Too much of the focus of the deregulatory effort has been on zoning and too little on new space, which makes little sense in a country this size.
The headline in a New York Times article by Conor Dougherty consists of a question:
Could Embracing Sprawl Ease California’s Housing Crunch?
That this can even be a question reveals thinking that has already done a fair bit, at least in some parts of the country, to hold back homebuilding.
Higher home prices are in no small part (and obviously) the result of a shortage in the supply of new housing. It is no secret that one of the reasons for that shortage of supply is overregulation. But too much of the focus of the deregulatory effort has been on zoning and too little on new space, which makes little sense in a country this size.
There is clearly a good case to be made that better use should be made of existing urban or suburban land, such as by easing the path for infill development, brownfield cleanup and redevelopment, and, with care, more flexible zoning rules. But the emergence of the technocratic obsession with “density” as an ideal rather than an option should not be allowed to stand in the way of greenfield development, too.
And so to California.
Dougherty’s article opens as follows:
In the foothills above Los Angeles sits a yellow field with a cement plant in the distance. It looks like the middle of nowhere but lies at the center of a debate about the cause of California’s housing crisis and whether more suburbs can help solve it.
The company that owns the field, the Tejon Ranch Company, has spent the past two decades trying and failing to turn the plot into housing, part of a larger plan to build what would amount to three new towns with some 40,000 homes across them. The development has been stymied by lawsuits arguing it would increase wildfire risk and lead to more carbon emissions that cause climate change.
To fight back, Tejon Ranch is backing a ballot initiative, Proposition 45, that would curtail the length of environmental reviews on large projects, including housing, roads, power and other infrastructure. Proposition 45 would also make it harder to challenge development.
In principle, at least, that would seem like a good thing. Talk of increased wildfire risk looks more than a little like scare tactics and, given what is happening in other parts of the world, an argument based on carbon emissions is too absurd to merit more than a moment’s consideration. Other objections inevitably include dark talk about data centers, but the real battle revolves around “sprawl,” to use that demonizing word. There has been some housing deregulation in California, but, as Dougherty writes:
Most of these efforts have focused on building more housing in existing cities, usually by allowing more density or punishing local governments that drag out permit approvals. The idea that the state should also make it easier to add subdivisions on the urban outskirts — which is what Tejon Ranch wants to do — has been largely absent from the policy agenda.
Anthill urbanists may not like it, but the data consistently show that most prospective homebuyers prefer single, detached homes. Adding subdivisions ought to make such homes more affordable while, as people move out to them, lessening the price pressure on existing or future urban multi-occupancy housing. That looks a lot like win-win.
Ideologues may disagree.