Category: Local Government (Page 1 of 2)

Walking a Tightrope: Urban Expansion and Rural Conservation

December 12, 2023 / odrozd

By Anthony Buckley

I grew up on an 83-acre cattle farm and went to a public high school surrounded by cornfields. Rural southeastern Ohio is the place I call home. Many might ask where urban planning comes into play in an area that had 700 people in its village center. Ohio countryside is by no means comparable to the streets of New York City or even the neighborhoods of Chapel Hill or Durham. Where the country and the city do become akin is in their need for smart planning.

The World Cities Report 2022, a piece produced by the United Nations, projects that 58 percent of the global population will live in cities in the next 50 years. At the same time, a meta-analysis in Nature Food forecasts a 35 to 56 percent increase in global food demand by 2050. In other words, cities are set to expand at unprecedented rates while the need for rural areas to provide food and other necessities becomes ever more critical. These two realities, predictions or not, contradict one another without smart urban planning orchestrating their unification.

This bold proposition, though, is hardly one I have lived. In Fairfield County, the place I come from, county commissioners recently drafted a document called the Fairfield County 2023 Comprehensive Plan. This 100 or so page proposal outlines the future development goals for the area, both urban and rural. As a county immediately adjacent to Columbus, Ohio, Fairfield will experience significant growth over the coming decades and commissioners are moving to ensure they are ready. However, their aspirations, as noble as they are, have failed to meet the needs of a 21^st century county.

The Future Land Use plan outlines the zoning of each parcel of land within the borders of Fairfield County. To the credit of the commissioners, plans are in the works to create mixed-use zones and high-density housing. These initiatives reflect an understanding of the finite resource present in Fairfield County. However, my frustration, a sentiment I share with many other residents especially farmers, lies with the commissioners plans for rural areas.

The working draft states in its outlook that, “From a development standpoint, primary agricultural areas where working farms are concentrated should be conserved through a variety of measures.” It then goes on to propose policies such as directing growth away from priority preservation areas and restricting new homesites to very large parcels. I applaud the premise of these policies as I believe them to be thoughtful and deliberate as rural land makes up 75% of the available area in the region. Yet, the map included with the draft proposal contradicts these ideas.

The discrepancy’s present themselves almost immediately. In the Comprehensive Plan, commissioners aspire to construct “live/work” units along commercial corridors and create open spaces that maintain a “sense of rural character.” Despite that, the map from both 2018 and 2023 demonstrate no commitment to build out these promises. The central artery connecting central Fairfield County to Columbus is Route 33. The growth planned for this critical corridor is entirely inadequate. Instead, commissioners and developers have proposed rapid expansion out from the center of Lancaster and Pickerington into the surrounding countryside. Not only does this plan pave the way for unsustainable urban sprawl, it also presents a direct threat to the rural way of life. Furthermore, it opposes the very notion that farmland will be critical for feeding an expanding population, an idea firmly established by leading researchers and organizations.

The misguided plans have a very natural origin though: there is a disconnect between smart urban planning and rural conservation. Rural people understand and view the land they live on differently from those in the city and the suburbs. In the country, the land is more than just a way to make a living; the land is as coupled to our identity and heritage as our photo albums and homes. In the city, land is a commodity; in the country, it’s a keeper of culture. Ensuring land stays in the hands of rural people means our history is preserved, able to be passed down to the next generation. The 2023 Fairfield County Comprehensive Plan threatens to take away what gives country residents identity, a serious urban planning misstep.

In response to the commissioner’s proposal, I want to make a proposal myself. Urban planners have often conducted their work to provide for those living within a city’s limits. I opine that viewing urban planning through a more rustic lens is equally important. My county commissioners and their ill-advised plan exemplify the need for such a change. I propose those responsible for training the next generation of planners begin to ingrain a regard for rural spaces in their students. Rather than viewing the countryside as the foundation upon which to build yet unrealized apartment buildings, view the land as a living testament to the history of rural people. Teach undergraduates, master’s students, and government leaders to understand and appreciate the land the same way rural people do.

As the world moves forward, land will continue to become a premium. Cities will need to expand, but urban planners must find a way to balance the needs of the cities with the needs of the country. Both places are equally important, and both deserve to have a say in the future that we want to build.

Citations

Commission, F. C. R. P. (2018). Fairfield County Future Land Use Planning Areas. Fairfield County Comprehensive Land Use Plan. Retrieved 2023, from https://www.co.fairfield.oh.us/rpc/pdf/Fairfield-County-Future-Land-Use-Plan-2021.pdf.

Anthony is an undergraduate student in the Department of Environment, Ecology, and Energy at UNC Chapel Hill. He is interested in clean energy as a tool for economic development, the public policy of energy and sustainability, and rural empowerment in the renewable energy transition. Outside of the classroom, you can find Anthony at Carolina sporting events year-round or grabbing dinner with his roommates on Franklin.

Featured image courtesy of Anthony Buckley

Flipping the Script: Understanding Pedestrian and Bicyclist Safety in Chapel Hill-Carrboro

May 20, 2022 / odrozd / 0 Comments

By Emma Vinella-Brusher, Angles Managing Editor

Each year, over 3,000 pedestrians and 850 bicyclists are hit by vehicles here in North Carolina, making our state one of the least safe states for walking and biking[i]. Last month, the UNC Department of City & Regional Planning and Collaborative Sciences Center for Road Safety were joined by Tom Flood of Rovélo Creative and Arleigh Greenwald aka Bike Shop Girl for a free, two-day workshop on addressing this crisis.

*A “ghost bike” sits at Franklin and Graham in Chapel Hill, in honor of cyclist Nick Walton who passed away earlier this year (Source: author)*

The April 22-23 Flipping the Script on Traffic Violence event featured a guided bike ride and walk, a facilitated discussion about marketing/storytelling, and a workshop to develop marketing content. Students, academics, professionals, and elected officials gathered together to learn how to better communicate the critical issue of traffic violence towards our most vulnerable road users.

Flipping the Script kicked off at 1 PM Friday with a casual bicycle ride through the streets of Carrboro, Chapel Hill, and the UNC campus. Participants covered ~4.5 miles and stopped to photograph and discuss traffic safety concerns along the way. This was followed by a one-mile walking tour of downtown Chapel Hill, for another opportunity to identify safety challenges for pedestrians and bicyclists in the area. The day concluded with a facilitated debrief of both tours and discussion of opportunities to advocate for and improve local road safety.

