Houston's planning is wrong in every way possible. The problem is that it's "desirability" has been exacerbated by "traditional" cities overly regulating development and preventing growth and affordability (i.e. San Francisco). Additionally, America's "war on cities" since the 1950s has completely decimated the rust-belt cities and forced residents out to the sun-belt. More than anything, the problem with Houston and similar cities is that they're completely dependent on gas prices since the car is the only realistic form of transportation. Even with recent improvements in Houston's bus network, it doesn't change the fact that it's nearly impossible, from a financial standpoint, to build out a public transit and bike network to such a large region. If Houston want to maintain its status quo, it has every right to do so, but not at the expense of the rest of us. Obesity is endemic of sprawling cities, like Houston, and one of the largest obstacles to establishing single-payer or universal healthcare. Tiger grants and all other types of federal grants are a lost cause to such an inefficiently designed city and would be better spent on dense, traditional cities.
The article pitted low reg sprawl against highly contained (by geography or zoning) cities. What's missing is the third option of less regulation (i.e. Nimbyism) in densely populated cities. Don't build out; build up! (See Paul krugman's latest column.)
By building denser housing, multi unit buildings, etc. costs savings abound. Not to mention better air quality, greener footprint, etc. The problem of course is to sell this vision to the American people that don't drink soy lattes.
What would be interesting is to compare the infrastructure costs on a like for like basis to support a New Yorker (yes in an apartment) vs the cost of supporting a Houstonian. Of course you have to include external costs like pollution and carbon footprint too. Just go down the list with side by side comparisons.
By building denser housing, multi unit buildings, etc. costs savings abound. Not to mention better air quality, greener footprint, etc. The problem of course is to sell this vision to the American people that don't drink soy lattes.
What would be interesting is to compare the infrastructure costs on a like for like basis to support a New Yorker (yes in an apartment) vs the cost of supporting a Houstonian. Of course you have to include external costs like pollution and carbon footprint too. Just go down the list with side by side comparisons.
4
It really is about mitigating risk, yes a 500 year flood will cause damage. The key is how much. A little urban planning will decrease the severity of the total damage. Put in daily risk terms a seat belt won't keep you from being injured in a major car crash but will lessen the severity, you might walk away rather than being killed.
Sprawl feels like what it sounds like, unfortunately. It often comes with a lack of defining character and personification. Maybe I am missing the point...
2
Well, if Houston thinks it got it so right building a city with no thought, no open spaces, regulation, and no sense then let them pay for their own clean-up. To put it another way in the vernacular of the rightwing, why should every one else pay for the consequences of their decision to pave over their land with no place for drainage, and build toxic chemical producers on top of where people live. They built it with shortcuts and now they expect everyone else to pay for it. How in republican of them except when you consider the hypocrisy of it all which is the real republican way..
10
It's worth pointing out - as this article should have - that Cox is hardly a neutral, objective observer. Rather, most of his research is funded by the very industries that stand to lose from denser, less car-dependent development. Those kinds of biases should be pointed out.
3
Nor are professors of urban planning neutral observers. Their livelyhood depends on Zoning laws being accepted by the public as valid legislation - which in my opinion they are not at all.
Houston (and Texas, overall) has a growth model based on light taxes and low regulation. A good part of the growth of the Texas economy overall has been based on the Texas state government luring existing US companies to expand their facilities into this environment. It is NOT an entrepreneur-based approach, creating new jobs from scratch, but luring jobs away from other stated where the businesses originated. The defenders of this approach have resorted to Darwinistic arguments. Fair enough, but given all this, shouldn't Texas also be self-reliant in accepting the results of their choices. Shouldn't Houston be rebuilt primarily with Texas money? Shouldn't those corporations and citizens who benefited, reach into their own pockets and utilize the savings from those past benefits? And why should taxpayers in high-tax, high regulation states, who have spent their own money trying to avoid being like Houston, now have to subsidize both Texans' mistakes, and past and future attempts to lure jobs from their own regions?
9
Hurricane Sandy destroyed beach front homes. The most important thing is for Houston to now make improvements to mitigate the effects of the next storm.
As for paying for it, the US needs to start thinking about self insuring for the next storms. Insurance "premiums" should be part of every state and federal budget.
As for paying for it, the US needs to start thinking about self insuring for the next storms. Insurance "premiums" should be part of every state and federal budget.
wait until the Millennium Tower falls over in a major earthquake and Houston can sneer back.
4
So Houston/Texas no lessons to learn, or just no lessons learned?
'So the real cause is 50" of rain'
'No city could withstand 50" of rain'
'Don't make it about politics'
and finally, the blissfully ironic 'coastal elites looking down on Houston complaining about federal money'
...see for the next "500 year" event coming up in 3, 2, 1...
'So the real cause is 50" of rain'
'No city could withstand 50" of rain'
'Don't make it about politics'
and finally, the blissfully ironic 'coastal elites looking down on Houston complaining about federal money'
...see for the next "500 year" event coming up in 3, 2, 1...
2
All cities have points of vulnerability. Will there be a similar article in the Times when San Francisco is eventually destroyed in "the big one"?
Nature deals last and never loses for long.
Nature deals last and never loses for long.
5
Why is Ed Glaeser referring to Red-state Texas? This article is about solidly blue Houston.
5
It takes 15 paragraphs to get to the heart of the matter:
No city can withstand 50 inches of rain.
No city can withstand 50 inches of rain.
5
Well of course it is affordable if you rely on your friends in the North-east cover your risk and bale you out - again - when your gamble goes south.
7
"Rainy day fund"
Except if you're a blue dot in a red sea, apparently...
Except if you're a blue dot in a red sea, apparently...
2
Hey Mr. Cox, hows that affordability thing working out for you? Especially for the thousands that lost their homes, all their belongings?
1
The Tire Industry Association's solution for Huston's run amok development is for every house-hold to purchase a number of inflatable tire tubes . "Follow The Flow"
The Houston Plan: Those who Plan least plan best and those who plan not at all plan bestest of all.
1
Houston is like Phoenix and Las Vegas,a large city where no large city should be.I truly fear for their futures when resource constraints and climate change combine.They could very well become unlivable.
2
Literally one of the most strange and totally incomprehensible posts I have ever seen. A sheltered harbor bay on the Gulf Coast surrounded by some of the most productive farmland anywhere on earth and several rivers leading to more productive farmland is a dumb place to build a city? Fyi - Houston is a bigger port than NYC by tonnage or $.
Literally unbeliveable how crazy biased your statement is.
Literally unbeliveable how crazy biased your statement is.
4
Your own words describe a floodplain, A.N.
A floodplain actually is not the best place to build a city.
A floodplain actually is not the best place to build a city.
3
There is no way you can plan your way around 3 500 year floods. There is no way to plan around 50 inches of rain in 3 days.
No non-omniscient central planner could have prevented these disasters. Every US city would have been crushed by similar conditions, centrally planned or not.
No non-omniscient central planner could have prevented these disasters. Every US city would have been crushed by similar conditions, centrally planned or not.
2
So no lessons to learn, or just no lessons learned? See for the next "500 year" event coming up in 3, 2, 1...
4
Houston is a kind city. It is ugly, polluted and flooded but all of that is trumped by Houston's unique kindness and diversity. Houston welcomed a quarter of a million people displaced by Katrina, when others refused them for reasons of poverty, crime and race. Houston is traumatized but it will live and overcome (through engineering and stubbornness) unless the forces against it are too large to overcome - if indeed these storms become more violent and frequent, and are caused by climate change. I love Portland but everyone knows that in spite of its zoning, it's waiting on an offshore earthquake with devastating consequences. Thinking your choice of city as better than Houston's at Houston's time of need is decidedly self-righteous and self-centered. I think its too early to judge.
8
My parents who are 86 live near Braes Bayou in Houston and 56 years without a flood now it is 3 in two years. Something has changed. A contractor met with them today to rebuild a "dream home" ( flood insurance money) with granite counters. They are moving to a retirement home feeling anyone who moved in it would be a fool and the house should go back to nature. Their idea of future is about their grandchildren
4
What will Houstonians and Texas GOP pols do when they are confronted with cleaning up all the new toxic waste sites created by the flooding of the toxic waste sites already existing in Southeast Texas? Most likely, the pols will ignore the sites and double-down with further environmental deregulation and thus increase the danger to Texans--especially to already disadvantaged Texans.
Should those who sowed the wind reap the whirlwind?
Should those who sowed the wind reap the whirlwind?
3
What will Texas GOP pols do when they are confronted with cleaning up all the new toxic waste sites created by the flooding of the toxic waste sites already existing in Southeast Texas? Most likely, they will ignore the sites and double-down with further environmental deregulation and thus increase the danger to Texans--especially to already disadvantaged Texans.
Should those who sowed the wind reap the whirlwind?
Should those who sowed the wind reap the whirlwind?
What is most important question about cities is do they have soul and character. Years ago I travelled to Houston with a European business colleague for a meeting. After listening to the Texans brag about the city, my friend queried them about where were all the people. He found the city lacking hustle and bustle of a street life the type you seen Europe, all over NYC, on Michigan Ave in Chicago, Union Square in SF, and Newbury Street in Boston. No where in Houston was that to be seen then, it still has little today They aren't on the Houston sidewalks because they are in their cars driving everywhere.
9
I have come to understand the the US economy is all about transferring risk to others in order to get rich quick. Bewildering financial instruments cooked up by Wall Street? Good to go. Tax cuts to benefit the 1%? Good to go. And subsidized government flood insurance to backdrop insane development decisions (when private insurers sprint away from the risk). The subsequent $60B + recovery package will be funded by more prudent taxpayers elsewhere in the country, in order to keep the metro-industrial complex moving along in "free market" Houston.
13
That's about the best description of our system I've seen.
6
Yup. We don't price risk. We hide risk.
