
What Happens When a Suburb Begins to Die? - fern12
https://psmag.com/news/when-a-suburb-begins-to-die
======
ucaetano
> _Once part of the central city, the suburb gains a high-profile mayor in the
> public spotlight who is now responsible for what happens there. It becomes
> part of a city with diverse neighborhoods and housing types that will rise
> and fall on different cycles. And there are the assets of a big city
> downtown to draw on to help finance services._

Why would a city agree to merge with a distressed, money-draining suburb?

There is no solution for these suburbs: they aren't economically sustainable,
their income and household density is too small to support the vast
infrastructure they require. The lower the density, the more miles of roads,
pipes, wires are needed per capita, and more policing, fire services, etc.

Let them fail and wipe them out. Instead of wasting money trying to sustain a
broken system, provide resources to facilitate moving to mid and high-density
housing in the central city.

If people still want to live in large houses in low-density areas, let them
pay for it.

~~~
tomcam
> If people still want to live in large houses in low-density areas, let them
> pay for it.

Excellent! Same with urban mass transit, then.

~~~
peatmoss
Cool, cool, as long as we're moving to user fees for everything, let's also
have that apply to roadways which are not remotely covered by the gas tax.

~~~
sbov
At least on the federal level, considering the federal gas tax hasn't been
raised since 1993, it does a pretty good job at covering the costs of roads.

[https://www.fhwa.dot.gov/highwaytrustfund/](https://www.fhwa.dot.gov/highwaytrustfund/)

~~~
peatmoss
That link is only showing the state of the gas tax fund, and shows none of the
transfers from the general fund to prop up shortfalls.

Second, local roads (i.e. the majority) are mostly funded through the general
fund of municipalities.

Here's an overview of how laughably short gas taxes fall when it comes to
paying for the roads: [http://frontiergroup.org/reports/fg/do-roads-pay-
themselves](http://frontiergroup.org/reports/fg/do-roads-pay-themselves)

------
thearn4
Annexation was a strategy used by Columbus OH some years ago to continue
growth past the limits of its suburban sprawl (and officially past the size of
Cleveland, making it defacto the largest city in Ohio). Cleveland has been
talking about doing the same for some time now, but I don't think the state
government has been very supportive. Cleveland proper isn't large in itself,
but the metro area is about the size of Austin:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Metropolitan_Statistic...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Metropolitan_Statistical_Areas)

A negotiation for merger between Cleveland and East Cleveland was shot down
last year because of some pretty ridiculous demands by the EC leadership:

[http://www.cleveland.com/metro/index.ssf/2016/08/east_clevel...](http://www.cleveland.com/metro/index.ssf/2016/08/east_cleveland_wants_to_keep_r.html#incart_m-
rpt-1)

Some discussion at the time:
[https://www.reddit.com/r/Cleveland/comments/4zeubq/east_clev...](https://www.reddit.com/r/Cleveland/comments/4zeubq/east_cleveland_has_conditions_for_cleveland_merger/)

~~~
penguinUzer
As a resident of the Columbus Ohio area for many years the equivalent to East
Cleveland would be Whitehall. Whitehall is an inner-belt suburb that has
nothing but [now] dirt cheap housing with a high crime rate. Meanwhile a 20
minute drive to the north is one of the fastest growing areas in the country,
Delaware County. All suburb with upper six figure homes, retail, medical, and
a near zero crime rate. One can use Columbus as the perfect example of what
happens when affluent people keep moving further away from the city core. Far
flung suburbs are building like crazy, like Dublin and Westerville in Deleware
County. Gahanna is getting swallowed by Columbus annexing, New Albany's
aggressive annexing may save part of the city from going "ghetto" in 25-30
years. Reynoldsburg, Pickerington, and Pataskala all annexed to block Columbus
from swallowing them whole too.

Inner suburbia like Whitehall is not coming back. Highway infrastructue
shuffles more traffic between suburbs around Columbus and many other citys
rather than traffic into the city core. Poor people displaced from hip new
downtown building are moving into these abandoned inner burbs and bringing all
the crime with them.

------
blfr
_By not merging, those black residents are cut off from the tax base being
created by the technology and medical industry booms happening in the city of
Pittsburgh next door. Black control in many of these suburbs has meant
inheriting a community where previous generations of residents did the
equivalent of running up 250,000 miles on the odometer, then handed over the
keys to what 's now used-up jalopy and walked away._

That's not how real estate works. It's not a car. Usually, when a city
experiences a boom, its suburbs benefit by housing workers from the booming
industries.

If people choose to extend their commute or pay higher prices for residences
in the city just to avoid you, I'm guessing you gave them a very good reason
to avoid you. Why did the original middle class residents leave?

