CodeNext and Zoning Issues
Nov. 16th, 2017 01:59 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
livingdebAustin is developing new zoning rules, called CodeNext, and we are allowed to send our comments. Which means I have to figure stuff out. I recently went to a panel discussion on this topic--I will publish detailed comments on that in my next post for anyone interested in all of that. But here I'm going to try to pull all of that together with everything else I know to come up with some conclusions.
Austin has several problems, and CodeNext could affect all of them.
Affordability
Housing costs are going up faster than incomes. Here are some median house prices over the years:
* 1996 - 100K
* 2001 - $149K
* 2007 - $183K
* 2016 - $280K
* 2018 expected - $320K
Currently, 70% of us make less than 100K and thus can't afford a median-priced house.
Why? More people keep moving here (fact), so my guess is that supply is not keeping up with demand. Also, whenever I get excited about more supply (e.g., Mueller, west campus), it turns out that all the new stuff is "luxury" accommodations and thus super expensive. Even the apartment complex next to me put in all granite countertops (and got rid of the vermin problem) and called themselves luxury apartments. If you add only luxury accommodations, that does not seem a like a good way to lower costs. I don't see how all those developers could even get buyers at those prices. I once thought well maybe that means that the older places will have to lower their prices to get people, but apparently not. My best guess is that the supply just isn't keeping up with demand.
Basic math tells me you can increase affordability by increasing income or reducing housing costs. Austin tries to increase income by incentivizing companies to move here, but I get the idea that they do this poorly. They let them pay fewer taxes even if they don't provide many jobs, the jobs don't pay well, and/or they don't even provide as much as they promised. And exempted company taxes leave more of the burden on other property owners.
My economics learning tells me you can improve affordability by raising supply or reducing demand. So I say we should stop offering monetary incentives to companies. Streamline approval processes of whatever bureaucracy they have to deal with, but make them pay their share of taxes. If they go elsewhere, that's fine. We should also encourage small business. Let's not even talk about how Austin gave away the land at the old airport.
One of the big goals of CodeNext is to increase density within the city, or as some would say, sprawling upwards as well as outwards. And that means making more of Austin less like a suburb and more like a downtown. People in my neighborhood complain about how it will make the areas along Cameron and 51st Street more like Mueller and the Triangle, but except for the bad parking, I love those places. In Lausanne, Switzerland, where my friend had a postdoc, you could walk to two grocery stores and there was a bakery in the same building. Both Barcelona and the much smaller Granada also were made of block-sized buildings with retail on the bottom and housing on the top. Granada was walkable; Barcelona had fabulous trains and buses. Both also made sure to have a grocery store every block or two and a park every block or two.
I think the biggest problem is how to transition. CodeNext allows for reduced parking requirements (you need only one off-street parking place for a house instead of two) and I know that's premature. You can't make a place walkable by making parking expensive. You have to actually mix residence and retail or at the very least have good mass transportation. Our mass transit sucks. By "sucks" I mean a) all routes go downtown, b) our best, fastest service is Barcelona's worst, we're-on-strike service (buses come every 15 minutes), c) only one (above-ground) train with very few stops--all the rest are buses.
Current residents versus newcomers
All of the people on the CodeNext panel felt that increasing density is a terrible idea. Why? Austin does still have fairly empty areas, but that is not where developers are building. Instead they are going into existing low-priced neighborhoods and building. The resulting gentrification displaces the current residents (and no one knows where they're being displaced to--probably outside of Austin; I've heard that musicians are moving to Lockhart, a sort-of nearby town beyond the suburbs). They feel that increasing density may sound good in the abstract, but in reality it ignores current residents. They feel that most of us are going to be displaced out of town to make room for a whole new kind of resident. And also that developers are being allowed to build anything they want without having to consult the people who live nearby. Different parts of town have different types of character, and that should be preserved, which is a thing that is not at all addressed by CodeNext. Except that neighborhoods can send comments, too; mine certainly has done so. We'll see if they listen.
If you look at the actual new denser areas of town (Mueller, the Triangle), they are plenty expensive (because they are nice places to live with lots of cool stuff nearby). At least those two places didn't displace anybody (Mueller was an airport; The Triangle was a grass field). They also have terrible and/or expensive parking. Buses do go by; Mueller does not have one of the better ones; I think the Triangle might.
I would think that increased density would making housing more affordable and "smart growth" would make an area more livable, but people on the panel disagreed. I tried to research criticisms of smart growth. Cato uses Oregon as a case study, but Oregon made artificial borders beyond which dense growth was not allowed. Another difference is that Austin is increasing the allowable density but in Oregon "The new minimum density zoning codes specified, for example, that the owner of a vacant quarter-acre lot in an area zoned for 24-unit-per-acre apartments could not build a single home — or even a duplex — on the lot. Instead, the owner would be required to build at least a six-unit complex, or else nothing could be built on the land at all." Bizarrely, "Planners were especially aggressive about rezoning neighborhoods near Portland’s light-rail line, which opened in 1986. They believed that higher densities along the light rail would promote light-rail ridership. However, time has shown that few people want to live in such high-density communities and few developers want to construct them, even if there is convenient access to mass transit." So most of the sites along the rail line stayed vacant. And so Portland developed a housing shortage which increased housing costs. Yet apartment vacancy rates have increased and apartment rents have gone down. Another bizarre statement: "In order to increase the use of public transportation, the agency has publicly announced its goal of increasing roadway congestion to the point of stop-and-go traffic flow on roads parallel to existing or planned transit lines." Unfortunately, that does sound like something Austin would do, except maybe for publicly announcing the strategy.
