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naraburns  nihil supernum  1yr ago (text post)   29600 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of February 6, 2023

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homeless shelters [...] gave them first-hand and literal application of “yes in my backyard”

YIMBYs aren't advocating for new homeless shelters, they're advocating for more residential development, generally - and, at the margin, those units will be filled by normal people who are able to pay slightly less than current residents are, not the homeless. (Maybe affordable unit requirements mess with this? idk) Maybe if somewhere went full YIMBY rents would drop a lot, but that seems unlikely imo. YIMBYs claim more housing will help with homelessness not because poor druggies will be able to live alongside rich families, but because increases in stocks everywhere means more rich-ish people can live near you, freeing up units in middle-class areas for middle-class people, who'll put less pressure on poorer areas ... etc.

Coase's theorem relies on zero transaction costs, which are not present IRL when negotiating between diffuse collections of residents and state and local governments. And it guarantees pareto efficiency, which (by definition) leaves massive improvements on the table if a few people are very stubborn, e.g. strongly prefer 'not in my backyard' even over being paid.

So is it that high prices, specifically, keep out the wrong kinds of people? That would still allow a lot of building that might only lower prices somewhat. And is it really worth spending 25-35% of everyone's income on rent to maintain that? Even if [high rent, no building, good communities] is better than [low rent, lots of building, bad communities], there must be a way to achieve 'good communities' without banning building - although not necessarily a politically viable one.

YIMBYs aren't advocating for new homeless shelters, they're advocating for more residential development, generally - and, at the margin, those units will be filled by normal people who are able to pay slightly less than current residents are, not the homeless.

I think the definition of YIMBY/NIMBY has changed a bit. When I first heard it in my highschool class, my teacher was ranting about progressives who were like "Homeless shelters are so important! We need to do more for the poor!" but who would blanche and try to stop any such projects if they were being built nearby their own home. The initial emphasis was originally Not In My Backyard, it was about hypocrisy. But the counter-movement that's emerged, YIMBY's, is more Yes in My Backyard, they're more about just getting stuff built in general and tearing down red tape, they aren't actually organizing to build homeless shelters nearby themselves.

Maybe affordable unit requirements mess with this? idk

"New residential development" in NIMBY cities (as opposed to rural America) usually means tearing down existing single-family homes on large lots and replacing them with high-density housing on small lots, which consists of multi-floor, multi-family apartments, at least 20% affordable or subsidized units, and no yards. While the developer makes a lot of money on these due to the high-density, the price paid per household is almost always lower than the area average, the area loses some of its greenery, and the average social class of the area falls.

I think getting rid of the affordable housing requirement would result in some developers focusing on large high-density, high-cost, high-quality condos near in-demand areas, but the affordable housing requirement puts a limit on unit sizes and quality overall, and makes NIMBY the equilibrium position of a neighborhood.

I'm a YIMBY and I think that so-called affordable housing requirements should be abolished. All houses are potentially affordable given a healthy market.

Yup. This is the way things are done in the rest of the world. If there is "affordable housing" it takes the form of little tiny apartments (like ... 6 square meters) which anyone can afford because they are minimalist. (Americans might call these tenements, and they are illegal.) Developers outside of the US seem to prevent claims of gentrification by grandfathering old tenants/owners into the new, larger units built on the same land.

"New residential development" in NIMBY cities (as opposed to rural America) usually means tearing down existing single-family homes on large lots and replacing them with high-density housing on small lots, which consists of multi-floor, multi-family apartments, at least 20% affordable or subsidized units, and no yards.

I don't know about percentages, but in my portion of a major NIMBY city, development usually does not tear down single family homes, but instead tears down poor-quality 1- or 2- story apartment buildings (often of the dingbat variety, which does not age well at all) and puts up in their place 10-12 story (4-5 of which is above-ground parking) stickbuilt cookie cutter "luxury" apartment blocks with rents that are far higher than the units replaced (because newer and nicer amenities, and often larger individual units).

The new units may be more expensive, but the net effect is still to depress prices generally. Yuppies move into the new "luxury" units, freeing up the mid-level housing they used to occupy for the middle class, in turn freeing up cheap housing for the poor.

Jesus, are those stickbuilt things really up to 12 storeys now? We're going to have a lot of deaths when one of those burns. Or are they only 6-7 wood above concrete?

6-7 stories above 4-5 concrete parking-garage floors.

Are you sure? The limit prescribed by the US's International Building Code for apartment buildings (occupancy R-2) has not been increased beyond five stories of heavy timber (type IV-HT) or four stories of dimensional lumber (type V) on top of a concrete podium, with a total building height of 85 feet for heavy timber or 70 feet for dimensional lumber.

But maybe your city uses a different code.

I think there may be a difference with newer engineered timber buildings, e.g.: https://www.fox6now.com/news/worlds-tallest-mass-timber-building-milwaukee-ascent

I think an engineer (def. local authorities sufficiently lobbied) can override this sort of thing -- it's expensive, but definitely is not physically unpossible:

https://www.vancouverisawesome.com/real-estate/tallest-wood-residential-tower-world-vancouver-bc-1943876

I could be wrong and it could just be 5 above the parking. Regardless, they're tall. And expensive. And generally replacing old apartment/condo units instead of single-family homes.

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