Sprawl taxes are badly needed for the environment. What needs to be financially incented is extremely dense urban population centers. As in Manhattan everywhere.

IIRC Japan has density patterns like this.

Basically, if an area adjacent to a high density population area wants to expand into the area, it accepts a very very high entry cost, either ongoing property tax or initial permit cost. That would force only very large and dense building development.

Transportation could be exempted as could parks and certain low income housing which is basically government controlled anyway at this point.

That might also incent vertical farms, although I haven't kept up with the viable economics of skyscraper-class vertical farming yet.

One of the primary challenges of modern environmentalism is just sprawl: people driving too far, people spreading out too much, people buying too big of houses that are energy inefficient, people buying yards that they use 1% of the time