New Geography

Category: Suburbs

  • Queensland’s Future: Diverse and Dispersed

    I was recently asked to outline my thoughts on how the Queensland urban landscape might look 40 to 50 years from now.  Go on, you can laugh.  I did too.  It’s hard enough to forecast the next 12 months, let alone two generations away, but I’ve given it a go, of sorts, so here it is:

    First though, it might be best to outline my methodology.  In short, this forecast will be based on underlying trends, some understanding of human nature, and importantly, the Australian mindset.  My outlook is supported by evidence – what people actually do rather than say – and importantly, not by urban myths or fallacies, despite the frequency with which they have been aired of late.  Unfortunately, we don’t have the space or the time here to support every claim or go into massive detail; so this discussion is confined to broad shapes – not nitty gritty.

    Queensland’s urban future (and that of Australia) can best be summed up in two words – Diverse and Dispersed.

    Let’s deal with the second D – dispersion – first.  Our regional centres are likely to become a whole lot bigger and at the expense of the already crowded south-east corner of the state.  The move away from the world’s bigger cities is already underway, as evidenced in the recent census in the United States, but also throughout much of Europe.  Several Asian and Middle-eastern countries are now also following suite  As a Mckinsey Institute study recently found, smaller cities, particularly in the developing world, are growing considerably faster than the much discussed megacities.

    The annual ABS small-area population data suggests this trend is also very true in Australia and particularly in Queensland, which, over the past decade, been the fastest growing state on the continent, appears to be following the same trend, something likely to be borne out by 2011 Census, due later this year .

    Within our capital cities themselves, the much ballyhooed move downtown will slow – again, it already is doing so – as the cost to live within close proximity to the CBD is just too high compared to the real benefits. 

    The irrational assertions about the trend towards denser living rest on urban myths that promote inner city density over other housing forms. These include the notion that suburban growth worsens carbon emissions and traffic congestion; people are being forced to live far from jobs concentrated in our CBDs and denser development will make it cheaper for them to get to work. These notions are all largely exaggerated or incorrect. More to the point, they stand in opposition to the basic preferences of the market.  

    Instead of having a single high-density city core, with lower development density radiating outwards, the most likely urban shape in the future will be one of more even distribution of housing density throughout the city; concentrated more, no doubt, around middle-ring transport hubs and new master planned town-centres.  Our middle-ring and outer suburbs will have much more compact urban settings but will remain primarily dominated by relatively low density housing.

    Diversity relates to the housing stock itself.  The current push towards smaller dwellings has little to do with demographics and the market’s wants, but reflects basic reaction to diminished housing affordability.   There is a demand for tightly-sized product, but it is nowhere as near as high, nor is the long-term trend towards such as strong, as the urban boosters advocate.

    Taking a wider view, Australia (and America too) is still in its frontier or "barbaric" stage of its cultural evolution.  We walk with wide gaits, worship most things large from roadside bananas to women’s appendages, and don’t really like crowded spaces or queues Most of us like our space; aren’t really ready to give it up, and are not likely to do so for many decades to come.

    Rather than remaining focused on density and concentration, it could well serve the community to focus on what appeals to the vast majority of the population, particularly the middle and working class families.  A more practical approach might be to foster the development of smaller, more efficient cities, as well as expansive suburbs and revived small towns rather than engage in a manic drive towards persistent centralization. 

    Rather a forced density agenda on a largely unwilling population, it makes sense to consider how to make a more dispersed (and diverse) urban future more workable and sustainable. Innovations in work environments, notably increased use of telecommuting and dispersed workplaces, and more fuel efficient cars hold more promise than plans that force Aussies to live a way the vast majority do not prefer.

    This article originally appeared in the June/July 2011 edition of the UDIA Queensland’s Urban Developer Magazine.

    Michael Matusik is a qualified town planner and director of independent residential development advisory firm, Matusik Property Insights.

    Photo by Michael Zimmer.