It isn't prudent to ignore sound land use design principles and effective storm water management practices for the sake of unrestrained growth. The Houston area's imprudence has amplified the destruction caused by a natural disaster. We'll all bear the cost of that imprudence - to some degree, but not nearly as much as the people of Houston. Zoning and land use regulations, done properly, are restraints on only our own worst land use impulses, a means of protecting us from ourselves, not churning growth. In that regard, Houston failed to control its impetuous inner child. It's misfortune should be a lesson to us all.
6
Great way to describe what the purpose of zoning laws should be.
Houston and Atlanta metro populations are about the same 5.6 and 5.7 million respectively. And they have similar characteristics. Gridlock traffic, unchecked growth, and a booming economy.
There is one major difference. Atlanta is 1,050 ft. above sea level!
There is one major difference. Atlanta is 1,050 ft. above sea level!
3
Correction Houston=6.3 million and Atlanta=5.7 million metro population. Atlanta with the smaller population does indeed have worse traffic vs pre-Harvey Houston.
1
I remember visiting Houston in the 70s. It was the up and coming place. Young people were moving there in droves. Now, it's not so great. The politicians have resisted zoning. It's a good example of what happens when there's a complete lack of planning.
4
"Harvey, they say, makes arguably the strongest case yet that Houston’s free-market model may have a fatal flaw."
The fatal flaw, of course, is that cutthroat crony capitalism, Houston style, always puts short-term profits first and the long-term interests of the majority of citizens last.
We are a throw-away culture increasingly devoted to creating throw-away cities.
The fatal flaw, of course, is that cutthroat crony capitalism, Houston style, always puts short-term profits first and the long-term interests of the majority of citizens last.
We are a throw-away culture increasingly devoted to creating throw-away cities.
8
As someone who grew up in Southern California, I can assure you that rampant development does not lead to lower housing prices. Ventura, CA is a good example. During the 1980s and 1990s huge developments were built in Ventura County, especially in the east. Three thing invariably followed each subdivision: traffic congestion, more complaints about everything from said congestion to crowding in schools to utility costs, and higher house prices. Plus, unregulated urban growth is classic "privatize the profit and socialize the cost". Developers made piles of money but were always long gone when houses slid off their foundations during mudslides, or when the oh-so-chic wood shakes on the roof burnt like the kindling they were during the annual wildfires in the area. I'll take urban growth boundaries and decent regulation any day over the blight of unregulated sprawl, especially when it doesn't bring housing costs down.
7
It's amazing to me when people move to rapidly growing areas then whine about their property taxes going to to pay for schools. Guess they expect the schools to educate hundreds of new students for free.
1
That is not the model. The model is no zoning laws, minimal construction permitting laws, , right to work laws, employment at will laws, no income tax, and real estate tax laws that favor small homeowners over businesses. As in a real person gets a homestead exemption in real estate tax that businesses do not. Right to work laws keep wages under control, real estate taxes as designed keep land prices low, and low cost and delays in permitting result in low cost housing.
I see San Francisco and Houston as two extremes, with a more ideal solution lying somewhere in the middle. However, in the last 20 years or so I have personally witnessed not just San Francisco but the greater Bay Area transform from a diverse, vibrant land of opportunity to a plastic playground for the very rich, where the major opportunities are mostly for wealthy foreign land speculators. When the next major catastrophe (earthquake, tsunami, fires, maybe a combination of all three) hits the Bay, as it inevitably will, I cannot say for certain that it will even fare as well as Houston has in the wake of Harvey. In some respects, the housing crisis in San Francisco is already humanitarian disaster as big as Harvey. It's just happening in slow motion.
Also, I want to say something about the snide I see here that fault Houston being built in an area prone to flooding. Yes, all areas carry certain risks of natural disasters, and planning around such risks is prudent. But faulting a city for existing in a place where natural disasters occur is basically victim blaming. Nowhere, I repeat, nowhere on this Earth is safe from a natural catastrophe. For example, the Midwest, for whatever reason less associated with is prone to floods, fires, tornadoes, and even earthquakes. The strongest Earthquake recorded in the U.S. occurred on the New Madrid fault line. The coasts may attract the most media attention, but every town in the U.S.A. is susceptible experiencing its own Harvey.
Also, I want to say something about the snide I see here that fault Houston being built in an area prone to flooding. Yes, all areas carry certain risks of natural disasters, and planning around such risks is prudent. But faulting a city for existing in a place where natural disasters occur is basically victim blaming. Nowhere, I repeat, nowhere on this Earth is safe from a natural catastrophe. For example, the Midwest, for whatever reason less associated with is prone to floods, fires, tornadoes, and even earthquakes. The strongest Earthquake recorded in the U.S. occurred on the New Madrid fault line. The coasts may attract the most media attention, but every town in the U.S.A. is susceptible experiencing its own Harvey.
5
I'm in Cleveland. We've had one very minor tornado in the 40 years I've lived here. Two very minor earthquakes which caused no damage. And only a few low lying areas are flood prone. There's a big difference natural disaster wise between Ohio and other parts of the Midwest.
1
I grew up in the Midwest, including about 10 years in Chicagoland. We lived in a few houses, virtually all of which we carried flood insurance on. Illinois, which is notoriously flat, has a lot of flooding. Additionally, it seemed like there was at least one severe thunderstorm every week during the summer months, often times multiple ones. There was also at least one major tornado outbreak each year, often times several. In 1990 an F5 tornado tore through the town of Plano, IL, killing 29 and injuring 353. By comparison, so far the death toll in Hurricane Harvey is 69. This is in Houston, 4th largest city in the nation. Plano was (and is) but a fraction of that size.
This is not to make Chicago sound like a constant disaster area, or to minimize the threat hurricanes and flooding pose to Houston. The point is, the statistical probability of a person getting killed or injured in a major natural disaster anywhere in the U.S. is vanishingly small, even in a "disaster theme park" like California. And whatever economic advantage there is to be gained by a policy that encourages people to relocate to an area perceived to be less "disaster prone" is likely insignificant, or perhaps even outweighed by the cost of discouraging development in a place where there is an economic incentive to build (which is why most cities are where they are in the first place).
This is not to make Chicago sound like a constant disaster area, or to minimize the threat hurricanes and flooding pose to Houston. The point is, the statistical probability of a person getting killed or injured in a major natural disaster anywhere in the U.S. is vanishingly small, even in a "disaster theme park" like California. And whatever economic advantage there is to be gained by a policy that encourages people to relocate to an area perceived to be less "disaster prone" is likely insignificant, or perhaps even outweighed by the cost of discouraging development in a place where there is an economic incentive to build (which is why most cities are where they are in the first place).
1
Victim blaming in HOUSTON? Ridiculous. It stakes the claim to risk taking. Well guess what? Assume the consequences.
2
HUH??! In who's right mind is Houston a "model city"???
As an architect who has studied urban planning, I have never heard Houston called a "model city"!
It's built on one risky assumption: that all the citizens have access to cheap, plentiful and uninterrupted gasoline. If our reliance on gasoline had been different in the past century, and therefore also the automobile, the landscape and land use of Houston (and nearly all US cities) would be markedly different - probably for the better.
Forcing citizens to rely upon the automobile for nearly all their travel needs without other equally dispersed and accessible backup modes of transportation results in such communities digging themselves into a deeper hole of transit and urban environmental problems.
As an architect who has studied urban planning, I have never heard Houston called a "model city"!
It's built on one risky assumption: that all the citizens have access to cheap, plentiful and uninterrupted gasoline. If our reliance on gasoline had been different in the past century, and therefore also the automobile, the landscape and land use of Houston (and nearly all US cities) would be markedly different - probably for the better.
Forcing citizens to rely upon the automobile for nearly all their travel needs without other equally dispersed and accessible backup modes of transportation results in such communities digging themselves into a deeper hole of transit and urban environmental problems.
12
Someone who studied classical economics, and can read the fact that Houston housing costs are like 1/3 or less than those in San Francisco while having a much larger economy and population. Don't start with the flooding, maybe 3% of homes in the greater Houston area flooded with the world record rain event.
We have a hurricane maybe every 10 years and the flooding from this one is unprecedented.
Even assuming 3% flooding every 10 years with 100% damage as a cost, which is unrealisticly pessimistic, as a cost, we still underprice almost everywhere else with a similar sized city.
We have a hurricane maybe every 10 years and the flooding from this one is unprecedented.
Even assuming 3% flooding every 10 years with 100% damage as a cost, which is unrealisticly pessimistic, as a cost, we still underprice almost everywhere else with a similar sized city.
2
Houston's housing may be "afforable" to people in Houston, but it's not affordable to me. Not only do I have to pay for my own home and property, now I must pay for homes and properties in Houston as well, which are several thousands of miles away from me.
That's no bargain. Those who live in Houston and want freedom from regulation and low taxes need to sign on the dotted line agreeing to freedom from getting my money. As they say boys --- freedom ain't free.
That's no bargain. Those who live in Houston and want freedom from regulation and low taxes need to sign on the dotted line agreeing to freedom from getting my money. As they say boys --- freedom ain't free.
15
So stop federal flood insurance subsidies. Most Texans would agree to that.
The article provides a false choice. What is being compared are cities that are allowing growth and cities that are limiting growth, or in the case of New York, already humungous dwarfing Houston in size and a completely different animal.
It is absolutely true that limiting growth increases poverty and many liberal cities are guilty of it.
It is just absolutely not true that good planning needs to curtail growth. It might limit the building on a flood plane, it might require density instead of sprawl, it might limit the size of single family homes, but planning need not stop growth. Houston is simply kicking the can down the road and will end up paying for it's lack of foresight (or in the case of this Hurricane, the rest of the country will pay for it). I know this because LA did the exact same thing, and we are struggling to bring the required infrastructure to the residents and now every inch of infrastructure is fought for against NIMBies. New York City actually did a great job of managing growth, growing, and providing housing. Unfortunately, there just is a limit to how much an urban areas can grow and New York is there. Houston has already outgrown it's infrastructure and problems will only get much worse. Any academic who doesn't point this out is just being disingenuous.
