Why American Cities Are Broke - The Growth Ponzi Scheme [ST03]

[Hamartia Antidote]

they were set in the 1950's and are costly and difficult to change.

The only difficulty mentioned is the Governor convincing towns to build more multi-unit housing which apparently the majority are happy with their current setup and are not interested.

What just happened with single-family zoning in California?

Gov. Gavin Newsom signed legislation that allows more than one unit to be built on lots zoned for only one. It sounds technical, but it's a major change in California housing policy. Here's what it means.

www.latimes.com

"Again, local governments will decide for themselves whether to adopt the denser zones that SB 10 allows for “transit rich” or urban “infill” areas. "

coincidentally at the time a major concern of the FHA was preventing minorities from moving into suburbs.

Certainly you need a level of wealth to move from cities to suburban living. If the FHA was intentionally zoning the suburbs to only allow wealthier people to be able to afford living there then sure that could lead to an initial bad design. But again things change and the town can easily authorize apartment buildings/shops to be built later. You seen that in many towns...especially the centers.

I would say the inefficiencies of the suburbs aren't my problem. but the export of pollution and conservative politics from suburbs are my problem.

The pollution was a lot worse before manufacturing was exported to Asia. I think our skies are far more bluer and streams far more clear even with the car increase..

 

[Hamartia Antidote]

Watch these by another Canadian who lives in Tokyo now...

This is one of the reasons towns aren't budging on the single family home zoning.
Multi-family units end up turning into rental property.
Renters tend to be transient and lower income. They have no vested interest in the well-being of the town. So they tend to be the litterbugs. Since landlords don't live in the property they skimp on the maintenance...causing blight.

it already is a disaster for postwar suburbs as the examples of East Cleveland, Vallejo, Ferguson, etc show. As the first postwar inner ring suburbs can no longer expand, they fall into decay. you can always just say '**** them' and neglect the infrastructure but that results in massive rise in crime and violence like Ferguson.

the 1970's-80's suburbs are next.

How can they not expand? They can tear down a block of 12 "decayed houses" and put up a multi-story building. Detroit tomorrow could authorize 100's with all the abandoned property they have. The problem is (and always has been) finding buyers who actually want to live there.

 

[Hamartia Antidote]

Perhaps there is another way, new urbanism style walkable neighborhoods with detached townhouses. Cheaper to maintain on the tax base and a quick walk to shops; all the benefits of a city without most of the density.

Sort of like your Brookline part of Boston I visited a few years ago.

Unfortunately you will need far more density to keep a Starbucks like that alive. That Starbucks is only surviving because it is in the town center not due to that neighborhood.

 

[FuturePAF]

Unfortunately you will need far more density to keep a Starbucks like that alive. That Starbucks is only surviving because it is in the town center not due to that neighborhood.

Maybe not a Starbucks but a local independent coffee place is what these town need to prioritize. Money circulated back Into the local economy more with independent stores. Rebuilding a sense of community rather then a redesigned strip mall filled with chain stores.

 

[tower9]

it already is a disaster for postwar suburbs as the examples of East Cleveland, Vallejo, Ferguson, etc show. As the first postwar inner ring suburbs can no longer expand, they fall into decay. you can always just say '**** them' and neglect the infrastructure but that results in massive rise in crime and violence like Ferguson.

the 1970's-80's suburbs are next.

Well those cities have already been in decline for a long time. People have moved away to other states since decades ago so it’s nothing new.

 

[letsrock]

Well those cities have already been in decline for a long time. People have moved away to other states since decades ago so it’s nothing new.

Exactly. Cleveland is part of rust belt for decades. It reinvented itself in to services trade a little post 2010. So its not surprising suburbs closest to city will see some negative impact. But deeper suburbs of cleveland like strongsville etc are doing absolutely fine.

 

[Bilal9]

Maybe not a Starbucks but a local independent coffee place is what these town need to prioritize. Money circulated back Into the local economy more with independent stores. Rebuilding a sense of community rather then a redesigned strip mall filled with chain stores.

Starbucks is wonderful but everyone here is forgetting that the corner cafe, streetcar or the American Diner was always a great tradition that formed in every neighborhood past the turn of the last century, especially the 1930s and 40s. There was one every few blocks, along with your Victory gas station and auto service place.

I live in the West part of LA where the population density has always supported Pubs and Diners (in fact several) in every block along with Sushi and Vietnamese Banh Mi places. They are places where people congregate before/after/during games or singles use as places to meet and socialize. People bring their dogs and just hang out on the sidewalk tables for a couple of hours shooting the breeze.

This is Big Deans in the People's Republic of Santa Monica...rustic and casual are the key words.

 

[FuturePAF]

Starbucks is wonderful but everyone here is forgetting that the corner cafe, streetcar or the American Diner was always a great tradition that formed in every neighborhood past the turn of the last century, especially the 1930s and 40s. There was one every few blocks, along with your Victory gas station and auto service place.