  • The Evolving Urban Form: Los Angeles

    Los Angeles has grown more than any major metropolitan region in the high income world except for Tokyo since the beginning of the twentieth century, and also since 1950.  In 1900, the city (municipality, see Note) of Los Angeles had little over 100,000 people and ranked 36th in population in the nation behind Allegheny, Pennsylvania (which has since merged with Pittsburgh) and St. Joseph Missouri (which has since lost more than one quarter of its population).

    As people moved West in the intervening decades and especially after World War II, the Los Angeles area exploded in population. By 1960, the Los Angeles metropolitan area, which was then and is now composed of Los Angeles and Orange counties, had passed Chicago to become second in population only to the New York metropolitan area. It was to take considerably longer for the city of Los Angeles to pass the city of Chicago as the nation’s second largest municipality, though this occurred by the 1990 census.

    The Los Angeles combined statistical area (analogous to the former consolidated metropolitan statistical area) is made up of three metropolitan areas, Los Angeles, Riverside – San Bernardino and Oxnard (Ventura County). This combined area covers 35,000 square miles or more than 90,000 square kilometers. This is a land area nearly as large as that of Hungary and larger than Austria. The overwhelming share of the CSA is rural, with less than 10 percent of the land area developed.

    Growth from 1900: The CSA had only 250,000 people in 1900, though grew to nearly 5,000,000 in 1950. By 2010, the population was nearing 18 million, a figure not much less than that of Australia, at 22 million (Table 1). Indeed until 1990 the Los Angeles CSA population was closing in on Australia. However, since that time population growth in the Los Angeles area has slowed considerably and Australia should remain larger.

    Table 1
    Los Angeles Combined Statistical Area: Population (CSA): 1900-2010
    Year City of Los Angeles Balance: LA County  Los Angeles County   Orange County   Riverside County   San Bernardino County   Ventura County   Total 
    1900        102,479                   67,819         170,298           19,696         17,897            27,929         14,367         250,187
    1910        319,198                 184,933         504,131           34,436         34,696            56,706         18,347         648,316
    1920        576,673                 359,782         936,455           61,375         50,297            73,401         28,724     1,150,252
    1930    1,238,048                 970,444      2,208,492         118,674         81,024         133,900         54,976     2,597,066
    1940    1,504,277              1,281,366      2,785,643         130,760       105,524         161,108         69,685     3,252,720
    1950    1,970,358              2,181,329      4,151,687         216,224       170,046         281,642       114,647     4,934,246
    1960    2,479,015              3,559,756      6,038,771         703,925       306,191         503,591       199,138     7,751,616
    1970    2,816,061              4,216,014      7,032,075     1,420,386       459,074         684,072       376,430     9,972,037
    1980    2,966,850              4,510,653      7,477,503     1,932,709       663,166         895,016       529,174   11,497,568
    1990    3,485,398              5,377,766      8,863,164     2,410,556    1,170,413      1,418,380       669,016   14,531,529
    2000    3,694,820              5,824,518      9,519,338     2,846,289    1,545,387      1,709,434       753,197   16,373,645
    2010    3,792,621              6,025,984      9,818,605     3,010,232    2,189,641      2,035,210       823,318   17,877,006
    Consolidated statistical area as defined by OMB as of 2010

    The city of Los Angeles had grown 88 percent from 1950 to 2000, but over the past decade added only three percent to its population. Even more spectacular declines in growth occurred in the rest of the CSA. For example, Orange County had grown 1200 percent between 1950 and 2000 yet grew only six percent in the last decade.

    Growth: 2000 to 2010: The population growth in the Los Angeles CSA was widely dispersed and away from the core. The central area (urban core) of the city Los Angeles extends from the Santa Monica Mountains to South Los Angeles and from the boundaries of Beverly Hills, West Hollywood and Culver City to East Los Angeles grew only 0.7 percent. Uniquely, the central area densified strongly between 1960 and 2000, while other urban cores nearly all declined in population, whether in the United States or Western Europe. Much of this was due to strong immigration from Mexico, other parts of Latin America, as well as Asia.

    The inner suburban ring, which includes the balance of Los Angeles County south of the Santa Susana and San Gabriel Mountains as well as the older northwestern Orange County suburbs grew by 1.5 percent. Within this area, 32 inner suburbs (all in Los Angeles County) grew from 1.766 million to 1.767 million (0.1 percent) from 2000 to 2010 (Note 2).

