The Suburban Solution

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Debate & Discussion > The Suburban Solution

Badger of Basra: Jul 26, 2007

boner confessor posted:

oh, no, this is one of the easiest things to fix in suburbs because you can fix it one building at a time. it's actually pretty organic to take a big old house that nobody can afford to live in and split it into three different units. or knock down some houses and put up duplexes/triplexes/condos/whatever. the big problem here is jurisdictional fragmentation and single use zoning or monozoning

jurisdictional fragmentation is a particularly american problem. basically, the police power and the ability to determine land use is only a hundred some odd years old. before then you could build anything wherever unless some local ordinance said you couldn't. around the beginning of the 20th century governments in the western world started realizing it was a cool and useful thing to have a formal process to determine who could build what, where. in the united states this was confirmed in the supreme court decision euclid vs. ambler realty co. which basically said that local governments had a legal right to establish land use zoning. i'm not familiar with the legal history in european nations but it's probably both older and similar. anyway the idea, which the germans came up with, is that you chop up all the land into zones and then you define what can happen in those zones.

zoning authority ultimately rests with the local jurisdiction, in the united states either the city or the county. in the united states, the states have the ability to incorporate cities (more or less, there are 50 different ways to do it) as well as the power to establish regional or metropolitan planning bodies. most states have weak or nonexistent regional planning bodies (special exception: oregon, because of a wave of environmentalism in the 1970's). because of the 10th amendment to the us constitution, basically the "keep your nose out of the state's business" clause, the federal government is actually pretty powerless to handle local land use policy, so they don't really matter. the basic chain of land use control in the united states is:

states, who can legally create cities and define what cities can do
regional/metro planning organizations, if they exist, which can override local control
counties, which take over in non-incorporated areas aka. places outside of any city
cities, which generally have the bulk of land use control in the usa

so one of the basic functions of american cities is to control land use zoning. problem is that it's often fairly easy to incorporate to become a city, and there's a couple good reasons to do so - namely, to gain local control of property tax collection/expenditure and land use zoning. it's a fairly common thing for american metropolitan areas to be split up among dozens if not hundreds of cities, each with its own little fiefdom of land use authority (in the absence of a larger planning organization). you don't see as much of this in european nations because the sensible thing to do is to establish regional planning bodies to coordinate all of these little decision makers. some european nations are so geographically small that it actually makes sense to nationalize planning - england for example has a single national planning authority, with the exception of the london region. but in the usa, you have a thousand thousand little jurisdictions - so we say the jurisdictions are fragmented, and uncoordinated, and largely up to the whims of what kinds of development the local government wants to have

this intersects with single-use zoning. a sort of natural, organic way to build cities is to have multiple uses. shops on the ground floor, housing above. housing and shops and businessess and offices all mixed together side by side. you see a lot of this in europe, this is also part of the urban morphology of a city oriented around the pedestrian mode. in america, for various reasons, you tend to see single use zoning - large areas which are just housing, or just offices, or just industry, etc. this is more automotive mode morphology. and one of the things you can do with single use zoning is establish more granular and draconian restrictions on the kinds of things which can be built in that zone. for example, we may define a whole zone as R-1 which means "only single story, single family freestanding structures on lots of no less than .5 acres which cover no more than half the lot" which produces large, relatively expensive, spread out neighborhoods - perfect for keeping out poors. so if you legally bar apartments from being built, you can create that sort of "missing middle" thing you describe. but this is absolutely a legal problem, not a practical or physical problem (to a certain extent - once you start greatly increasing the density of old single family neighborhoods you start running into nasty traffic problems requiring more transportation infrastructure, etc.)

i keep saying america but the same is kind of true in canada - canada has one foot on both sides, both there's a ton of land in canada and it's a young country which largely developed in an automotive mode context, but also canadian government has less of a hardon for local autonomy thus there's more weight in regional planning and control, which is an unequivocal good thing when it comes to sane metropolitan areas

There are a couple interesting counter-examples to this in the U.S. Portland has the Metro Council, which I believe has land use control, and also very strict urban growth boundaries. A big problem in Texas at least is that outside of city limits, developers can sprawl all over the place with the only limit being how much land they can buy. In Oregon (I believe) the areas that can be built up are dictated by the state, and only very very limited growth can happen outside those areas.

Twin Cities also has a Metro Council with land use control. I don't think Minnesota has urban growth boundaries, but this is another example of stronger regional planning that can lead to more sensible land use decisions.

