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Comment by extrapickles | Hacker News Reader

Pretty much the only zoning needed is low noise and high noise (airport, late night music venues, etc). All the other things that tag along with zoning are not needed. The only reason for noise zoning is to prevent people from moving next to an existing high noise activity and pushing it out.

Zoning laws effectively turn into a tax on new comers to an area as things like "protected views", height restrictions just add to the cost of housing and running a business. Also these laws reduce density which makes having good public transportation harder and means you have to commute more to your job.

Permitting could be more streamlined, but should be required for any non cosmetic change as people try to cut corners to save $0.50 that can easily kill someone.

Disclaimer: I own property next to a large airport.

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Zoning isn't needed just for low and high noise.

You also have to consider factors like industrial safety. For example, fertilizer[1] and pesticide[2] plants must be built a certain distance away from populated areas. There are, of course, many other industrial processes that also require a safety perimeter, but those are two that come immediately to mind.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/West_Fertilizer_Company_explos...

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bhopal_disaster

While I haven't though enough on the issue to have much of an opinion on abolishing zoning completely, zoning seems like the wrong way of dealing with hazardous companies like that regardless. There is already an extensive permitting process and a mountain of regulation that you'd have to go through to open one of these companies, so why not enforce the safety perimeter through that?

It makes more sense to me to place the restrictions on the company/factory than the land itself, and building permits are already used by municipalities to negotiate location, etc.

That would prevent a hazardous factory from being built next to residences, but wouldn't prevent residences being built nearby after the factory is already there. For that, you'd need restrictions on the residences and/or the land.

Maybe a hybrid solution would work? Have a zone tied to the factory, no residential buildings within a certain radius of the factory, but if the factory shuts down or moves, the zone goes with it.

That's a really cool idea.

Is that the problem these cities have, too many fertilizer plants? It seems unlikely, but I haven't visited the West Coast in a few years. You might have better luck talking about natural gas storage.

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