If people want to live in a single family home in the suburbs, why not let them? It's not like the US is short on space.
In areas where there is high demand for a particular reason (ex. NYC or the Bay Area because of the job market) I think it makes sense to intensify. But in cities where it isn't important for a lot of people to live close to the center, I don't really see a problem with just building more houses. Having a backyard is nice.
If you ever go to Phoenix, all you see is miles of suburbs. And then you drive out of the city, and all you see is miles of open land that they can expand into. I say just keep building them, clearly they are pretty popular.
>If people want to live in a single family home in the suburbs, why not let them? It's not like the US is short on space.
1. The main complaint you hear is R1 zoning, which doesn't just permit single family homes but MANDATES single family homes. This is wasteful lunacy.
2. If single family homes can pay for their requisite infrastructure without external subsidy, then by all means. If they can't pay and expect others to pay for them, then we need to have a conversation on the topic.
> If single family homes can pay for their requisite infrastructure without external subsidy
...and they basically don't, over time. The initial boost in property-tax revenue is eventually overwhelmed by the maintenance costs for all that sprawling infrastructure. It's one of the drivers behind the churn that OP is all about. A fuller exposition was discussed here recently.
In principle I agree, but I think that in many cases these developments are not well thought out.
Any time the housing values in an area significantly drop or the population largely leaves, what gets left behind is a poor and poorly maintained neighborhood that creates a ton of negative externalities for surrounding areas. When you build an entirely new development on undeveloped land this is almost guaranteed to happen as all of the buildings and infrastructure will need to be replaced at the same time.
> If people want to live in a single family home in the suburbs, why not let them? It's not like the US is short on space.
Because the federal government often foots the bill for new suburban expansion. If the suburbs will foot the bill for road, sewer, and electricity expansion then they should be left to do so.
In areas where there is high demand for a particular reason (ex. NYC or the Bay Area because of the job market) I think it makes sense to intensify. But in cities where it isn't important for a lot of people to live close to the center, I don't really see a problem with just building more houses. Having a backyard is nice.
If you ever go to Phoenix, all you see is miles of suburbs. And then you drive out of the city, and all you see is miles of open land that they can expand into. I say just keep building them, clearly they are pretty popular.