    The outer suburbs, which include the balance of Orange County (including the Mission Viejo urban area) and the western portions of Riverside and San Bernardino counties (including the Riverside – San Bernardino urban area) grew 19 percent.

    The exurban areas, which include areas outside the core urban areas of Los Angeles, Riverside-San Bernardino and Mission Viejo grew 30 percent. The hot spots included Ventura County, the Santa Clarita Valley, the Antelope Valley, the Victorville-Hesperia area, the Coachella Valley (Indio-Palm Springs), the Hemet area and the Temecula-Murrieta area. An argument could be made that Temecula-Murrieta would be in the San Diego metropolitan area if metropolitan areas were defined by smaller area units, such as municipalities (as in Canada) or census tracts. The exurban areas are more attractive to residents at least in part because of considerably less expensive housing and their greater availability of detached houses than in the three core urban areas.

    More remote areas of the desert extending to the Nevada and Arizona borders added 42 percent to their population (Table 2, Figure 1 and 2).

    Table 2
    Los Angeles CSA: Population by Sector: 2000-2010
    Sector 2000 2010 Change % Change
    Central Los Angeles          1,752,024              1,763,967         11,943 0.7%
    Inner Ring          9,093,756              9,231,513       137,757 1.5%
    Outer Suburbs          3,053,615              3,630,273       576,658 18.9%
    Exurbs          2,173,459              2,822,884       649,425 29.9%
    Remote             301,331                 428,369       127,038 42.2%
    Total       16,374,185            17,877,006    1,502,821 9.2%

    City of Los Angeles: The dispersion of population was also evident in the city of Los Angeles. For decades, the city of Los Angeles has grown strongly. Approximately one-quarter of this growth since 1960 has been the densifying central area, as noted above.

    However, little noted is the fact that most of the city’s growth was greenfield suburban in nature, built at low and moderate densities and largely car-oriented. For most of the past fifty years the growth has been “over the hill” in the San Fernando Valley, a formerly rural area which was annexed by the city before 1930. Between 1950 and 2010, the population of the San Fernando Valley grew from 300,000 to 1,400,000. Thus, the Valley grew like virtually every fast-growing historical core city in the nation that has grown since 1950, by filling up empty land (Figure 3).

    Much has been written about the “Manhattanization” of the Los Angeles core. However, with only 13 towers more than 550 feet, downtown Los Angeles is no threat to Manhattan, with more than 125, or even Chicago with more than 70. Further, job growth is stagnant, with virtually no change in private sector employment over the last decade, despite substantial government subsidies.

    Between 2000 and 2010, the central area grew at its slowest rate since the 1950s, growing by only 0.7 percent to its population, growing only 12,000 (to 1,764,000) or barely 12 percent of the city’s growth. Nonetheless, and contrary to the reputation of Los Angeles, the central area is very densely populated, at approximately 14,000 people per square mile, with the highest density census tracts having more than 90,000 residents per square mile. Among the nation’s largest municipalities, only New York and San Francisco are denser than central Los Angeles.

    The big story in growth was on periphery. The San Fernando Valley captured 70 percent of the city’s growth in the 2000s, with considerable greenfield expansion in the hills north of Chatsworth and Northridge. Even so, the Valley’s growth was only five percent. The western portion of the city, which extends from the Santa Monica Mountains to Los Angeles International Airport, grew three percent and accounted for 13 percent of the city’s growth. The Harbor area added two percent to its population and accounted for five percent of the city’s growth (Figure 4).

    The Future: Growth or Stagnation? After more than a century of spectacular growth, Los Angeles demographic juggernaut is stagnating and could conceivably go in reverse due to declining immigration, an exodus of middle class and working class families.  Indeed Even the strong growth in the outer suburbs and exurbs was not sufficient to drag the regional population increase (9 percent) up to the national rate of 10 percent between 2000 and 2010.

