Market Urbanism

Liberalizing cities | From the bottom up

“Market Urbanism” refers to the synthesis of classical liberal economics and ethics (market), with an appreciation of the urban way of life and its benefits to society (urbanism). We advocate for the emergence of bottom up solutions to urban issues, as opposed to ones imposed from the top down.

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1. Systemic Failure praises Gov. (again) Jerry Brown’s efforts to do away with California’s redevelopment agencies and “enterprise zones” (there’s a euphemism if I’ve ever heard one), which the author claims promote autocentric development with public funds. He then cites a few examples of redevelopment agencies pushing such plans in San Jose. If he can come up with that many in one city, I can’t even imagine how much damage they’ve done throughout the whole state. So far I’m liking Jerry Brown’s second act.

2. A very interesting Wikipedia article about a controversial Brooklyn-based developer.

3. One Staten Island councilman wants to use the dreaded environmental review against bike lanes.

4. An article about the Toronto condo boom. I’d like to know more about this:

But perhaps the biggest demographic that will continue to drive sales this year is the investor market, both local and international. Mr. Lamb says there are few developers building rental towers any longer, in part due to the city’s rent control laws, so investors hold the key to rental accommodation. He says it’s not uncommon for 40% of a building to be owned by investors, with most rentals situated below the fifteenth floor because they are less expensive than those with a brighter view. Mr. Myers estimates 50% to 60% of downtown condo units are owned by investors who rent them out.

  • These are the kind of articles that make me love this blog so much, but sheesh, oftentimes I start to think I don’t even want to know how bad things are.

  • Nonny

    I would hesitate to accept Brad Lamb’s assertion that rent control is the primary or most important (or most worth mentioning) cause of Toronto’s rental housing shortage without doing independent research. (Notice that they only interviewed condo developers and realtors for the article.)

    Rent controls were dramatically reduced in Toronto in the 1990s, but this did not substantially help with the affordable housing shortage: http://www.thestar.com/news/canada/article/669109

    I don’t know enough about housing markets to make a definitive statement, but there is a popular perception in Toronto and area that municipal governments are in the pocket of high-end developers.

  • Hm, I see your point, but there has to be some explanation for why developers have to sell their rental units to investors, who then rent them out themselves. It’s an inefficient, kludge-y arbitrage, and if not rent controls, then what?

  • Benjamin Hemric

    I — Regarding Item #2 (Wikipedia article on architect, Robert Scarano, Jr.)

    I’m not familiar with the particulars of the controversies surrounding this architect/developer (and the particulars are, of course, crucial), but speaking in general I have mixed feelings about these kind of controversies.

    Although I am, generally speaking, skeptical about the usefulness of much government regulation, I’m a big believer in good (i.e., sensible) safety regulations. I think they are the “crown jewels,” so to speak, of government. This is particularly true with regard to fire regulations, which I think are a tremendous blessing of modern day government.

    Although I disagree with many of the density type regulations that Mr. Scarano seems to be accused of breaking — NEVERTHELESS, I think it’s important to abide by them while they are the law.

    I also heartily disagree with the idea of self-regulation, self-certification. Again, while I don’t believe in “big government,’ I do think if a government promulgates laws and regulations, it should be enforcing them. THAT is the legitimate job of government, in my opinion.

    Along these lines, by the way, I’ve been meaning to bring to the attention of the readers of Market Urbanism and interesting blog that is, in a way, an intellectual adversary. It’s a blog by someone who lives in Queens, NYC, and is very anti-development (or, at least it was, the last time I looked — which hasn’t been for a year or two).

    a) One of the blogger’s pet peeves is builders who flout the law (and I agree with the blogger on this one).

    b) Another pet peeve is shoddy development (it is here where the blogger offers his most legitimate challenge to market urbanism, I think). By the way, I would call this “schlock” architecture, instead (less unnecessarily vulgar, I think)

    c) But the blogger also seems to be against ANY development/densification in Queens whatsover, good or bad. Some of the developments that the blogger has criticized seem pretty good.

    In any case, I think it’s good for market urbanists to take a look at this blog, as it does occasionally present some legitimate and important issues — and it does show what we are up against.

    Here’s a link to the blog:

    http://queenscrap.blogspot.com/

    II — Regarding Item No. 4 (the Toronto condo boom).

    Although I’d love to visit Toronto, I’ve never been there. But in the meantime, it seems to me that a good way to acquire great information about the city (including information about various controversies relating to market urbanism) is the excellent “Urban Toronto” blog. (Unfortunately, there don’t seem to be many market urbanist commenters, there. But there’s very helpful information, nevertheless.

    Here’s a link to the “Urban Toronto” blog:

    http://urbantoronto.ca/

    I like the “Forum” section, particularly the “Toronto Issues” forum.

    Benjamin Hemric
    Tuesday, January 25, 2011, 7:30 p.m.
    P.S. — Hope people will not mind if any future posts of mine in this thread, if there are any, are done as independent comments (i.e., outside the nesting feature).

  • I have similar thoughts about the illegal building, but I do find them all incredibly interesting and telling. Previously I’d only known about NYC “tenement toppers” like Ramy Issac and Ben Shaoul who, quite frankly, are ugly Jewish stereotypes (I say this as a Jew), which makes them not very sympathetic. But Scarano’s interesting because he’s got a mainstream, award-winning, Brooklyn-based firm, and yet he’s still willing to take huge risks (relative to most mainstream entrepreneurs) for the chance to squeeze a little more out of the zoning code than the other guy. I also like all of them because they’re doing adaptive reuse projects, and in my opinion doing more for historical buildings in the longrun than preservationists.

    But you’re right – obviously there’s something extremely unsavory about him. The “deaths” section of Scarano’s Wikipedia page is chilling, but I’d be curious to know what percentage of the market he had during the period…does he have significantly less than 3 out of 29 new units built during the one-year period?

  • here’s a post I did about mezzanine floors of a Scarano building from 2 years ago…
    http://www.marketurbanism.com/2009/02/24/how-to-sidestep-far-restrictions-mezzanine-floors/

  • Anonymous

    Most are those mentioned in the Systemic Failure article are in DOWNTOWN San Jose no less. One is in San Francisco, in a very dense area of the city, and I doubt many people of any political stripe would agree with a luxury hotel getting public money to build a parking garage.

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