Live chat with Christopher Leinberger

Fringe sprawl homebuilders (Toll, Ryan, etc.) pretty much only know how to do one thing…drivable sub-urban stuff so they just want to keep on doing the same ol’, same ol….only cheaper and faster and dumbed down. The next couple years will tell us if these old dogs will ever learn new tricks.

And I like BIDs being an intermediary between the transit agency and the land owners in these financing schemes. As a developer, I would not like sharing my books with City Council or the transit board.

BTW, it will not favor the rich parts of town. H Street will have far more upside from today than Dupont does…it is starting at lower values and will increase on a percentage basis far more so the the SE and NE parts of town should actually be in a competitive advantage.

Arlington and Montgomery County are two great role models. They are using serious annual investments in creating more PERMANENT affordable units and inclusionary zoning to create a fairly impressive number of units…more must be done even in these two jurisdictions.

BTW, value capture could be used for affordable housing as well….gentrification can be used to pay for affordable housing…take from the rich for the not as well off.

The developer gets it and is willing to work on paying for the station (a form of value capture) since he sees the power of TOD…he is the same developer who did the retail in Clarendon. The city is quite behind it…the mayor lives within walking distance and is probably looking forward to walking there for lunch some day.

If the subsidies would be taken away and we were given a CHOICE in how to get around and how to live, you would see a very big difference in what land use patterns would look like. How do I know this: The huge price premiums in walkable urban places vs drivable sub-urban…that is the market telling us something profound.

RE: business leaders, I have the impression most in-fill/inner suburban business people get it. However, even in Arlington, I know there is unnecessary bad blood between business leaders and government. I personally think we should take a corral approach: build a literal and figurative corral around these walkable urban places and tell business, do not even think about going outside the corral but inside, it is a free market.

Too many times, government leaders get into decisions they should not have to bother themselves about and add uncertainty to the business decision making. That raises costs and might have some businesses steer clear of those jurisdictions.

However, those are national stats. Our region is growing a lot. Do the same trends hold true? Do you think the demand for drivable suburban houses is basically already met here in our region?

So I have little doubt that the fringe drivable sub-urban demand has been quite satisfied…there will always be people who want during certain times of their lives and maybe their entire life a drivable sub-urban life style. It is just there is a generation of pent up demand for walkable urban…hence the huge price premiums and all the concern about gentrification, which is a direct consequence.

If I could be the beneficent dictator (sort of like Mayor Daley), I would stop the ICC and drivable sub-urban development and focus all transportation spending on rail transit, bike, walking, bus service and repairing the road system we already have. We as a region would find our infrastructure costs reduced by 1/4rd to 1/3rd over the next generation and we would be more economically competitive…not to mention healthier and not contributing as much to climate change.

I do not have all of the answers but know that if we have the intention to address this challenge, there are plenty of tools available. The intention is the issue, however. There are some very smart people working on this; Enterprise (I am on one of their boards), LISC, etc. At Brookings we are looking at the connection betwen social equity and economic performance of walkable urban places…stay tuned.