It is absolutely true that limiting growth increases poverty and many liberal cities are guilty of it.
It is just absolutely not true that good planning needs to curtail growth. It might limit the building on a flood plane, it might require density instead of sprawl, it might limit the size of single family homes, but planning need not stop growth. Houston is simply kicking the can down the road and will end up paying for it's lack of foresight (or in the case of this Hurricane, the rest of the country will pay for it). I know this because LA did the exact same thing, and we are struggling to bring the required infrastructure to the residents and now every inch of infrastructure is fought for against NIMBies. New York City actually did a great job of managing growth, growing, and providing housing. Unfortunately, there just is a limit to how much an urban areas can grow and New York is there. Houston has already outgrown it's infrastructure and problems will only get much worse. Any academic who doesn't point this out is just being disingenuous.
5
As somebody who has lived in Houston for a few years now, I agree with many points raised by the article and by some of the comments. However, though many changes need to be considered for smart future development, I believe the author and many commentators (whose only concept of Houston is images of sprawl and highways) are overly dismissive of the prosperity that has been brought by Houston's lax business environment. It's this environment in Houston and Texas in general that is currently causing so many people from coastal cities to move here because the lack of affordability caused by those cities' own flawed housing policies.
3
I get it. We should all leave our expensive homes and move someplace with poor planning. That way, we get cheaper housing and a bailout from taxpayers in more expensive locales. Sounds like a brilliant plan, no?
10
Assuming you can afford to live in an expensive home in New York, you have the luxury of not having to engage in these cost-benefit analyses necessary to accommodate such rapid growth of largely low-mid income populations. Again, I'm not anti-planning, it just has to be balanced against economic benefits, which in this city is huge, greatly surpassing even the downsides of such a significant event like this.
It's also interesting to see you and so many people on this thread (who I'm sure are normally "progressive") suddenly anti-federal intervention when it means helping a city you look down on up there on your elitist pedestal.
It's also interesting to see you and so many people on this thread (who I'm sure are normally "progressive") suddenly anti-federal intervention when it means helping a city you look down on up there on your elitist pedestal.
1
It's always easier to avoid looking at reality in the face. And that in a nutshell, is Texas. Happy trails!
2
I'm starting to think that building enormous sprawling cities in drained coastal bayous is not a very good idea. At least NOLA had the excuse of having a rich culture before modern times. But Houston is the epitome of 1950-present car-dependent sprawl. I feel sympathy for the plight of individual people, and I at least recognize the necessity of the Port of Houston, but seriously - don't drain wetlands and then build enormous cities on top of them. Cities should be slightly higher than surrounding terrain and more inland, with adjacent port facilities serving as industrial areas closer to the water.
11
Houston needs zoning regulations - which are for the purpose of protecting life and property. And if adhered to, will necessitate less of a hand out from the rest of us the next time disaster strikes.
Texas & Houston need to implement an income tax and generate revenue to offset disaster relief.
And Gov. Abbott needs to use his $10 BILLION dollar rainy day fund for Harvey rebuilding now - not to subsidize some sports stadium down the road.
Texas & Houston need to implement an income tax and generate revenue to offset disaster relief.
And Gov. Abbott needs to use his $10 BILLION dollar rainy day fund for Harvey rebuilding now - not to subsidize some sports stadium down the road.
18
Especially given that it literally was an unprecedentedly rainy day, or rather week.
5
No, we don't. Not going to have income taxes or zoning laws either.
Great model, but assumed no disasters were possible. The history of the area is known. Ironically, Houston grew because the first hot city, Galveston. was wiped out in a hurricane and folks just moved a bit north. But all the topography and weather conditions always remained.
Houston clearly overbuilt in the lowest lying land and never quite mastered the precautions.
Now if this happens again, should fed money be offered? That's the real question for all our coastal cities.
Houston clearly overbuilt in the lowest lying land and never quite mastered the precautions.
Now if this happens again, should fed money be offered? That's the real question for all our coastal cities.
12
Sadly, Texas will vote against aid the next time a storm pummels the Northeast.
13
Here's a deal for you freedom-loving Texans - you can build wherever you want, however you want, so long as us taxpayers in the other 49 states don't have to subsidize your flood insurance for building in areas that have been shown to be clearly flood-prone in this day and age. That way, the magic hand of the insurance marketplace rather than the jackboot of socialistic oppression can determine the true value of Houstonians' homes. But don't worry - we will still donate money toward your emergency shelter and food after the next 500-year flood two years hence!
21
I've been to Huston. Twice. The second time I had a great meal. Mexican. If it's such a madel city, let its supporters foot the recovery bill. Personally, it didn't appeal to me. I couldn't get out of there fast enough. I'm also tired of footing the bill for such sloppy development. Let them drain their wetlands, suffer their droughts and wade through their floods. Serves them right for delivering the state to Trump. He'll deliver a beautiful recovery.
6
Sure, but have you ever been to Houston?
1
You're not up on your facts if you think Houston delivered the state to Trump. Houston is a Democratic/blue area, which is not something that can be said about Upstate New York, where you live. If NYC wasn't part of your state, Trump would have won New York by a greater margin than he won Texas (which was only 9 points, by the way).
1
I've lived in several large cities and a few small ones. Never have I hated living anywhere more than Houston. It's at once crowded and spread out. Most people drive monstrous gas-guzzlers and the architecture leaves so much to be desired. Bigger everything isn't better and ostentatiousness is the opposite of class. Don't even get me started on the heat and the proliferation of roaches.
15
The proliferation of giant trucks and SUVs in a region that almost never gets snow or ice is baffling to me. You don't even see as many here in Ohio where it snows 5 months of the year.
Houstonians are already rationalizing this by talking about it being a 500-year flood, or historic rain. Well, yeah -- but the point is that all this was made worse by the supersprawl that is Houston. Sprawl into flood plains and wetlands, sprawl covering dirt with concrete. Sprawl not providing for protections where needed.
How about we start by no longer subsidizing the flood insurance program, and raising the rates on flood insurance to actually pay for the calculated risk? That's what people in areas prone to earthquakes have to deal with, after all. Maybe if they had to pay the REAL cost for the lack of planning and control, Houstonians might think twice about whether their free market sprawl is so desirable.
How about we start by no longer subsidizing the flood insurance program, and raising the rates on flood insurance to actually pay for the calculated risk? That's what people in areas prone to earthquakes have to deal with, after all. Maybe if they had to pay the REAL cost for the lack of planning and control, Houstonians might think twice about whether their free market sprawl is so desirable.
14
I fear we will soon be calling 500 year storms "annual"...warming seas and rising sea levels are real no matter the cause.
6
As I have watched this catastrophe play out, the only positive thing I have seen is the wonderful way in which all of the people have helped one another without being worried about the color of a person's skin or what church he attends, his income level. That has been truly wonderful to see that there is real humanity left in the world.
Early on as the storm was first hitting the news, I heard the usual 500/1000 year storm comments. So being the curious old gaffer that I am, I took to Google. Well to my surprise I learned the Harris county Texas was one of the first counties in the nation to enroll in the federal flood insurance program and since enrolling it has received more money from the program than any other district in the nation.
That information came to me via the Harris County Flood Control District web site.
So Texans have been mooching off the rest of us since 1937. That's actually longer than I have been alive.
Early on as the storm was first hitting the news, I heard the usual 500/1000 year storm comments. So being the curious old gaffer that I am, I took to Google. Well to my surprise I learned the Harris county Texas was one of the first counties in the nation to enroll in the federal flood insurance program and since enrolling it has received more money from the program than any other district in the nation.
That information came to me via the Harris County Flood Control District web site.
So Texans have been mooching off the rest of us since 1937. That's actually longer than I have been alive.
2
I note a disturbing lack of facts and figures in your reporting, which seem aimed at support of a nonsensical political position:
https://www.google.com/amp/nypost.com/2017/08/30/up-to-40000-homes-wiped...
“We’ve got probably 30,000 to 40,000 homes that have been destroyed,” Harris County Office of Homeland Security and Emergency Management director Ed Emmett told ABC News.
.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greater_Houston
The Houston metro area has a population of 6.5 million.
A reasonable back of the envelope calculation based on a population of 6.5 million Americans indicates an average of one residence per 3 inhabitants, 4 on the outside. That means at least 1.5 million residences, probably more like 2 million. 40,000 homes damaged out of 1.5 million is 2.67%, , after the most intense rain event in US according to your paper a day or two ago.
Houston statistically gets hit by a hurricane about every 10 years or more.
You act as if the cost of the flooding is a significant argument against our policy of no zoning. Do the math.
That means the annual cost of flooding by your assumptions that lack of zoning causes this (for which not an iota of evidence exists) is at best 0.267%, while homes in cities with zoning cost as much as 150 to 200% what homes in Houston do, in which case, by the numbers Houston should reject zoning laws.
https://www.google.com/amp/nypost.com/2017/08/30/up-to-40000-homes-wiped...
“We’ve got probably 30,000 to 40,000 homes that have been destroyed,” Harris County Office of Homeland Security and Emergency Management director Ed Emmett told ABC News.
.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greater_Houston
The Houston metro area has a population of 6.5 million.
A reasonable back of the envelope calculation based on a population of 6.5 million Americans indicates an average of one residence per 3 inhabitants, 4 on the outside. That means at least 1.5 million residences, probably more like 2 million. 40,000 homes damaged out of 1.5 million is 2.67%, , after the most intense rain event in US according to your paper a day or two ago.
Houston statistically gets hit by a hurricane about every 10 years or more.
You act as if the cost of the flooding is a significant argument against our policy of no zoning. Do the math.
That means the annual cost of flooding by your assumptions that lack of zoning causes this (for which not an iota of evidence exists) is at best 0.267%, while homes in cities with zoning cost as much as 150 to 200% what homes in Houston do, in which case, by the numbers Houston should reject zoning laws.
