The Growth Ponzi Scheme (suburbs, crime, Detroit, schools)
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Suburbs are absolutely sustainable, the next construction boom is going to come with the refinement of '3d printing of concrete' all of those 70s era ranches that no one wants to buy any more are going to be destroyed and new homes '3d printed' on the property for not much more than the cost of concrete, all the building costs will be for wiring/plumbing/fixtures. New building technologies that make it cheaper to go bigger will make space a premium and suburban living will contiguously be more and more attractive. Not to mention constant improvements in gas mileage and electric vehicles that make travel continuously easier.
Personally, I'm receptive of your argument; though I disagree with it, I'd like to see you expand on it with more concrete (no pun intended) details.
I start from the position that building at low density while providing city-levels of services (police, fire, medical, school, libraries, civic centers, parks, social services, infrastructure, etc.) is untenable. The tax base isn't large enough under normal growth levels to fund what citizens have come to expect in those areas.
I haven't read the whole series yet, so maybe I am missing something, but i did read the suburban case study. It appears the case study author didn't factor in a number of items I would have to create a proper picture. It appears they looked at property tax for a street, versus the cost of maintenance of that street.
-I assume the new residents create efficiencies in the government...i.e. more revenue, but not another finance person, mayor, etc. The city should be able to grow revenues faster than the cost of the government.
-I would tend to think that new residents would lead to new business, this doesn't appear to be included
-The new businesses could lead to more commercial property tax revenue, more sales tax revenue, etc.
-Does the city charge fees for services provided? Do the added people make this a greater source of revenue (It should)?
In the end, it appears (again, I didn't read everything) that the author only looked at a portion of the value of new residents and assumes the government has no business sense to be more efficient (which may be true). Certain parts of a city should drive excess dollars into the city (sales taxes, property taxes, etc). The city then needs to use these dollars wisely to continue to make the city a desirable place to live.
Suburbs are absolutely sustainable, the next construction boom is going to come with the refinement of '3d printing of concrete' all of those 70s era ranches that no one wants to buy any more are going to be destroyed and new homes '3d printed' on the property for not much more than the cost of concrete, all the building costs will be for wiring/plumbing/fixtures. New building technologies that make it cheaper to go bigger will make space a premium and suburban living will contiguously be more and more attractive. Not to mention constant improvements in gas mileage and electric vehicles that make travel continuously easier.
suburbia was built when the price of gasoline was under a buck per gallon. it was built on the premise that our access to unlimited supplies of cheap oil would never run out. sorry, but that is a fantasy. oil is neither unlimited, nor cheap anymore. and oil prices will only continue its relentless climb upwards. its plain and simple economics even a child can understand. the scarcer something gets, the higher its price becomes.
the culture of mindless happy motoring driving endlessly from one parking lot to the next is enormously wasteful, inefficient and unsustainable. the collapse of this idiotic system is inevitable.
suburbia was built when the price of gasoline was under a buck per gallon. it was built on the premise that our access to unlimited supplies of cheap oil would never run out. sorry, but that is a fantasy. oil is neither unlimited, nor cheap anymore. and oil prices will only continue its relentless climb upwards. its plain and simple economics even a child can understand. the scarcer something gets, the higher its price becomes.
the culture of mindless happy motoring driving endlessly from one parking lot to the next is enormously wasteful, inefficient and unsustainable. the collapse of this idiotic system is inevitable.
There was this great discovery a hundred years ago, the harnessing of electricity to turn a motor.
Personally, I'm receptive of your argument; though I disagree with it, I'd like to see you expand on it with more concrete (no pun intended) details.
I start from the position that building at low density while providing city-levels of services (police, fire, medical, school, libraries, civic centers, parks, social services, infrastructure, etc.) is untenable. The tax base isn't large enough under normal growth levels to fund what citizens have come to expect in those areas.
Well here's one detail, when the technology to build bigger is affordable, people want bigger, always have.
Technology will continue to improve, labor costs for house building will fall not grow (low skill wage flatline or decline, technology replacing labor). I know that the technology will improve because of the paths of India and China, they have millions who are on the path to mcmansions, the industry technology will be reinvented many times over in the next decades. Mass factory production of house building supplies on the cheap will mean even bigger and more competitive construction industries than we have now.
Here's another article where there term "ponzi scheme" is used to describe using new development to subsidize current costs. He says that smart growth is a better value for taxpayers.
I doubt the guy knows what a Ponzi scheme is. This phrase is tossed around too freely on this board. Having read the link, I have to laugh at the idea of Champaign IL being concerned about growth. There aren't all that many people who want to live in *that* hell-hole!
Quote:
Originally Posted by memph
Chuck Marohn looked at the ability of certain suburban developments to pay for themselves, one of them was his own street. I think he mentioned the houses were on lots of about 5 acres and worth $250,000. That's $50,000 of property value per acre. The result was that it didn't even come close to paying for itself through taxes.
However, not all suburban development is equal. In Toronto, new suburban development is roughly along the lines of $750,000 homes on 1/8 of an acre or $500,000 on 1/12 of an acre, or around $6,000,000/acre. I suspect a lot of suburbs of major metropolitan areas are not overly different, I'd expect at least $1,000,000/acre for the NW, Florida and SW. So it's a completely different situation than the small town exurban development Chuck Marohn looked at. Mind you, that's for new construction, as it ages, the value often decreases, but it would still be orders of magnitude more than small town exurbia. These denser suburbs do require a lot more services per acre, with a denser road network, more highways, transit, and a lot of costs are not related to density but to population, such as paying teachers. I would be interested in knowing how this denser kind of suburban development compares.
The more traditional residential areas of Toronto, the ones built in the late 19th century for example have about $15-20,000,000 of property value per acre, and the highrise condo developments can be upwards of $100,000,000/acre. Although I think it's safe to say dense condo development requires much less road costs than suburbia, transit costs can be quite high. The amount of transit spending Toronto is expected to need over the next few decades (assuming 2-2.5 million pop growth) would likely require upwards of $1000/year per household.
Anyways, it is interesting to see what's happening to suburbs that run out of land. They do tend to run into financial difficulties. It's part of the reason why the former suburbs amalgamated into Toronto. Mississauga has largely run out of greenfields and is now facing it's first deficit and having to hike taxes after decades of abundance and low taxes. They're trying to encourage intensification, but from 2006 to 2011, the population of the built up area only increased by about 10-15,000 with the rest of the 45,000 population growth in the last remaining greenfields. From 1970 to 2000, Mississauga was growing by about 80,000 every 5 years.
Brampton, the suburb just North of Mississauga looks like it's at the same place as Mississauga 20 years ago, in fact it's been growing even a bit faster. 20 years from now, it will be near build out and have a similar population, a little over 700,000, with most of Brampton being typical Toronto suburbia, even more so than Mississauga. Brampton also has more workers than jobs, the opposite of Mississauga, so it won't get as much revenue from industry/commercial properties that require fewer services.
There are very few 5 acre home subdivisions here in CO. 5 acres is not the norm anywhere that I am aware of.
While you make a compelling critique, the CURRENT (or recent) housing crisis is not related to this but rather a different ponzi scheme: the selling off of mortgages from one financial institution to another and another without regard for the risk associated with it.
Sorry. You should see the monster trucks the kids in my town keep buying. There must be something wrong with your math or, you aren't seeing the bigger picture.
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