So “One Thousand Lawyers of Oregon” came up with a new scheme to cram people in density after they banned development on millions of acres of land right outside Portland.
Nobody wants to live out there, there are no jobs or transit.
Portland passes low-density zoning reform
21–30 of 438 posts
Re: Portland passes low-density zoning reform
#22I live in the area. Proponents have couched this as a 'progressive' vs. 'nimby' effort, which like the rest of life is not true at all. Housing is complex, not good vs. evil, liberal vs. conservative, urgan vs sprawl. If you doubt this, watch how much this comment is downvoted. One thing we know, based on over a century of data around the world: increasing density of housing has little effect on affordability, in the…
You’ve either studied completely different fields of economics and urban planning than what I’m aware of, or you didn’t study them at all... Sources, please.
Re: Portland passes low-density zoning reform
#23I like almost all of this. I have one minor concern, the maximum home size is dropping from 6750 to 2500 square feet. Which is probably fine for a nuclear family, but in my neighborhood, such homes are largely occupied by multigenerational families. In areas closer to colleges and universities, those homes end up being shared by large groups of students. Both of these populations will take a hit under this policy.
The removal of the off-street parking mandate will also impact EV adoption. Parking is already difficult to find in many older Portland neighborhoods. Edit: You need a place to plug-in your EV at night.
Re: Portland passes low-density zoning reform
#24Earlier quoted context omitted.
You’ve either studied completely different fields of economics and urban planning than what I’m aware of, or you didn’t study them at all... Sources, please.
I have a master's degree in urban & regional planning. I'm a Portland native, and went to college here and studied the city fairly intently. But I'm not writing a paper here on HN.
Re: Portland passes low-density zoning reform
#25I like almost all of this. I have one minor concern, the maximum home size is dropping from 6750 to 2500 square feet. Which is probably fine for a nuclear family, but in my neighborhood, such homes are largely occupied by multigenerational families. In areas closer to colleges and universities, those homes end up being shared by large groups of students. Both of these populations will take a hit under this policy.
The removal of the off-street parking mandate will also impact EV adoption. Parking is already difficult to find in many older Portland neighborhoods. Edit: You need a place to plug-in your EV at night.
Re: Portland passes low-density zoning reform
#26I live in the area. Proponents have couched this as a 'progressive' vs. 'nimby' effort, which like the rest of life is not true at all. Housing is complex, not good vs. evil, liberal vs. conservative, urgan vs sprawl. If you doubt this, watch how much this comment is downvoted. One thing we know, based on over a century of data around the world: increasing density of housing has little effect on affordability, in the…
There's only one guarantee - limiting density in a growing city with jobs does make housing less affordable. That has been the status quo in every major city in the USA over the past 50 years.
Re: Portland passes low-density zoning reform
#27I like almost all of this. I have one minor concern, the maximum home size is dropping from 6750 to 2500 square feet. Which is probably fine for a nuclear family, but in my neighborhood, such homes are largely occupied by multigenerational families. In areas closer to colleges and universities, those homes end up being shared by large groups of students. Both of these populations will take a hit under this policy.
The removal of the off-street parking mandate will also impact EV adoption. Parking is already difficult to find in many older Portland neighborhoods. Edit: You need a place to plug-in your EV at night.
I agree that getting rid of government mandated parking will decrease government-subsidized car storage (which is good across the board). Sure that will affect EVs, but it will also affect ICEs equally.
Re: Portland passes low-density zoning reform
#28I like almost all of this. I have one minor concern, the maximum home size is dropping from 6750 to 2500 square feet. Which is probably fine for a nuclear family, but in my neighborhood, such homes are largely occupied by multigenerational families. In areas closer to colleges and universities, those homes end up being shared by large groups of students. Both of these populations will take a hit under this policy.
I missed that part. Though both multigenerational families and college students could be served well by multi-structure setups as well. Or in many cases, better served.
Multigenerational families are not better served. If they're doing a new build, it can work. But imagine trying to purchase not one, but four houses on the same lot. That's a helluva coincidence to wait for, for them all to be vacant simultaneously.
Re: Portland passes low-density zoning reform
#29As a former Portlandian I’m pretty stoked to imagine where this could take the city! A low altitude densification would beat what’s been done to the inner East side... Here’s a fun thought experiment... Imagine if most streets became parks/plazas (aside from a few left for utility reasons) and everyone rode (electric) bikes, or similar relatively light transport options. To me that’s be idyllic. Imagine not being rel…
Before the massive efforts of the auto industry, this is basically what they were. Streets of small European towns still feel this way and the cars feel very much like the interlopers.
So, a return to normalcy.