*The bike route, starting at Wilson Park in Carrboro and ending at New East on UNC’s Chapel Hill campus (Source: author)*

*Walking tour participants critique a Chapel Hill pedestrian crossing (Source: Tom Flood)*

Day 2 of Flipping the Script consisted of an afternoon hands-on workshop, where participants practiced crafting effective media messages about road safety challenges. The group developed messaging around the safety concerns facing pedestrians and cyclists to share with the public and local elected leaders in the hopes of making our streets safer for all.

*Tom Flood shows participants the language used by the media to describe crashes resulting in injury or death (Source: Collaborative Sciences Center for Road Safety)*

Thank you to Tab Combs, Seth LaJeunesse, Tom Flood, Arleigh Greenwald, and everyone else in putting on this fantastic event!

[i] Watch for me NC, “Crash Facts.”

Featured image: Bicyclists participate in the 2022 Durham Ride of Silence to honor cyclists who have been killed or injured while cycling on public roadways, courtesy of author

The Untold Story of Amazon’s Arrival to Hudson Yards

January 11, 2020 / odrozd

By Brandon Tubby

In March 2019, an assortment of politicians, businessmen, and architects gathered in Manhattan’s Far West Side to celebrate the grand opening of Hudson Yards, New York’s newest neighborhood. The city’s mayor, Bill de Blasio, though, was notably absent. Make no mistake – the event was certainly worthy of mayoral attention. With its soaring towers, expertly-engineered 26-acre platform, and $25 billion price tag, the development of Hudson Yards has been dubbed the largest private real estate project in U.S. history. As such, Mayor de Blasio’s decision to forgo the event was peculiar. An aide for de Blasio claimed that the Mayor couldn’t fit the event into his schedule, although other high-profile politicians like Senator Chuck Schumer carved out time to attend and deliver a speech. But in the wake of the Amazon HQ2 fall-out, his absence quietly underscores a growing philosophical predicament for progressives as to what is ‘good’ economic development.

The HQ2 Dilemma

Just one month before the grand opening of Hudson Yards, Mayor de Blasio penned an op-ed in the New York Times scorching Amazon for abruptly pulling out of an agreement to locate its second headquarters (HQ2) in Queens, taking with it promises of over 25,000 jobs. De Blasio attributed local political opposition against HQ2 to growing frustration with flagrant corporate greed and increasing wealth inequality, as the deal with Amazon had included nearly $3 billion in financial assistance from the city and the state.

The endowing of taxpayer money to Amazon raised important questions over how public dollars should be spent. It also ignited a debate among progressives resistant to subsidizing massive corporations but still eager to champion economic development, foster job creation, and bring in cutting-edge industries. So when the news broke that Amazon was quietly bringing over 1,500 jobs to the Hudson Yards neighborhood in December 2019, just months after the HQ2 fall-out, progressives opposed to the original deal felt validated.

Representative Ocasio-Cortez was among progressives opposed to the original HQ2 deal who celebrated Amazon’s move to Hudson Yards (via Twitter).

Behind the Curtain

The real story of Amazon’s new New York office, though, is not so simple. The sleek neighborhood would itself not exist without lenient tax policies and significant financial assistance from the city and state of New York. The Hudson Yards project caught momentum post-9/11, as the administration of Mayor Michael Bloomberg sought to create a state-of-the-art mixed-use district to increase the city’s supply of both high-end office space and housing. The Bloomberg administration also felt that connecting the development to public transit was a necessity for the neighborhood’s vitality. However, the Far West Side had no subway or train station at the time; thus, building an extension of the number 7 subway line became imperative. One problem: the subway extension came with $2 billion price tag. Anyone familiar with the state of the Metropolitan Transit Authority’s financials knew that the subway project would take years of capital planning and lobbying before ever receiving the green light.

So, in an unusual maneuver in New York City economic policy, the Bloomberg administration proposed paying for the entire subway project through tax increment financing (TIF), a public financing method which calls upon future tax revenue generated by a development to fund associated development costs. In 2007, the city authorized the issuance of $2 billion in bonds to raise capital for the subway extension, wagering that future tax revenue captured from Hudson Yards would generate enough money to pay back their debts. Essentially, the Bloomberg administration put the city on the line for Hudson Yards in an unprecedented fashion.

The Newly Opened 34-Street Hudson Yards Subway Station (via Curbed New York)

For the funding scheme to succeed, the city needed Hudson Yards properties to quickly generate tax revenue. The Hudson Yards Financing District (HYFD) was mapped out along the Far West Side to designate which sites would have their property tax revenue directed towards fulfilling the city’s bond obligations. Crucially, property tax discounts – 25% for 15 years compared to the average Midtown tax bill per square foot – were also offered to developers to swiftly attract tenants. Amazon’s new office, along with new offices for JPMorgan, Blackrock, and L’Oreal, all opened within the boundaries of the HYFD and are, thus, eligible for a substantial tax discount.

Despite these tax incentives, an analysis done by The New School showed that revenue gains fell gravely short of projections, partially due to the economic uncertainty posed by the Great Recession. The city expected to contribute $7.4 million from 2007 to 2015 to make up for the potential revenue mismatch between property tax revenue and debt payments, but ended up spending 40 times more – a whopping total of $359 million. Many see TIF as a “self-financing” funding mechanism, but it proved to be anything but for New York taxpayers. In terms of job creation and economic development, many of the commercial tenants in Hudson Yards simply relocated from other parts of the city due to the generous tax breaks made available. Clearly, the full story of Amazon’s move to Hudson Yards and the financing scheme that made the move possible, reflects the complex, sometimes shady, relationship between government and the world’s wealthiest corporations.

Left, New York City Bill de Blasio and right, state Governor Andrew Cuomo (via Spencer Platt/Getty Images and New York Observer)

An “Unexplained” Absence?

Some politicians like Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez celebrated how Amazon, in the aftermath of the HQ2 fall-out, quietly moved to New York, seemingly without public financing and tax-breaks. But, as the overseer of the city’s debt obligations, Mayor de Blasio better grasped the full story. He sees how the city’s financials are now intricately tied to the success of the luxury Hudson Yards neighborhood. He was aware of the complex subsidy schemes, financial loopholes, and tax incentives that made Hudson Yards, including Amazon’s new offices there, possible. So he understood well the optics of celebrating the project’s opening. Hudson Yards is, in fact, the antithesis of what progressives like de Blasio believe urban development should look like: exclusive, gaudy, and subsidy-heavy. But the realization of the project under his administration (though the vision for Hudson Yards is unmistakably a product of the Bloomberg era) reflects the challenges facing the city today as it strives to balance economic development with what is best for residents, economically, socially, and culturally. It epitomizes New York’s ongoing tilt towards private gain over inclusive urban design and underscores how cities are increasingly boxed-in by superagency hegemonies and corporations like Amazon.