~~~
twobyfour
Why did original middle class residents leave? Because American suburbs are
built unsustainably. Because maintaining or replacing infrastructure built 30
years ago and designed to last 25 years costs more (prohibitively so) than new
greenfield development. Because they're moving into the city to shorten their
commutes rather than further out to lengthen them.

~~~
blfr
Why does it cost prohibitively more to raze a house and build a new one? Or
repave a road over building a new one?

At least some infrastructure is reusable and you get residences closer to the
city therefore much more valuable than outer suburbs which are doing better.
You beat the city by offering a real backyard. There, sold.

Some people will still live farther out and others will remain in the city but
you should have no trouble finding younger families happy to live there. This
is not the issue.

~~~
twobyfour
It's not uncommon for new development to be subsidized by regional or state
(or in the case of building roads, federal) entities in a way that maintenance
and replacement are not. Plus maintenance/replacement disrupts other
infrastructure and activity in ways that greenfield development doesn't.

------
gerbilly
It's funny, we created communities that are too low density, and which contain
almost no commercial or industrial development to support the tax base, and
then we act surprised that they can't sustain themselves.

These communities seem to me like unsustainable resorts built for the upper
middle class of fifty years ago.

~~~
peatmoss
This is my feeling as well. The marginal cost of expensive infrastructure such
as sewer, water, transportation, etc. is intrinsically higher the further out
you go. When you were building on greenfields during suburban expansion, you
overlooked that because relatively affluent people were getting a bargain on
the land and thus the development costs looked more reasonable. Now the
deferred maintenance on those bits of infrastructure is catching up and they
want the central cities—the places where the marginal cost of infrastructure
is low—to subsidize repairs to the infrastructure that allows for low density
sprawl.

To be fair, the article is talking about relatively close-in suburbs. Things
will look worse when the even more farflung exurbs start having a lot of
deferred maintenance catch up to them.

~~~
ghaff
In many areas, far flung "exurbs" long predate many of the closer-in suburbs.
The town I'm in was founded in 1653 or something like that. So this narrative
that infrastructure for living outside of cities only exists because of
subsidized greenfield development. Yes, many people in those outlying towns
commute to work elsewhere but many of those jobs aren't actually in the major
nearby cities. They're in other suburbs.

~~~
astura
Then it would more properly be classified as a small town rather than an
exurb.

~~~
ghaff
"Small towns" constitute the vast majority of people living in more spread-out
communities outside of New England cities. Some are more built up than others
but most of them date to some degree or other to well before highways. FWIW
ESRI classifies where I live an an exurb.

New England is an older part of the US and patterns are obviously different
with newer cities.

~~~
phil21
New England really isn't interesting to discuss for the most part when
discussing US suburbs. New England is as close to "europe" style development
as we get.

The flyover states are really where this conversation needs to be focused on,
as these are the communities that will first be hit hard.

Small towns that eventually got absorbed into a giant metroplex are not the
usual in the country. I think most folks see them as entirely different when
it comes to sustainability models/etc.

~~~
ghaff
That's somewhat fair although I'll point out that migration out of the urban
cores in Boston/Cambridge was the norm until not that many years ago. So the
dynamics weren't all that different. And there were basically no significant
tech jobs left in the core urban area until about 20 years ago.

------
yardie
If this inner ring suburb is dying then the city is also dying. Inner ring
suburbs are usually one of the first to benefit as city workers, looking for a
shorter commute, buy housing nearby.

My city, Miami, dilapidated shacks are being snatched up for 300-500k, cash.
And they are <20 minutes from the city core. That is what a ring suburb in a
thriving city looks like.

If they aren’t getting developers sniffing around driving up the tax base then
merging with the city won’t fix it.

~~~
notfromhere
Not necessarily. Chicago is experiencing a trend where the city center and
north/west side are booming but the inner suburbs are slowly dying while the
outer suburbs are booming.

~~~
yardie
I remain to be convinced. The last figures I could find was for 2015,
2010-2015 population grew 0.9% [0]. Not necessarily booming.

