We moved from Arlington a month ago. We may move back if we find affordable housing near the Columbia Pike corridor, a multicultural community of immigrants, many of whom are getting priced out of the county and moving west (Fairfax, Loudoun) or south (Prince William, Stafford). Even advocates for these communities wonder if the missing middle initiative, due to Arlington's location and demographics, will not help the "middle" but will favor developers and the lower high-end real estate buyers. The price of a new unit, one of four on a former single-family lot, will still be exorbitant.
One small but promising movement in Arlington have been churches that sell their land to make way for affordable housing or senior living facilities. Sometimes the churches rent back space on the first floors of these new buildings. Our former church has great relationships with some of the tenants of those units and serves them in different ways.
Another key point is that NIMBYism is almost entirely classist. It knows no ideological boundaries - political "progressives" are just as likely to shut down new/different housing as is your old-school Reagan Republican. In Santa Cruz, CA where I once lived - a bastion of political "left-ness" - any time a multi-housing project was considered the town would come out in record numbers and scream, in their best Vito Corleone impressions, "look how they massacred my town!".
I now live in Mexico where, of course, things are a lot different. For the most part, zoning laws just don't exist. Mexico is not nearly as well off economically as the US, and poverty is widespread. But homelessness is not, because one can build a one-room cinder block shelter next door to a $500,000 mansion. And, at the neighborhood level, things just continue to work. The trees grow, etc.
NIMBYism in the U.S. is pernicious. It is frustrating, entitled, hypocritical, cruel. I don't miss it, but I acknowledge it, even though I've chosen to live in a society where the freedom to be housed still largely exists.
The NIMBYs in Austin have successfully weaponized the courts here, too, though we've taken some measures to make sure recent reforms are "lawsuit proof"—our "proper steps" included multiple grueling public hearings, at which, of course, the opponents claimed the city had not provided sufficient opportunities for public input. 🙄 Perhaps the silver lining of the NIMBY playbook being apparently the same everywhere is that our defense of housing policies can draw on the success of other cities in allowing more housing and somehow finding ways to handle trees, drainage, and traffic.
I offer a free ride to and from work, a lard butte says she wouldn’t walk to a common gathering point out there in McMansion land. Nope! The argument for a free express ride to and from work is becoming an easier sell. Imagine a world where “Children have Freedom of Movement” not just in Japan when they send a toddler out to do an errand. Social Contracts should include many things especially in transportation. We would easily get to know which kids were oddballs if we were more locally community minded.
We moved from Arlington a month ago. We may move back if we find affordable housing near the Columbia Pike corridor, a multicultural community of immigrants, many of whom are getting priced out of the county and moving west (Fairfax, Loudoun) or south (Prince William, Stafford). Even advocates for these communities wonder if the missing middle initiative, due to Arlington's location and demographics, will not help the "middle" but will favor developers and the lower high-end real estate buyers. The price of a new unit, one of four on a former single-family lot, will still be exorbitant.
One small but promising movement in Arlington have been churches that sell their land to make way for affordable housing or senior living facilities. Sometimes the churches rent back space on the first floors of these new buildings. Our former church has great relationships with some of the tenants of those units and serves them in different ways.
Another key point is that NIMBYism is almost entirely classist. It knows no ideological boundaries - political "progressives" are just as likely to shut down new/different housing as is your old-school Reagan Republican. In Santa Cruz, CA where I once lived - a bastion of political "left-ness" - any time a multi-housing project was considered the town would come out in record numbers and scream, in their best Vito Corleone impressions, "look how they massacred my town!".
I now live in Mexico where, of course, things are a lot different. For the most part, zoning laws just don't exist. Mexico is not nearly as well off economically as the US, and poverty is widespread. But homelessness is not, because one can build a one-room cinder block shelter next door to a $500,000 mansion. And, at the neighborhood level, things just continue to work. The trees grow, etc.
NIMBYism in the U.S. is pernicious. It is frustrating, entitled, hypocritical, cruel. I don't miss it, but I acknowledge it, even though I've chosen to live in a society where the freedom to be housed still largely exists.
The NIMBYs in Austin have successfully weaponized the courts here, too, though we've taken some measures to make sure recent reforms are "lawsuit proof"—our "proper steps" included multiple grueling public hearings, at which, of course, the opponents claimed the city had not provided sufficient opportunities for public input. 🙄 Perhaps the silver lining of the NIMBY playbook being apparently the same everywhere is that our defense of housing policies can draw on the success of other cities in allowing more housing and somehow finding ways to handle trees, drainage, and traffic.
I offer a free ride to and from work, a lard butte says she wouldn’t walk to a common gathering point out there in McMansion land. Nope! The argument for a free express ride to and from work is becoming an easier sell. Imagine a world where “Children have Freedom of Movement” not just in Japan when they send a toddler out to do an errand. Social Contracts should include many things especially in transportation. We would easily get to know which kids were oddballs if we were more locally community minded.