In light of these challenges, what de Blasio and future mayoral administrations can, and must, do is sit out of bidding (and building) wars and instead focus on investments in affordable housing, green-collar job creation, education, and infrastructure. In the short-run, there may be no star-studded ribbon cutting ceremonies or sleek new skyscrapers on the skyline. But, in the long-run, they will help create a more resilient, economically just, and inclusive New York for the benefit of all. Hopefully de Blasio understood this when he missed the Hudson Yards grand opening. Perhaps, in fact, the Mayor’s absence was not so peculiar at all.

Feature Image: Hudson Yards New York Press Images

References:

AP Archive. 15 March 2019. $25 billion NYC Hudson Yards development opens. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jW1rUjgiWE8

Barro, Josh. 13 November 2018. Here’s Why New York Is Resorting to Paying Amazon $3 Billion for What Google Will Do for Free. NY Mag. http://nymag.com/intelligencer/2018/11/why-new-york-is-paying-amazon-usd3-billion.html

de Blasio, Bill. 16 February 2019. The Path Amazon Rejected. The New York Times. https://www.nytimes.com/2019/02/16/opinion/amazon-new-york-bill-de-blasio.html?smtyp=cur&smid=tw-nytimes

Feiner, Lauren. 9 December 2019. Amazon will open a new office in New York, less than a year after dropping plans for HQ2. CNBC. https://www.cnbc.com/2019/12/09/amazon-to-lease-space-in-manhattan-less-than-a-year-after-hq2-fallout.html

Fisher, Bridget and Flávia Leite. 2018. The Cost of New York City’s Hudson Yards Redevelopment Project. The New School. https://www.economicpolicyresearch.org/images/docs/research/political_economy/Cost_of_Hudson_Yards_WP_11.5.18.pdf

Ghaffary, Shirin. 30 January 2019. Amazon’s HQ2 was supposed to be a win for New York City. Instead it has become a huge political battle. VOX. https://www.vox.com/2019/1/30/18202825/amazon-hq2-new-york-city-political-battle-de-blasio-queens

Urban, Rob; Levitt, David; and Christopher Cannon 14 May 2018. Wall Street Is Moving, and It’s Reshaping New York. Bloomberg. https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2018-manhattan-office-migrations/?srnd=real-estate-and-home

About the Author: Brandon Tubby is a senior undergraduate at UNC-Chapel Hill majoring in public policy with a minor in urban studies and planning. Brandon competes for the Tar Heels as a distance runner on the varsity cross country and track teams, specializing in the mile.

How Immigrants Can Revitalize Rural Communities

August 2, 2019 / odrozd

For much of its history, Siler City, North Carolina was mostly white; now, due to jobs in poultry processing, the town is 40% Latinx. Driving through downtown, the demographic change is marked by the tiendas, beauty salons, and evangelical churches with signs en español that line the streets. Like many towns across the state, Siler City suffered when the furniture and textile industries moved elsewhere. Though the poultry processing plants remained, the workforce changed as native-born workers no longer wanted low-paying, dangerous jobs.¹ Immigrants not only filled job shortages at the poultry plant and storefronts downtown: this new population also brought new life to a dying industrial town.

Siler City is not an isolated example. Across the South and Midwest, rural communities are experiencing an influx of Latinxs in search of economic opportunity. Latinxs accounted for more than half of the rural population gain in this decade.² Initially drawn to work in agriculture or meat processing, many choose to settle in these places, some opening small businesses. In fact, immigrants are twice as likely to start businesses as their native-born counterparts.³ These businesses contribute to economic development and community building in a number of ways including paying taxes, creating jobs, reducing commercial vacancy downtown, and providing spaces for cultural interaction.⁴ Often, they are launched without technical assistance or formal loans which demonstrate entrepreneurs’ resourcefulness and tenacity but also highlights the need for more institutionalized support.

Providing support for Latinx entrepreneurship can be a promising strategy for economic development in rural communities; however, this approach requires an understanding of the unique barriers and needs of Latinx entrepreneurs. Latinxs are more likely to finance their businesses with personal savings or informal loans from families and friends and are less likely to seek loans from financial institutions.⁵ Due to language or cultural barriers, they may not be able to access technical assistance or understand the processes for starting a business. To effectively engage Latinx business owners, local institutions will need to develop greater cultural competency as well as more targeted and inclusive approaches to outreach.

Mural in Downtown Siler City. Mural and Photo Credit: JR Butler, Siler City Mural Society.

Some organizations and institutions have already begun integrating these concepts into their programs. The Iowa State University Extension and Outreach office, for example, has a dedicated facilitator who works closely with Latinx business owners to navigate the start-up process and facilitate community forums with existing residents.⁶ The office also created “A Citizen’s Guide for Change” that offers lessons from four Iowa communities that have experienced an influx of Latinx immigrants. More and more, communities are recognizing the existing contributions and untapped potential of immigrants.

Efforts are already underway in Siler City, North Carolina to better integrate Latinxs and leverage their potential for entrepreneurship. In 2017, Siler City underwent a multi-year community planning process to identify issues affecting the immigrant population and generate public policies. Part of the Building Integrated Communities Program at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, the process involved a community assessment and a series of stakeholder workshops. Over 75 residents representing a diverse sample of immigrants in Chatham County participated, along with town officials and service providers. As a result of these workshops, town officials and service providers have a better sense of what immigrants need and how they can support integration.⁷ In the next year, the town will work toward implementing aspects of the Building Integrated Communities action plan, including having the planning department visit existing Latinx businesses and hosting a starting a business seminar in Spanish.

The extent to which rural communities adapt to change or welcome newcomers could potentially determine their future. At a time when decline and despair are the dominant narratives of rural America, Latinx immigrants are a source of renewal and hope. By welcoming diversity, small towns can demonstrate to the rest of the country how to embrace inclusiveness and collaborate as a community.

About the Author: Lucia Constantine is a recent graduate of DCRP, interested in immigrant integration and inclusive economic development. Prior to coming to UNC, Lucia worked in higher education and nonprofits. She lives in Durham and enjoys taking her dog to the Eno.