# ? Dec 2, 2016 04:10

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# ? Apr 27, 2024 15:00

boner confessor: Apr 25, 2013; by R. Guyovich

Badger of Basra posted:

There are a couple interesting counter-examples to this in the U.S. Portland has the Metro Council, which I believe has land use control, and also very strict urban growth boundaries. A big problem in Texas at least is that outside of city limits, developers can sprawl all over the place with the only limit being how much land they can buy. In Oregon (I believe) the areas that can be built up are dictated by the state, and only very very limited growth can happen outside those areas.

Twin Cities also has a Metro Council with land use control. I don't think Minnesota has urban growth boundaries, but this is another example of stronger regional planning that can lead to more sensible land use decisions.

yeah i mentioned the oregon example - in 1978 oregon passed a statewide measure which empowered very robust metro planning organizations, which is unique in america for a few reasons. and, no matter your thoughts on whether the urban growth boundary is a good or bad thing (i think good on the whole) at least it's against the grain of typical american development patterns

# ? Dec 2, 2016 04:13

Badger of Basra: Jul 26, 2007

boner confessor posted:

kunstler is a crazy, crotchety rear end in a top hat but he's completely on point when it comes to the banal soullessness of suburban development

his main thesis is that it doesn't have to be this way! we can make suburban areas worth caring about! suburbs aren't inherently bad, they're specifically made that way through low effort laziness

This is important to note because there were some very well developed and pleasant suburbs from pre-WWII. Riverside, IL was designed by Frederick Law Olmsted, the guy who did Central Park, and is one that gets called out a lot as a good example but I'm having a hard time finding decent pictures. Others sprang up around street car lines and are therefore more walkable than you would expect. The lovely suburb we think about today is post-WWII, and is only the way it is because of deliberate decisions and laziness. Some parts of central cities that people love today began as suburbs!

# ? Dec 2, 2016 04:18

boner confessor: Apr 25, 2013; by R. Guyovich

Badger of Basra posted:

This is important to note because there were some very well developed and pleasant suburbs from pre-WWII. Riverside, IL was designed by Frederick Law Olmsted, the guy who did Central Park, and is one that gets called out a lot as a good example but I'm having a hard time finding decent pictures. Others sprang up around street car lines and are therefore more walkable than you would expect. The lovely suburb we think about today is post-WWII, and is only the way it is because of deliberate decisions and laziness. Some parts of central cities that people love today began as suburbs!

yeah, when people talk about suburbs there's a heirarchy

ancient suburbs - villas, areas a few miles from the town gates, villages on the other side of the mountain. close enough to be part of the economic activity of a city but physically distinct from a city. typically part of the downtown core nowadays. one notable example is that queen elizabeth 1 decreed for defense and food production purposes that the immediate area outside of the london town gates be kept clear of development, which kinda forced suburbs to exist in early modern london

old school greenbelt suburbs - riverside is the main example here. based on ebenezer howard's theory of the garden city. usually for upper middle class people who would commute via old timey steam trains. heydey in the late 1800's.

streetcar suburbs - there are lots of these. most of brooklyn, oak park in chicago, hollywood/wilshire in los angeles. you ride on a clang clang streetcar a few miles from the city to your house. all of these nowadays are basically parts of the city, some are still very desirable - such as inman park in atlanta. you tend to see a lot of big old mansions in these neighborhoods, if they've survived. often very walkable and nice places to live. people who live here often don't think of themselves as living in suburbs, they're probably right. typically from 1880-1920

prewar, early 20th century automotive suburbs - most of inner los angeles, the outer reaches of most american cities within the city limits - marked by smaller houses with driveways but no dedicated car storage. you'd drive from your house to the city a few miles away. these places are more notably suburban in character but still usually very expensive today, if they haven't been completely redeveloped, and if they're on the right side of town of course. can also be aggressively lower middle class. the very inner fringe of what are called "inner ring suburbs". from 1920sish and the first big suburban boom / white flight era in america until the late 1950's and the beginnings of the interstate highway system

midcentury suburbs - further away, usually outside of the city. levittown, ny (and levittown, pa) are the textbook examples. you can see a marked shift in midcentury domestic architecture here, and a much larger focus on garages as a distinct part of the house. road layouts are sometimes curvilinear, aka confusing, to keep people out. sometimes has a detached garage. tend to be associated with the postwar housing boom. most baby boomers grew up here. mid 1940's-1960's

postwar interstate highway suburbs - where you start seeing what most people would call subdivisions. based on the idea of definitely driving a car from your neighborhood on a limited access roadway. garages are a prominent feature of the house. by now we are leaving the inner ring suburbs. lots of split level houses and one of my favorite kitschy domestic architectural styles, cedar modern. definitely part of what's called the "outer ring" suburbs, typically built from the late 60's-mid 90's, but still being built today in many areas

exurbs - far flung, full blown suburbs. typically recently built and/or far from the city. very low densities, pretty rural as suburbs go. people who live here often don't think of themselves as suburban. from 1960's till today

of course, this is all for white people. people of color in america, especially black people, had a very different experience

boner confessor fucked around with this message at 04:40 on Dec 2, 2016

# ? Dec 2, 2016 04:33

Badger of Basra: Jul 26, 2007

This is a very fun blog if you want to get into suburban architecture: http://www.mcmansionhell.com/

