The Most Concrete Indicator of a Housing Crisis

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2 pointskjshsh1232 comments

Where I live - in a large American city, the biggest barriers to allowing new development are the lack of provisioning for increased density.

Sure, let that new apartment building come up. Screw everyone's commute time, ability to park, availability of services - no, we won't issue enough permits, require the construction come with a massive underground parking facility, ensure there's sufficient expansion of roads, or drastically improve transit.

Improvements have a history of being so slow to appear and in a deficient state, that the prospect of having more people around makes people unhappy.

"The middle class always pays".

Building apartments where people want to live generally reduces commute time. The same people need to get to the same place but usually you're letting people start closer. The same people driving less distance means less traffic, not to mention, you might even get people out of cars. Taking transit or walking are dependent on living close enough to where you want to go. Transit funding is also dependent on density.

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