Featured image: A family from Siler City enjoying the playground. Photo credit: Siler City, http://www.silercity.org/

Alexander, C. S. (2012). Explaining Peripheral Labor * A Poultry Industry Case Study. Berkeley Journal of Employment and Labor Law, 33(2), 353–399.
Johnson, K. M. (2012). Rural Demographic Change in the New Century. Carsey Institute, Winter(44), 1–12.
Fairlie, R. (2012). Open for business: How Immigrants Are Driving Small Business Creation in the United States.
Mathema, S., Svajlenka, N. P., & Hermann, A. (2018). Revival and Opportunity Immigrants in Rural America.
Bates, T., & Robb, A. (2015). Impacts of Owner Race and Geographic Context on Access to Small-Business Financing. Economic Development Quarterly, 30 (2), 159–170.https://doi.org/10.1177/0891242415620484
McDaniel, P. (2014). Revitalization in the Heartland of America: Welcoming Immigrant Entrepreneurs for Economic Development.
The Latino Migration Project. (2019) Building Integrated Communities in Siler City: Action Plan for Immigrant Integration.

Why Planners Should Study Finance

June 28, 2019 / odrozd

In 2016, Oregon planners hoped to take advantage of a new light-rail line between Portland and Gresham, a suburban city towards the east, by developing a mixed-use community around Gresham’s rail station. The project would be a walkable transit-hub in a city otherwise dominated by single-family homes and automobiles. But Metro – Portland’s regional government that purchased the land – faced a problem. Nearly all developers rely on loans to pay the costs of construction, and very rarely have enough cash on hand to finance projects themselves. And lenders in Portland were unwilling to finance a transit-oriented development that would be the first of its kind in the region.

This issue is part of a larger pattern that prioritizes existing models of car-based development.Just as some zoning codes can make developments less pedestrian-friendly by demanding minimum parking requirements, banks often have their own set of parking criteria that can sometimes supersede that of local zoning rules. As a Street Blogs article put it: “In many parts of America, efforts to build transit-oriented, walkable communities are foiled because financing can’t be secured for projects that differ from the templates lenders have become used to since World War II.”

The Crossings at Gresham. Photo credit: Myhre Group Architects

To get buy-in from financial groups, the community had to first prove the value of the project. It was only after a coordinated education campaign by regional leaders showing the viability of transit-oriented developments without large amounts of parking that lenders eventually financed the project. The development ended up being a success with 100% occupancy and long wait lists, and has provided a valuable template for financing other projects in the region that have less stringent parking requirements or none at all.

As planners, we often interact with zoning codes, ordinances, and other public tools to (ideally) create healthier, safer, and more sustainable communities. While these tools are essential, we sometimes overlook how economic or financial systems create barriers to achieving those goals. By studying how financial markets work and understanding how banks, lenders, or other parties think, planners can have a better understanding of the barriers for good policy.

This summer, I’m working as a graduate fellow with the Development Finance Initiative in UNC’s School of Government. The group supports local governments across the state with economic and real estate development decisions. One of our current projects is to facilitate the development of affordable housing eastern North Carolina communities ravaged by hurricanes over the past few years.

Today, nearly all affordable housing developments are financed using a federal program called the Low-Income Housing Tax Credit (LIHTC), a program that has been around since 1987 and has helped produce an estimated 2.3 million affordable units. Developers rarely use these credits themselves, and instead sell them to investors or companies who wish to reduce their tax bills while using the proceeds to finance the project. But credits are rarely sold at a 1-to-1 value, and the price often fluctuates in response to investor demand. For example, after President Trump passed his tax reform bill in 2017, the corporate tax rate was cut from 35 to 21 percent. Suddenly corporations weren’t in need of tax credits, and the price of LIHTC dropped. For developers, that means less investment to cover the costs of construction. Some industry experts predict passage of Trump’s tax reform will reduce the supply of affordable units by nearly 235,000 over the next 10 years.

While subtle shifts in financial markets can have large consequences at the local level, economically distressed communities have increasingly turned to these same credit systems to spur economic development. Federal and state governments are turning towards tax credits as a way to preserve historic structures or to incentivize investment in high-poverty neighborhoods.

Luckily, a number of towns are using these tools to their advantage. James and Deborah Fallows, in their series on American Small Towns, documented the role that tax credit policies played in the revitalization of downtown Danville, Va. Like North Carolina, Virginia’s small towns have an abundance of vacant or underutilized textile mills and tobacco warehouses. Similar to the LIHTC program, Virginia and the federal government provide tax credits for the rehabilitation costs of redeveloping old structures that retain their historic aesthetic. In this case, Danville’s historic character was what made revitalization possible.

Main Street Plaza. Photo credit: City of Danville

For better or for worse, every community in the nation is increasingly affected by capital markets and the faraway investors who operate in them. Just this month, the New York Times reported that an estimated 1 in 5 starter homes are bought up by investors, leaving local families facing stiff competition in buying their first homes. As local leadership grapples with these new realities, planners should learn how to take advantage of financial and tax policies to create economic opportunity, and develop policies to protect local residents from the worst effects of global capital. Understanding how the assortment of carrots and sticks that developers and bankers used to finance projects, gives planners a better understanding of the forces that drive their communities.

Featured Image: A rendering of a redevelopment plan relying on public-private partnerships for the City of Kannapolis, NC, as developed in partnership with the Development Finance Initiative.

About the Author: Frank Muraca is a rising second-year master’s student in the UNC Department of City and Regional Planning. His interests include neighborhood change, displacement, and disaster housing. Prior to graduate school, he lived and worked in Jiangsu Province, China, writing about migrants and how changing city borders affect outlying farm communities. He’s originally from Charlottesville, Virginia, and earned his bachelor’s degree in economics at George Mason University.

Edited by Nora Louise Schwaller

Path to Peace: Road Building and Recovery in Afghanistan

May 31, 2019 / odrozd

While Americans are debating a Hyperloop, electric scooters, and ride-hailing services, some people are still just trying to access basic road infrastructure. Take Kunar, Afghanistan: located on the Afghanistan-Pakistan border, Kunar is a stronghold for the Taliban and the Islamic State Khorasan Province (ISKP), the Afghan branch of ISIS. Despite the ongoing violence in Kunar, the government has been unable to advance its counter-terrorism agenda in the region due to the poorly connected and managed road network. According to former US commander Lieutenant General Karl Eikenberry, “Wherever the road ends, that’s where the Taliban starts” (1).

Since the official ‘end’ of the Taliban regime in 2001, the Afghan government has been trying to rehabilitate and expand its Soviet-era road infrastructure after decades of war and neglect. According to a 2016 report by the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction, the US Agency for International Development and the Department of Defense have spent $2.8 billion since 2002 on construction and repair of the country’s road infrastructure (2). Starting during the Obama era, however, the US shifted from funding road maintenance projects to relying on pre-allocated money to build new roads. President Trump has gone a step further, expressing his intent to slash $3 billion in foreign aid (3). In response to these losses, the Afghan government cut more than half of its infrastructure spending in 2018. The overall development budget, meanwhile, was reduced by 42 percent (4).