    The immediate prognosis should be for even slower growth. The financial, regulatory and cost of living disadvantages of California are widely recognized by households and businesses alike. With stronger regulations in the offing, such as the stronger land use restrictions likely to occur as a result of Senate Bill 375, any future growth on the periphery could be dampened. Even with multi-billion support in terms of tax breaks and public investment, the central core seems unlikely to come close to making much of a real difference, at least beyond the media.  Los Angeles may not be on the road to Rust Belt stagnation, but the dynamism of the last century is no more.

    ——

    Note 1: In this article, the term "city" means municipality.

    Note 2: This includes municipalities and census designated places nearest the central area of the city of Los Angeles, from Glendale and Pasadena through Monterey Park to South Gate, Compton and Gardena and to the west of the central area.

    Note 3: Biographical Note: The author was born in the Echo Park district, near downtown Los Angeles.

    Photograph: Downtown Los Angeles from Echo Park (by author)

    Wendell Cox is a Visiting Professor, Conservatoire National des Arts et Metiers, Paris and the author of “War on the Dream: How Anti-Sprawl Policy Threatens the Quality of Life”

  • Banana-nomics

    The price of bananas is again making headlines as it pushes up inflation and threatens rising interest rates. But what’s the price of the humble ‘nana got to do with property markets? Plenty.

    Banana prices have risen almost 500% since Cyclone Yasi wiped out much of north Queensland’s banana crop earlier this year. The immutable laws of supply and demand dictate that when supply falls relative to demand, prices will rise. Which is what they have done, and as they did a few years ago when the same thing happened after Cyclone Larry. As banana supply was restored, prices fell. As they will again.

    Banana prices are a self-evident, every day example of supply and demand at work. They’re the sort of example understood by consumers and even school children with no formal economic training. But clearly the lessons are beyond the capacity of some Australian politicians, most land regulators and many town planners. In the very same way that constraints on supply create scarcity value for every day commodities, constraints on supply and scarcity equate to rising prices for all types of real estate, not just housing.

    It starts with misguided planning schemes that aim to direct consumer behaviour and distort their purchasing decisions by limiting choice. This has become commonplace in planning to the point of representing accepted wisdom. One of the most obvious examples has been the continued efforts by some regulators and planning authorities to attack the detached house as a choice – however best suited to the needs of young families – which ‘Australia can no longer afford.’ Like a contemporary version of Stalinist central command, housing choice is distorted via planning schemes that are biased to high density apartments in central locations (that consumers are told is good for society), as opposed to detached housing on the urban boundary (that remains the majority consumer preference). Faced with little choice, more people are forced to choose the option deemed appropriate by higher authorities than themselves, and when this is later reflected in data, the regulators hail this as some sort of fundamental change in consumer preferences. You’re seeing this type of shallow analysis in the media, pushed by various interest groups, on a regular basis now.

    An equally significant consequence of using planning ideology to achieve social engineering outcomes has been the impact on prices. In the case of raw land for housing, we have succeeded in the unimaginable – needlessly elevating prices far beyond the reach of average Australians, on the basis that we may run out of land, in a country where land is plentiful. This has been achieved simply by making raw land for detached housing development scarce because permission is not allowed outside artificially drawn urban planning boundaries. (On top of creating scarcity, of course, new land supply is taxed more aggressively than existing supply, via upfront levies. This is no doubt because there are fewer votes at risk in taxing new housing lots as opposed to raising council rates or other broad based revenue measures. Plus, new supply is tied up in a regulatory tangle which now means it can take 5 or 10 years just to get permission to develop land in areas already described as intended for future housing. Go figure).

    The proof is readily available. In the Brisbane region, for example, the price of vacant land per metre is now 2.3 times (230%) what is was a decade ago. Established house prices also increased, but at a lower rate – they are 1.5 times (150%) the price a decade ago. Average weekly earnings, just to bring it back to earth, are 0.6 times (60% higher) what they were a decade earlier.

    In Melbourne, where supply constraints have been more sensibly managed, land for housing is 1.3 times the price of a decade earlier. Little wonder developers are giving up hope for south east Queensland and focussing their energies in Victoria.

    If the fundamentals of supply and demand (let’s call it banana-nomics) are so obvious in the market for new land for housing, where else are they revealing themselves?

