People debating about what kind of housing to build are getting ahead of themselves. The housing crisis is intentional. Homeowners demand the value of their home keep going up and they vote. They way to do that is to keep supply lower than demand. The first step to fixing the housing crisis isnt to figure out what kind of housing to build, it's to convince enough of the voting population there is a housing crisis that needs fixing.
Mass timber is great, but it will not solve the housing shortage
651–660 of 799 posts
Re: Mass timber is great, but it will not solve the housing shortage
#652Earlier quoted context omitted.
https://indyweek.com/news/opinions/op-ed-the-purpose-of-zoni... https://www.whitehouse.gov/cea/written-materials/2021/06/17/... Some of the housing regulations were legitimately put in place for safety reasons to protect people. Others were put in place to keep black and Asian people out. Especially after government initiatives to prevent discrimination in housing like the 1968 Fair Housing Act, efforts to keep out m…
but it's a lot more than that. Blue cities are by far the worst offenders at anti-housing regulations. part of it must be that people are funadamentally extremely conservative when it comes to housing.
This is important to highlight. The worst issues show up in deep blue cities. SF is the worst offender.
It's more so a generation issue than a red-blue issue. Urbanism is bipartisan.
Re: Mass timber is great, but it will not solve the housing shortage
#653It takes significantly less materials to build a multi-dwelling apartment/condo/townhouse structure than a single family home. In addition, the required square footage per person drops by huge amounts when people can walk to nearby community centers, restaurants, kitchens, theaters, and bars. We are building massive 3-4k sq. ft. homes for families of four because all of their food, entertainment, and social needs are…
This idea that the problem with western society is that we allow people to live in detached houses with yards instead of inner-city apartment buildings is bollocks. People need privacy, something to work on, freedom to move about, and agency over their environment to thrive psychologically. That's why prison is the opposite of this. "Something to work on" is partially being met by video games, and it's not going well…
That we don't allow people to build nice apartments is the real problem. No one mentioned outlawing SFH.
Re: Mass timber is great, but it will not solve the housing shortage
#654Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Los Angeles, San Francisco/San Jose, Dallas, Phoenix -- could be (and should be) a global metropolises Yes! > with a populations and cultural relevance rivaling Tokyo or Hong Kong. YES! > They would be, if not for the car. ...what? They are not because their local governments prohibit construction and actively oppose growth, which is only vaguely related to the car. Approximately zero "global metropolises" have sin…
I think we agree. But the car is a much bigger part of it than you're letting on. The reason we zone this way is because people are unable to imagine their lives without being able to drive around. The very first thing people say in my town when an apartment tower goes up is "where am I going to park? Do they have a plan for moving the parking spots that this tower displaced? Traffic on tower St. is going to get so m…
Yeah, all this is the stated argument here.
But in the US, at least, the underlying argument is about class, and race. If you haven't already, it might be worth reading about redlining, the historical practice of outlining which neighborhoods were "safe" to issue mortgage loans in because they were white and not at risk of non-whites moving in. This was about race, primarily.
Redlining became illegal starting in the '70s in many places, and its replacement was exclusionary zoning---a practice that continues to this day that relies instead on race's strong correlate, wealth. Apartments and other similar higher-density arrangements are much more affordable--and as a result, accessible to racial minorities (and the crime, etc. that racial minorities were "associated" with).
All the modern arguments around traffic jams, neighborhood character, transit, etc.---these are all modern-day variants of the same old arguments, because again, who can afford a 1:1 ratio of cars to people-in-household to get around the low-density suburbs?
So when you hear people say "I can't park! It'll be loud!" consider if they're really saying "I don't want those other people who rely on transit in my neighborhood", but using the words "there won't be room for me to park!"
Re: Mass timber is great, but it will not solve the housing shortage
#655Earlier quoted context omitted.
This idea that the problem with western society is that we allow people to live in detached houses with yards instead of inner-city apartment buildings is bollocks. People need privacy, something to work on, freedom to move about, and agency over their environment to thrive psychologically. That's why prison is the opposite of this. "Something to work on" is partially being met by video games, and it's not going well…
This would be a compelling complaint if the rest of the world didn't exist. Every complaint about apartments stems from American inner city dilapidation. My first culture shock when arriving in the US was the sorry state of American apartments. We know how to build apartments that are insulated to sound. Common building courtyards give kids safe play-areas within walking distance while supervised. Balconies can be bu…
As someone from India now in the US, you just can't compare US and Indian infra.
These colonies you refer to are built on literal and figurative sand with shoddy regulations.
https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/bengaluru/bengaluru...