A few examples of the eclectic private vehicle fleet on the roads of Afghanistan. Cars are typically old, can have a steering wheel on either side, and are subject to little safety regulation (photo credit – Heyne Kim).

Although Afghanistan saw an average growth rate of 7 percent in GDP between 2007-2016, and has become more responsible in government spending, the country still relies on international donors. For example, in the 2018 budget, domestic revenue accounted for only 47 percent of the total, compared to 52 percent from foreign aid (4).

Today, China has in many ways taken up the role previously held by the US, investing $62 billion in Pakistan for the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC). A part of China’s greater Road and Belt initiative, the CPEC project aims to build a roughly 2,000-mile road network across Pakistan, all the way to the Port of Gwadar on the Arabian Sea (5). CPEC also features a real-time monitoring and 24-hour surveillance system in urban areas, as well as explosive detectors and scanners for major roads, case-prone areas, and crowded places (6). China’s pilot program will be launched in Peshawar, a critical Taliban stronghold, and expanded overtime to other important political and economic hubs. The political motivations behind, and long-term implications of, these investments are complicated, but, currently, CPEC may be Pakistan’s best option for combatting terrorism.

Aside from the security concerns of the Taliban’s resurgence and China’s growing presence, there are other reasons why the US needs to maintain its commitment to improving infrastructure in Afghanistan. Infrastructure has been identified as a top government priority to ensure long-term economic growth and the eradication of poverty in Afghanistan, where agriculture produces 24.5 percent of the GDP and employs nearly 60 percent of the population. The country also contains 1.3 million hectares of valuable forestland and mineral resources estimated to be worth at least $1 trillion (7). Due to the lack of access, though, these resources are currently underutilized and subject to illegal exploitation by terrorist groups. Moreover, Afghanistan contains five major river basins and 36 sub-basins, which are critical to the larger region’s fragile freshwater management system (8). As such, having good relations with Afghanistan is key to promoting US-Central Asia relations more broadly.

Of course, foreign aid alone cannot solve Afghanistan’s infrastructure crisis; real change must come from within. Corruption has caused an estimated $5 billion in losses every year, while a lack of domestic traffic regulation has led to the proliferation of illegal drivers, overweight trucks, and improvised explosive devices, all of which contributes to wear and tear on the roads (2,4). Meanwhile, use of local contractors for road maintenance has been shown to help avert insurgent attacks. As such, addressing corruption and poor governance, while also increasing the share of local resources in road projects, will help ensure safety while also improving the local economy and allowing greater public participation in the planning process.

An efficient, safe, and accessible road network is seen as a matter of life or death today in Afghanistan, just as it was at the height of the Cold War in the 1950s here at home. As such, continued US investment in Afghanistan’s road infrastructure is critical for combatting terrorism, improving US relations in the region, and protecting Afghan life and property. However, efforts must be made from the Afghan side as well, like two horses pulling a cart side by side. Peace and prosperity in Afghanistan is long overdue, and a better road network is one of the first steps to get there.

References:

Sieff, K. 2014. After billions in US investment, Afghan roads are falling apart. The Washington Post. 30 Jan. 2014. <https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/asia_pacific/after-billions-in-us-investment-afghan-roads-are-falling-apart/2014/01/30/9bd07764-7986-11e3-b1c5-739e63e9c9a7_story.html?noredirect=on&utm_term=.29ba8ab84656>
SIGAR. 2016. Afghanistan’s Road Infrastructure: Sustainment Challenges and Lack of Repairs Put U.S. Investment at Risk. Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction Audit Report 17-11. Oct. 2016. <https://www.sigar.mil/pdf/audits/SIGAR-17-11-AR.pdf>
Ferris, S. 2018. Trump administration to attempt to kill $3B in foreign aid. POLITICO. 17 Aug. 2018. <https://www.politico.com/story/2018/08/17/white-house-cut-foreign-aid-money-743481>
IWA. 2017. The Game of Numbers: Analysis of the National Budget 2018. Integrity Watch Afghanistan. Dec. 2017. <https://iwaweb.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/IWA__National-Budget__English_6.pdf>
Rafiq, A. 2017. China’s $62 Billion Bet on Pakistan. Foreign Affairs Letter from Gwadar. 24 Oct. 2017. <https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/china/2017-10-24/chinas-62-billion-bet-pakistan>
Bilal, S.H. 2017. How China and Pakistan are Combating Terrorism. The Asia Dialogue Belt and Road Initiative. 15 Nov. 2017. <https://theasiadialogue.com/2017/11/15/how-china-and-pakistan-are-combating-terrorism/>
Schewe, E. 2017. War Has Made Afghanistan’s $1 Trillion in Minerals Worthless. JSTOR Daily. 20 Nov. 2017. <https://daily.jstor.org/war-has-made-afghanistans-1-trillion-in-minerals-worthless/>
Huwaida, M.R. 2018. Afghanistan Water Resources: The Cause of Conflicts with Neighboring Countries. Daily Outlook Afghanistan. 23 May 2018. <http://outlookafghanistan.net/editorialdetail.php?post_id=20987>

About the author: Heyne J. Kim is a candidate for the Master of City and Regional Planning at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Prior to joining the program, she worked as a Coordinator for International Relations in southeastern Japan, promoting multiculturalism to Japanese citizens and foreign residents (edited by Leah Campbell).

Featured Image: A small town in Kunar, a politically volatile region in Afghanistan mentioned in the opening paragraph.

Not All Developers Are Boogeymen

November 15, 2018 / odrozd

So why do people hate developers so much? UCLA conducted a study to examine just that, and their conclusion boils down to two primary reasons. First, developers generally get in and out of the market as quickly as possible to reduce risk, limiting their ability to engage with the community. Second, people do not like that developers make money by building public and private space (Holder, 2018).

City planning and management requires work from many different stakeholders. To build roads, community centers, schools, housing, etc., cities depend on developers and inevitably work with them. However, there is a large problem in this area: when going into interactions with developers, the community members and representatives are prepared for battle. There is an assumption that developers are boogeymen that have dollar signs as pupils.

It is important to explore this disillusionment with developers because cities always have and will continue to rely on them to help keep up with the changing design, structure, aesthetic and functionality of densely populated areas as they grow in area and density. Cities rely on developers to help manage this growth, so there needs to be a strong relationship here to optimize the results. There needs to be more cohesion in the relationship between developers and communities; a sense of trustworthiness so that there is a baseline where all stakeholders are on the same page about the overall goals of projects.

