The conservative case for denser cities

[Simfan34]

Selfish, Selfish San Francisco

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http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/politics/2014/06/

I know a lot people here have taken exception to under-density here, myself included, but I don't know if Sausalito per se is the best place to be doing that. South of Market, though, and other places, more than merit increased density. And it's not even as if this necessitates tall towers everywhere, but just rowhouses would do the trick- I once read that a neighborhood of single-family townhouses could produce a density of 50,000 people/sq mi. We need to move towards a more efficient, graceful, and overall sustainable (in all senses of the word) way of living. And we cannot afford NIMBYs raising hackles at every corner.

The solution is fairly conservative- let the free market (reasonably regulated to protect the character and quality of neighborhoods) take control and meet demand. But a lot of people seem hell-bent on rent control as the answer, despite the fact pretty much every introductory economics class uses it as an example of the distortions of price ceilings- literally, textbook. That and wage increases which are, as the article points out, are not effective.

[Simfan34]

"reasonably regulated to protect the character and quality of the neighborhoods"

Lmao. You have no ideas.

I mean, you can't go and build a 50-story tower in the middle of, say, Pacific Heights that blocks everyone's views. There needs to be an equilibrium. I'm not saying anything particularly profound here nor am I trying to persuade anyone otherwise.

[Simfan34]

I support more high rises. I just think in a place like San Francisco there are a lot of places where they'd essentially be killing the patient with the cure. That might be because of the nature of the city. But in a place in Manhattan, there a places all over calling for up-building. And I feel the solution calls for a good heaping dose of conservatism- weakening "community boards", loosening union's strangleholds, rolling back rent regulations, fast-tracking approval procedures, pursuing transit projects with a Moses-esque singleness of purpose and regard (or more properly lack thereof) for "community needs", pursuing neighborhood renewal and "gentrification" with vigour, selling off and redeveloping public housing projects, using eminent domain for private developers liberally, and generally riding roughshod over naysayers.

There are a lot of places that could benefit from this rapid up-building in NYC that I can think of, the Far West Side, southern Harlem, Yorkville, Chelsea, Hunters Point, Astoria just to name a few.

Also, my problem with new development might stem from the fact that modern architecture, the pedestrian sort and not your star-chitect's work, is just awfully banal and bad. I'd have no desire to live in any building like that.

[Simfan34]

I think everyone who has thought about the issue agrees with you in principle.  We need way more free market thinking and creative chaos in land use.  Basically, the difficult part is ramming through a development agenda (Getting much of NYC upzoned was one of Bloomberg's greatest achievements).  Everyone wants a piece of the action.

Ah, but see here at my school, you have an "anti-gentrification campaign". I mean, just, ugh.
 

I will caution you on your use of "conservative" though.  Conservative doesn't mean free market.  Conservatives generally idolize exurban cookie cutter tract homes where everyone can have tons of cars, children and cheap consumer crap.  You sound like one of the people Michelle Bachmann warned us about:

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Well, those aren't the conservatives I hang out with. Like traininthedistance said, it's a central issue- considering I live here.

Also, the importance of this "forcefulness" is speeding up construction of transit projects- looking at cut-and-cover construction for new subways, for example.

[Simfan34]

"Heavy industry!!!11"

Heavy industry does not belong in modern cities. It belongs elsewhere. It simply doesn't make sense to plop a 500,000-square foot factory in the middle of a city. Read Greg David's Modern New York for an idea about what I am talking about. I was reminded of it just a few days when some politicians gathered to demand (sillily) to create more "industrial jobs" Here's an example of what he talks about:

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http://www.crainsnewyork.com/article/20140601/BLOGS01/140539979/de-blasio-zones-out-on-manufacturing

I think everyone who has thought about the issue agrees with you in principle.  We need way more free market thinking and creative chaos in land use.  Basically, the difficult part is ramming through a development agenda (Getting much of NYC upzoned was one of Bloomberg's greatest achievements).  Everyone wants a piece of the action.