4
Using statistics or actuarial "science" to assess the cost impact of phenomena that are clearly not "normal" is a good explanation for why Houston and the National Flood Insurance Program are great reasons why both are in such deep holes. Use the right science (Extreme, "Black Swan" methods) where there is such acknowledged uncertainty as there is in extreme weather forecasting.
12
Such statistical sleight of hand is ideologically-driven poppycock! If you want to play accounting games, you need comprehensive data and full accounting -- not an early, misguided assessment of only home damage!
Errors abound.
1. You quoted the emergency director of just ONE county saying 30-40,000 homes had been *destroyed*, but then shifted to calling them "damaged"!
2. You used that as if it were the full extent of Harvey's damage!
3. It's far too early to estimate the total damages. As more reports come in, #s and costs always go up. The # of homes destroyed is already 70,000 and climbing. The damages are already in the tens of billions. They will surely end up much higher.
4. You ignored a host of costly attendant damages. You'd need to account for injuries, lack of housing and transportation for weeks and months, loss of jobs, evictions (many landlords are already evicting flood victims for lack of rent -- even though they have no jobs), etc.
5. You overlooked long-term medical costs caused by mold, pollution, and chemicals, inhaled and absorbed.
6. Your worst error was ignoring the tremendous amount of personal suffering; the loss of family and loved ones; and the toll of unrecoverable homes and memories. Those do not have a price tag!
Tough regulation is needed to ensure people's well being and a just society. What happened is clear proof that laissez-faire capitalism, libertarianism, and neoliberalism do not work and devastate people's lives.
Errors abound.
1. You quoted the emergency director of just ONE county saying 30-40,000 homes had been *destroyed*, but then shifted to calling them "damaged"!
2. You used that as if it were the full extent of Harvey's damage!
3. It's far too early to estimate the total damages. As more reports come in, #s and costs always go up. The # of homes destroyed is already 70,000 and climbing. The damages are already in the tens of billions. They will surely end up much higher.
4. You ignored a host of costly attendant damages. You'd need to account for injuries, lack of housing and transportation for weeks and months, loss of jobs, evictions (many landlords are already evicting flood victims for lack of rent -- even though they have no jobs), etc.
5. You overlooked long-term medical costs caused by mold, pollution, and chemicals, inhaled and absorbed.
6. Your worst error was ignoring the tremendous amount of personal suffering; the loss of family and loved ones; and the toll of unrecoverable homes and memories. Those do not have a price tag!
Tough regulation is needed to ensure people's well being and a just society. What happened is clear proof that laissez-faire capitalism, libertarianism, and neoliberalism do not work and devastate people's lives.
1
Factually Houston is not "in the red" If national flood insurance is, that is hardly Houston's fault.
What Mr King argues is a classical error in logic called "begging the question". He inserts nonsense in his question that is flatly false in order to have people think it true.
What Mr King argues is a classical error in logic called "begging the question". He inserts nonsense in his question that is flatly false in order to have people think it true.
1
As a lifelong Houston resident, Harvey was certainly one of the worst storms we have ever seen. It is truly horrible that 100,000 houses were severely damaged. However, let's realize that this is about 5% of the housing units in Greater Houston. What city is able to handle 50" of rain and have "less" damage? Does anyone believe that LA or NY could handle this any better? There is no doubt that we will all learn from this tragedy and explore strategies that will benefit Houston and other cities. Many of the ideas suggested in these comments deserve to be addressed. I will say that the pic of the lamppost at Allen's landing is in a "park area" along Buffalo Bayou. This area floods; there are no permanent structures there.
6
It's not a question of handling it, it's a question of allowing it to happen in the first place. Houston's experience with previous floods should have been a wake-up call with regard to storm water management. But it wasn't. Those 100000 homeowners paid the price for the hubris and ignorance of developers. New York is a much older city and is what it is...Houston's growth took place in full knowledge of what might happen and guess what, you hit the jackpot! If you look at how regulations increased after each California earthquake you can see what a proper response should be. I am sick of paying to bail out fools who build in flood zones whether in Texas, New Jersey or here in the Carolinas.
10
I imagine there will be thousands who can't rebuild or return home and will just walk, losing everything. They are the real victims of bad policy.
4
Thanks for the link (to a competitor no less!) :
"Houston is experiencing its third ‘500-year’ flood in 3 years. How is that possible?"
www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2017/08/29/houston-is-experiencing-i...
"Houston is experiencing its third ‘500-year’ flood in 3 years. How is that possible?"
www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2017/08/29/houston-is-experiencing-i...
4
@Leaky that's no news.
Paris was a city 2000 years ago, the (original) Louvre and plenty of other structures were built along the Seine over a thousand years ago. You're gonna compare that with "pave paradise, put up a parking lot..." Houston? Bless your heart.
Yet flood risk maps are in the public domain in Paris and work is being done to protect vulnerable sites, and channel flood waters up and downstream as well as in the city. Drainage works have been going on for decades to ensure overflow doesn't pollute the Seine, the commuter train along the Seine has been shut ever summer for a decade to upgrade flood defenses not only that line but structures all across the south shore of the Seine, and these upgrades are imposed on . It's known what will flood and the work is done to mitigate the results.
So...Relevance of your comment "Leaky"?
Paris was a city 2000 years ago, the (original) Louvre and plenty of other structures were built along the Seine over a thousand years ago. You're gonna compare that with "pave paradise, put up a parking lot..." Houston? Bless your heart.
Yet flood risk maps are in the public domain in Paris and work is being done to protect vulnerable sites, and channel flood waters up and downstream as well as in the city. Drainage works have been going on for decades to ensure overflow doesn't pollute the Seine, the commuter train along the Seine has been shut ever summer for a decade to upgrade flood defenses not only that line but structures all across the south shore of the Seine, and these upgrades are imposed on . It's known what will flood and the work is done to mitigate the results.
So...Relevance of your comment "Leaky"?
Thanks Texas, you can keep your model city.
10
I love Portland (I assume you're from Oregon, not Maine, which I've never visited). When I first visited Portland in the mid-80s it seemed like a utopia. But so it appeared to a lot of upwardly mobile people. Now, however, real estate prices are skyrocketing. Long time residents can't afford their homes. People of color are being forced to move to outer suburbs. Apartment rents have gone up so much that the Portland City Council declared a housing emergency! And white liberal urbanism pushes back on any semblance of affordable housing by opposing large housing projects. The very thing that makes Portland so attractive -- charming shops, bike paths, walkable streets -- has become the province of wealthy white people. Houston, on the other hand, is among the most culturally diverse cities in the country, with ample affordable housing.
Certainly, if you're wealthy, Portland (and San Francisco, etc...) are model cities. If not, try Houston.
Certainly, if you're wealthy, Portland (and San Francisco, etc...) are model cities. If not, try Houston.
4
If you don't like diversity and only want to be surrounded by white people, you can keep your model city of Portland. I'll prefer having my food from all over the world and hearing every language imaginable in Houston.
1
I hope that most of the people who bought flooded homes see the writing on the wall and do not rebuild. It is really too bad that some of their Houston cohorts can't see the truth before their eyes. How many times do we have to pay for their blind arrogance in the face of catastrophe? It doesn't have to be either us or them. They can simply rebuild with a modicum of practicality.
8
Glad not to live there. And other commenters are right: U.S. taxpayers are subsidizing their folly.
10
I wish that some of those victims could sue developers, but building on the flood plain was legal. Public transportation could have evacuated without clogging roads. Now, car dealerships will have a windfall, and many of those ruined cars will end up in the used car market. Quo vadis.
6
The people are another matter, but the city of Houston, which I've spent several weeks in, several times, is just hideously ugly. Planning is a form of aesthetics. It doesn't just build in economic prosperity and efficient use of resources, it makes things look nicer. Houston just makes you sad to look at it. The buildings were the cheapest ugliest things imaginable, because they were built to turn out maximum profit at minimum expenditure. You can be proud of the spirit of the people perhaps, but the town was ugly before the storm and now it has a chance to rebuild — for god's sake take advantgae of it and plan something better than what was there before.
12
The Kotlin/Cox thesis that unhindered development explains low housing costs reminds me of the explanation given by the man walking around with a banana in his ear: it's to keep the elephants away. And as someone who is not a "coastal elite" but rather from Michigan, while my heart goes out to those devastated by Harvey, it irritates me no end to have my tax dollars bailing out Texans who allowed developers to ignore factors that exasperated the effects of Harvey.
12
Have you ever been here? Maybe you should come spend some time before you try to arbitrate the dispute.
2
Yes, many of us have.
3
Went on business: 2 days work and one day to visit. Left at the end of day 2.
1
Houston never has been a model city. It is a fraud. It has charged into the limelight of dumb growth with no concern for the consequences of ignorning the risks and costs of overpopulation. It has thumbed its nose at the federal government - the rest of us - as if they did not need their fellow citizens. It is a model of foolishness, and now the consequences of that. Take care of the poorest people there and let the rest of the arrogant Texans fight amongst themselves for the favor of Ted Cruz.
11
Only in a truly black comedy could Houston be considered a model city.
14
How many Parisians want to see Houston rather than the opposite? I don't think city planning is going to become obsolete...
16
Unfettered growth is idiotic. Free-markets without some regulation is dumb. The answer is never on the extreme right or left...it's somewhere in between.
7
Cute to use the justication of providing "affordable housing" for keeping wages down, taxes and regulations low. The Walmart model of growth management. And like Walmart utimately dependent upon government to help with the clean up.
10
Houston lacks coherence on so many levels. It has multiple 'centers' but no heart. You live your life in strip malls and on freeways. It may have affordable housing but you still have to spend your life in traffic jams and now, we see, in fear for your life because over development has placed the whole city in the bulls-eye of any big storm. Residents are getting a bounce in civic pride because of the truly inspiring way they have handled their disaster but when the water recedes everyone who lives there will wake up with the realization that this could be a yearly occurrence, or even worse. I fear that development in my home city in Charleston will also override good sense. This time of year has become truly terrifying.
10
The rebuilding of Houston will be the cover girl for the old adage - the best way to get out of a hole is to stop digging. At least progressive Austin finally discovered its major problem - it is surrounded by Texas.