To be fair, many developers are driven by dollars alone, with little regard for impacts on the surrounding area. Holder (2018) argues that this is because only cutthroat developers can survive the restrictive zoning laws and fees. She notes that “when city policies and zoning regulations make development more difficult, the developers who prosper are more likely to be the richest, nastiest, and most aggressive.” This argument essentially suggests that survival of the fittest makes ugly, mean developers that can turn large profits the ones that thrive in the marketplace, pushing lovely, community-focused developers out of the picture. I agree – it’s plainly the survival of the fittest. As they say, “It’s not personal, it’s just business.” Holder offers a straightforward solution to this problems: make development easier (through cutting developers some slack relevant to unnecessarily strict zoning laws and land-use policies) so that other developers can keep their head above water in such a ruthless industry. But perhaps a reduction on regulations would not change situations where more ruthless developers box out smaller, community-minded developers from new opportunities.

This negative sentiment towards real estate developers does not only live in the city planning world; it has saturated popular culture. “A reliable rule of thumb: In Hollywood, the developer is never the hero” (Hogan 2017). A variety of films are driven entirely by a developer v. community conflict. In It’s a Wonderful Life (1946), ‘good’ developer George Bailey faces off with ‘mean’ developer Mr. Potter about affordable housing. In Superman (1978), Lex Luthor wants to sink the entire state of California, transforming his desert property into the new West coast, making him millions. One Crazy Summer (1986) follows a group of wild teenagers that fight a greedy developer to protect their neighborhood. In the recent film Up (2009), a long-time resident uses balloons to save his home from development in his area. Even in modern children’s series Phineas and Ferb, the villain Dr. Heinz Doofenshmirtz constantly talks about his dreams to transform the tri-state area to his liking. (Hogan, 2017)

The “Real Life Up House.” Photo Credit: Wikimapia

This unspoken understanding that developers are evil has to change; both parties should not go into negotiations with the expectation for conflict. However, the reality of the situation is that developers and cities have competing interests. Cities want low costs and high quality, and developers want low production costs and high profits. Both groups have to work together to find the best solutions. It is worth noting that a more collaborative relationship can be tricky to navigate. This is highlighted by the UCLA study previously mentioned, which essentially concludes that when cities work more closely with developers to get things done, residents loose trust in city planners and local government rather than more gain confidence in developers (Holder, 2018).

Developers are essentially curators of our cities because they create space for specific uses in the densest, most popular areas (Sowers, 2017). As businessmen, they want to supply what is demanded to make the best profits, in the safest, cheapest way (Badger, 2012). To make negotiations run smoother, to encourage developers to get more invested in the community, and to hearten residents, the cities, communities and developers have to find a way to work together and not against each other. Behind these stakeholder roles are people that have motivations and are capable of personal connections, which can alter the course of projects.

So what now? Developers need to be at town hall meetings to talk through the impacts of previous projects, and plans for future ones. Cities should consider prioritizing locally-based developers that might have a personal connection to the landscapes they will transform. Residents and developers should talk, rather than keep each other at arm’s length. The sole solution is more conversation, for it is conversation that inspires innovative thinking and problem-solving.

About the Author: Olivia Corriere is an undergraduate student from Ann Arbor, Michigan, majoring in Environmental Studies (Sustainability Track) and minoring in Geography. She is particularly interested in the implementation of sustainable practices of all kinds in the daily lives of the public. During Summer 2017, she interned with the Huron Waterloo Pathways Initiative with the Karen’s Trail campaign. In her free time, she enjoys running, creating music playlists, and spending time in coffee shops with friends.

Badger, Emily. “Why Don’t Real Estate Developers Just Ask Us What We Want?” CityLab, CityLab, 8 Mar. 2012, www.citylab.com/life/2012/03/why-dont-real-estate-developers-just-ask-us-what-we-want/1439/.

Holder, Sarah. “Maybe NIMBYs Don’t Hate New Housing: They Just Hate Developers.” CityLab, CityLab, 14 Sept. 2018, www.citylab.com/equity/2018/09/what-if-nimbys-hate-developers-more-than-housing/570169/.

Hogan, Mark. “A Holiday Salute to the Evil Developer, Hollywood’s Most Reliable Villain.” CityLab, CityLab, 25 Dec. 2017, www.citylab.com/life/2017/12/real-estate-tycoons-are-the-ultimate-movie-villains/547433/.

Sowers, Scott. “Real Estate Developers Become the Entertainers.” CityLab, CityLab, 26 Oct. 2017, www.citylab.com/life/2017/10/mixed-use-developments-real-estate-entertainment-public-space/543711/.

Hazard Mitigation and Hurricane Harvey: Reflections on a Conversation with Dr. Galen Newman

October 30, 2018 / odrozd

The following is derived from an interview about the 2017 disaster with Dr. Galen Newman, a Fellow in the Institute for Sustainable Communities and a member of the Hazard Reduction and Recovery Center at Texas A&M University. His research focuses primarily on urban regeneration and flood resilience.

Harvey was different. While many hurricanes pose serious flooding risks to coastal areas, the danger often lies in the rapid rise of seawater known as a storm surge. There is a reason that Harvey’s storm surge was hardly mentioned in the weeks and months following its landfall: the most serious flooding was caused by excessive rain. In an area that is accustomed to only 50 inches of precipitation annually, Harvey’s nearly 48 inches of rainfall was devastating. This inundation of water posed a completely different set of challenges for the Houston area.

Harvey’s Uniqueness

Accordingly, it was nearly impossible for authorities to plan for the 2017 hurricane. The unique nature of the storm resulted in an unprecedented strain on Harris County’s stormwater infrastructure system. Due to relentless and widespread rainfall, one-quarter of the resultant flooding occurred in areas outside of the 100-year floodplain. The new and unpredictable pattern of flooding had catastrophic effects on some Houstonians. Flood insurance is not required outside of designated floodplains and as a result, many of those whose property was damaged or destroyed were forced to start over from square one.

While Harvey was a particularly devastating event, Houston was previously vulnerable to any major rain, storm, or hurricane occurrence. The relaxed regulation of land use zoning and widespread development (much of it within existing floodplains) meant that a substantial amount of land was covered by impervious surfaces like concrete and asphalt. Weep holes—the gaps within brick walls that allow for drainage and ventilation—were easily clogged. Combined with relative inattention to stormwater infrastructure, these practices led to inadequate drainage in neighborhoods all over Harris County.

Keeping it Local

Preparing for the next big storm must be undertaken by planners and policymakers at all levels of government and private enterprise. While large-scale infrastructure improvements and national or state hazard mitigation plans can be helpful, it is critical to focus on smaller scale issues that could endanger individual communities and neighborhoods. This is especially salient when addressing issues in underserved communities. For example, some lower-income neighborhoods in Houston were especially vulnerable because of their open ditch drainage system and their proximity to industrial sites that could potentially contaminate floodwaters. Local issues like this are easy to gloss over at the national level. It is critical for lawmakers and planners to address the issues and concerns of individual communities and neighborhoods while drawing up large-scale mitigation plans.