I live in the West part of LA where the population density has always supported Pubs and Diners (in fact several) in every block along with Sushi and Vietnamese Banh Mi places. They are places where people congregate before/after/during games or singles use as places to meet and socialize. People bring their dogs and just hang out on the sidewalk tables for a couple of hours shooting the breeze.

This is Big Deans in the People's Republic of Santa Monica...rustic and casual are the key words.

Definitely, the diners are a cornerstone of American dinning traditions. Local institutions need to be supported and brought back as much as possible. These kinds of places are the “third places” of any real community. Suburbia always felt like it was getting more and more soulless as everything became a series of chain stores.

Exactly. Cleveland is part of rust belt for decades. It reinvented itself in to services trade a little post 2010. So its not surprising suburbs closest to city will see some negative impact. But deeper suburbs of cleveland like strongsville etc are doing absolutely fine.

The working classes have to live somewhere. The inner suburbs tend to be the only places they can afford, once the inner cities have gentrified.

 

[FairAndUnbiased]

Exactly. Cleveland is part of rust belt for decades. It reinvented itself in to services trade a little post 2010. So its not surprising suburbs closest to city will see some negative impact. But deeper suburbs of cleveland like strongsville etc are doing absolutely fine.

Meanwhile Vallejo is pretty close to gleaming SF which has now essentially priced out all the poor into either far away places or homelessness, and yet...

 

[letsrock]

Meanwhile Vallejo is pretty close to gleaming SF which has now essentially priced out all the poor into either far away places or homelessness, and yet...

After 2008 crisis - some suburbs went bankrupt - thats due to real estate contraction. Many of these small cities took on huge pension obligations from 2000-08 in the expectation they can pay them through land sales or land revenue. This kind of occasional glitches are to be expected. Again these are exceptions .

 

[FuturePAF]

Meanwhile Vallejo is pretty close to gleaming SF which has now essentially priced out all the poor into either far away places or homelessness, and yet...

That’s why I was glad the infrastructure bill passed the house, and hopefully the commuter routes like the capital corridors for the Altamount corridor express will get an upgrade. In the long run they want a second trans at tunnel and it should be made compatible with Bart and capital corridor trains. In SoCal, they need to build out their subway network faster then over the next 20-30 years if they are to get denser in an affordable manner.

If people can live further out and still get into the Bay Area to work, it might solve some of the affordable house issues; building more supply where it is most economical to do so, to meet the demand. Linking the Central Valley and the Bay Area with a fast system will also spread around the tax revenue in the state so that Bay Area can maintain its premium value for residents while allowing more equitable resources for the Central Valley; because for a long time people think of California is basically the Greenwich Connecticut along the coasts and Alabama in the middle.

If California can balance this out it can attract back some of the middle class it lost to Texas and Colorado and Oregon and Idaho, and be ready to absorb the 10-15 million more by mid century it will need to in order to balance its pension books. It will also need to scale back the pensions for new workers it is to become sustainable but that’s another topic for another thread.

p.s. pre-pandemic the Capital Corridor had year on year growth for residents around sacremento that worked in SF.

 

[Hamartia Antidote]

Starbucks is wonderful but everyone here is forgetting that the corner cafe, streetcar or the American Diner was always a great tradition that formed in every neighborhood past the turn of the last century

Again like that Starbucks in the neighborhood they are simply at the mercy of price and demand. As quaint and nice as they are they need customers to survive. When I was in Boston there were some convenience stores deep in the local neighborhoods that I used to go to. They just didn't get the traffic needed to survive and now are laundromats.

 

[FuturePAF]

Again like that Starbucks in the neighborhood they are simply at the mercy of price and demand. As quaint and nice as they are they need customers to survive. When I was in Boston there were some convenience stores deep in the local neighborhoods that I used to go to. They just didn't get the traffic needed to survive and now are laundromats.

That’s how the market should work. Failed business should go under so more economically viable ones can take their place. It’s just that cities allow landlords to keep rents artificially high (to keep busilding prices high; to keep tax revenue to cities high), which prevents small business from setting up shop.

 

[nahtanbob]

they were set in the 1950's and are costly and difficult to change. coincidentally at the time a major concern of the FHA was preventing minorities from moving into suburbs.

I would say the inefficiencies of the suburbs aren't my problem. but the export of pollution and conservative politics from suburbs are my problem.

zoning laws are set by individual cities. the residents of the cities decide

the author shows it using actual taxes from the same city for dense vs suburban developments on equal lot sizes on the same street. The dense region produces 40% higher tax revenue at equal lot size. It pays for itself, suburbs don't. Suburbs aren't collapsing - yet - because there's still developmental growth going on and most of all because federal government subsidizes the initial infrastructure. it all comes down to debt, which as we know eventually comes from USD as reserve currency.

if I work in a dense development and live in a suburb please tell us where my taxes should go

 

[Goritoes]

Just came back from Myrtle beach, looks nice and clean to me