Hacker News Reader

Comment by jeffreyrogers | Hacker News Reader

Sure, but zoning is largely done for economic reasons. And cities without zoning (e.g. Houston) end up similar to cities with it. I don't think it changes that there's not an active effort to segregate cities or keep people with alternative lifestyles away.[0]

[0]: There was some of this in NYC when Robert Moses was the central planner, but it's hard to argue it's continued today.

View on HN

https://www.rentcafe.com/blog/rental-market/apartment-rent-r...

According to this site, rental prices in Houston were less than a third of prices in San Francisco in June 2017 ($1046 vs $3441).

That sort of difference is certainly going to drive away less affluent people.

Houston doesn't have zoning, but it has development regulations that include many of the same restrictions found in the zoning codes of other US cities.

https://www.houstontx.gov/planning/DevelopRegs/

From the webpage: "The City codes do not address land use."

These regulations appear to deal with things like setbacks, street access, etc. but it sounds like you can do whatever you want on the land. I think these regulations are just to deal with how to divide up a parcel of land, rather than to regulate anything you do with it.

A huge portion of most zoning codes is made up of that kind of regulations. Land use restrictions are only one tiny aspect of zoning regulations.

And, independent of local zoning, our financial system drives hard for the type of stuff that zoning also reinforces. When easy capital supports single family houses and large projects, everything in between is crowded out.

That was the point I was trying to make above. Zoning is more a reflection of what is most profitable for developers, so you get similar results in cities with zoning and without.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com