Ah, but see here at my school, you have an "anti-gentrification campaign". I mean, just, ugh.

Hey, I'm with you there.  I'm a white guy who lives in a historically black neighborhood, I'm at the forefront of gentrification.  I hate those self-righteous liberals who want to treat half of NYC like some type of Indian reservation for poor black people.  These notions of "gentrification=bad" would just look like sour grapes and old, bitter people griping about younger people if the issue didn't trigger the leftist "Spidey-sense" for anything that can be analogized to colonialism/racism/whites taking from browns.

It makes me so mad. These people are basically calling for the maintenance of racially segregated ghettos. How this is supposed to improve their lot, I don't know, but I mean, it's just baffling how these people think.

https://www.facebook.com/coalitionagainstgentrification

[Simfan34]

Yeah, that sort of thing belongs in the suburbs, or the South.

[Simfan34]

I think everyone who has thought about the issue agrees with you in principle.  We need way more free market thinking and creative chaos in land use.  Basically, the difficult part is ramming through a development agenda (Getting much of NYC upzoned was one of Bloomberg's greatest achievements).  Everyone wants a piece of the action.

Ah, but see here at my school, you have an "anti-gentrification campaign". I mean, just, ugh.

Hey, I'm with you there.  I'm a white guy who lives in a historically black neighborhood, I'm at the forefront of gentrification.  I hate those self-righteous liberals who want to treat half of NYC like some type of Indian reservation for poor black people.  These notions of "gentrification=bad" would just look like sour grapes and old, bitter people griping about younger people if the issue didn't trigger the leftist "Spidey-sense" for anything that can be analogized to colonialism/racism/whites taking from browns.

It makes me so mad. These people are basically calling for the maintenance of racially segregated ghettos. How this is supposed to improve their lot, I don't know, but I mean, it's just baffling how these people think.

https://www.facebook.com/coalitionagainstgentrification

I think the harsh reality is that if you're poor, you should think about moving to a more affordable part of the country.  Nobody just deserves to live in the most desirable real estate in America because it's their birthright. 

This. Thank you. I don't know why people seem to think housing projects belong right next to Lincoln Center or in the middle of Chelsea. Like I always say, it's not like I have a right to live on the Upper East Side.

[Simfan34]

I think everyone who has thought about the issue agrees with you in principle.  We need way more free market thinking and creative chaos in land use.  Basically, the difficult part is ramming through a development agenda (Getting much of NYC upzoned was one of Bloomberg's greatest achievements).  Everyone wants a piece of the action.

Ah, but see here at my school, you have an "anti-gentrification campaign". I mean, just, ugh.

Hey, I'm with you there.  I'm a white guy who lives in a historically black neighborhood, I'm at the forefront of gentrification.  I hate those self-righteous liberals who want to treat half of NYC like some type of Indian reservation for poor black people.  These notions of "gentrification=bad" would just look like sour grapes and old, bitter people griping about younger people if the issue didn't trigger the leftist "Spidey-sense" for anything that can be analogized to colonialism/racism/whites taking from browns.

It makes me so mad. These people are basically calling for the maintenance of racially segregated ghettos. How this is supposed to improve their lot, I don't know, but I mean, it's just baffling how these people think.

https://www.facebook.com/coalitionagainstgentrification

I think the harsh reality is that if you're poor, you should think about moving to a more affordable part of the country.  Nobody just deserves to live in the most desirable real estate in America because it's their birthright. 

This. Thank you. I don't know why people seem to think housing projects belong right next to Lincoln Center or in the middle of Chelsea. Like I always say, it's not like I have a right to live on the Upper East Side.

A couple of my relatives live in an upscale neighborhood in Manhattan, in city subsidized housing.  Two people, 4 bedroom apartment, less than $600 a month in rent.  That sort of thing needs to end, it's totally unfair.

EDIT: I didn't know bedstuy said "more affordable part of the country". I'd have said more affordable part of the region/city.