[0] [http://worldpopulationreview.com/us-cities/chicago-
populatio...](http://worldpopulationreview.com/us-cities/chicago-population/)

~~~
notfromhere
It's more of the poor are leaving and the middle/upper class is arriving.

------
pjc50
I thought British local government was a mess, but it seems US local
government is much worse.

One thing that jumps out as soon as you look at a map is that East Cleveland
isn't a geographically distinct built-up-area. It's not really a city of its
own, I suspect much of its employment comes from Cleveland proper.

It seems to me that a lot of these urban sprawls should be merged into what
the UK would call "unitary authorities", which could then better make area-
wide planning decisions.

~~~
tonyedgecombe
Yes, every time I hear calls from politicians to devolve more powers to
regions in the UK I wonder what the outcome will be. It seems like an
invitation for them to become fiscally irresponsible.

------
averagewall
It seems like the problems are from low density so I wonder if there's a way
to set up an economic incentive for residents of suburbs to congregate in
naturally growing/shrinking high density clusters so empty areas remain
completely empty instead of sparsely populated and can have their services
shut down.

Perhaps property tax grows the fewer property tax-paying people are in a
street/small area. Ulitimately making the one guy at the end of a deserted
street pay for the sewer pipe and road going all the way up the street.

~~~
akoncius
so in that case real estate prices in suburbs will drop to zero because nobody
would want to have house with sky-high taxes for services and poor people will
become poorer and be forced to move out of suburbs. And given that they
already have little or no money, they would not have where to go, and they
would need to purchase new apartments in city which will be expensive and they
would need to take a loan for it, which most likely would not be granted
because of a low income.

~~~
LeifCarrotson
They should be able to purchase/rent _inexpensive_ apartments in the city.
Because the apartments are higher density, they ought to be cheaper.

It must be a result of inefficient and damaging market forces, poorly planned
maintenance expenses, and selfish political manipulations that make it cheaper
for one person to live at the end of a culdesac than to live in an apartment
building.

Think about it. Individual electric, sewer, water, roads, foundations, roofs,
garages, exteriors, etc. on each house, with services and businesses like
groceries, trash pickup, police/fire/ambulance, and transport spread over a
broad area, should not be able to compete with a system in which these costs
are shared and services are concentrated between many residents.

Yes, there are downsides to apartment living. I personally own my house, and
enjoy that. But it's absurd that I can buy 2300 square feet of house and 2
acres of land for $1200/mo in mortgage, taxes, bills and maintenance when a
2-bedroom apartment outside my small Midwestern city rents for $1100/mo. And I
paid extra for a newer house, larger lot, and nicer neighborhoods - you can
buy less desirable spots for $800/mo, less than renting in less desirable
apartments (assuming you have decent credit and a small down payment)! I
should be paying way more, or they should be paying way less, if we're going
to have balanced costs on the local economy.

~~~
yazan94
> Because the apartments are higher density, they ought to be cheaper.

In my experience, that is not true because of the location of the apartment
buildings. Anecdotally, most apartments I know of are in an area where space,
thus housing supply, is at a premium and demand is high, not out in the
suburbs where land and housing are already cheap. Why would you pay $X/month
for an apartment when $X/month will also suffice for a mortgage?

~~~
LeifCarrotson
Yep, I don't deny that your points are currently true.

I'm trying to say that a more rational system would put efficient, inexpensive
apartment buildings where they would be cheaper, and more accurately ascribe
higher costs to inefficient, expensive suburban single-family homes.

It's because the system is stupid and ineffective that apartments are in
premium locations and suburban housing is artificially cheap. This
ineffectiveness results in arguments like the parent article where people
propose that the artificially cheap suburbs should be propped up by 'merging'
with the wealthier and more efficient city who would be able to afford their
poor choices.

~~~
akoncius
why it is "artificially cheap" ? price is result of supply / demand , and if
nobody wants to live in suburbs then price will also be low. I agree that
police/emergency/firefighters will be subsidised by district, but for example
trash services could have higher pricing to compensate longer trips to
locations. same applies for water/gas services. For example my dad recently
build tiny house in suburbs of one small city and he paid his own money to do
some pipe works in order to have city's water supply. Same for sewage. But
still pricing is lower compared to city's more central places because of
prestige and comfort, so it makes sense to have cheaper pricing in suburbs.

I understand what you are trying to say but it contradicts how currently
market is working, because in order to make sense city's apartments should be
cheaper compared to suburbs, but given that population in cities is
increasing, it means demand for apartments in cities is increasing, so
increasing pricing too, and then we go back to square one - suburbs are
cheaper to acquire.

------
rhapsodic
These suburbs are "dying" because the majority of their population are low-
skilled, low-educated people who have fewer and fewer opportunities to prosper
in an economy that is becoming more and more automated and skills-oriented.
The blight and decay is just a symptom of the actual problem, which is
decreasing opportunity for these people.

That's one of the reasons I oppose opening our borders to a flood of
additional low-skilled, low-educated people. It hurts the ones who are already
here.

I'm sure this will attract a lot of downvotes, and I'm perfectly fine with
that, but I'd appreciate it if the downvoters would also point out the flaws
they perceive in my logic.

------
mabbo
One only needs to fly over Detroit to see what happens when suburbs die. At
night, huge areas of houses with only 1 or 2 having lights on. In the day, you
see giant areas where there are no people, houses are falling apart, and some
areas where they've simply torn down the buildings and left the land empty.

How many more cities will see this fate happen to their outer edges?

------
euroclydon
China could deal with this problem pretty easily. They don’t have that pesky
_strong property rights_ issue like the US does. They could just relocate
everyone and bulldoze the suburb.

