Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
The idea of “smart growth” should be like mom and apple pie. But take a closer look and you find, for the most part, that smart growth policies often have unintended consequences that are anything but smart.
If housing is unaffordable, the cost of living is high and people are leaving, it probably means that a state rates higher in smart growth policies. That's the story from an analysis of the new Smart Growth America state ratings on transportation policies the organization believes would reduce greenhouse gas emissions. The new ratings are based upon strategies recommended in Moving Cooler, a smart growth oriented report authored by Cambridge Systematics in 2009
Portland has had smart growth policies in place for 30+ years and they have grown quite a bit during that time. Yes, their housing prices have increased but by and large people seem to have accepted that. Portland has no higher rate of homelessness than comparable cities, and people aren't moving away from the place in great numbers.
Smart growth should have nothing to do with high housing prices and limiting supply. Actually smart growth would leave more land for future growth since it is more efficient than unchecked sprawl. In the U.S. smart growth is often instituted in already high priced areas as a management tool. It's not the reason for those high prices. Furthermore, what exactly are these "quality of life indicators" that are mentioend in that article?
Smart growth should have nothing to do with high housing prices and limiting supply. Actually smart growth would leave more land for future growth since it is more efficient than unchecked sprawl. In the U.S. smart growth is often instituted in already high priced areas as a management tool. It's not the reason for those high prices. Furthermore, what exactly are these "quality of life indicators" that are mentioend in that article?
it's in the foot notes. and uhh yeah they aren't that good
Note 2: There are additional quality of life indicators, such as shorter work trip travel times, less intense traffic congestion, less intense air pollution, more living space, etc.
Note 3: This measure is based upon median house value, which is the only data available at the state level. The median value multiple is different from the Median Multiple (median house price divided by median household income), which is widely used in metropolitan area analysis (such as in the Demographia International Housing Affordability Survey).
So basically, op ed extremely biased journalism... with some foot notes so they don't get trashed so bad, at least they admit their tactics, but I think they know many reading the article or cover it on whatever their affiliate sites or news agencies who run an excerpt.
Basically the article should be called, people are moving to where there is cheap housing.
Smart Growth = Expensive housing ! It's not hard to understand !
Um, no. Smart growth in the U.S. is pretty much a non-factor when it comes down to it because it's rarely practiced. The only city you can point out that has really instituted it to a great deal is Portland. Portland is expensive due to its geographic location, but is actually the cheapest large city on the West coast of the country.
Smart Growth = Expensive housing ! It's not hard to understand !
That's not necessarily true. For example, New Jersey's dumbest period of growth was in the 1960s-90s when many of the more affluent suburbs established 1 acre minimum zoning in residential areas. This practice is called "exclusionary zoning." It's not "smart growth" because it promotes sprawl. It also kept property values (artificially?) high because you know what an acre of land in Northern NJ is worth? So rather than promoting growth and affordability, large-lot zoning stopped, or limited the potential for, growth and made many places unaffordable for middle class people to move into. While some of the poster-child transit-oriented developments are planned for wealthy inhabitants, many of the recipients of NJDOT's "transit villages initiative" awards are blue collar towns trying to fit more housing (including affordable housing) near their train stations.
Furthermore, it's not a good approach to compare domestic migration at the STATE level to determine how "good" regional and local smart growth policies are. While many of the states listed have some smart growth, they also have had a lot of dumb growth too. Within NJ, again, the "smart growth" areas are experiencing population growth. Jersey City, Hoboken, and many other cities and towns have experienced population growth in recent years for the first time in decades, and tens of thousands of new housing units have been built in those two towns alone in the past decade. Thanks to smart growth, some of the most marginal, decaying cities have become livable places again (and not entirely unaffordable either).
Some of these states have sprawled as far (or almost as far) as they can. Although, again, I think growth pressures are experienced primarily at the regional (metro) and local levels. If not for smart growth, we couldn't grow much at all. How can you sustain a sprawling development pattern in a place that looks like this: http://pubs.usgs.gov/circ/circ1201/i...inj_fig00a.gif or in the urbanized valleys of CA?
I think the story in the OP has it backward. It seems to me that smart growth isn't the cause of the problems of domestic outmigration and unaffordability. It's an attempt to keep growing when you've reached (or are near reaching) buildout. Once all land is developed, you can't sprawl anymore. Smart growth seems to be the only way you can keep growing in that situation.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
