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Comment by spodek | Hacker News Reader

Turns out building in a flood plain leads to flooding too. Maybe no zoning laws has drawbacks.

I stayed with a friend in Houston for a week. As a New Yorker, I took the bus a few places. I also found a farmers market within walking distance to his home and organized a few people to shop there. They were pleasantly surprised at this wonderful, affordable source of delicious, healthy produce.

But these social activities were swimming hard upstream. Telling people I took the bus to meet them prompted reactions like I came from another planet. Not many people looked like they ate a lot of vegetables. They liked it far more when I told them I went to a firing range and shot a gun for the first time.

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This sounds exacty like the kind of bigoted drivel you'd get from someone who thinks they know what Houston is like, but has never actually been there. First, Houston has pretty strict zoning laws, second, the metro system is pretty widely used where it is built out, and thirdly, Houston with some exceptions, is one of the blue-est (and some areas are the red-est, to be fair) cities in the state, with a pretty wide spectrum of political opionons represented in between. Where exactly in Houston were you? Edit: 'zoning laws' is the wrong term. Houston, does not, in fact have zoning laws as we we think of them traditionally, but are instead governed by 'https://houstontx.gov/planning/DevelopRegs/'

> First, Houston has pretty strict zoning laws

Maybe in downtown. Get much outside of the tall buildings (which isn't very far tbqh) and you'll find fast food places, breweries, residences, schools, offices, and shopping centers all within blocks of each other. I honestly think this is generally a good thing.

> the metro system is pretty widely used where it is built out

I live in Houston and I don't get the impression that Houstonians understand where bus stops are (they're "there" but where do they "go" and at what times?). Moreover the only person I know who took the bus had to leave the office prior to a specific time: prior to when the bus route stopped. Otherwise she'd be stranded 15 miles away from her home. Everyone else avoids the bus because they don't want their schedule to be dictated by the public transport system and can't afford the occasional taxi/rideshare.

So in my experience: the metro system is mostly used by poor people and it's mostly not built out very much. There's light rail in downtown but the bulk of public transportation going into downtown from outside the 610 loop is via bus. That's a sliver of people compared to people driving by car.

> is one of the blue-est (and some areas are the red-est, to be fair) cities in the state, with a pretty wide spectrum of political opionons represented in between.

Being "one of the blue-est cities in the state" doesn't mean much when the rest of the state is very bible-belt red outside of Dallas, Houston, Austin, and San Antonio.

And being "one of the blue-est cities in the state" ignores the fact that we're gerrymandered to hell. We're so gerrymandered that we're made fun of on social media. Of course, the mockery usually excludes the fact that the gerrymandering occurred 20 years ago. But it's still a mockery nonetheless.

> 'https://houstontx.gov/planning/DevelopRegs/'*

I think there's an issue with Hacker News' autolinking. As-is your link returns 404. Remove your single-quotes and the link works.

When I didn't have access to a car I did use the Metro bus in Houston. The place I was going to was about 5 mins by car (10 mins in traffic). The closest bus stop was about a mile's walk from my house. The actual bus ride was quick enough but there was usually a mile of walking to the front-door of the place I was going to. So, this turned into about a 30~45 minute commute. And I will agree that most of the bus riders are the poorer people of Houston (not all riders). I also can not count the number of times a bus just wasn't on time and I would walk to the next stop. I had even seen taxis come by and haggle with riders when the bus wasn't on time.

> Houston has pretty strict zoning laws
My understanding is that Houston does not have zoning laws. In fact from their newspaper:
> The city of Houston does not have zoning but development is governed by codes that address how property can be subdivided. The City codes do not address land use."
Houston is also the 4th largest city in the US and extremely diverse (not just in race), I imagine depending where you are in the city is whether or not you're more likely to see mostly healthy people or mostly unhealthy people
https://www.chron.com/news/houston-texas/houston/article/Wei...

Yep, I was wrong, and the OP and you are correct - there are no zoning laws as such, only a series of what would be considered building codes in other cities.

From the standpoint of land-use regulation, there are "de facto zoning laws": https://kinder.rice.edu/2015/09/08/forget-what-youve-heard-h....

Soon to be the third largest -- Houston will likely overtake Chicago this decade.

>the metro system is pretty widely used where it is built out
Nationwide, the general sentiment is that only poor people use public transportation. Just because it's widely used does not affect that sentiment.
>Houston with some exceptions, is one of the blue-est (and some areas are the red-est, to be fair) cities in the state, with a pretty wide spectrum of political opionons represented in between.
I'm guessing this is in response to the gun comment...believe it or not, dems like guns too.

> Nationwide, the general sentiment is that only poor people use public transportation. Just because it's widely used does not affect that sentiment.
Yes it does. If it’s actually widely used class stigma dissipates rapidly. See the subway in New York or commuter rail in the New York metro area. I believe commuter rail is also a thing in other parts of the Boston-Washington corridor and I know BART has substantial non-poor ridership even though the Bay Area’s public transport is a complete snafu. North America may have the worst public transport of the continents with substantial development but it’s not uniformly awful, just awful compared to Europe or Asia.

>If it’s actually widely used class stigma dissipates rapidly
I think the same is true for Chicago - both buses and rail are used extensively. There's still plenty of people in cars, but the stigma is a lot lower.

>If it’s actually widely used class stigma dissipates rapidly.
Sounds like it's not actually widely used then? Do you have any stats for the Houston metro ridership?

> Not many people looked like they ate a lot of vegetables.
Do you really believe NYC hipsters have a monopoly on eating vegetables?

I think that was a very carefully worded way of saying people looked unhealthy and overweight.
This would seem to align with the stats. New York has the ninth lowest obesity rate. Texas has the tenth highest.

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