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Why affordable housing is scarce in progressive cities

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Re: Why affordable housing is scarce in progressive cities

#51

Post by orcdork »

skybrian wrote: post #34
SolaceQuantum wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the greater context here misses the trauma behind being forced to move out of a home. Being separated from your social network, familiar surroundings, into a new and unknown environment can be highly traumatizing to the people who move and the community which loses its members. Children have their educations interrupted, elders lose a family of support, adults need to forge new friendships in a time where we…

Does it have to be a trauma? After all, most people don't live with their parents forever. Finding your own place is a rite of passage. Most college students graduate and move somewhere else. One way of preventing trauma would be to make sure people don't have to move. Another way would be to make moving something to look forward to, rather than a trauma.

Yes, of course having to move due to no longer being able to afford living in the place you've lived on for say 10+ years, downsizing probably not only in living space, but also quality of surroundings, is comparable to leaving your college dorm in your early 20s. I guess one way of preventing trauma is pretending it doesn't exist by making ridiculus comparisons.

Re: Why affordable housing is scarce in progressive cities

#52

Post by saosebastiao »

shse wrote: post #28
mrep wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No they are not, look at the varience in population density of us cities [0] and it's pretty obvious lots of them can expand. The real problem is that jobs are highly local and people want to live in an area where their are lots of job opportunities. Thus, cities with lots of good job opportunities beget more job opportunities like how Amazon chose New York instead of a smaller city. [0]: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/w…

When you build more appartments, more people come to the city. It’s a positive feedback loop. The result is a city with terrible quality of life. The city no one wants to live in. Only then it will stop growing.

Nobody goes there anymore, it's too crowded...

Re: Why affordable housing is scarce in progressive cities

#53

Post by saosebastiao »

darren0 wrote: post #50

Can some explain why affordable housing is a problem that requires government policies to prevent? For example, I can't afford a home in Malibu, so I don't live there. I don't understand the issue. Why does government need to step in and fix this?

Lack of affordable housing is a problem that government policies cause. Why not fix it?

Re: Why affordable housing is scarce in progressive cities

#54

Post by ajmurmann »

shse wrote: post #28
mrep wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No they are not, look at the varience in population density of us cities [0] and it's pretty obvious lots of them can expand. The real problem is that jobs are highly local and people want to live in an area where their are lots of job opportunities. Thus, cities with lots of good job opportunities beget more job opportunities like how Amazon chose New York instead of a smaller city. [0]: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/w…

When you build more appartments, more people come to the city. It’s a positive feedback loop. The result is a city with terrible quality of life. The city no one wants to live in. Only then it will stop growing.

Yeah, like Tokyo. It's still one of the most amazing places on the planet, with great culture, ready to get around and even beautiful green spaces. But soon it will continue to grow and become awful...

Re: Why affordable housing is scarce in progressive cities

#55

Post by psadri »

darren0 wrote: post #50

Can some explain why affordable housing is a problem that requires government policies to prevent? For example, I can't afford a home in Malibu, so I don't live there. I don't understand the issue. Why does government need to step in and fix this?

It is a problem when not just Malibu, but the entirety of Los Angeles becomes unaffordable. Then people with less means need to live very far away from where they work, etc.

Re: Why affordable housing is scarce in progressive cities

#56

Post by davidf18 »

jayd16 wrote: post #11

These article are pretty ridiculous and I see this political bent more and more on here. The article/book makes a huge leap in assuming progressive cities are somehow worse at housing. The reality is people actually want to live there. The most densely populated cities in the US, and in general all cities, lean left politically. Finding new housing is important but we're really losing perspective on how successful th…

[dead]

Re: Why affordable housing is scarce in progressive cities

#57

Post by jayd16 »

AnthonyMouse wrote: post #3

> a shortage of new construction, a lack of tenant protection "Tenant protection" -- especially rent control -- is a nontrivial cause of the shortage of new construction. High rents are a signal to developers that there is money to be made constructing new housing. If it's not possible to make the money, they won't do the construction, which is what rent control causes. You get a population of existing residents with…

>You get a population of existing residents with rent controlled apartments, who then have no incentive to fix the housing shortage or eliminate rent control, but insufficient construction going on and consequently even higher prices for people who didn't get a rent controlled apartment in 1975.

You may not be in that population but you have to solve for them as well. Removing rent control is only going to price them out.

Re: Why affordable housing is scarce in progressive cities

#58

Post by ajmurmann »

shse wrote: post #19
ajmurmann wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That sounds amazing!

That’s how it will look like https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=AoPpFfXwx_o

I've been to Tokyo several times and always use public transit, even during rush hour and it honestly has never been worse than the light rail in SF. It gets crowded at times sure and I'm sure there are specific times on some lines when it's this bad that you get staff posing passengers in, however it's far away from being the norm. It's usually pleasant and if take it over my commute on a car any day.

Re: Why affordable housing is scarce in progressive cities

#59

Post by skewart »

gaadd33 wrote: post #37
Domark wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem is, I've been hearing about these problems since I lived there in 1995. 1995 would have given an intelligent species enough time to build a money-losing, poor-people housing skyscraper or two. Yes building vertically in crowded places is a challenge and expensive but those are just excuses. Since 1995 they could have figured out a way to get the job done, so now we have to examine what the problems are.

Isn't that what the "towers in a park" style of public housing from the 60s and 70s are? From that we've found that it isn't a good solution, eg Cabrini–Green Homes or Robert Taylor Homes I think people have been looking into these issues for far longer than 1995.

I don't think the issues that emerged at Cabrini Green and Robert Taylor Homes can be blamed primarily on their design. I suspect the systemic lack of maintenance and overall poor management were far more significant factors. There are thousands of safe, clean, and healthy "towers in the park" public housing projects around the world - from Singapore to Spain. And there are plenty of low-rise and townhome public housing projects in the US that suffer from health and safety problems.

Re: Why affordable housing is scarce in progressive cities

#60

Post by jayd16 »

Bucephalus355 wrote: post #31
thrav wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There’s no denying that building is a hell of a lot easier in a place like Houston without zoning than anywhere else though.

Grew up in Houston and now live in Austin and your statement is 100% accurate. Housing in Houston means you can get an 1800 ft house for 90k 15 miles from downtown. In Northwest Austin, let’s say 20 miles from the city center, such a house would cost 300k plus.

I've never lived in either place. How is the transit there? In SF and Los Angeles, 20 mile could mean an hour commute. We do bump up against natural obstacles but it could certainly be better.
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