Lots of informative posts in addition to the ones making fun of McMansions. Add to OP imo.

boner confessor posted:

prewar, early 20th century automotive suburbs - most of inner los angeles, the outer reaches of most american cities within the city limits - marked by smaller houses with driveways but no dedicated car storage. you'd drive from your house to the city a few miles away. these places are more notably suburban in character but still usually very expensive today, if they haven't been completely redeveloped, and if they're on the right side of town of course. can also be aggressively lower middle class. the very inner fringe of what are called "inner ring suburbs". from 1920sish and the first big suburban boom / white flight era in america until the late 1950's and the beginnings of the interstate highway system

This is interesting to me because most Texas cities are still annexing aggressively, so the city limits of Austin are probably 1960s or 1970s development at the absolute earliest. Our prewar suburbs are defined as central city now.

Badger of Basra fucked around with this message at 04:44 on Dec 2, 2016

# ? Dec 2, 2016 04:41

Furnaceface: Oct 21, 2004

So things can change but its going to be expensive and requires a good chunk of the population to support the moves? And so long as developers make the most money from the bad kind of suburban sprawl this isnt likely to happen I guess.

OK this might be further from your specialization but how do suburbs handle upgrades to public transit. Stuff like high speed rail seem like super important things we should be working towards but they clash with how things currently operate. Are there ways for the two to work together?

# ? Dec 2, 2016 04:51

boner confessor: Apr 25, 2013; by R. Guyovich

Furnaceface posted:

So things can change but its going to be expensive and requires a good chunk of the population to support the moves? And so long as developers make the most money from the bad kind of suburban sprawl this isnt likely to happen I guess.

on the one hand, it's within the power of a single individual to knock down an old house and replace it with a duplex. i know a guy who got a HUD loan to build a multifamily dwelling. he took out a $3 million loan, built a 9 unit apartment building, and rents out the 8 units he doesn't live in to pay off the loan. local developers could add even more muscle if the market is there (currently it is, kinda sorta - theres a shitload of luxury condos going up in american cities)

on the other hand, this could explicitly be forbidden according to local land use regulations that statutorally prevent multifamily housing in an area

so, it's not difficult to slowly add more dense housing to an area... so long as it's legal and the local voters and planning authorities approve

Furnaceface posted:

OK this might be further from your specialization but how do suburbs handle upgrades to public transit. Stuff like high speed rail seem like super important things we should be working towards but they clash with how things currently operate. Are there ways for the two to work together?

high speed rail is totally different from mass transit. completely different. not even nearly the same thing

but, it's not impossible to add either bus lines, bus rapid transit, streetcars, or even new metro heavy rail to a suburb. problem here is funding and regional organization. a lot of american cities are taking more steps to add transit to suburban areas - dallas texas is actually hugely progressive in this area with the DART system - but it requires a large amount of local political capital, as well as voters being on board with the idea. traditionally this has been a long shot but in the last 2016 election, even while trump was getting elected, a bunch of american cities voted yes on local transit referendums - there's a specific d&d thread for that, check on page 2. so again the problem is not that it's impossible, it's just so far been improbable. i could do more of an effort post on the topic but right now this little one is all i can manage

Badger of Basra posted:

This is interesting to me because most Texas cities are still annexing aggressively, so the city limits of Austin are probably 1960s or 1970s development at the absolute earliest. Our prewar suburbs are defined as central city now.

yeah texas is in a weird spot because of "cowboy zoning". houston doesn't even do explicit land use zoning! but it's also easier to annex if you don't have to integrate land use plans, and as mentioned dallas is probably the most aggressive developer of mass transit in the last decade. in thirty years texas is going to look very different as the texas triangle grows as a region - iirc houston and dallas-fort worth are like #4 and #6 in america's biggest metros, and the san antonio-austin axis is also getting thicker

boner confessor fucked around with this message at 05:05 on Dec 2, 2016

# ? Dec 2, 2016 05:02

boner confessor: Apr 25, 2013; by R. Guyovich

Badger of Basra posted:

This is a very fun blog if you want to get into suburban architecture: http://www.mcmansionhell.com/

haha this is a great blog, and showcases some of the stupidity of upper middle class suburban housing in terms of just gaudy architecture and unnecessary floorspace

my dad made a good amount of money in the 1990's suburban wave in the construction industry. specifically, he hung gutter, and i spent many summers in high school and college working with him nailing drainpipes to houses and lugging sheet metal up ladders and crawling around on roofs.