15
There are so many disturbingly dumb free-market arguments in this article that, by the end, my sympathy for the victims was matched by a growing anger at all those who advocate unregulated growth. At the very least federal aide should come with a few caveats. Federal assistance should be tied to very specific demands that further development in flood plains be halted and that reconstruction, in these areas, be severely regulated. It would also be worthwhile if all candidates in future Texas elections be asked to acknowledge that human activity has greatly accelerated climate change. All politicians who refuse to do so should be awarded exceptions to any development ban and be required to live in the lowest regions of coastal flood plains without any possibility of federal assistance when they are, as they will be, swept away.
12
The greater Houston area could use a lot more greenery and parks, a lot better public transportation set up, some much stronger efforts to limit pollution. I say that as one who has lived in South Houston, The Woodlands, Cy Fair, Sharpstown and Stinkadena.
And it probably wouldn't cost that much, relatively speaking.
So no it is not a model city and it never was. That sounds like some hucksterisms coming out of the Chamber of Commerce. It's not bad, just not a "model" city.
And it probably wouldn't cost that much, relatively speaking.
So no it is not a model city and it never was. That sounds like some hucksterisms coming out of the Chamber of Commerce. It's not bad, just not a "model" city.
11
Well, sometimes stuff just happens, no matter what human design does. Would Portland (OR) have withstood 50" of rain? No. In fact, Portland is near enough to the fault line of an overdo major seismic event (Cascadia) that is is expected to be, in the word of one expert, "toast."
Still, the startling damage could have been mitigated. And does anyone really think unregulated sprawl is a reasonable solution--- does he think aesthetics and practicality (traffic congestion) of neighborhoods and areas are unimportant?
It is a little shocking to see die-hard opponents of regulation still fiercely clinging to their beliefs. What would it takes, one wonders, to wake them up?
Still, the startling damage could have been mitigated. And does anyone really think unregulated sprawl is a reasonable solution--- does he think aesthetics and practicality (traffic congestion) of neighborhoods and areas are unimportant?
It is a little shocking to see die-hard opponents of regulation still fiercely clinging to their beliefs. What would it takes, one wonders, to wake them up?
13
Minneapolis is a lot like Portland in affordability and level of planning, and not much like Houston. Wendell Cox is trying to deflect discussion of reasonable development standards and planning, what most would call "Typical American Development Standards and Culture," into a red state / blue state argument trap.
Local governments in the Twin Cities area say "No" to developers who want to build in floodplains, require wetlands be recreated elsewhere if filled, require developments to create onsite detention ponds to maintain 24 hour runoff to pre-development levels, have cities that scrupulously account for flash flooding volumes and movement of storm water runoff to ensure no flooding down the line, and would never, concrete-line natural streams and drainage ways which just amplifies the flooding problems elsewhere. It's simply not the way the Twin Cities (or most of the USA) operates.
I'm a little horrified that the discussion that is most pertinent to come out of Harvey is not the impact of climate change (which is valid but not primary), but the value of building with respect to the environment. Remember tropical storm Allison dropped nearly 40 inches on Houston in 2001, and the response was MORE irresponsible development, not planning for the future, that's the topic that needs to be #1 right now. Note that Houston was inundated with flash flooding from Harvey almost immediately, on Sunday, 48 hours before the 40" threshold of Allison was surpassed on Tuesday.
Local governments in the Twin Cities area say "No" to developers who want to build in floodplains, require wetlands be recreated elsewhere if filled, require developments to create onsite detention ponds to maintain 24 hour runoff to pre-development levels, have cities that scrupulously account for flash flooding volumes and movement of storm water runoff to ensure no flooding down the line, and would never, concrete-line natural streams and drainage ways which just amplifies the flooding problems elsewhere. It's simply not the way the Twin Cities (or most of the USA) operates.
I'm a little horrified that the discussion that is most pertinent to come out of Harvey is not the impact of climate change (which is valid but not primary), but the value of building with respect to the environment. Remember tropical storm Allison dropped nearly 40 inches on Houston in 2001, and the response was MORE irresponsible development, not planning for the future, that's the topic that needs to be #1 right now. Note that Houston was inundated with flash flooding from Harvey almost immediately, on Sunday, 48 hours before the 40" threshold of Allison was surpassed on Tuesday.
16
Subways/underground rail would be out of service for at least two weeks if NYC, SF, Boston or Philly got 18 inches of rain in one storm. Some storms are not neatly solved by more regulation or less
2
Mr Kotkin does realize, doesn't he, that drainage is dictated by stormwater regulation, regulation that is in most places is required of developers as they build? As noted, these are not zero-sum propositions -- to build or not to build. Many American cities produce both affordable housing and that which limits liability and protects existing homeowners' investments with reasonable regulation.
9
One of the arguments for unregulated development in Houston is to keep housing affordable. How affordable is the housing when it's destroyed or badly damaged along with the people's possessions? While some of their possessions will never be replaced someone will pay the price for those that can, or must, be replaced and that will come from people's savings, loans, or the taxpayers. So, just how affordable is that housing?
23
So the city fathers et al are enriched by the development and the rest of us eventually have to pay the bill through FEMA and cheap flood insurance.
21
Just follow the money. Builders, who are opposed to restrictions on unsafe building, get to build houses twice after they flood. What an obscene racket!
2
As a Portlander, I am proud of our urban growth boundry and smart planning. I believe in federal disaster aid. However, while developers in Texas benefit financially from lax zoning and building regulations, they expect the rest of the country to clean up their mess. There need to be guidelines and basic parameters states must meet to be eligible for federal disaster relief. As a country we cannot afford to continually bail states out as major disasters become more and more frequent.
27
Houston is a good example of the free market - without government restrictions. People who bought homes without any thought or research on flooding risk have learned a hard lesson. In the future, homes in flood areas will become harder to sell, as buyers slowly become smarter. There will always be people who take the risk of flooding in return for a lower house price. Free market in action. (The government reimbursing these people for their losing gamble is a mistake, as it disrupts the free market adjustment.)
Laws and regulation that try to protect people from their own poor decisions or lack of diligence are a fools errand.
(I've lived in Houston, where I did a lot of research before buying my house. I've also lived near Boston, where I needed to spend time and money to get a permit to cut down a tree in my own yard.)
Laws and regulation that try to protect people from their own poor decisions or lack of diligence are a fools errand.
(I've lived in Houston, where I did a lot of research before buying my house. I've also lived near Boston, where I needed to spend time and money to get a permit to cut down a tree in my own yard.)
11
The level of the Gulf of Mexico is rising, therefore regions prone to flooding will continue to expand. Digging deeper ditches to evacuate floodwater will have diminishing returns. Either (1) raise the homes above the flood plain level (which can cost almost as much as the dwelling itself); or (2) buy out risky neighborhoods, raze all the homes and return the land to its original role of being a sponge for rainwater. Either way the cost will be staggering.
12
As a longtime Houstonian happily residing out of state watched Houston's unbridled growth for 40 years. I lived near downtown in a great neighborhood that was built there because it was on the highest ground. When I left Houston, infrastructure was falling apart and growth seemed to be the only important thing as developers turned every bit of open space into pavement. There are many things about Houston and Texas I miss, but pollution, floods and right wing politicians are not one of them.
17
In all these discussions, an important factor, the property tax, was omitted on purpose (?). In old subdivisions, the property tax (including school tax, county tax, medical center tax etc.) is about 2.5%, but the relatively new subdivision property tax is about 3.5%. With cheap labor mainly from immigrants and plenty of land, government officials and developers have common interests in collecting more money in a shorter time. They care less about future problems but current prosperity. Recent oil price boom only added fuel to this fire. In the end, it is the people who were falsely led to this "fake American dream" by owing houses. A flood in this magnitude should wake us all about reality.
13
Manhattan is using flood resistant designs for new building. Maybe Houston needs such building codes.
10
Republicans don't believe in protecting "the people." They don't believe in codes or regulations. They believe in grabbing everything they can get their hands on, Kim Jong un style, and "the people" can pay the consequences. They will never behave responsibly, or take the blame for any of their past actions. NOW, they will attempt to get the oil and chemical industries back on their feet, just as before, while "the people" wait.
9
With so many engineers, Houston can plan ahead at the same time it solves problems. Planning versus solving is not an either/or choice, as the story seems to imply.
Since the city has sunk half a foot due to so much exploration by the petrochemical companies, it is critical to design for that problem too, which exacerbates the poor drainage and poor buffer.
Since the city has sunk half a foot due to so much exploration by the petrochemical companies, it is critical to design for that problem too, which exacerbates the poor drainage and poor buffer.
10
What Huston obviously lacks is systems engineers engaged in building resilient cities and communities. The US Army Corps of Engineers put their finger on the problem when they attributed the pre-Katrina flood protection system as being "a system in name only". What a system that address high stress conditions with components that work together? Call a systems engineer!
1
It would seem worthwhile to buy up the 100,000 homes or so in regular flooding areas (as opposed to insurance payments, aid, etc) and return that land to nature using the super absorbent native prairie grass that has historically been there. If Houston is so pro-development, allow sparse high rise development in or around these areas and offer the displaced residents housing units or credits in the new buildings. Developers can be allowed incentives (they receive giveaways all the time as it is) and can make money off of the additional units. A seemingly better investment for the money than widening hundreds of miles of water channels.
For those insisting on single family homes - fine, just not in a flood plain. Use some common sense.
For those insisting on single family homes - fine, just not in a flood plain. Use some common sense.
16
Yes, 50 inches of rain is the primary cause of the most recent Houston catastrophe. However, the secondary cause is unbridled greed on the part of corporations and developers who demand freedom from regulation, viz., zoning regulations. So, now these same "visionaries" are clamoring for financial aid from those who recognize the value of prudent regulations. Go figure!