Fodor and Associates explain that growth is a problem, even if it's handled well, so we need to stop encouraging growth. Interesting.
Institutionalized racism and classism versus equality
First of all, although Austin is possibly the most progressive place in Texas (our county is the *only* one that voted against the state constitutional amendment that marriage can be only between a man and a woman), we have a long history of institutional racism and classism. We've been disallowing minorities from certain parts of town or later, for getting homeowner loans in certain parts of town. Plus we have the very common problem of artists moving somewhere cheap, making it cool, and then being priced out (along with the original residents). Our city even now is one of the most segregated in the country.
Apparently CodeNext is not addressing this issue. Supposedly current code still has racist bits in it; surely they're getting rid of that. But interestingly, although CodeNext is increasing density in most of the city, apparently some of the richer areas (such as Hyde Park and Tarrytown) are not changing in this way. If that is true, it means that rich people don't like it, and if they don't like it, why should we?
Flooding
Flooding in Austin tends to be flash floods which make it hard to escape. Floods have become more frequent and flood plains have expanded. Our city's current solution is buy-outs. Many of the people who were bought out ended up moving out of Austin because they couldn't afford to stay. Yet buy-outs are expensive anyway. We have too many creek variances (variance is exceptions to the rules). Expanding drainage pipes is also expensive. So we need to be careful to not cover up a bunch more land with buildings.
Conclusions
I love most of the dense cities I have visited (such as Boston, MA; Lausanne, Switzerland; London, England; Amsterdam, The Netherlands; and Barcelona and Granada, Spain) (but not New York City--too scary). But it's possible that Americans mostly don't. I don't know.
I oppose subsidizing growth such as by giving tax exemptions and environmental exemptions to companies, even if we do make them comply with promises about employment, wages, and affordability (which I've heard we don't).
I strongly oppose reducing parking requirements (and deliberately slow down traffic) until the need for auto use is actually falling.
I strongly support policies that make the city more walkable, like allowing a lot more mixed-use development, smaller houses, and denser development. I want more flexibility in city codes except to mitigate flooding and discrimination.
And I support the idea that most specific zoning rules should be made at the local level (even though this is also problematic with very few people attending the neighborhood association meetings where votes are taken). I support at the very least the League of Women Voters' recommendations.
Austin has several problems, and CodeNext could affect all of them.
Affordability
Housing costs are going up faster than incomes. Here are some median house prices over the years:
* 1996 - 100K
* 2001 - $149K
* 2007 - $183K
* 2016 - $280K
* 2018 expected - $320K
Currently, 70% of us make less than 100K and thus can't afford a median-priced house.
Why? More people keep moving here (fact), so my guess is that supply is not keeping up with demand. Also, whenever I get excited about more supply (e.g., Mueller, west campus), it turns out that all the new stuff is "luxury" accommodations and thus super expensive. Even the apartment complex next to me put in all granite countertops (and got rid of the vermin problem) and called themselves luxury apartments. If you add only luxury accommodations, that does not seem a like a good way to lower costs. I don't see how all those developers could even get buyers at those prices. I once thought well maybe that means that the older places will have to lower their prices to get people, but apparently not. My best guess is that the supply just isn't keeping up with demand.
Basic math tells me you can increase affordability by increasing income or reducing housing costs. Austin tries to increase income by incentivizing companies to move here, but I get the idea that they do this poorly. They let them pay fewer taxes even if they don't provide many jobs, the jobs don't pay well, and/or they don't even provide as much as they promised. And exempted company taxes leave more of the burden on other property owners.
My economics learning tells me you can improve affordability by raising supply or reducing demand. So I say we should stop offering monetary incentives to companies. Streamline approval processes of whatever bureaucracy they have to deal with, but make them pay their share of taxes. If they go elsewhere, that's fine. We should also encourage small business. Let's not even talk about how Austin gave away the land at the old airport.
One of the big goals of CodeNext is to increase density within the city, or as some would say, sprawling upwards as well as outwards. And that means making more of Austin less like a suburb and more like a downtown. People in my neighborhood complain about how it will make the areas along Cameron and 51st Street more like Mueller and the Triangle, but except for the bad parking, I love those places. In Lausanne, Switzerland, where my friend had a postdoc, you could walk to two grocery stores and there was a bakery in the same building. Both Barcelona and the much smaller Granada also were made of block-sized buildings with retail on the bottom and housing on the top. Granada was walkable; Barcelona had fabulous trains and buses. Both also made sure to have a grocery store every block or two and a park every block or two.
