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Most upzoning in my country is pre-determined development, so that new buildings will represent the quality of the current prices in that nearby area. So new development will neither rise or lower the previous market value. Unless the City wants to go nuts and build a homeless center. As this is "Socialist Scandinavia", the city often like to build some subsidised or social housing among with the upscale condos.
For example a new block is being built and 3 condos are given to private constructors, who build something that warrants the price level in the area (often with the city's predefined guidelines), and the city itself builts the 4th condo for subsidised housing, completing the block, but it's available for lower-income people who otherwise couldn't afford the area at all.
Only if the supply and demand is capped, then upzoning will have an effect, but you don't see that happening in the bigger urban areas. So the city will only disrupt the market if it does something stupid, like the mentioned homeless shelter.
We also have some private corporations that do development, like VVO which is owned by insurance companies, a pension fund and workers' unions, and they often want a piece of the upzoning, and offer lower rents for their condos in lucrative areas than the market price is. And in return they get a dividend and interest tax reduction by the state as "they do common good offering quality housing at a lower price". The issue how this unfair competition affects the market is undecided, but usually their % of the new development is quite small and usually forming an own block, so the neighboring blocks won't be very much affected.
As in probably all cities in the western world: the average quality of the area (housing, noise, comfort, buildings), the services, public transport, parks, no suspicious areas nearby and the overall reputation of the district is what first and foremost adjust the price level.
Most upzoning in my country is pre-determined development, so that new buildings will represent the quality of the current prices in that nearby area. So new development will neither rise or lower the previous market value. Unless the City wants to go nuts and build a homeless center. As this is "Socialist Scandinavia", the city often like to build some subsidised or social housing among with the upscale condos.
For example a new block is being built and 3 condos are given to private constructors, who build something that warrants the price level in the area (often with the city's predefined guidelines), and the city itself builts the 4th condo for subsidised housing, completing the block, but it's available for lower-income people who otherwise couldn't afford the area at all.
So if I'm following you correctly, the city tells the developers what to build on the block. And the city lays out the plots and the developers build on it?
So if I'm following you correctly, the city tells the developers what to build on the block. And the city lays out the plots and the developers build on it?
I'm sort of curious that an agency determines how "new buildings will represent the quality of the current prices in that nearby area." Is this formalized? It would be interesting to hear about the mechanism, though I don't know how such a one would fly here in the States, in practice.
So if I'm following you correctly, the city tells the developers what to build on the block. And the city lays out the plots and the developers build on it?
Yes. Zoning is very strict here, and the plans very old, so they have to be approved from the city council for a change to build anything.
So in simplicity if the land is owned or bought by the city, the procedure goes like:
City: "We want a building with at least six but maximum seven floors, in this colour theme to fit in with the environment, minimum and maximum apartment size x m2 and y m2, no balconys may create shadows in that direction and this and that, the roof can't be that and this, and parking can't be on the streetside. Build this and the contract is yours ."
Then it's guidelines are given to an architectural firm and they create the plan, send it to the city for approval and building will commence.
If the land is privately owned, the builder contacts the city and applies with a readied plan. "We want to build condos, 8 floors, the colour and building theme is suitable, may we build?". The city approves or not.
The laws is been followed more strictly these days, as in past decades (70's to early 90's) hideous developments were built cheaply in bulk by low-class builders just to collect rent en masse, and the whole environment and the cityscape suffered. The cities have learnt from this and give clear guidelines. And the people as well, after the demolition craze in the 60's and 70's, several NGO's, both nimby's and not will take legal action and complain to the district court for example.
Yes. Zoning is very strict here, and the plans very old, so they have to be approved from the city council for a change to build anything.
So in simplicity if the land is owned or bought by the city, the procedure goes like:
City: "We want a building with at least six but maximum seven floors, in this colour theme to fit in with the environment, minimum and maximum apartment size x m2 and y m2, no balconys may create shadows in that direction and this and that, the roof can't be that and this, and parking can't be on the streetside. Build this and the contract is yours ."
Then it's guidelines are given to an architectural firm and they create the plan, send it to the city for approval and building will commence.
If the land is privately owned, the builder contacts the city and applies with a readied plan. "We want to build condos, 8 floors, the colour and building theme is suitable, may we build?". The city approves or not.
The laws is been followed more strictly these days, as in past decades (70's to early 90's) hideous developments were built cheaply in bulk by low-class builders just to collect rent en masse, and the whole environment and the cityscape suffered. The cities have learnt from this and give clear guidelines. And the people as well, after the demolition craze in the 60's and 70's, several NGO's, both nimby's and not will take legal action and complain to the district court for example.
Yeah, I suppose something of the same is in place here, upon reflection, with planning approvals. But it sounds much more controlled there. It often depends on prevailing tastes, though, and I often object to certain stodgy civic "tastemakers" who insist buildings conform to architectural vernacular that keeps a place from being innovative or interesting, albeit risky to the neighborhood and perceived visual property "value."
Our town went through the 'every few years' ( I word it that way because the state mandate used to be every 10 years but it may be changing) comprehensive plan where property owners can request changes to the zoning of the property. Sometimes several property owners in a neighborhood get together and ask for the changing of an entire neighborhood or block (The most effective way to approach it) Every rezoning that was requested by ore than a single property owner was to downgrade from a denser (R-2 or R-3) classification to a less dense (R-2 or R-1) class. In every case this also restricted or eliminated the possibility of multi resident buildings. Our town had a history of having some multifamily homes or 'boarding houses' along Main street that over he years had been converted to single family homes (many Victorian era) . In almost every case the residents of the neighborhood wanted this recognized in the zoning so they could noit be converted back.
The starting point for this was when there was a special exception (The year before) brought before the Board of Appeals for Habitat for Humanity to build a triplex house squeezed into one of the few vacant lots in a neighborhood (An existing house had burnt down 20 years or so ago and the lot cleaned up and is a grass plot with hints of the old foundation.) The plan was a squeeze and almost every setback and parking requirement would have had to be waived as well as the individual lot size once they divided it up. Habitat lost their appeal and the lot was left open.
The other case was when the County Board of Ed was trying to sell an old school and the potential buyer wanted to convert it to either commercial or Apartments. problem was the land was zoned open space on a narrow street with single family homes on two sides of it and other open space on the other two sides (small library and grave yard) They were asking for Commercial or R-3 (Our highest density) Many in the town wanted to keep the old school building but the problem was the traffic that either of the proposals would create. In the end the neighborhood in the first case got their lower zoning and the second case stopped the upzoning. In this case it has worked out well because an independent Catholic elementary school has bought the building and is now using it keeping the building and the character of the neighborhood.
My point with both of these cases is that in general residents of a neighborhood are generally against upzoning. They feel it hurts proeprty values and changes the character of the neighborhood. Our Planning and zoning board saw it the same way and in the proposed Comprehensive Plan (which sailed through the approvals by the Town council and was accepted by the state) implemented the same or down zoned zoning that the neighborhood wanted.
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