18
Hmmm, high car insurance rates, 40 minute commute, one of the highest property tax rates in the US, higher cost of living than Dallas or San Antonio, what's not to love? As to development, that is a canard because they have room to sprawl unlike their false comparisons with Portland and other established cities. How they sprawled is the problem, developing land that should not have been developed.
26
Don't forget the naturally beautiful surroundings and the hot, humid weather. Why, who wouldn't want to live in Houston?
5
Let's think about the need to signing on to the Paris Accord. The U.S. needs to join the other nations of the world in collectively addressing climate change!
12
My adopted hometown of Houston has been a good place to live work and prosper. When it's time to retire I look forward to relocating. It doesn't make sense to live here if you don't need to work.
15
Houston has been managed with a hands off attitude, very much the way we managed the conquest of this nations land and resources.
When the US was founded we had what appeared to be unlimited resources. As we moved west, we clearcut great tracts of virgin timber from the cypress of the south to the great pine forest of the north. When gold was discovered out west we dug up, literally destroyed river after river for it.
It wasn't until the early 20th century that we started to figure out that without rules or regulations, all would eventually be lost. As the country matured we learned to manage our reaources. We regulated to prevent diasaster.
Houston is much like that young country. Blessed with natural resources it's the economic center of the oil and gas business. Even so, nobody wanted to live here until the invention of air conditioning. Since the late 50's Houston's growth has accelerated and its footprint has expanded with the rise of car ownership and growth of its suburbs.
But just as that uncontrolled growth lead to unwanted results in our nation building, it has made Houston vulnerable, sometimes dangerous, with poor flood controls and dotted with industrial waste.
Houston, we have a problem.
When the US was founded we had what appeared to be unlimited resources. As we moved west, we clearcut great tracts of virgin timber from the cypress of the south to the great pine forest of the north. When gold was discovered out west we dug up, literally destroyed river after river for it.
It wasn't until the early 20th century that we started to figure out that without rules or regulations, all would eventually be lost. As the country matured we learned to manage our reaources. We regulated to prevent diasaster.
Houston is much like that young country. Blessed with natural resources it's the economic center of the oil and gas business. Even so, nobody wanted to live here until the invention of air conditioning. Since the late 50's Houston's growth has accelerated and its footprint has expanded with the rise of car ownership and growth of its suburbs.
But just as that uncontrolled growth lead to unwanted results in our nation building, it has made Houston vulnerable, sometimes dangerous, with poor flood controls and dotted with industrial waste.
Houston, we have a problem.
16
"Light regulation and fast growth" simply defies logic and common sense. In what context could that possibly be a healthy long-term model?
21
I used to live in Houston and work at NASA, including through previous floods. Like most people who live in Houston, I'm more liberal (and sometimes even more socially libertarian) than most Texans. What happened with Harvey has little to do with so-called "suburban sprawl" of spreading things out. In fact, if things has been more compacted, such as in New Orleans, things would have been worse. The city was actually created as a response to the Galveston devastation around 1900, moved 30 miles inward to protect from storm surges. Still, it is flat, bayou country, and you just can't prevent ALL flooding, though it withstands floods that would devastate New York, New Orleans, or Miami every other year.
It's not a design issue or an infrastructure issue. What makes Houston unique is that it is at the center of the fossil-fuel burning and climate warming for planet earth. And that warming has made all hurricanes, especially Harvey, much worse than ever anticipated, even when planning for floods. Although zoning and urban planning might make some people politically happier, it really would have done little or nothing to protect the population from the weather. The best neighborhoods in Houston, those near the exclusive, private Rice University, with the richest and most educated people, were some of the first to flood.
What Houston should do is have home-based benefactors like Exxon, BP, and countless others to ween us off fossil fuels--unlikely, but we can only hope.
It's not a design issue or an infrastructure issue. What makes Houston unique is that it is at the center of the fossil-fuel burning and climate warming for planet earth. And that warming has made all hurricanes, especially Harvey, much worse than ever anticipated, even when planning for floods. Although zoning and urban planning might make some people politically happier, it really would have done little or nothing to protect the population from the weather. The best neighborhoods in Houston, those near the exclusive, private Rice University, with the richest and most educated people, were some of the first to flood.
What Houston should do is have home-based benefactors like Exxon, BP, and countless others to ween us off fossil fuels--unlikely, but we can only hope.
8
Well, the surrounding grasslands act as a natural sponge. The surrounding grasslands are paved over. Design and sprawl has a lot to do with Houston's long-term survival.
34
Let's give in to the states rights advocates. Buy your flood insurance on the open market and have individual states pay for recovery. It appears that blue states have far fewer weather related catastrophes than the low state taxed red ones.
30
Um, heard of Superstorm Sandy?
Unrestrained, unregulated industrial development, near bodies if water, don't seem like a "model" to me. I wonder if the water, air, and soil pollution,caused by Harvey, will EVER be cleaned up. Also, why doesn't the government ever seem to plan ahead for these inevitable weather related catastrophes, which is only going to get worse without strong environmental legislation, by local, state, and federal authorities?
12
Given the flood risk, I think Houston is a prime example of going against nature without a plan. But Houston is not alone in that. Human nature, perhaps.
5
Be careful what you wish for, I know. But I do think it would be great if we could have an honest ongoing discussion about what risks we subsidize; how and how much we subsidize a risk; the extent to which we're subsidizing a risk that we should also regulate because we're subsidizing it; and the extent to which we're regulating a risk too much, not enough, or unwisely.
Could it possibly be the case that we subsidize the risk of Texas floods and yet we don't subsidize the risk of east coast floods, the risk of west coast fires, droughts, earthquakes, and tsunamis, or the risk of blizzards or drought in the northeast or Midwest? That seems doubtful.
Also, is it useful to rail against subsidizing public transportation and alternative energy while we quietly subsidize roads or fossil fuels? From a public interest viewpoint I don't see the point of such tiresome arguments.
I also wish we could get clear on the difference between public safety regulations and zoning. California building codes make California safer in case of an earthquake. California zoning ordinances that prescribe whether you can build apartments or office buildings near single family houses generally do not.
Could it possibly be the case that we subsidize the risk of Texas floods and yet we don't subsidize the risk of east coast floods, the risk of west coast fires, droughts, earthquakes, and tsunamis, or the risk of blizzards or drought in the northeast or Midwest? That seems doubtful.
Also, is it useful to rail against subsidizing public transportation and alternative energy while we quietly subsidize roads or fossil fuels? From a public interest viewpoint I don't see the point of such tiresome arguments.
I also wish we could get clear on the difference between public safety regulations and zoning. California building codes make California safer in case of an earthquake. California zoning ordinances that prescribe whether you can build apartments or office buildings near single family houses generally do not.
3
Isn't Houston a beneficiary of POTUS L. B. Johnson weighing in on the decision to locate NASA in Houston. That created many high tech jobs and much else in Houston and its surroundings. What I'm saying is that without government spending there the place would be a medium sized town with little appeal to large American corporations. Obviously their weather is not appealing.
Then we hear their senators and representatives telling us in the rest of the U.S. to raise ourselves by our bootstraps. I'm not saying that these current Houstonians not be helped but their government officials ooze hypocrisy!
I'm thinking that once these citizens get their government help they'll go on electing senators and Reps who want to deny government help for other sections of our country. And of course they'll want deport all those undocumented immigrants, who are currently their neighbors because then they'll have to share the government largess Houston will be getting.
Then we hear their senators and representatives telling us in the rest of the U.S. to raise ourselves by our bootstraps. I'm not saying that these current Houstonians not be helped but their government officials ooze hypocrisy!
I'm thinking that once these citizens get their government help they'll go on electing senators and Reps who want to deny government help for other sections of our country. And of course they'll want deport all those undocumented immigrants, who are currently their neighbors because then they'll have to share the government largess Houston will be getting.
24
No, they probably won't elect senators and reps who want to deny government help to other parts of the country. Instead, they won't vote at all, so those senators and reps will win (as usual) with little resistance.
Overpopulation. Why aren't we discussing THAT???
9
Oh don't worry, there are plenty of drones repeating that malthusian nonsense endlessly and on every topic imaginable, whether pertinent or not.
The growth of urban living is far more complicated than national population growth. It is a reality because rural living has become unsustainable economically. Large scale distributed manufacturing no longer supports whole swaths of the hinterlands, small, and medium sized cities. Those service and extractive industry jobs that remain can not sustain existing populations and do no stem the migration out of economically depressed areas. Jobs are in metro centres, so people move their and they grow relentlessly, regardless of overall population growth.
The growth of urban living is far more complicated than national population growth. It is a reality because rural living has become unsustainable economically. Large scale distributed manufacturing no longer supports whole swaths of the hinterlands, small, and medium sized cities. Those service and extractive industry jobs that remain can not sustain existing populations and do no stem the migration out of economically depressed areas. Jobs are in metro centres, so people move their and they grow relentlessly, regardless of overall population growth.
3
My family lives in Houston. Fortunately, they were spared from the flooding. My brother believes the only reason they didn't flood is because they live in a part of the city that has not been over built.
Houston is a truly bizarre place. Looking down on the city from a hi-rise, I saw development after development of McMansions built on the smallest of lots, all surrounded by asphalt.There is no public transportation to speak of so the traffic is terrible. And, the lack of zoning regulations is really strange. Hi-rise buildings can be built in the midst of a residential community.
I think the issue of "middle class affordability" is a red herring. Yes, the housing may be affordable but, overall, the quality of that middle class housing is shoddy at best. My brother has lived in quite of few homes in Houston, so I've seen the construction up close. Additionally, allowing developers to build in areas that any reasonable person could predict will flood is outrageous.
Houston is the perfect example of the wild west mentality gone wild and look where that has led. This doesn't have to be an either-or situation. Reasonable restrictions should be put in place that protect citizens and storm water control must be at the top of the list.
Houston is a truly bizarre place. Looking down on the city from a hi-rise, I saw development after development of McMansions built on the smallest of lots, all surrounded by asphalt.There is no public transportation to speak of so the traffic is terrible. And, the lack of zoning regulations is really strange. Hi-rise buildings can be built in the midst of a residential community.