[Simfan34]

We need to develop large scale affordable housing areas around express transit nodes for easy access in and out of the city. But I don't see why we need to cut out commerce from those areas, rather we need to throw in large-scale housing in the mix. I keep on saying "large scale" because that's the only way reasonably priced housing could be conceivably be profitable without subsidization nowadays. But there are still large swathes of Manhattan than can be upzoned and built-up.

Also, I'm a small-minded Manhattanite, but more subways are always a good idea. You will probably eat me alive for saying this, but we should have built the Westway- not only would it have freed the West Side from unsightly traffic, but it would have created a lot of new land.

[Simfan34]

We need to develop large scale affordable housing areas around express transit nodes for easy access in and out of the city. But I don't see why we need to cut out commerce from those areas, rather we need to throw in large-scale housing in the mix. I keep on saying "large scale" because that's the only way reasonably priced housing could be conceivably be profitable without subsidization nowadays. But there are still large swathes of Manhattan than can be upzoned and built-up.

Also, I'm a small-minded Manhattanite, but more subways are always a good idea. You will probably eat me alive for saying this, but we should have built the Westway- not only would it have freed the West Side from unsightly traffic, but it would have created a lot of new land.

I think everyone besides striped bass thinks we should have buried the Westside highway. 

I mean, wouldn't this have been great:

[Simfan34]

We need to smash the cycle of poverty, but charlatans who are professional race-baiters (e.g. Al Sharpton) aren't going to be helping in that regard, now are they? That's another issue entirely, but there's no reason for that uplifting- if and when it happens- to happen on the Upper East Side or right behind Lincoln Center.

[Simfan34]

Of course not. What is your point?

[Simfan34]

What are the "social costs of that monoculture" you speak of? But yes, Little Italy has been pressed by Chinatown, the East Village and the Bowery.

[Simfan34]

LOL you've seen that.

Personally, I like the DC height limit. It defines the character of the city. The city seems pretty dense as is, the 7-8 stories it allows is more than reasonable as far as density is concerned. The average American city is pretty dull, I don't see any reason to make DC more like it.

[Simfan34]

Trinity Cemetery (in Audubon Park) needs to be dug up and turned into a public park, yes. Over a century after its construction, Audubon Terrace, a magnificent public space, hasn't reached a fraction of its potential. I mean, that has the capacity to be a great neighborhood.

[Simfan34]

I'm sure at least some of you are aware of how, in the olden days, those big cemeteries basically were their cities' marquee public parks, and people would go on their Sundays off to picnic among the gravestones and the grass and trees. 

Of course we know. But it isn't the olden days.

[Simfan34]

My fixation with the banlieue is well documented, and I openly acknowledge my approach to social housing is not much beyond "out of sight and out of mind". But I do maintain that the idea of "mixity" is overrated whereas it compromises character, security, aesthetics, and quality of life for a neighborhood's residents.

I am not opposed to building more of these in the Bronx:

[Simfan34]

There is a difference between an organic process of change and razing 10 blocks of buildings to erect towers-in-the-park. "Income mixity" is highly overrated and gives a neighborhood a rather... schizophrenic character. It shouldn't be forced, and it rarely happens naturally.

[Simfan34]

There is a difference between an organic process of change and razing 10 blocks of buildings to erect towers-in-the-park. "Income mixity" is highly overrated and gives a neighborhood a rather... schizophrenic character. It shouldn't be forced, and it rarely happens naturally.

I'm, uh, really not sure where you're getting support for "razing 10 blocks of buildings to erect towers-in-the-park" from?

...housing projects? I'm suggesting razing all of them between 14th or Houston Street and 110th Street and replacing them with market-rate apartments. They can relocate to Hunts' Point, I don't really care where.

[Simfan34]

Of course, I'm being a tad hyperbolic. But there needs to be a significant upbuilding, alongside the curtailment of rent protections, in order to achieve the price suppression we agree needs to happen.