    Recent reports have noted that Australian retail property rents (a lot like our housing prices) are amongst the highest in the world. Research by CB Richard Ellis suggests that rents in Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane are higher than the better shopping strips in Los Angeles or Milan. How can this be? Los Angeles County has a population of around 10 million people, some of whom are noted big spenders. Retail demand there would dwarf that of Brisbane’s retail spend.

    Once again, the answer lies in supply. LA’s ‘sprawl’ is arguably more about the historically easy dispersion of retail and commercial space along high streets and back roads throughout the metro area, as it is about expanding housing. As LA developed, it was relatively easy to create new retail space, and there is plenty of redundant retail space in older strip areas where secondary traders can operate at low market rents. In Australia, by contrast, planning constraints have been much more onerous. The major retail centres, developed from the 1960s to the late 1990s throughout metropolitan areas largely remain the same major centres we have today. Finding new opportunities for retail expansion is a large hurdle which few clear – protection of the retail hierarchy and existing centres, and preventing a dispersal of retail activity beyond existing areas, is the deliberate intention of urban planning schemes.

    The result has been that those with the existing retail centres have paid for, and now own, a precious commodity: the permission to conduct retail activity, with limited threat of competition in that catchment. Our retail rents have grown because retailers – and consumers – have had limited alternative choices. New retail operators have encountered barriers to entry in the form of planning laws and no-compete clauses, once again reinforcing the value of existing permissions. Just ask Aldi or Costco what they think our planning schemes are doing for competition if you don’t believe it.

    City carparking is another example of banana-nomics at work. A study by Colliers International reveals that city parking costs in Sydney and Melbourne are more expensive than London, Tokyo or New York. Brisbane came in at 14th most expensive on a global list of 156 central business districts. How can it be? The answer is simply that the anti-car crusade has led to planning policies which deliberately seek to limit CBD parking spaces, in the futile hope that this will somehow force people to abandon the convenience (and frequently the necessity) of private transport in favour of buses or trains.

    Those ambitions have never come to much, so regulators then resort to the blunt weapon of taxes – with car parking levies now common in many cities and the prospects of congestion charging for access to CBDs frequently rearing its ugly head. This deliberate attempt to restrict (and then punitively tax) the supply of city parking spaces has the inevitable effect of raising prices.

    But there is one fundamental difference between how banana-nomics works for banana growers and property developers. Banana growers can grow more plants and create more supply. The same can’t be said for developers of property. In housing, new supply is likely to remain constrained by growth boundaries and the preference of regulators towards higher and medium density within existing areas. This will create a floor under the cost of new supply which means that prices are unable to fall (they can’t fall below the cost of production). So raw land is unlikely to get much cheaper, unless there are some radical (and many would say much needed) reforms to planning policies around Australia.

    The same applies to retail property. Retailers (most recently evidence by Solomon Lew’s Just Group comments about retail rents) may object to high rentals, but they won’t get much option. Major retail centres are where the action is, and the alternative (on-line retail) isn’t sufficiently appealing to the majority of consumers, who get more from their shopping trip than just a retail transaction. New shopping centres won’t be created within existing urban boundaries because planning schemes are unlikely to allow further retail dispersion away from existing centres. In the limited cases where approval is granted, existing centre owners will play hard ball, arguing fervently against the free market (witness Westfield’s objections to a new Aldi Store, approved by Brisbane City Council, north of Brisbane). Their actions are understandable, given they’ve outlaid very large investments that are contingent on the existing planning scheme remaining.

    And the same applies to car parking. Unless there’s a monumental shift in policy attitudes to private transport and city car parking, we aren’t going to see multiple new above or below ground public car parks being created in our cities, no matter how much the demand. That will mean prices remain high.

    In all cases, it has been the planning regulations that restrict supply and limit choice, not demand, that have been responsible for making our housing, our retail rents, our car parking and so much more, amongst the costliest in the world. And given that those constraints are unlikely to change, you’re unlikely to see that position reverse itself any time soon.

    The burning question, of course, is how long can it last? If supply costs elevate prices beyond the capacity or desire to pay, people stop buying. Economies slow down. The music stops.

    How do you like them apples?