I think the issue of "middle class affordability" is a red herring. Yes, the housing may be affordable but, overall, the quality of that middle class housing is shoddy at best. My brother has lived in quite of few homes in Houston, so I've seen the construction up close. Additionally, allowing developers to build in areas that any reasonable person could predict will flood is outrageous.
Houston is the perfect example of the wild west mentality gone wild and look where that has led. This doesn't have to be an either-or situation. Reasonable restrictions should be put in place that protect citizens and storm water control must be at the top of the list.
82
Maybe as much as 2.67% of homes were flooded, in the world record rain event. We have 6.5 million people in the metro Houston area and maybe as much as 40,000 homes flooded. Do the math, main stream media is ignoring the big picture.
1
$150 billion in rebuilding costs, mostly paid for by the taxpayers of America, that "big picture" enough for you?
10
The numbers are more like 100,000 homes flooded. A very conservative value of repairs for that amount of housing stock is eight billion dollars. That doesn't include anything other than housing stock. Not to worry, the government and US taxpayers will end up footing large amounts of the expense. Privatise profits and socialise losses - it's a great scheme for those profiting off of the miracles of gonzo development and non regulation. In fact the contractors and developers profit multiple times, during the initial build and for each flood event, which is apparently Houston's third 500 year event in three years. You mention a world record rain event - it's more like a US record event - for the continental US. I expect we'll be seeing quite a few more of those 'world record events', thanks in no small part to one of Houston's own industries.
9
As usual, in this article there is no mention of the large role of immigration in making Houston what it is today.
4
More accurately, unbridled growth from US migration, much more than immigration from outside the US. But why point out facts when an agenda works just fine for some people?
10
Texas is the poor person's California and Houston is its LA. Leveraging cheap labor provided by illegal immigrants, for whom Houston has been only a few hours away up US 59, the city exploded into the metastatic mess we all had a good look at during Harvey. A city without any effective infrastructure including functioning storm sewers, relying instead on everything draining in a bayou. A city without anything like public transportation other than a creaky wheezy bus system because Texans don't want to wait on anyone when they have so many pickups to drive...the world's largest concentration of petrochemical refinery capacity and also one of elevated cancer rates, because environmental protection is a quaint concept that people outside Texas may have to acknowledge. But in Texas they let the good ole boys win.
78
Houston is indicative of America itself, a sprawling fat and lazy mass. Because of unlimited growth, unchecked zoning laws, and a complete disregard for the environmental impact this unhealthy city has on its residents, Houston has been an accident waiting to happen for decades. Air-conditioning brought people from the Northeast down to live and work and pay less taxes. They would prefer to pay no taxes, yet receive competent government service. Of course, that is an impossibility, but try to tell that to the millions who vote for idiotic politicos like Trump, Ryan, McConnell, Cornyn and Cruz. They claim we can't afford it. The dams built to hold back flooding were built during the Great Depression by the FDR administration. They managed to do the job as best they could, but they were constructed when Houston was a fraction of the mass it is now, when it still had wetlands to absorb huge rainstorms. Houston has not been a model city for decades, why expect it now? Does anyone think Texas Republicans are going to do anything different? I believe that's the very definition of insanity, wot? Enough said.
DD
Manhattan
DD
Manhattan
42
And yet no discussion of the form of structures. Instead of single family stick-built houses, how about five-story condo buildings built of reinforced concrete from foundation to roof -- no wood involved. The ground floor is parking and maybe some retail. When a Harvey hits, residents can sit on their balconies and watch the waters flow by. The stick-built house is the problem. Go with reinforced concrete, like in Mexico. Nuts that Mexicans live in better structures than Texans.
11
Wood is cheap in the USA, so is land. What you suggest makes no sense given our population density and farmed wood. Yes people in the USA farm trees for lumber.
2
If you are in an earthquake of any size, you don't want to experience the quality of housing codes in Mexico. It is a scandal how many of those houses will collapse. Not up to modern seismic zone construction standards.
1
There are quite a few such apartment/condo buildings in Houston. They're not the majority of housing there, but it's not like Houston is all single-family homes.
What seems to be ignored is that both Houston and Harris County have been working on drainage. Building in flood plains is regulated. Residents in the City of Houston actually voted for a special flood control tax asessment. Without these improvements to the flood drainage system, thousands more homes would have been flooded.
What folk are trying to say is that Houston needs zoning. Everytime someone brings this up, I can't help but ask what did zoning do for Pittsburgh, Detroit, New Orleans, Miami or even San Francisco? Not much but to constrain housing, strangle organic development, and destroy entire urban communities that were bull-dozed for redevelopment.
But if one is going to assert that heavier regulation prevents natural disasters, it didn't prevent the dsmage from Andrew, Katrina or Sandy.
What folk are trying to say is that Houston needs zoning. Everytime someone brings this up, I can't help but ask what did zoning do for Pittsburgh, Detroit, New Orleans, Miami or even San Francisco? Not much but to constrain housing, strangle organic development, and destroy entire urban communities that were bull-dozed for redevelopment.
But if one is going to assert that heavier regulation prevents natural disasters, it didn't prevent the dsmage from Andrew, Katrina or Sandy.
4
Propublica.org published an excellent piece on Houston's tendency to flood--BEFORE Harvey! The zoning regulations you mentioned are a joke. Developers are allowed to build homes in 100-year flood plains, for example. They also build right up against reservoirs and bayous. The gist of the Propublica piece is that the flood maps are entirely unreliable, particularly because global warming has changed the equation. Many Houstonians who don't even live in flood plains get flooded out regularly. As for the tax assessment, it is being heavily litigated by the business community.
22
Of course, it is easy for Mr.Kotkin and Mr.Cox to not back down when the "coastal elite" states are paying for Houston's rebuilding/relief efforts and cheap flood insurance plans.
I will also buy a new Ferrari and wreck it in "once-in-500-year" accidents if the "big gummint" pays for a new car and "small-gummint-regulations" ensure my insurance rates do not go up...
I will also buy a new Ferrari and wreck it in "once-in-500-year" accidents if the "big gummint" pays for a new car and "small-gummint-regulations" ensure my insurance rates do not go up...
35
Mr. Glaeser, a well-known Harvard professor specializing in urban economics, knows full well that in Massachusetts, near Boston, we’re all crammed in. Do you know where we have space? Far from Boston, so the commute is horrible. Then, if you were to build up out there, do you know how those extra cars will get to Boston? Through my small town eight miles from downtown. The highways into Boston are inadequate, get jammed, so commuters cut through my dinky town center, and traffic gets backed up so nobody moves. Build up the outer suburbs and my streets are in gridlock all day. Thanks.
Houston? You had all the space in the world to build it right, yet, you opted for sprawl. I recently drove, for the first time, through Houston. It was a nightmare. Fourteen lanes on Interstate 10 and every lane, except the pay lanes, of course, were jammed. In the middle of the day. You think this is good? I thought I might like to stop, visit, but it became apparent that except for downtown it was all the same: flat, crammed, boring. You could have shown the rest of us how to do it right when you had a blank slate; instead you’ve shown us how to build cheap garbage that gets destroyed in a flood. Glad you have all those civil engineers down there, they did a heck of a job.
Thank you, I’ll go with, as one article put it, my “jackbooted thugs in the zoning department” over Houston, any day.
Houston? You had all the space in the world to build it right, yet, you opted for sprawl. I recently drove, for the first time, through Houston. It was a nightmare. Fourteen lanes on Interstate 10 and every lane, except the pay lanes, of course, were jammed. In the middle of the day. You think this is good? I thought I might like to stop, visit, but it became apparent that except for downtown it was all the same: flat, crammed, boring. You could have shown the rest of us how to do it right when you had a blank slate; instead you’ve shown us how to build cheap garbage that gets destroyed in a flood. Glad you have all those civil engineers down there, they did a heck of a job.
Thank you, I’ll go with, as one article put it, my “jackbooted thugs in the zoning department” over Houston, any day.
67
I don't think it is a case of either choice A or choice B. It is simply deciding what to do going forward, and how are you going to pay for it. I don't think the solution is going to be cheap.
2
Houston is a model of a city that should not even exist! It was planted in a flawed region that is, frankly, just a swamp. The city was founded in 1836 and floods have occurred regularly -- 1837 (2 floods), 1839, 1841, 1843, 1845, 1853, 1854, 1875, 1879, 1887, 1899 and that's just in the 19th century. And then the modern development - without regard to the bayous and the swamps - really started. Jumping to *now,* floods have hit the city in 2015, 2016 and 2017. And it should be rebuilt? Rebuilt to what standards? Big existential questions here. They better be asked and considered in a way they've never been handled.
13
I really like SF, Sonoma, parts of LA and the bounty of California agriculture. So I hope you don't also decree that areas that require federal subsidies to provide water for farms and cities or to take into account the risk of fire, drought, earthquakes, winter storms, and mudslides should also be depopulated out of existence.
2
There must be a third option between Houston's hideous sprawl and obnoxiously anti-family left coast gazillionaire hypocrisy.
Maybe it's time to move to Europe.
Maybe it's time to move to Europe.
4
Certainly it's time to learn from European city planning. The big mistake on the left coast is to regulate against density (read: high-rises), other than that they got it right. And the livability advantage of midsize European cities over their U.S. counterparts is mind-blowing.
5
What might be a more productive use of your time at this particular point post Harvey, is instead of criticizing Houston, spend your time thinking about how your own city would fare with 50 inches of rain. Or, you could spend your time thinking about what you could to help Houston right now... think of the help you would want/need right now if this had happened to your city and bring it!
8
I didn't choose to live in a city that gets 50" of rain. Nor that had "500 year floods" three years running : 2025, 2016, 2017.
Federal money is coming regardless, so in the meantime how about you take a minute to think about your choices?
Federal money is coming regardless, so in the meantime how about you take a minute to think about your choices?
