In other words, "not in my backyard". But other people's backyard is fine!
Commendable, I'd say.
What's OP's course of action now? To move again?
I'm not excusing the effects of NIMBYism, but it's natural phenomena for many people and often not about raising property values, but resistance to change--especially as folks age and become less willing to adapt or move elsewhere.
Yes, if that's what I want. It's not really my backyard. it's proverbial, but we can't make the mistake of taking it literally. it's someone else's front yard. I have no say in it.
So I have a choice, move somewhere more rural, or enjoy the financial benefit of being an early resident of a growing community. But the onus is always on me, I cannot externalize my preferences onto others unwillingly. There are always decisions to be made, there is always a trade off. You're right about resistance to change.
Personally if where I live began to urbanize, I'd leave.
Isn't that exactly what those arguing for higher densities are doing?
telling people they:
- have to live next to a skyrise is externalizing.
- have to use public transit is externalizing.
- can't let their kids get a good education is externalizing.
- can't let their kids play safely without adult supervision is externalizing.
I'll freely admit zoning laws kind of suck in some instances, but you are going to be hard pressed to find a place that does not have them. In fact, the more dense the housing, the more rigorous the zone laws are likely to be. The reality almost everywhere is that one simply cannot do whatever one pleases with their property including keeping it from the government.
So, yes my proverbial view of your smog may well be legally protected and that might suck, but you and I are both also protected from a neighbor converting their property into a toxic waste dump.
A century of established case law say otherwise. If a private landowner wants to change the zoning on a parcel of land near established residences and the residences can show decrease in property values as a result of rezoning the courts have consistently awarded financial damages to the owners of the residences from the city that decides to change the zoning.
It’s just not reasonable to say, “the houses I saw growing up cannot change”
Doing so, generally, will make things worse for someone like GP, because when they do go into the city, it will be less car-friendly.
So I think your reply is somewhat less than charitable.
Why should I care if there's high density housing in cities if I don't live there? Let those people decide what they want for that area.
The problem in this case is that it's not different desires. The existing landowners in every area have the same incentive -- to increase artificial scarcity so that the land they already own increases in value.
The people this comes at the expense of are the future residents of that area, who for that very reason don't have a vote there. If you live in town A and get a job in town B, you might like for town A to have restrictive zoning (where you're selling your old house) and town B to have relaxed zoning (where you're buying a new one), but you only get a vote in town A, until you've actually moved to town B at which point your incentives invert. So if zoning is local, every place structurally has unduly restrictive zoning.
This is one of the few places where local control doesn't work, specifically because the interests of current residents and future residents are in conflict.
Only above a certain population number. Many smaller cities and towns don't have this issue.
"at which point your incentives invert."
Only if you own land. And only if your ideals support it. With a sufficient renting population there can be change.
"The existing landowners in every area have the same incentive -- to increase artificial scarcity so that the land they already own increases in value."
If this is true, then why even have a discussion? I mean, it's settled then - this is a democracy and the voting base will not support changes. Otherwise, there are multiple incentives and desires, so your statement would be an over simplification.
Then we are also ignoring effects of housing crunches. In theory, jobs people are moving to should have leadership that realizes the issue and moves to alleviate it (and have competitive cost advantages), or doesn't move there in the first place. Same for people, if it doesn't make financial sense to move somewhere, then they will select other options. We are already seeing some of these affects in movement from places like CA to TX.
So only every place where it matters then.
Not having restrictions on 20 story buildings in farm country where nobody has any incentive to build 20 story buildings is irrelevant.
> Only if you own land. And only if your ideals support it. With a sufficient renting population there can be change.
This is another instance of "only where it matters" -- you have an area zoned exclusively for single family homes and nobody is renting because nobody who has to rent can afford to live there.
Also, this is "solved" by the scam of rent control. You bring just enough of the existing renters into the "screw the new guys" fold to prevent changes adverse to landlords.
> If this is true, then why even have a discussion? I mean, it's settled then - this is a democracy and the voting base will not support changes.
The question is at which level of government it should be decided. You do it at the state level instead of the town level and now there are a lot of people willing to remove zoning restrictions in the places they want to move to.
Not having restrictions on 20 story buildings in farm country where nobody has any incentive to build 20 story buildings is irrelevant."
This brings us to the root of the issue - job location and density. There's no reason companies can't move to existing small cities or towns. They don't have to cluster together in places like SF. It's tough to influence those choices, just like the preference of people to want low density housing. Some of it occurs naturally, at least for the worst offenders, like CA to TX in recent years.
"You do it at the state level instead of the town level and now there are a lot of people willing to remove zoning restrictions in the places they want to move to."
Are there though? I haven't really seen this. It also ignore local concerns. Maybe in low density places they don't care about higher density housing going in because the setbacks are naturally large. This changes if you go to a medium density area.
There is. They put their offices where they can find workers. You can staff a Google office from the people who already live in San Francisco, not from the people who already live in Tuscon.
And people don't want to live in a company town. If you live in a major city which has offices for every major company in your industry, you can buy a house there and not worry about what happens if you switch jobs. Are you going to want to buy a house some place you'd have to sell it if you ever wanted to work for a different company?
> Some of it occurs naturally, at least for the worst offenders, like CA to TX in recent years.
That only happens when the offenders are extraordinarily egregious. And even then, they're not moving from San Francisco to a thousand separate little towns. They're pretty much all going to Austin -- which has a higher population than San Francisco.
> Are there though? I haven't really seen this.
Have they actually moved zoning control to the state level anywhere? There are proposals to do it in California but I'm not sure that any of them have been implemented.
Not just implemented, but even studied/surveyed.
If you need a given amount of tax revenue per person, set the tax rate so that you get that amount of tax revenue per person. This might be a different rate based on a different housing market. So what?
To be blunt, a high density housing project going into a low density community is literally leaching off the existing tax basis. Exacerbating this is the fact that developers often know how to game local tax laws further reducing their tax burdens and thus shouldering it on others.