some of our best days were when we worked in middle class subdivisions with very simple houses with non-hipped roofs. those houses were great - two long gutters, front and back, four downspouts one on each corner, you could knock out a whole house in about 90 minutes and do 8-9 houses a day. good money on those days, about $200 a house, half of which was profit

some of our worst days were working in fancy rich people subdivisions, usually connected to golf courses. one of these stupid rear end mcmansions would take an entire day to do, just because of all the roof angles and poo poo - like if the roof had 12-15 different hips and angles, that's like 45 minutes per hip to measure and cut the gutter, and measure and cut a downspout, and install the thing, the whole corner of the upstairs master bedroom jut is like 35 feet off the ground, etc. it sucked. it's hell to maintain too, way harder to clean out your gutters when you have like a bunch of little nooks and crannies on your roof. if you have just a 3/2 ranch with non-hipped roof you can just go the gently caress up on your house with a step ladder and clean your gutters out with a simple broom. good luck if the backside of your house needs an extension ladder and a loving pressure washer to get all the built up poo poo out of there

another thing we did was gutter cleaning and installing gutter guards, you have no idea how often you'd find so much built up leaves and poo poo in a gutter such that there would often be saplings growing on people's roofs, spreading roots and causing roof damage and poo poo from water overflow. it was kind of easy money, just scooping out decomposing leaves and pinestraw with a gardening trowel so long as you didn't mind you were a few feet away from a break your neck fall. once we spent three days putting copper (!) gutter on this dude's huge mansion with an absurd roofline and he paid us like twelve grand for the privilige - i bought a gaming computer that lasted me from 2001 to 2006 on my cut of that house alone

anyway yeah a lot of these houses are nice to look at but they're a son of a bitch to maintain (they're not maintained properly in like nearly all cases) and if you really want to show off how much wealth you have leading to bad decisions, there's lots of far flung suburban houses which will meet that bill. a number of them were visibly crumbling due to poor workmanship, poor design, poor maintenance after not even 10 years - i remember a house whose entire brick porch had separated and was slowly sliding downhill - and this is just an allegory for suburban infrastructure in general, and to be honest was probably a formative experience for me in terms of being curious as to the economics of urban development

boner confessor fucked around with this message at 08:06 on Dec 2, 2016

# ? Dec 2, 2016 07:55

super sweet best pal: Nov 18, 2009

Companies should experiment with arcological design. Employees could live, dine and be entertained in the same building where they work, cutting down on traffic and shrinking the suburbs.

I know it's horribly nerdy and definitely a financial and logistical nightmare but I'd like to see a moderately sized company experiment with something like this so we could see what effect it would actually have.

# ? Dec 2, 2016 09:13

boner confessor: Apr 25, 2013; by R. Guyovich

super sweet best pal posted:

Companies should experiment with arcological design. Employees could live, dine and be entertained in the same building where they work, cutting down on traffic and shrinking the suburbs.

I know it's horribly nerdy and definitely a financial and logistical nightmare but I'd like to see a moderately sized company experiment with something like this so we could see what effect it would actually have.

they already do

not a single building, but give it time

boner confessor fucked around with this message at 09:18 on Dec 2, 2016

# ? Dec 2, 2016 09:15

mobby_6kl: Aug 9, 2009; by Fluffdaddy

Careful, you'll quickly run into people whining about company towns and isolation form the poors!

# ? Dec 2, 2016 10:36

Panzeh: Nov 27, 2006; "..The high ground"

super sweet best pal posted:

Companies should experiment with arcological design. Employees could live, dine and be entertained in the same building where they work, cutting down on traffic and shrinking the suburbs.

I know it's horribly nerdy and definitely a financial and logistical nightmare but I'd like to see a moderately sized company experiment with something like this so we could see what effect it would actually have.

I too want to live at my job like they expect in ridiculous tech companies. Now there's no time off! But hey, there's a foosball table in the office now.

# ? Dec 2, 2016 11:39

Rush Limbo: Sep 5, 2005; its with a full house

super sweet best pal posted:

Companies should experiment with arcological design. Employees could live, dine and be entertained in the same building where they work, cutting down on traffic and shrinking the suburbs.

I know it's horribly nerdy and definitely a financial and logistical nightmare but I'd like to see a moderately sized company experiment with something like this so we could see what effect it would actually have.

Read up on Victorian Workhouses and you have your answer.

Hint: It ain't going to be pretty.

# ? Dec 2, 2016 16:44

KomradeX: Oct 29, 2011

super sweet best pal posted:

Companies should experiment with arcological design. Employees could live, dine and be entertained in the same building where they work, cutting down on traffic and shrinking the suburbs.

