Posts tagged Affordable Housing
-
Arlington looking to legalize accessory dwellings
Accessory dwellings are rentable units inside another home, like a basement apartment or an upper floor with a separate entrance. These are common in DC, but illegal in Arlington. What’s Up Arlington reports an intiative underway to change this law. Keep reading…
-
North Capitol: Competing visions for handling traffic
Capitol Quarter isn’t the only bland urban renewal project being replaced with townhouses. Last week, Express reported that developers have been chosen for Northwest One, which will replace the Sursum Corda and Temple Court projects near New York Avenue and North Capitol with mixed-use redevelopment that has the potential to become a walkable neighborhood. But… Keep reading…
-
Cities are more than just poverty
John Edwards has a plan to “revitalize urban America.” It encompasses many important goals, like creating affordable housing, ending poverty, and reducing crime. But this agenda also belies a common conception, especially among liberals, that equates cities with poor minority people, that helping cities means helping the poor, and uses the language of charity… Keep reading…
-
Maybe they can build ‘em like they used to
During the dark ages of urban planning (the 1960s and 70s), many old residential buildings were replaced with boxy, alienating public housing projects, until Jane Jacobs discredited the idea. Block after block of attractive row houses are gone forever, even though brownstones in places like Brooklyn, Boston, San Francisco, and DC sell for a million dollars or two, or more. Can… Keep reading…
-
Island Plan for new villages?
Martha’s Vineyard’s regional land use agency, the Martha’s Vineyard Commission, is conducting a broad participatory planning proccess, Island Plan, to solicit input and devise a long-term plan for the future of the island over the next 50 years. Still in its early stages, it covers topics such as housing affordability, year-round employment opportunities,… Keep reading…
-
“Saving” a neighborhood in order to destroy it
Many neighborhoods in New York City have their local NIMBY civic groups, which believe that all development is bad and frequently use phrases like “preserving the low-rise character of the neighborhood” as arguments for resisting all development and all change. A group in and around the Bowery has such a petition now, which a friend forwarded to me, but I had to reply… Keep reading…
-
Economists for sprawl?
A Harvard economist, Edward Glaeser, got some press recently for a report he has written about the connection between land-use rules in Massachusetts towns and housing prices. It’s really not much of a surprise that many towns, like Lincoln and Weston (among the richest towns in the Commonwealth) use land restrictions to keep their towns small and expensive. Keep reading…
-
Principled development
This summer, I convened a series of discussions about development, urban planning, and policy in New York City. Out of those discussions I wrote down some thoughts, but ended up putting them in a drawer as people got busy with the campaign, other jobs, and life… but better late than never, here is a draft. The Imperative Today, New York City is entering a new era of… Keep reading…