I think the biggest problem is how to transition. CodeNext allows for reduced parking requirements (you need only one off-street parking place for a house instead of two) and I know that's premature. You can't make a place walkable by making parking expensive. You have to actually mix residence and retail or at the very least have good mass transportation. Our mass transit sucks. By "sucks" I mean a) all routes go downtown, b) our best, fastest service is Barcelona's worst, we're-on-strike service (buses come every 15 minutes), c) only one (above-ground) train with very few stops--all the rest are buses.
Current residents versus newcomers
All of the people on the CodeNext panel felt that increasing density is a terrible idea. Why? Austin does still have fairly empty areas, but that is not where developers are building. Instead they are going into existing low-priced neighborhoods and building. The resulting gentrification displaces the current residents (and no one knows where they're being displaced to--probably outside of Austin; I've heard that musicians are moving to Lockhart, a sort-of nearby town beyond the suburbs). They feel that increasing density may sound good in the abstract, but in reality it ignores current residents. They feel that most of us are going to be displaced out of town to make room for a whole new kind of resident. And also that developers are being allowed to build anything they want without having to consult the people who live nearby. Different parts of town have different types of character, and that should be preserved, which is a thing that is not at all addressed by CodeNext. Except that neighborhoods can send comments, too; mine certainly has done so. We'll see if they listen.
If you look at the actual new denser areas of town (Mueller, the Triangle), they are plenty expensive (because they are nice places to live with lots of cool stuff nearby). At least those two places didn't displace anybody (Mueller was an airport; The Triangle was a grass field). They also have terrible and/or expensive parking. Buses do go by; Mueller does not have one of the better ones; I think the Triangle might.
I would think that increased density would making housing more affordable and "smart growth" would make an area more livable, but people on the panel disagreed. I tried to research criticisms of smart growth. Cato uses Oregon as a case study, but Oregon made artificial borders beyond which dense growth was not allowed. Another difference is that Austin is increasing the allowable density but in Oregon "The new minimum density zoning codes specified, for example, that the owner of a vacant quarter-acre lot in an area zoned for 24-unit-per-acre apartments could not build a single home — or even a duplex — on the lot. Instead, the owner would be required to build at least a six-unit complex, or else nothing could be built on the land at all." Bizarrely, "Planners were especially aggressive about rezoning neighborhoods near Portland’s light-rail line, which opened in 1986. They believed that higher densities along the light rail would promote light-rail ridership. However, time has shown that few people want to live in such high-density communities and few developers want to construct them, even if there is convenient access to mass transit." So most of the sites along the rail line stayed vacant. And so Portland developed a housing shortage which increased housing costs. Yet apartment vacancy rates have increased and apartment rents have gone down. Another bizarre statement: "In order to increase the use of public transportation, the agency has publicly announced its goal of increasing roadway congestion to the point of stop-and-go traffic flow on roads parallel to existing or planned transit lines." Unfortunately, that does sound like something Austin would do, except maybe for publicly announcing the strategy.
Fodor and Associates explain that growth is a problem, even if it's handled well, so we need to stop encouraging growth. Interesting.
Institutionalized racism and classism versus equality
First of all, although Austin is possibly the most progressive place in Texas (our county is the *only* one that voted against the state constitutional amendment that marriage can be only between a man and a woman), we have a long history of institutional racism and classism. We've been disallowing minorities from certain parts of town or later, for getting homeowner loans in certain parts of town. Plus we have the very common problem of artists moving somewhere cheap, making it cool, and then being priced out (along with the original residents). Our city even now is one of the most segregated in the country.
Apparently CodeNext is not addressing this issue. Supposedly current code still has racist bits in it; surely they're getting rid of that. But interestingly, although CodeNext is increasing density in most of the city, apparently some of the richer areas (such as Hyde Park and Tarrytown) are not changing in this way. If that is true, it means that rich people don't like it, and if they don't like it, why should we?
Flooding
Flooding in Austin tends to be flash floods which make it hard to escape. Floods have become more frequent and flood plains have expanded. Our city's current solution is buy-outs. Many of the people who were bought out ended up moving out of Austin because they couldn't afford to stay. Yet buy-outs are expensive anyway. We have too many creek variances (variance is exceptions to the rules). Expanding drainage pipes is also expensive. So we need to be careful to not cover up a bunch more land with buildings.
Conclusions
I love most of the dense cities I have visited (such as Boston, MA; Lausanne, Switzerland; London, England; Amsterdam, The Netherlands; and Barcelona and Granada, Spain) (but not New York City--too scary). But it's possible that Americans mostly don't. I don't know.
I oppose subsidizing growth such as by giving tax exemptions and environmental exemptions to companies, even if we do make them comply with promises about employment, wages, and affordability (which I've heard we don't).
I strongly oppose reducing parking requirements (and deliberately slow down traffic) until the need for auto use is actually falling.
I strongly support policies that make the city more walkable, like allowing a lot more mixed-use development, smaller houses, and denser development. I want more flexibility in city codes except to mitigate flooding and discrimination.
And I support the idea that most specific zoning rules should be made at the local level (even though this is also problematic with very few people attending the neighborhood association meetings where votes are taken). I support at the very least the League of Women Voters' recommendations.