I know it's horribly nerdy and definitely a financial and logistical nightmare but I'd like to see a moderately sized company experiment with something like this so we could see what effect it would actually have.

Life in Cyberpunk is awful

# ? Dec 2, 2016 21:38

Okuteru: Nov 10, 2007; Choose this life you're on your own

super sweet best pal posted:

Companies should experiment with arcological design. Employees could live, dine and be entertained in the same building where they work, cutting down on traffic and shrinking the suburbs.

I know it's horribly nerdy and definitely a financial and logistical nightmare but I'd like to see a moderately sized company experiment with something like this so we could see what effect it would actually have.

Yeah, we really should pit city blocks against each other like in Judge Dredd.

# ? Dec 2, 2016 23:10

Paradoxish: Dec 19, 2003; Will you stop going crazy in there?

There's a fun combination housing/retail complex that's currently in the planning phases in my city. High-end apartments joined up with high-end retail space in a walkable, but more or less entirely self-contained area. The intention is for it to provide housing and services primarily for workers in the large corporate parks that are adjacent to the area that it's being built in.

# ? Dec 2, 2016 23:22

Shbobdb: Dec 16, 2010; by Reene

Chicago has a couple of cool communities that were designed for people to live, work and play in them. They needed to be downtown for reasons but were built in the era of White Flight so they were designed to be isolated patches in the larger city. Plus it was supposed to provide a solution to Chicago weather.

No idea how they actually turned out. Since I haven't heard much about them, my guess is that they were much more integrated into the city than originally intended.

# ? Dec 3, 2016 04:06

Morzhovyye: Mar 2, 2013

Here's an old thread about Cities and Suburbs. Most of the images are lost to time but the rest still stands on its own.

# ? Dec 3, 2016 07:48

Morzhovyye: Mar 2, 2013

Hate suburbs? Want to throw up? Look up Phoenix, Arizona on google maps.

# ? Dec 3, 2016 07:59

sitchensis: Mar 4, 2009

Odobenidae posted:

Here's an old thread about Cities and Suburbs. Most of the images are lost to time but the rest still stands on its own.

drat, I remember making that post a long time ago. Since then I actually got a masters in the subject and now I work in the field. Who'da thought.

# ? Dec 3, 2016 09:26

Badger of Basra: Jul 26, 2007

The Urban Land Institute came out with an interesting report about the state of the suburbs.

Commentary here: http://cityobservatory.org/are-the-burbs-really-back/

Original report here: http://uli.org/wp-content/uploads/ULI-Documents/Housing-in-the-Evolving-American-Suburb.pdf

The headline finding going around a lot of places is that Suburbs Are Back but if you read the commentary piece about it's a little different.

There's also a fun little map where you can see how ULI classified areas of your city - they don't follow the classic approach where everything in an MSA outside the central city is generic "suburb."

http://rclco.maps.arcgis.com/apps/webappviewer/index.html?id=6e5e27a780ff4b9fb8a50f3561a1c213

e: also Trump is bringing back urban renewal y'all :sun:

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/07/upshot/why-trumps-use-of-the-words-urban-renewal-is-scary-for-cities.html?_r=0

Badger of Basra fucked around with this message at 01:52 on Dec 9, 2016

# ? Dec 9, 2016 01:48

ryonguy: Jun 27, 2013

Odobenidae posted:

Hate suburbs? Want to throw up? Look up Phoenix, Arizona on google maps.

Want to laugh? Check out the East Valley in the same area where between '00 and '07 idiots built up massive shopping centers on the intersections of the 1-mile grids in anticipation of the residential neighborhoods that were about to be built. I worked for a butcher shop driving delivery to little independent restaurants and nothing was more hilarious/sad than delivering to a sports bar in the middle of four square miles of nothing. Let's just say not too many of them survived.

For my own zoning nightmare, I bought a plot of property I eventually want to build a house on. I wanted to go with a small house, as I enjoyed living in a Mother-in-law house that had to have been less than 700 sq ft, and I want to keep costs down. Guess whose town has 1300 sq ft minimum housing sizes? Well, it must be for "No houses too small to inhabit" or some other sensible reason right?

Guess whose town also has no building codes? Nope, the square footage requirement is literally the only housing restriction. The city engineer told me, verbatim, "You can build a mud hut as long as it's thirteen hundred square feet." Imagine an HOA run by Three Olives for the full effect of how housing works around here.

Also, that McMansionHell blog is loving hilarious and seriously pro-read.

# ? Dec 9, 2016 02:55

Paradoxish: Dec 19, 2003; Will you stop going crazy in there?

Badger of Basra posted:

The headline finding going around a lot of places is that Suburbs Are Back but if you read the commentary piece about it's a little different.

