
Rezoning in the age of hyper-gentrification - elorant
http://www.theawl.com/2016/03/affordable-for-whom
======
eru
Just so much wrong with the situation described in the article and the weird
attempts to fix it.

At least they don't seem to be quite as bad as their west coast counterparts
who think supply-and-demand don't apply for housing.
([http://www.planetizen.com/node/73728/supply-and-demand-
denia...](http://www.planetizen.com/node/73728/supply-and-demand-denialism))

> Her statement continued: “Land is our most precious resource in New York
> City. It is very clear what we need: heavily subsidized, tenant-controlled,
> deeply affordable housing. We may never get that if we rezone now.”

You just need people to build. Luxury condos is fine, just make it dense:

[https://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:pr36Xv...](https://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:pr36XvQ9KvoJ:cityobservatory.org/what-
filtering-can-and-cant-do/+&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=au)

And, yes, land is the most precious resource they have. And very hard to hide
from the taxman. Hence, land value taxation:
[http://www.economist.com/blogs/freeexchange/2015/04/land-
val...](http://www.economist.com/blogs/freeexchange/2015/04/land-value-tax)

------
CalRobert
Zoning is what makes gentrification possible. We've made walkable, human scale
development illegal, so only what survives from nearly a century ago remains.
Among those who like urban living, only the wealthiest can afford to have it,
while others are pushed to the single - use, parking-minimum'ed suburban
asphalt hellscape.

~~~
ido
There's both plenty of gentrification and plenty of walkable, human scale
development here (Germany), so I don't buy that that's the cause (although it
might exacerbate the problem).

~~~
CalRobert
I was referring to the US, pardon that. In Germany it seems even recent cities
can have buildings spaced close to one another and without forcing people to
pay for parking.

This is untrue in most of the US; case in point, a person who wants to turn an
old building in to a restaurant in LA, even near transit, has been forced to
add 21 parking spots. To do this, they are tearing down the house next door,
exacerbating an already difficult housing shortage.

[http://planning.lacity.org/caseinfo/casesummary.aspx?case=ZA...](http://planning.lacity.org/caseinfo/casesummary.aspx?case=ZA-2015-2935-CU-
ZV-ZAA)

For Germany, my understanding is that it's still not too horridly expensive -
is that correct? Last I heard Leipzig was the hot new place, and it doesn't
seem fiendishly expensive (note: I've been desensitized to some extent by
living in Berkeley and Santa Monica)

~~~
ido
Leipzig, like several other eastern cities, is the "hot new place" _because_
it's still relatively affordable. The American equivalent might be Pittsburgh.

In Munich, Hamburg, Frankfurt, etc prices are much higher.

------
nikanj
The traditional wisdom was to always build A-quality housing, so people from B
could upgrade to A, people in C to the recently vacated B etc. Building the
possible quality increased the quality of housing available for everyone,
whereas building as cheaply as possible gave us "the projects".

Unfortunately the demand for A-quality housing is now global, and building
luxury condos doesn't mean an upgrade for the doctor down the street, it means
more investment opportunity for foreign capital. The modern A-quality housing
is firmly out of the reach of your traditional upper middle class, at least in
world-class cities.

~~~
jacobolus
This could be ameliorated via changes to the tax system. For instance, a
higher tax rate for non-owner-occupied property, or a higher marginal tax rate
for everything beyond the first 1000 square feet.

The problem in most cities though is insufficient housing to meet local
demand, rather than foreign investment per se. So maybe Georgist land value
taxes combined with relaxed zoning requirements (e.g. less parking
requirement, smaller minimum unit sizes, taller height limits, more mixed
residential/commercial zones, etc.) would be a better approach.

In San Francisco, for example, something like 3/4 of the city is zoned to only
allow 1–2 units per lot, and is made up of single-family detached homes, with
excessively wide streets and tons of parking. If even a fraction of this land
was re-zoned to allow 5-story mixed use buildings, downtown Paris style, the
city could fit a lot more housing.

~~~
ChuckMcM
I was going to say something similar. There is plenty of opportunity to apply
taxes here on "tertiary" housing, houses which are not the primary residence
of the owner. Sufficiently targeted requirements would hit the .1% and leave
the rest unscathed. Of course those folks have a tremendous ability to
encourage a different policy, but more and more cities could use the
additional funding.

~~~
mattzito
As a Manhattan resident, the problem you describe isn't really the one being
addressed by de blasio's plan.

"Billionaires row" in midtown was already expensive real estate beforehand in
a very desirable neighborhood, it just got converted into giant wealth safety
deposit boxes.

The Williamsburg example from the article is more of the core problem being
addressed - how do we allow a neighborhood that was not so desirable to be
redeveloped without blowing it to bits.

I do also believe we should tax non-primary residence apartments for the
reasons you describe, but it's a separate problem.

~~~
sokoloff
[Differentially] Taxing non-resident housing encourages buying first houses on
the margin, but also hurts renters (as the tax is passed through in the rental
economics).

I'm not saying it's all bad, but it's sure not all good either...

~~~
eru
That's why you tax land, not houses.

Land value taxes can't be passed through.

