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You know what is funny about that article, when I read it a few weeks ago, they failed to mention the amount of time it takes a building to fill up.
My hope would be that a real estate economist would take that into account before writing an article in the Business Section of the Washington Post.
Quote:
Originally Posted by MDAllstar
Also, keep in mind, you can't overbuild apartments. Apartments create induced demand. All that happens is the population shifts to the new units overtime, thus increasing housing supply which is badly needed in D.C. and we are way behind.
Why can't you?
I just thought the article was interesting considering that DMPED says everything in the city needs to be razed to make room for more condos ("If these condos don't get built, people will be sleeping under bridges!!!").
Even SEPTA acknowledges the subway portion in it's light rail system. Did you forget that it's officially called the "Subway–Surface Trolley Lines"?
No offense, but this is semantics.
The London Tube is never called the subway. The Chicago EL is never called the subway. Doesn't mean these cities don't have subway systems.
Even in NYC, locals rarely call it "the subway". It's usually "the train", and the suburban trains are "the railroad" (except for PATH which is "the train").
Also, keep in mind, you can't overbuild apartments. Apartments create induced demand.
No.
You most definitely can overbuild apartments. It actually happens much more often than with condos, because apartments are easier to finance and build, usually.
And you don't "induce demand" by building a building, you build a building because of "induced demand".
Even in NYC, locals rarely call it "the subway". It's usually "the train", and the suburban trains are "the railroad" (except for PATH which is "the train").
I call it both. I use "subway" no matter what city I'm in. In Boston, I called it the "T," the train and the subway. In DC, I called it "Metro," the train or the subway. I've never lived in Chicago, but if I moved there, I'd still call it the subway.
You know what is funny about that article, when I read it a few weeks ago, they failed to mention the amount of time it takes a building to fill up. A 400 unit building takes 2 years to lease up. Buildings in NOMA are still filling up faster than two years. I know NOMA very well and know management. If a submarket gets 1,000 units at the same time, it will take a few months for the curve to change again. Let's see what happens in a couple months.
Also, keep in mind, you can't overbuild apartments. Apartments create induced demand. All that happens is the population shifts to the new units overtime, thus increasing housing supply which is badly needed in D.C. and we are way behind. D.C. could build apartments until there was no land and it would still not be enough. The lease up time is for management companies to worry about with their excessive profit margins. All that happens is they have to wait a couple months to lease up. D.C. land offers major return on investment and developer demand shows that. D.C. this year, for the first time in 60 year's, increased it's share of the metro region population growth per capita over the suburbs. That will continue to move up going forward.
You can most certainly overbuild. I've gone on tour of basically abandoned five-year old apartment mega complexes in Shanghai. You can way overbuild.
Quote:
Originally Posted by MichiVegas
No offense, but this is semantics.
The London Tube is never called the subway. The Chicago EL is never called the subway. Doesn't mean these cities don't have subway systems.
Even in NYC, locals rarely call it "the subway". It's usually "the train", and the suburban trains are "the railroad" (except for PATH which is "the train").
Subways are underground whether light or heavy rail is how I think of it. I'd just say rapid transit or heavy rail for the systems you're describing. Interesting factoid is that only a slight majority of NYC's system is actually under ground.
What kind of ridership is Seattle expecting on this LRT subway expansions?
Here is LA:
Regional Connector: 89,000 daily riders (though this will probably cut into the Red Line ridership)
Crenshaw Line: 16,000 daily riders
Expo Line: 64,000 daily riders (~37,000 added to the current line)
Purple Line Phase 1 (to La Cienega): 16,000 daily riders
I can't find anything for the Gold Line Foothill Extension, but I can't imagine it is much more than 10,000 riders.
Seattle's light rail network (which mostly connects suburbs to the city) has a daily ridership of about 50,000. The one line that can somewhat be considered a "subway" line (the one with many stops in the city) gets about 25,000 riders per day, but that is also the line that goes to the airport, so those numbers probably do not accurately reflect commuters only.
Seattle's city bus system has a daily ridership of about 400,000 and the county bus system (Sound transit) adds about another 50,000.
I think these numbers compare quite favorably to Los Angeles considering that LA has 6 times the population of Seattle.
You can most certainly overbuild. I've gone on tour of basically abandoned five-year old apartment mega complexes in Shanghai. You can way overbuild.
That's a peculiar case because the government is basically driving this development, right? Even if these buildings are empty now, all the government has to do is bullzone some rural communities and force their inhabitants into the cities. Much to the chagrin of urbanistas on C-D and Streetsblog, the U.S. Government can't do the same to suburbs.
My hope would be that a real estate economist would take that into account before writing an article in the Business Section of the Washington Post.
LOL...unfortunetly, you and I both know the Washington Post can be pretty bad at their investigative jounralism when it comes to this stuff. They do the samething with most the sky is falling premature peices they do...lol
Quote:
Originally Posted by BajanYankee
I just thought the article was interesting considering that DMPED says everything in the city needs to be razed to make room for more condos ("If these condos don't get built, people will be sleeping under bridges!!!").
The reason you can't over build apartments is because they are rental. Developers make their money off the building, not the lease up. I can direct you to some people I know at JBG who are the best in the business here in D.C. to explain why that is.
Why do you think developers are still building here? It's because demand catches up with supply when it comes to rentals. There really isn't any city that could build too much rental property. Owner condo and housing is a different monster though and as you can see, nobody is building that lol.....
That's a peculiar case because the government is basically driving this development, right? Even if these buildings are empty now, all the government has to do is bullzone some rural communities and force their inhabitants into the cities. Much to the chagrin of urbanistas on C-D and Streetsblog, the U.S. Government can't do the same to suburbs.
Well, government economic and monetary policy is driving the development--it's actually private investors and companies who are building these because there is a massive demand for private citizens to invest in real estate often with the idea that these apartments are going to become lucrative. It's more akin to what happened to the Inland Valley and Las Vegas exurbs, but on a much bigger level.
The kind of eminent domain bulldozing does occur, but isn't actually the majority of development in most of the major east coast cities.
You most definitely can overbuild apartments. It actually happens much more often than with condos, because apartments are easier to finance and build, usually.
And you don't "induce demand" by building a building, you build a building because of "induced demand".
No, you do induce demand. Single family housing in the suburbs is no different. Migratory growth happens in a region. Migratory growth can only happen with available housing supply. Natural growth from births and deaths is different. Without new housing to move into, people have nowhere to live. The greater the supply, the more growth any city will have if that region is growing. This is why Maryland has stopped growth from going to rural area’s by limiting infrastructure. You can’t build a development without infrastructure being in place, thus, no growth funneling it back to where the infrastructure exists for new housing.
Why do you think D.C. the region has added 2 million people over the last 30 years yet, D.C. proper shrank? Because, even if the region was growing, people were not moving into the city. Now, class A apartments with dog salons are going up everywhere and some people are NOW moving into the city instead of the suburbs when prior to a few years ago, that growth would have ALL gone to the suburbs.
Hope this helps.
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