    Ross Elliott has more than 20 years experience in property and public policy. His past roles have included stints in urban economics, national and state roles with the Property Council, and in destination marketing. He has written extensively on a range of public policy issues centering around urban issues, and continues to maintain his recreational interest in public policy through ongoing contributions such as this or via his monthly blog The Pulse.

    Photo by Fernanado Stankuns.

  • Sustaining the Suburbs

    The proposition is simple, if not overwhelming.  If we want sustainable cities – however you define “sustainable” – we had better put some effort into the quality of suburban life.  We need to get over denigrating suburbs and sprawl.  That simply ducks the issue of where and how most people spend most of their time.  We need to moderate a preoccupation with promoting CBD and big centre lifestyles.  Those are places that people want visit, but not necessarily where they want to live.

    Come back Jane, our suburbs need you
    It’s fifty years now since Jane Jacobs’ landmark book about saving North American cities from themselves.  She argued against the prevailing push for urban renewal as displacing communities and destroying street life with motorways, car parks, and bland commercial development.  Jacobs’ writing and her activism inspired a resistance credited with saving inner city villages, helping retain the human character of large cities, and inspiring a generation of urban designers and planners. 

    There is no doubt that the Jacobs message took hold in New Zealand.  It’s become compelling since the crash of ‘87 slowed down the razing of inner city blocks and marked the beginning of the end of the white collar CBD.  Hanging on to what we’ve got is one way to stop the hollowing out.

    Unfortunately, today’s call for central city mega projects on which to stake a claim to an international presence and the push for large scale CBD residential development on which to stake a claim to environmental stewardship run the risk of reversing the gains to inner city life.  High rise apartments, tracts of high density housing, and grandiose civic plans risk undermining the essence of the central city in the same way as urban renewal and freeways once did.

    But that’s not what this posting is about.  The reality is that the bulk of our populations live in the suburbs; the suburbs that are growing the most; and that’s where we need to promote the capacity for people to live fulfilling lives.  That’s where today we need to promote street life and be wary of the threats posed by the new urbanists and their grand plans for intensification.

    Most people still live in the suburbs
    Its obvious that most people still live a suburban life.  But that doesn’t seem to be appreciated by the people who plan our cities today, even as the number of suburban residents keeps growing.

    Look at the three metropolitan areas in New Zealand, not big by international standards, but nevertheless reflecting an entrenched trend in the developed world – a move to decentralise.  The numbers say it all. 

    Over the last 14 years population growth has been totally dominated by the suburbs.  In Auckland, the inner city accounted for only 6% of a 326,000 person increase.  In other words, 305,000 opted to live in the suburbs and beyond, compared with 21,000 in the central city.  In Christchurch, the CBD accounted for just 1% of population growth and the rest of the inner city 2%.  Wellington, the capital city with a distinctively constrained setting did much better, but a revitalised CBD still accounted for just 10% of population growth. [1]

    Population Growth in the Central City: Auckland, Wellington, Christchurch, 1996-2010
    Source: Statistics New Zealand

    And they still favour the outer suburbs

    Let’s break this down a little further.  Greater Christchurch Urban Development Strategy Partners (http://www.greaterchristchurch.org.nz/) came up with a plan for consolidating the city.  This includes policies promoting central city living or living around established commercial centres and development contained largely within metropolitan limits.  Well, we can see the warning signs for this sort of thinking from the very small share of recent growth in the inner city.  It seems that the new plan is set to fly in the face of recent experience.   

    And if we divide Christchurch’s suburbs into three groups (inner, outer, and periphery) we find the decentralising tendency that it is set against is even stronger . [2]

    Population Growth in Christchurch Suburbs, 1996-2010

    The peripheral suburbs on the city fringes have led growth rates, while the outer suburbs have led absolute growth.  (That’s if we overlook the fact that the small towns in Christchurch’s hinterland left out of this analysis have grown at even faster rates, with the adjoining districts two of the fastest three growth areas in New Zealand).

    Does it make sense to stem this pressure?  Not if we want the cities to continue to grow, because the majority of people clearly favour suburban living, and that’s where the greatest capacity for accommodating them lies. 