To be fair, suburbs never went anywhere. A lot of the data over the last few years that gets trotted out to show the death of suburbs was either misunderstood or mischaracterized to make for better headlines. Here's a 538 article about it from last year. Basically, suburbs are still more popular places to live than cities and suburbs and small towns are still where most Americans live, the gap just isn't as wide as it used to be.

# ? Dec 9, 2016 03:03

Badger of Basra: Jul 26, 2007

ryonguy posted:

Want to laugh? Check out the East Valley in the same area where between '00 and '07 idiots built up massive shopping centers on the intersections of the 1-mile grids in anticipation of the residential neighborhoods that were about to be built. I worked for a butcher shop driving delivery to little independent restaurants and nothing was more hilarious/sad than delivering to a sports bar in the middle of four square miles of nothing. Let's just say not too many of them survived.

For my own zoning nightmare, I bought a plot of property I eventually want to build a house on. I wanted to go with a small house, as I enjoyed living in a Mother-in-law house that had to have been less than 700 sq ft, and I want to keep costs down. Guess whose town has 1300 sq ft minimum housing sizes? Well, it must be for "No houses too small to inhabit" or some other sensible reason right?

Guess whose town also has no building codes? Nope, the square footage requirement is literally the only housing restriction. The city engineer told me, verbatim, "You can build a mud hut as long as it's thirteen hundred square feet." Imagine an HOA run by Three Olives for the full effect of how housing works around here.

Also, that McMansionHell blog is loving hilarious and seriously pro-read.

Where the hell do you live? This sounds like a fair housing suit waiting to happen.

# ? Dec 9, 2016 03:27

ryonguy: Jun 27, 2013

Badger of Basra posted:

Where the hell do you live? This sounds like a fair housing suit waiting to happen.

Oh, believe me, I am going to challenge it. It was pretty clear the city engineer didn't think to highly of it, and he said I could apply for a variance.

I could use any and all advice on that front though (think of me as the anti-Grover if you will).

edit: for another idea of what my area is like, Johnson came pretty close to tying Clinton's percentage here.

ryonguy fucked around with this message at 03:43 on Dec 9, 2016

# ? Dec 9, 2016 03:36

Badger of Basra: Jul 26, 2007

ryonguy posted:

Oh, believe me, I am going to challenge it. It was pretty clear the city engineer didn't think to highly of it, and he said I could apply for a variance.

I could use any and all advice on that front though (think of me as the anti-Grover if you will).

I'm not a lawyer so I'd recommend contacting...your state ACLU maybe? This is pretty obviously a disparate impact situation but they can give you a better idea of whether a judge would agree. If you live in a blue state and have a Democrat state legislator you could maybe contact them as well.

This is the relevant Supreme Court case: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Texas_Department_of_Housing_and_Community_Affairs_v._Inclusive_Communities_Project,_Inc.

e: the lawyers for the above case listed their att.net and swbell.net email addresses ( :eyepop:

) in their filings so I'm guessing they're not from a big firm.

Badger of Basra fucked around with this message at 03:47 on Dec 9, 2016

# ? Dec 9, 2016 03:44

ryonguy: Jun 27, 2013

Badger of Basra posted:

If you live in a blue state and have a Democrat state legislator you could maybe contact them as well.

..Ohio.

For a less jokey response, I am almost certainly flying solo in this. This is more about being able to build the type of house I want versus any sort of social justice; if I could it would be great, but fighting entrenched Republican local and state governments in the process of getting a building permit for a glorified hut for myself is a little more than I want to handle.

ryonguy fucked around with this message at 04:13 on Dec 9, 2016

# ? Dec 9, 2016 04:08

FCKGW: May 21, 2006

Badger of Basra posted:

The Urban Land Institute came out with an interesting report about the state of the suburbs.

Commentary here: http://cityobservatory.org/are-the-burbs-really-back/

Original report here: http://uli.org/wp-content/uploads/ULI-Documents/Housing-in-the-Evolving-American-Suburb.pdf

The headline finding going around a lot of places is that Suburbs Are Back but if you read the commentary piece about it's a little different.

There's also a fun little map where you can see how ULI classified areas of your city - they don't follow the classic approach where everything in an MSA outside the central city is generic "suburb."

http://rclco.maps.arcgis.com/apps/webappviewer/index.html?id=6e5e27a780ff4b9fb8a50f3561a1c213

e: also Trump is bringing back urban renewal y'all

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/07/upshot/why-trumps-use-of-the-words-urban-renewal-is-scary-for-cities.html?_r=0

Hell yeah Established High-End Suburb Own Zone.