7
Maybe we should be spending our time thinking about what might be causing storms with 50" of rain, or three 500 year floods in three years. I certainly will be thinking about all the taxpayer money being spent to underwrite the building of homes in flood plains and who is profiting off of that.
4
An admirable sentiment! I only wish your Senators and your your congressional delegation shared the same feelings towards New York and New Jersey after Sandy. They held up aid for three months! Now they have their noses on the trough. Yup, memories are long here in Gotham.
3
Ah good old Wendell Cox. His perspectives on what good urbanism is could be equated with Donald Trumps views on the importance of truth and honesty.
7
As long as the US taxpayer keeps bailing Houston's poor decision making out of bankruptcy with cheap flood insurance and disaster relief, Houston will not learn their lesson. It is well past time to say no to US taxpayer dollars going to resurrect a city destroyed by predicted natural events. If they want to live there, they should pay the price.
7
Houston relative to San Francisco and Portland--nope. These are the extremes and this sort of comparison is utterly misleading. There is a vast policy space between the extremes, and this is where the arguments should focus. When looking at marginal trade-offs...a bit less regulation, a bit more planning we can talk about actual choices rather than a difference between cultures.
12
I agree
1
Sometimes it is worth asking the question: What would we do if We (inclusive) had limited time, limited money and limited land? The inclusive "we" is important here as it eliminates the option to presume big government bailouts, to externalize costs, to further defer maintenance, to mortgage the future of our children's children, etc. Suddenly, we are the Dutch after the 1956 floods, or Singapore after 1965. If it were your house with no option to trick anyone else into taking on the costs, what would you do? Like the Netherlands and Singapore, we might build infrastructure corridors first then the rest, but only where it makes long term sense.
5
Of course it is a model city - a model is, after all, a non working replica of the real thing.
39
I expect the Texas Governor, who has rejected Climate Change, Medicare expansion, the ACA, and every other form of Washington meddling, to immediately reject all federal help in rebuilding Houston. Bootstraps and the invisible hand of the marketplace should be enough to show the world that socialism has no place in America.
154
What happens to Houston when the world shifts to electric vehicles? Probably the same thing that happened to Detroit when the world shifted to Japanese and Korean-made vehicles.
28
Texas is a world leader in renewable energy and new Teslas swarm the highways on my side of town.
3
We can only hope.
One thought I had after seeing the flooded housing is to build houses for flood prone areas, elevated, on stilts, suspended ten or twenty feet off the ground. These homes could keep a boat underneath the house for emergencies. There also might be zoning created to allow for such new architectural forms since Houston seems open to improvisation.
15
Saying Houston is an example of "free market" urban planning is like saying the 2008 bank bailouts is an example of "free market" financing. It's not "free market" if taxpayer money is constantly needed to bail you out of disasters.
Here's an idea more in line with true free market principles: First, privatize the National Flood Insurance program. Second, if disaster recovery funding exceeds a certain threshold (such as three "500 year" floods in three consecutive years), the amount of taxpayer money available for recovery becomes severely curtailed. Beyond that, no restrictions on growth. The private market and homeowners bear all responsibility for risk.
By denying public money to bail out poor urban planning, you'll get a solution that avoid bureaucratic nightmares like S.F.'s planning processes yet still is environmentally sensible.
Here's an idea more in line with true free market principles: First, privatize the National Flood Insurance program. Second, if disaster recovery funding exceeds a certain threshold (such as three "500 year" floods in three consecutive years), the amount of taxpayer money available for recovery becomes severely curtailed. Beyond that, no restrictions on growth. The private market and homeowners bear all responsibility for risk.
By denying public money to bail out poor urban planning, you'll get a solution that avoid bureaucratic nightmares like S.F.'s planning processes yet still is environmentally sensible.
94
Good point about the flood insurance. That certainly changes the equation.
4
One factor not discussed much is the basic attractiveness of where to live. The West Coast has many attractive factors - weather, beauty, etc. This creates lots of pressure of people coming here - and the ensuing high costs (supply vs demand). On the other hand, Texas has a lot of hot, dry, flat land. I encourage people to move there all the time. (Remember, keep saying "it's better in Texas).
18
East Texas near Houston is wet and always has been. Once you pass maybe 100 miles from the gulf hills start.
You might want to do something more that repeat TV stereotypes. Texas is about the same size as France and has as much variation in climate and terrain.
You might want to do something more that repeat TV stereotypes. Texas is about the same size as France and has as much variation in climate and terrain.
2
Not many people in Texas live in the "hot, dry, flat part." They live in the "hot, flat" areas, but it's not dry (certainly nowhere near as dry as San Diego), save for frequent droughts.
Houston => a megalopolis in a state, Texas, that has never imposed a personal income tax on its residents. Where does one find the word "accountable" hidden in that phrase?
Harris => a county that paves over every available piece of real estate in order to make every square foot of the region "pay its own way". Some small spots on the county map call themselves independent. Of what? Sprawl? Flooding? Nightmare traffice when it's not raining? Their school systems aren't. See: begging Austin for money.
Twenty years ago I used to drive from one aunt's house to another's - both off of Westheimer (major thruway, west of downtown). In making the 8-10 minute trip, I'd pass a crummy, plot with just enough grass to keep a small herd of Santa Gertrudis grazing all day. A small slice of land between two commercial properties. Where in any U.S. city's urban planning manual is this vital feature discussed?
Houston + Harris + Texas. The only change they'll adopt will be those Mother Nature violently, suddenly imposes on them. See: a civilized people.
Harris => a county that paves over every available piece of real estate in order to make every square foot of the region "pay its own way". Some small spots on the county map call themselves independent. Of what? Sprawl? Flooding? Nightmare traffice when it's not raining? Their school systems aren't. See: begging Austin for money.
Twenty years ago I used to drive from one aunt's house to another's - both off of Westheimer (major thruway, west of downtown). In making the 8-10 minute trip, I'd pass a crummy, plot with just enough grass to keep a small herd of Santa Gertrudis grazing all day. A small slice of land between two commercial properties. Where in any U.S. city's urban planning manual is this vital feature discussed?
Houston + Harris + Texas. The only change they'll adopt will be those Mother Nature violently, suddenly imposes on them. See: a civilized people.
14
Obviously, there are better ways to guide cities toward sustainable development, but even the best of intentions are fighting the power of money, from the wealthy, developers, and property owners. Along with the true power running cities is the NIMBYism that Krugman writes of, but not just in San Francisco, but also in the suburbs.
4
This quote is quite disturbing:
It’s an example, according to a very different interpretation, of how to create affordable housing. It’s proof that fewer regulations mean more prosperity, that the market knows better than any central planner.
Maybe the free market, without the help US government, can rebuild and replenish the Houston model.
It’s an example, according to a very different interpretation, of how to create affordable housing. It’s proof that fewer regulations mean more prosperity, that the market knows better than any central planner.
Maybe the free market, without the help US government, can rebuild and replenish the Houston model.
55
Those inexpensive houses, built with a lot of low cost materials and immigrant labor get expensive the 3rd time you have to replace the carpets, wallboard, and even the ceilings. But your HOA will be sure to tell you that your grass is too long and that you need to put on a new coat of paint -- add long as it's one of the 5 or 6 approved neutral colors. And the house we sold 15 years ago? It stayed dry.
15
If Houston wants to double down on TANSTAAFL free-market forces, they will want to take out loans, not federal grants, for reconstruction. What, I wonder, would the interest rate be for a commercial $150 Billion loan, with a fairly high risk of catastrophic loss in the next 20 years? Fortunately for Houston, the city's unaccounted, intangible, para-market contribution to the economy over the past century and more will be included in the social welfare of cities equation.
20
In my mind there are really three, mostly independent questions:
Allow new construction or don't? (High prices v low)
Have the new construction be sprawly v urban in nature?
Build adequit drainage canals v don't?
And the answer to me is allow new construction like Houston, have it be urban in nature like the new construction in Denver, and build humongous drainage canals like Singapore.
Allow new construction or don't? (High prices v low)
Have the new construction be sprawly v urban in nature?
Build adequit drainage canals v don't?
And the answer to me is allow new construction like Houston, have it be urban in nature like the new construction in Denver, and build humongous drainage canals like Singapore.
6
There is no affordable housing in Houston when you consider the property taxes being over 3%. How can a middle class afford to pay more than double the taxes every year compared to many other states?
6
No state income tax?
5
No state income tax. In NC, our state income tax is over 7%.
8
Well, what is the assessed value of flooded property? In all fairness, I suppose your property just rose in value if it stayed dry, and your property taxes along with it. Whether or not you can afford to pay the increase or not seems irrelevant. I don't know what the effect on the multitude of taxing entities will be, including the Harris County Flood Control District. Those questions will be asked publicly in due course.
3
The costs and benefits of lighter vs more extensive regulation, planning, and infrastructure investment can be debated. What can not be debated is that the lack of flood mitigation in Houston resulted in privatized gains pre-flood, and will result in increased costs post-flood. If we privatize local gains, but nationalize the excess costs, we are incentivizing economically 'bad behavior'. Congress should be 'fair', but as you sow, so shall you reap.
127
Yes. How many times does this have to be repeated about Houston, New Orleans, Florida, Outer Banks, Gulf Coast -- you build on low-lands, by big water, in a HURRICANE zone, there are going to be $$$$$ problems that are predictable.
Ditto, SFO and earthquake zones.
Taxpayers cannot subsidize these areas, anymore. Period.
Ditto, SFO and earthquake zones.
Taxpayers cannot subsidize these areas, anymore. Period.
35
The commitment to rebuild Houston as it was is natural and has been the response elsewhere to disaster. But it guarantees a repeat of the same disaster.
19
As the term Robert Reich has popularized, lemon socialism, it means privatizing gains but incurring public costs, also known as "Socialism for the rich and capitalism for the poor." The public coffers subsidize deals made for private wealth that mean nothing to the local government except maybe future costs. You see it many spheres, stadium deals, finance bailouts, labor laws, war, etc., ad nauseam.
72