a long vacation. I stayed in multiple Disney properties, just for the novelty. The cheapest "resort" (really just a large motel complex) was one experience, the most expensive a very different one. I preferred the expensive one. I don't hate the poors.
onlyrealcuzzo 2y ago
Except when zoning intentionally destroys the value of neighborhoods where undesirables live - how the highways were built, red lining, etc.
- Schiendelman 2y ago
  Neither of those were zoning. It's easy to conflate a lot of these actions together, but they are very different legal structures.
insane_dreamer 2y ago
is there a book that chronicles that history accurately? interested (I know there's been a lot written about redlining specifically, but I'm talking more broadly of the development and history of zoning.)
- Schiendelman 2y ago
  "The Color of Law" gets into some details, though it's not explicitly about zoning. Other books about zoning are... strangely supportive.

rcpt 2y ago

Here in Los Angeles we have honest to God oil derricks on public school grounds and in the middle of our neighborhoods but you can't build an apartment or open up a new corner store because of zoning.

bradchris 2y ago
In *some parts of Los Angeles. The city is getting better district by district, if only incrementally. The east side of Los Angeles (Los Feliz Silver Lake, Atwater Village, Echo Park, Highland Park, Eagle Rock, Glassell Park) has managed to replace most of its neighborhood councils with YIMBY-sympathetic types that are pushing for mixed use and density along their arterials. Not that it’s the end-all-be-all solution, but compared to the west side where I have family, it’s a breath of fresh air to see neighbors generally cautiously enthusiastic about new development rather than immediately trying to figure out how to stop it by default

jimt1234 2y ago

I grew up in Middle America Suburbia, with big yards, cul-de-sacs and strict zoning laws. I thought it was normal that, for anything you wanted to buy, you had to get in a car and drive to it. I was told it was because of zoning laws, and it was meant to keep the neighborhood "peaceful". Well, in college I dated a girl from East LA, and she once took me to visit her family. The neighborhood had zero zoning enforcement. Every house was basically a residence and a small business - hair salons, taco shops, car repair shops, etc. It totally shocked me, like "How could people live like this?" And then we walked the neighborhood. I was shocked again how everyone knew one another so well, and all the little businesses served one another. It was a full-on bartering system, like, "Here's some fresh tortillas. Tell your Mom I'll be by next week with my daughter to do her hair for her quinceanera." I lived my entire childhood in the same house in Suburbia, and I still don't know most of my neighbors' names. The neighborhood was "peaceful", because of zoning laws, but it was boring as shit, and most of all, I'm not so sure having to get in a car and drive just to get a box of cereal was a good thing.

ToucanLoucan 2y ago
To borrow a line from Marvel's Ultron: "I think you're confusing peace with quiet." Don't get me wrong, I like my quiet suburb too. That said it's become increasingly apparent to me and I feel to society at large how incredibly atomized and alienated our society is with itself. All of us have "community" on the Internet, which is both not as good, and also is insanely catered to your individual desires and wants, and this is, frankly, unhealthy. A little social friction with people you live and work amongst is a good thing, it teaches you how to resolve conflicts, how to express difficult feelings, and how to negotiate your way through the world. I'm reminded of the book "Life in Code" by Ellen Ullman: “…the ideal of the internet represents the very opposite of democracy, which is a method for resolving difference in a relatively orderly manner through the mediation of unavoidable civil associations. Yet there can be no notion of resolving differences in a world where each person is entitled to get exactly what he or she wants. Here all needs and desires are equally valid and equally powerful. I’ll get mine and you’ll get yours; there is no need for compromise and discussion. I don’t have to tolerate you and you don’t have to tolerate me. No need to care for my neighbour next door when I can stay with my chosen neighbours in the ether, my email friends and the visitors to the sites I visit, people who think as I do, who want what I want. No need for messy debate and the whole rigamarole of government with all its creaky bothersome structures. There’s no need for any of this, because now that we have the World Wide Web the problem of our pursuit of happiness has been solved! We’ll each click for our individual joys, and our only dispute may come if something doesn’t get delivered on time. Would you rather be at home?” And what is this if not the core essence of Suburbia? Tiny kingdoms for tiny kings, each answerable only unto itself, and utterly beside itself with rage any time that authority is questioned by... anything, from Neighborhood Associations to building codes to the local city.

potato3732842 2y ago

Independent businesses can't pay to kiss the ring in the form of all manner of local permits and hoops that must be jumped through to the benefit of various parties who otherwise have no stake in the matter. Amazon can. Chain stuff can. That's a large part of why every good school district that's inevitably full of bad people winds up looking exactly the same.