There is also much to be done at a more regional level. The Texas Department of Transportation is keeping this in mind with long-term infrastructure projects, such as a redesign of highway 45 that will integrate detention ponds and pumps to prevent highway flooding like what occurred during Harvey¹. The goal is to prepare for the 100-year storm, which may be insufficient given that Harvey was a 500-year storm and these kinds of events are projected to happen more frequently in the coming years.

Key Takeaways

The storm’s aftermath forced cities all over the country to take a more critical look at their respective infrastructure and hazard mitigation plans. Cities have begun encouraging sustainable development that reduces the negative impacts on natural hydrology and drainage. Changes can also be seen in floodplain development. Building parks and other types of green infrastructure in floodplains prevents substantial losses while benefiting the local community. Buyouts in flood-prone areas becoming more common as well, as cities seek to move people and businesses from high-risk areas. While every storm is different, focusing on local issues as well as city and statewide mitigation plans puts cities in the most resilient position possible. With the negative consequences of climate change unlikely to halt anytime soon², Houston will need to take an aggressive approach in order to lose its reputation as one of the most flood-prone cities in the United States³.

Dr. Galen D. Newman is an Associate Professor in the Department of Landscape Architecture and Urban Planning at Texas A&M University (TAMU). At TAMU, he also serves as Associate Department Head, Coordinator of the Bachelor of Science in Urban Planning Program, Associate Director of the Hazard Reduction and Recovery Center, and Discovery Lead for Community Resilience for the Institute for Sustainable Communities. His research interests include urban regeneration, land use science, spatial analytics, community flood resilience, and community/urban scaled design. His current research focuses on the integration of urban regeneration (the reuse of vacant properties in shrinking and growing cities) and urban flood resilience.

About the Author: Wayne Powell is a first year Master’s student specializing in transportation and housing/community development. He is a research assistant with the Center for Urban and Regional studies focusing on accessibility in public transit. He hopes to further his education and career in planning by studying how technology can be used to shape cities and their transportation networks.

Delaughter, Gail. “Flood Control Is A Big Part of A Major Houston Transportation Project.” Houston Public Media, 24 Aug. 2018, www.houstonpublicmedia.org/articles/news/transportation/2018/08/24/301631/flood-control-is-a-big-part-of-a-major-houston-transportation-project/
“IPCC Special Report Global Warming of 1.5ºC.” IPCC – Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, 6 Aug. 2018, www.ipcc.ch/news_and_events/ma-p48.shtml.
Satija, Neena. “Boomtown, Flood Town.” Scientific American, Springer Nature American, 8 Dec. 2016, www.scientificamerican.com/article/boomtown-flood-town/.

Featured Image: Cars floating down a flooded street in Houston, Texas. Photo credit: Dominick Del Vecchio, FEMA.

Honk for Wildlife! And Other Neighborhood Tales

February 23, 2018 / odrozd

For much of the professional field, planning takes place in civic buildings, government halls, and non-profit offices. The range of their consideration can extend throughout a city or even an entire region. But for much of America, how neighborhoods function and how daily life gets lived is negotiated at a smaller scale. One (often amusing) way that this occurs is through the neighborhood listserv, which has posts that range from the silly to the minutely detailed. What is clear from a purview of these stories is that many communities across the country have a wealth of individuals with esoteric expertise who are all too willing to share their opinions and recommendations.

Decades of Study on Animal Behavior

Somewhere in the wilds of Vermont

800px-White-tailed_Deer_Crossing_a_Road_Kensington_Metropark_Michigan

Photo Credit: Dwight Burdette, Wikimedia Commons

If you haven’t spent much time in the wilder parts of the country, then you probably have never hit (or been hit by) a deer, bumped over a squirrel, or squished a frog under the treads of your tires, or seen the evidence thereof. But for others, this is major concern, as noted by KP early one afternoon:

I would like to comment that last Tuesday when I was driving about mid-day and I saw that a poor gray squirrel had been killed early that morning. Might I add that it should have been easy for the person driving that car to stop in a 20-mile per hour zone in order to miss that Squirrel, but they chose to kill it instead.

The implication as to the morality of the driver was clear, but the solution proved to be less so. A handful of emails were traded, but they found more questions than solutions. Is one honk enough to send a squirrel skittering, or will it simply freeze it in its place? What’s the best method to scare off frogs? Can birds be avoided at all? And, does it even matter if another squirrel dies? Luckily, for those with the animals’ best interests in mind, JW was able to provide a comprehensive guide on wildlife avoidance:

Here is a synopsis of my multi decade study:

A single honk works very well for deer – they bound away most of the time. Honk early, honk often.

Honk hard for squirrels for a brief period, once they decide which way to run disassociate from your horn and they will continue out of danger. If you see a car coming the other way honk again violently, but only if you have determined that they will still clear your wheels – you can control their every directional change like remote-controlled toys.

A timely acoustic detonation is nearly impossible for cats – by the time you see them they have already reached maximum velocity, which, of course, is hard to directionally alter.

Birds… I harbor little hope for when spotted – shear randomness here. I tried to keep a cat on the dashboard as an early warning device but that presented its own issues.

Frogs – Critical and brief decision here: if you have room ALWAYS veer towards their stern. If you look closely they simply point in the direction of their travel every time. If you pass in front of them with an open window you may end up with an unintended passenger and likely will find yourself one seatbelt short.

Honk for wildlife… a proven life saver!

One Person’s Trash, is Another Person’s Recycling

Somewhere in the wilds of Vermont

Photo Credit: Trash Project

Other conversations feel a bit more practical and inform the implementation of policy that planners might have had their hand in developing. That said, they can still get to a level of detail that we rarely consider. This is exemplified in a lively debate on how to best manage an increase in cost for local trash pickup that was caused by new legislation. While ML ran the numbers on switching to a coupon system with colorful purple bags as evidence of payment, others, like WM, took issue on the case study examples used in the study, proving the need for appropriate comparison cases:

Am I missing something here? The town manager’s “white paper” on the miraculous effects of Pay-As-You-Throw waste disposal in New Hampshire cities like Matick – MATICK??? – also known as MALLville – purports to present data applicable to our situation. Last time I checked – HELLO! – we already have a pay-as-you-throw system in place and we already offer free, single stream recycling. And I have not read of any proposed town wide curbside pickup (the most convenient) option – the primary system used in most all the town manager’s exemplar cities.

