Comment by helen___keller | Hacker News Reader

Comment by helen___keller | Hacker News Reader

Improving regional rail in greater Boston can also serve as a key to improving the housing crisis that the city is experiencing, especially if some of the suburbs served by regional rail can be convinced to re-zone for higher density mixed-use development in an area around their commuter train stations.

> millennials who’ve rejected suburban life to go car-free or car-light in the city

I'm one such millennial living car-free in Boston. I would gladly move to the suburbs if I could complete all my ordinary day-to-day tasks (commuting, grocery store shopping, hitting my favorite local restaurant, etc) without touching a car. But the fact is, aside from the commercial/residential zoning divide, having these stores in walking distance is not economically feasible without a certain level of density that American suburbs just can't fulfill. America's strange obsession with big lawns and single family housing has shut down the dream of living without a car everywhere except for the urban cores of the few top metro areas in the country. Furthermore, this dispersed suburban housing style is enforced by local zoning ordinance (& requires supermajority of town vote to change zoning rules in the state of MA)!

Waltham has that. Within walking distance of the commuter rail station (which is also a bus nexus), there are apartment buildings, two supermarkets, a large number of restaurants, and most of the other non-big-box store types you want. A nice movie theater, too. Waltham has a big stock of rental housing because there are two colleges (Brandeis in the south and Bentley in the north). Crime tends towards shoplifting and driving with a suspended license.

It's 23 minutes on the commuter rail to North Station, less to Porter Square. The 70 bus runs to Central Square Cambridge, stopping at the Arsenal Mall along the way.

Come be my neighbor.

Thanks for the reply. I've actually been looking at renting in Waltham when my current lease ends (as well as a few other places I've been looking - Quincy, Malden, Somerville). A while back I was thinking of buying, but prices are really damn expensive right now.

I lived in Quincy not far from the north Quincy redline stop. Aside from the typical delays it was pretty affordable and there is grocery and shopping in walking distance for the most part. Waltham has gotten a bit expensive the past few years.

You absolutely can live as you describe (commuting, grocery shopping, going to restaurants, etc without a car) in the center of almost every suburb inside of 128. You can even do it while living in a single family house. Go ahead and move already.

I'm also not so sure that it will go far in terms of easing housing costs. I just moved to the SF bay area from Boston and live outside of SF, but close to a CalTrain stop. Everything is walkable for me, but the cost of living is comparable to SF (albeit the apartment is a bit larger).

I have friends in the suburbs of Boston who have to commute into Boston for work, which is not something I have to do, as my community is a bit self enclosed. But their housing situation is not necessarily much better than mine was in Boston. Yeah, double the square footage for the same price but there wasn't more reasonably priced housing available that close to the commuter rail, and there wasn't exactly much to do in those areas outside of grocery shopping and commuting.

Anyway, I'm starting to ramble a bit, but I'm failing to understand how more housing stock will improve any housing crisis. At best, it will keep the prices from inflating at the current rate further, but I don't see an increase in stock actually lowering prices. Developers are just going to build for the same price point as the market has now.

You're not wrong, especially about "double the square footage for the same price". But that's why it's essential that the key to affordable housing isn't just connecting outlying suburbs by transit but also reevaluating zoning laws to fit more units in the same space.

For a simple example, look at one of the most livable and expensive (per sqft) cities in the world, Tokyo. A median family can afford to buy a single family house in the Tokyo metropolitan region. This works because the entire Tokyo region, including transit-connected suburbs, have very little restrictions on the type of housing that can be built, and where it can be built. ( Great article: https://www.curbed.com/2017/2/3/14496248/tokyo-real-estate-a... )

That model might not necessarily work perfectly for America, particularly because Tokyo is only increasing in population 1% per year and America's top cities are growing faster than that. But I guarantee thats a lot closer to a solution to the housing crisis than anything North America has produced.

My suburb already has several newly constructed apartment buildings near the commuter rail and more on the way. This, plus a new MBTA parking garage make me think improving the train infrastructure is the big "if" now.

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