~~~
justinph
Where exactly would the money come from to do that? Bulldozers don't drive and
fuel themselves.

~~~
baursak
Read the thread:
[https://twitter.com/StephanieKelton/status/90661446671188377...](https://twitter.com/StephanieKelton/status/906614466711883776)

------
justinph
It is almost as if the US has been promoting unsustainable development and
poor land use for decades and it is starting to bite cities and states in the
ass.

~~~
lolsal
Do you really think the US was 'promoting unsustainable development and poor
land use', or do you think maybe it was more the case that things may have
changed in the last 50-100 years, and we may have gotten a little wiser?

It's utterly silly to think that building suburbs in the 50s and 60s was
malignant, purposeful behavior. Things change, our population has increased
and our understanding about economics, technology and our resources has
evolved.

------
theyregreat
Two of the terrible things that increase: crime and grocery stores closing.

------
bryanlarsen
In Canada, the provinces often force cities to amalgamate. Is this not
possible in the US?

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cannonedhamster
I'm always genuinely surprised that we don't build down instead of building
up, especially when it comes to cities. Sure there are drainage issues but the
difference in heating and cooling needs would prove beneficial. The only real
reason I can think of is the risk of collapse, which we already have with
above ground buildings. This would provide more affordable housing to those in
cities themselves.

While it wouldn't solve the immediate issue it might mitigate some of the
issues that cause the flight to suburbs in the first place.

~~~
CalRobert
Light, and you gotta move all that dirt, and the view out the window is less
than inspiring.

~~~
cr0sh
Though probably not what the OP had in mind, your rebuttal is moot if one
considers what we (humans) do with deep pit mining.

Essentially, we make a huge tapering hole in the ground, with each "tier"
being part of the roadway for trucks and other mining equipment.

Light isn't really an issue, except at the very bottom, but even it receives
some light during the day. Moving the dirt isn't a problem either - I'm not
sure where it goes, but the tailings end up somewhere (it isn't all consumed
in the mining operation).

As far as a view? Well - if such a construction was done for housing, the
tiers could be rows and rows of buildings hugging the sides of the pit,
potentially looking out and over at other buildings across a large expanse -
like looking out over a valley (if you've never been to a deep pit mine, take
a trip to one sometime - it's quite amazing). With trees, plants, etc -
perhaps water features and maybe a lake at the bottom - I think (in theory) it
could be quite lovely to look at and live in.

It would be nice if the deep pit mines we already have dug could be
repurposed, but the problem with many are the amount of contamination caused
by the mining and other activities during the operation of the mine; I doubt
it would or could ever be fit to live in. Some of these mines are backfilled
with the tailings afterward, but not all.

~~~
cannonedhamster
That's actually a somewhat ingenious solution to housing tbh. You could also
utilize the interior space for hydroponic farming, etc, which would create
attractive greenery.

------
Animats
East Cleveland went down with the incandescent lightbulb. It's home to Nela
Park, the first industrial park, built in 1901 by the National Electric Lamp
Association and later acquired by General Electric. For most of a century, the
East Cleveland Lamp Works source of incandescent light bulbs. There were R&D
facilities; the compact fluorescent lamp was invented there, but not produced
there.

Now Nela Park is down to about 300 people and GE is looking at exiting the
lighting business completely.

------
todorstoyanov
Good relation with a blog post i read recently:
[https://econimica.blogspot.bg/2017/10/the-tale-of-two-
americ...](https://econimica.blogspot.bg/2017/10/the-tale-of-two-
americasurban-rise.html)