# ? Dec 9, 2016 04:16

Morzhovyye: Mar 2, 2013

ryonguy posted:

Want to laugh? Check out the East Valley in the same area where between '00 and '07 idiots built up massive shopping centers on the intersections of the 1-mile grids in anticipation of the residential neighborhoods that were about to be built. I worked for a butcher shop driving delivery to little independent restaurants and nothing was more hilarious/sad than delivering to a sports bar in the middle of four square miles of nothing. Let's just say not too many of them survived.

For my own zoning nightmare, I bought a plot of property I eventually want to build a house on. I wanted to go with a small house, as I enjoyed living in a Mother-in-law house that had to have been less than 700 sq ft, and I want to keep costs down. Guess whose town has 1300 sq ft minimum housing sizes? Well, it must be for "No houses too small to inhabit" or some other sensible reason right?

Guess whose town also has no building codes? Nope, the square footage requirement is literally the only housing restriction. The city engineer told me, verbatim, "You can build a mud hut as long as it's thirteen hundred square feet." Imagine an HOA run by Three Olives for the full effect of how housing works around here.

Also, that McMansionHell blog is loving hilarious and seriously pro-read.

drat. I just found https://earthengine.google.com/timelapse/, it's really cool for visualizing growth. Seeing the few farms in the area being paved over before your very eyes sure is something. It's like watching a hungry amoeba under a microscope.

Morzhovyye fucked around with this message at 06:14 on Dec 9, 2016

# ? Dec 9, 2016 06:11

Ardennes: May 12, 2002

If you want to give an alternative to suburbs you are probably going to have to go a European if not Soviet route of high density public housing and inordinate investment in public transportation. In the case of the US, there was actually some improvement on the transportation front but really housing still remains the core issue.

Ardennes fucked around with this message at 14:05 on Dec 9, 2016

# ? Dec 9, 2016 13:51

Neurolimal: Nov 3, 2012

A lot of problems around suburbs could be solved if we dismantled the housing industry and froze property values

it's always going to be a problem providing for the disadvantaged and expanding cities when doing either raises the land value and incentivizes forcing poor people out of their homes

# ? Dec 9, 2016 17:06

ryonguy: Jun 27, 2013

Odobenidae posted:

drat. I just found https://earthengine.google.com/timelapse/, it's really cool for visualizing growth. Seeing the few farms in the area being paved over before your very eyes sure is something. It's like watching a hungry amoeba under a microscope.

Phoenix is probably a prime example of suburbs done wrong. Land was cheap because it was complete poo poo, so the 'burbs just sprawled out every direction. About the only thing done right (?) was building on a grid. You also never see a building taller than three or four stories because why bother, buy the quarter square mile next to us if we need to expand.

Residential housing was cheap and lovely too. I could put my hand on the interior wall of my house and feel the heat from the sun if it was in the right direction. $300 a month electric bills for sub 2000 sq ft was not uncommon for at least half the year.

# ? Dec 9, 2016 17:12

Cicero: Dec 17, 2003; Jumpjet, melta, jumpjet. Repeat for ten minutes or until victory is assured.

Ardennes posted:

If you want to give an alternative to suburbs you are probably going to have to go a European if not Soviet route of high density public housing and inordinate investment in public transportation. In the case of the US, there was actually some improvement on the transportation front but really housing still remains the core issue.

The problem is neither the left or the right is very on board with denser housing. The right isn't on board because they're scared of poors and public transit. The left is more on board in theory but in practice isn't on board because they hate when old things get demolished by ~*~for-profit~*~ developers and replaced with bigger, newer things (just look at how many people in SF scream about 'Manhattanization').

# ? Dec 9, 2016 18:32

Ardennes: May 12, 2002

Neurolimal posted:

A lot of problems around suburbs could be solved if we dismantled the housing industry and froze property values

it's always going to be a problem providing for the disadvantaged and expanding cities when doing either raises the land value and incentivizes forcing poor people out of their homes

That would only work of course really if you had the state itself handle housing nearly completely. In cities, the issue is both an issue of supply but also price.

Cicero posted:

The problem is neither the left or the right is very on board with denser housing. The right isn't on board because they're scared of poors and public transit. The left is more on board in theory but in practice isn't on board because they hate when old things get demolished by ~*~for-profit~*~ developers and replaced with bigger, newer things (just look at how many people in SF scream about 'Manhattanization').

There is a natural resistance to density, but usually the resistance is harder when people don't feel like they are getting anything out of it. People in poor neighborhoods know they aren't going to be able to get an apartment in those new buildings, they aren't "meant" for them. That said, in the US public housing was purposefully poisoned back in the late 1960s by the federal pulling out of maintenance but other countries have had far more success.

It is going to be ugly there is an actual solution there but the US just needs to be desperate enough to try it (give it a century).

