Better planning for affordability

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5 Comments

  1. Bonnie Hauser

     /  June 26, 2017

    Great organizations – but your point is a good one. What would happen if private sector builders had a seat at this important table? Wake is getting 14 Habitat homes for free courtesy of local builders. http://www.newsobserver.com/news/business/article154480254.html

    Too bad none of these communities will have access to reasonable public transportation.

  2. bart

     /  July 2, 2017

    Ronald McDonald House built out its property last year. They built five new buildings and reduced outdoor space to almost nothing. However, they can house more people. Their argument, when proposing the build out, was that they could not nearly meet demand for rooms.

    I have no doubt that was true. It is probably still true. But what was once a building with a backyard that felt like there was still some country nearby has become a compound with several dorm like buildings.

    They can serve more people, true. But in doing so they have altered the nature (no puns intended) of what they offer and what the place now is.

    That’s probably just fine for those spending time in RMH. But we’re going down the same road with respect to housing. We’re building more, fundamentally changing the nature of this place, but housing is still too expensive and is likely to remain so as long as demand is so high.

    But what’s the end game?

  3. plurimus

     /  July 3, 2017

    The great irony of course is that “sustainability” has become a growth industry.

    The rhetoric goes that we need to prepare for this tremendous growth and that leads to the notion we need “density” to deal with “sprawl”. This is the fantasy of the ecological modernist who believe with a bit more efficiency, everything can simply keep on “progressing”.

  4. bart

     /  July 3, 2017

    So, as we infill the evil sprawl, do we get rid of sprawl?

  5. plurimus

     /  July 3, 2017

    Heh. Yes #SustainableSprawl