It’s not like we are going from a wild west style, open dumpster, garbage free-or-all with recycling only available for sorted #1 & #2 plastic and separated clear, brown, and green glass on the third Tuesday morning of each month in an obscure, out-of-the-way, dimly-lit warehouse. The town manager would have us believe that Purple Bags (or some wishy-washy hybrid system designed to be inconvenient for those NOT using purple bags) will reduce our solid waste by 40%.

Purple bags and other gimmicks aren’t going to prevent the small percentage of our residents that currently do not recycle as conscientiously as possible from “illegally” putting recyclables into the waste stream.

Sure, waste disposal probably should cost more than $3.00 for a big bag of garbage. And making it more expensive will have an impact – mostly, it will be a slight hardship for those on a fixed-income and low-income households. Enforcement is the ugly answer here. If, for six months, we splayed everyone’s trash out on a table and dug through it searching for recyclable items – like CSIs at a crime scene – we would certainly reduce solid waste because everyone who could afford it would pay some waste hauler to pick up their trash.

So, what am I missing? Why did the town manager present a 16-page proposal, complete with fancy graphs and pie charts, based on data, very little of which applies to the situation in our town? How much of his salaried time was spent compiling this showy document?

All of this is just a distraction from the real debate: How do we educate residents about the importance (and soon-to-be legal requirement) of recycling, composting organic (at least fruit, grain, and vegetable) waste, and reducing solid waste – and how do we, as a town, pay for it? I did not see anything the town manager’s proposal that indicated whether his exemplar New Hampshire cities recycling/solid waste programs were entirely self-supported by the users of these services.

Conclusion

Planning is often messy, but it still sometimes forgets to consider the neighborhood level where personalities can control the direction of seemingly simple conversations. This makes listservs an interesting place to check in to see how people actually respond to how the reality of their environment and the legislative actions of their local government. There, you can often find good people, strong opinions, and a few quick chuckles.

Feature Image Photo Credit: Ray Eye, Wikimedia Commons

Excerpts provided by MCP. Names and places were changed to preserve anonymity. Some edits were made for brevity and for grammatical considerations.

About the Editor: Nora Schwaller is a first-year Ph.D. student in the Department of City and Regional Planning, where she focuses on disaster recovery. Outside of class, Nora enjoys long bike rides and short walks, delicious food with good people, and casually perusing the design history of contemporary video games and systems. Prior to UNC, Nora worked as an architectural designer.

Short-Term Rentals and Housing Affordability in Asheville, NC

February 7, 2018 / odrozd

Downtown Asheville, NC. Photo Credit: Michael Tracey/ Flickr Public Domain

What happens when a city’s economic growth and its affordability to residents are in competition? Last month, Asheville’s City Council voted to enact rules to slow the development of vacation rentals in its downtown area. The new rules come in the wake of the rapid conversion of housing into short-term rentals, which local leaders believe has complicated an increasingly expensive housing market. The development highlights a challenge that many cities face when attempting to grow and sustain a tourist economy while also encouraging a healthy and affordable housing market.

Housing mismatch has been a concern in Asheville for some time. Mike Cronin from the Asheville Citizen-Times examined U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics data in 2016 indicating that wage increases were not keeping pace with housing price increases.¹ Additionally, Cronin notes Nationwide Insurance’s 2016 Health of Housing Markets Report, which identifies Asheville’s housing market decline as the eighth worst in the country during 2015. Other cities that ranked slightly worse, including Austin, Santa Fe, and Boulder, all have experienced sharp declines in affordability. The real estate listing website Zillow currently places median list price for Asheville at $375,000, with a 6.5% increase in home values over the past year.

At the same time, short term rentals have generated significant economic benefit for rental property owners and the tourism industry. In 2017, Asheville’s Airbnb rentals generated nearly $20 million, more than any other city in the state.² Flexible listing options like Airbnb and Vacation Rental By Owner are attractive to both tourists and property owners. However, the rapid growth in short term rentals of entire homes or condo units in recent years was enough to garner a 6-1 vote from the Council in favor of the new rules requiring any new short-term rental units to obtain conditional zoning for operation. The rules do not place the same restrictions on accessory dwelling units, which are typically adjacent to an owner-occupied home.

Asheville is not the first city to restrict short term rentals of residential properties. In 2016, New York City enacted restrictions on short term rentals, making it illegal throughout most of the city to rent for less than thirty days unless there are only one to two guests, and the owner is also present. San Francisco has enacted similar rules, along with many cities across Europe.³

Some local leaders see an opportunity for compromise and policy innovation. Laura Hudson, Chair of the Planning and Zoning Commission that recommended the new regulations to the City Council on a 4-1 vote, indicated that there are options to work with developers to increase affordable housing. In exchange for conditional zoning to develop short term rental units, developers could be required to also include long-term rental units at below-market rates.⁴

As long as workers in tourist-oriented cities struggle to find affordable housing near their places of employment, local governments and planning departments will need to continue examining the impact of the short term rental market upon the housing sector. In easing the rapid turnover of current housing stock to rentals and considering opportunities to develop an inclusionary zoning policy, Asheville is taking a first step at doing just that.

Notes:

1. Mike Cronin, “National study finds Asheville housing market unsustainable,” Citizen-Times (Asheville, NC), May 9, 2016. http://www.citizen-times.com/story/news/2016/05/09/national-report-asheville-housing-market-unhealthy-unsustainable-affordable-housing-real-estate-housing-sector-asheville-buncombe-county/84115312/

2. Dillon Davis, “Amid new city restrictions, Airbnb brings a state-best $20M to Asheville hosts in 2017,” Citizen-Times (Asheville, NC), Jan. 23, 2018. http://www.citizen-times.com/story/news/local/2018/01/23/amid-new-city-restrictions-airbnb-brings-state-best-20-m-asheville-hosts-2017/1057075001/

3. Feargus O’Sullivan, “Europe’s Crackdown on Airbnb,” CityLab, Jun. 20, 2016. https://www.citylab.com/equity/2016/06/european-cities-crackdown-airbnb/487169/

4. Joel Burgess, ” Update: Asheville’s downtown vacation rental ban passed quickly,” Citizen-Times, (Asheville, NC), Jan. 9, 2018. http://www.citizen-times.com/story/news/local/2018/01/09/asheville-downtown-vacation-rentals-airbnbs-banned-6-1-city-council-vote/1019195001/

About the Author: Catherine Peele is a second year Master’s of City and Regional Planning candidate from Albemarle, North Carolina. Her planning interests include transportation project prioritization methods and freight mobility.