Ardennes fucked around with this message at 18:55 on Dec 9, 2016

# ? Dec 9, 2016 18:52

Badger of Basra: Jul 26, 2007

Neurolimal posted:

A lot of problems around suburbs could be solved if we dismantled the housing industry and froze property values

it's always going to be a problem providing for the disadvantaged and expanding cities when doing either raises the land value and incentivizes forcing poor people out of their homes

Things would be different if the system worked completely different to how it currently does, it's true

# ? Dec 9, 2016 22:49

mastershakeman: Oct 28, 2008; by vyelkin

Submarine Sandpaper posted:

With US Pol closed I figure this is a good outlet with regard to how to deal with spiteful, racist, FYGM middle class white voters.

This is a multi step plan that should be able to get through most red state gov, leave blue alone.

1) Legalize Raw Milk, the justification is simple, it'll allow local rather than wholesale sale of Milk and a step further would be to allow Whole Foods or other overpriced suburban re-sellers to sell it. This will help MAGA
2) Wait, make some cheese during this step as well as raw milk cheese is amazing and quite safe.
3) Some folk will die, others will get sick, regardless they'll not be able to afford medical bills and will fall from their suburban ivory towers clamoring for govt regulation.
4) Profit with the class redistribution in 2020.

FYI; the FYGM white voters are the ones in big cities with jobs mocking everyone scraping by.

# ? Dec 9, 2016 23:12

Flip Yr Wig: Feb 21, 2007; Oh please do go on; Fun Shoe

Shbobdb posted:

Chicago has a couple of cool communities that were designed for people to live, work and play in them. They needed to be downtown for reasons but were built in the era of White Flight so they were designed to be isolated patches in the larger city. Plus it was supposed to provide a solution to Chicago weather.

No idea how they actually turned out. Since I haven't heard much about them, my guess is that they were much more integrated into the city than originally intended.

Are you talking about spots like this weird neighborhood bounded by Polk, State, Roosevelt, and Clark? It's almost a gated community; difficult to find your way in except by two or three small entrances. The entire west side of it is walled off, the south side is bounded by an overpass, the east side by dense housing, and the north side by a former train station turned into a failed mall. I feel like it was a white-flight era fortress, but I can't find a history of it. The Near South Side has a bunch of them, from what I understand.

Edit:
Ah, it's called Dearborn Park, and here's a crummy history of it from two seconds of googling.

Flip Yr Wig fucked around with this message at 23:32 on Dec 9, 2016

# ? Dec 9, 2016 23:25

Shbobdb: Dec 16, 2010; by Reene

Flip Yr Wig posted:

Are you talking about spots like this weird neighborhood bounded by Polk, State, Roosevelt, and Clark? It's almost a gated community; difficult to find your way in except by two or three small entrances. The entire west side of it is walled off, the south side is bounded by an overpass, the east side by dense housing, and the north side by a former train station turned into a failed mall. I feel like it was a white-flight era fortress, but I can't find a history of it. The Near South Side has a bunch of them, from what I understand.

Edit:
Ah, it's called Dearborn Park, and here's a crummy history of it from two seconds of googling.

There were a bunch of other ones too. The really iconic buildings on the waterfront near President-Elect Trump Tower were also designed to be communities like that. The two towers where the bottomish level is a parking garage and you can see the cars.

# ? Dec 10, 2016 03:23

ryonguy: Jun 27, 2013

Flip Yr Wig posted:

Ah, it's called Dearborn Park, and here's a crummy history of it from two seconds of googling.

quote:

I sell high end real estate and I love this city!

# ? Dec 11, 2016 04:36

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# ? Apr 27, 2024 15:00

suburban virgin: Jul 26, 2007; Highly qualified lurker.

Neurolimal posted:

A lot of problems around suburbs could be solved if we dismantled the housing industry and froze property values

it's always going to be a problem providing for the disadvantaged and expanding cities when doing either raises the land value and incentivizes forcing poor people out of their homes

I hope this doesn't really need to be said but these are terrible ideas.

The smarter thing to do would be to rein in power of local governments and tear up zoning laws across the board. A big part of the reason developers have fled out to build endless lovely tract housing in desert scrubland is that no-one will fight them doing it. They throw up the houses, they sell the houses. Or not. The things are so cheap I wouldn't be surprised if they could eat the occasional complete failure and go build somewhere else. Try renovating a multi-building lot within a city block on the other hand and it's endless complaints from authorities with masses of power but no responsibility. There's huge amounts of money to be made in building or renovating nice modern housing in cities, and plenty of old or badly purposed lots that need fixed up. The pieces to the solution are all there, if the local governments could ever be convinced to get out of the way.

# ? Dec 11, 2016 14:06

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