> Bengaluru water crisis: Plush society asks residents to use disposable cutlery and wet wipes
https://www.thehindu.com/news/cities/chennai/floodwaters-cau...
Traditional Indian houses are SFH like US homes.
Re: Mass timber is great, but it will not solve the housing shortage
#656It takes significantly less materials to build a multi-dwelling apartment/condo/townhouse structure than a single family home. In addition, the required square footage per person drops by huge amounts when people can walk to nearby community centers, restaurants, kitchens, theaters, and bars. We are building massive 3-4k sq. ft. homes for families of four because all of their food, entertainment, and social needs are…
This idea that the problem with western society is that we allow people to live in detached houses with yards instead of inner-city apartment buildings is bollocks. People need privacy, something to work on, freedom to move about, and agency over their environment to thrive psychologically. That's why prison is the opposite of this. "Something to work on" is partially being met by video games, and it's not going well…
Do people need privacy (of the sort you mean) and something to work on (meaning a house and not a body, a language, a family, friendships)? Is that why everyone in New York and São Paulo and Tokyo is so sad?
Re: Mass timber is great, but it will not solve the housing shortage
#657Earlier quoted context omitted.
Their thesis is clear and falsifiable, it's just that the timelines are very large. If you are going to criticize the thesis, it would make sense to address the actual arguments of ongoing cost-per-resident of various pieces of infrastructure, rather than just calling the organization 'biased'.
The Strong Towns "hypothesis" is at least partly falsified by objective economic data. Many suburbs/exurbs have been around for decades now. If the costs per resident were truly unsustainable then we would expect to see a surge in Chapter 9 bankruptcies, or at least a major spike in muni bond insurance premiums. So far that isn't happening. Most cities manage to muddle through and patch their infrastructure well enou…
I mean, the main argument against their thesis is just that most people will pay more for services than they otherwise would have and be poorer, but not collapse. On the other hand, the trouble in the mid-west and rustbelt we are seeing more and more bailouts on infrastructure (the $1B Blatnik bridge fix, for example, will be paid for by the US Gov't), while also seeing more deferred maintenance.
The good news is that, again, this is falsifiable, and I'm an empiricist. If Phoenix doesn't can weather their future lack of growth without adding density, then I'll wave the white flag.
Re: Mass timber is great, but it will not solve the housing shortage
#658Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Los Angeles, San Francisco/San Jose, Dallas, Phoenix -- could be (and should be) a global metropolises Yes! > with a populations and cultural relevance rivaling Tokyo or Hong Kong. YES! > They would be, if not for the car. ...what? They are not because their local governments prohibit construction and actively oppose growth, which is only vaguely related to the car. Approximately zero "global metropolises" have sin…
I think we agree. But the car is a much bigger part of it than you're letting on. The reason we zone this way is because people are unable to imagine their lives without being able to drive around. The very first thing people say in my town when an apartment tower goes up is "where am I going to park? Do they have a plan for moving the parking spots that this tower displaced? Traffic on tower St. is going to get so m…
The idea that if you remove cars from 90% of the population that you won't sometimes need to drive something into these areas is laughable. Even Tokyo has roads.
Re: Mass timber is great, but it will not solve the housing shortage
#659Earlier quoted context omitted.
I find it amusing that many folks here are ready to clap back at this comment about how "but people want single family homes" as if that weren't why we are in a housing crisis. Yes... people want single family homes, it's just not feasible to put 3M people into single family homes in a metro area without absorbing an unsustainable amount of costs. Here we are talking literally the cost of construction, but there is a…
You can easily get housing affordability crises even without single family homes, as is plainly evident right now in non-North-American cities. It's a bit of a red herring. You end up sitting in traffic for an hour instead of standing on a bus or train for an hour for your commute, and other knock-on differences like that, which can be debated for various other reasons like ecological impact, but you still end up run…
I spend a lot of time in São Paulo, and no matter how you slice it, housing is cheaper there. Adjunct professors and freelancers can afford houses there. Maids can afford houses, albeit far from the center.
Everyone complains about the city’s endless verticalização (verticalizication) because they like the idea of old houses, but I say keep it coming.
Re: Mass timber is great, but it will not solve the housing shortage
#660Earlier quoted context omitted.
If Tokyo is hell why did so many people choose to move there?
You cannot replicate the Tokyo (or Seoul, or Taipei, or Singapore, or Hong Kong) model in the US without making certain societal choices that are either impossible or unpalatable here. We will never have anything remotely as nice as the Tokyo transit system for that reason. I love taking the Tokyo subways whenever I visit. I make it a point to avoid the NYC subway if at all possible.
People get so mad but this is the 100% truth.