    So while it’s exciting to record rapid growth rates of population gain in our inner cities, policy makers really need to make sure we are doing the right thing by our suburbs. 

    Places to live …
    This may mean, for example, ensuring that we don’t sacrifice too many of the green spaces to high density housing: our suburbs also need to breathe.  If we want to lift densities, then terraced units and the occasional low rise apartment may be all we need.  They are probably the most easily achieved forms of intensification in areas where consolidating sites is notoriously difficult and where existing residents will fight to preserve existing character. 

    Better still may be judicious development of greenfield sites, where we can boost densities by applying the principles of Smart Growth without destroying what people value about what went before, without overloading existing facilities and infrastructure, creating attractive public and private realms, and potentially enhancing rather than trashing biodiversity, water and air quality.

    Places to work …

    >We will also need to promote neighbourhood centres to ensure that they can accommodate diverse activities and services, that they are easy to get to and get around, well appointed and vibrant.  They may even become the focus of modest park and ride facilities, the framework around which flexible public transport within and beyond the neighbourhood can best be delivered.

    It may be timely to review what in our planning provisions force people to make regular cross-city journeys to work, and whether this can be changed through more decentralised employment. 

    Places to play …
    While local centres are becoming the focus of community and neighbourhood commerce and culture, suburban parks and gardens will also have a role to play.  We need good spaces close to the majority of homes for sport and recreation, and safe local places for families and children to gather.   

    We might more actively protect some of the informal spaces in our suburbs, and take a broad view of what constitutes heritage in doing so.  We may have to protect landscapes and structures because they are iconic in local areas, not because we believe they may have national or international significance.  Where they don’t exist, we may even have to create the landmarks, the parks and town belts, and the structures that reinforce local identity and culture.

    Strong suburbs for a strong CBD
    By allowing more things to happen in the suburbs without overloading them with bland residential development or tracts of mixed use that fall between urban design stools, we have an opportunity to advance the planners’ live-work-play mantra, and to enhance the sustainability of our cities. 

    Ultimately, it is the quality of day-to-day life in a city and its capacity to attract and hold skilled and motivated people that will determine its prosperity.  And it is those people and that prosperity that will underwrite the health of the CBD.  Without strong suburbs, we cannot sustain a strong CBD.

    [1]            For this exercise, the following council areas were counted, Kapiti, Porirua, Upper and Lower Hutt, and Wellington City.

    [2]           This classification omits the largely rural Banks Peninsula which is quite separate from the metropolitan area.

    Phil McDermott is a Director of CityScope Consultants in Auckland, New Zealand, and Adjunct Professor of Regional and Urban Development at Auckland University of Technology.  He works in urban, economic and transport development throughout New Zealand and in Australia, Asia, and the Pacific.  He was formerly Head of the School of Resource and Environmental Planning at Massey University and General Manager of the Centre for Asia Pacific Aviation in Sydney. This piece originally appeared at is blog: Cities Matter.

    Photo by New Zealand Defence Force.

  • How Los Angeles Lost Its Mojo

    Los Angeles today is a city in secular decline. Its current political leadership seems determined to turn the sprawling capitalist dynamo into a faux New York. But they are more likely to leave behind a dense, government-dominated, bankrupt, dysfunctional, Athens by the Pacific.

    The greatness of Los Angeles stemmed from its willingness to be different. Unlike Chicago or Denver or New York, the Los Angeles metro area was designed not around a central core but on a series of centers, connected first by railcars and later by the freeways. The result was a dispersed metropolis where most people occupied single-family houses in middle-class neighborhoods.

    Lured by the pleasant climate and a business-dominated political economy, industries and entrepreneurs flocked to the region. Initially, the growth came largely from oil and agriculture, followed by the movie industry. Defense and aerospace during World War II and the postwar era fostered a vast industrial base, and by the 1980s Los Angeles had surpassed New York as the nation’s largest port, and Chicago as the nation’s leading industrial center.

    The region hit a rough spot as the end of the Cold War led to massive federal cutbacks in aerospace. Los Angeles County lost nearly 500,000 jobs between 1990 and 1993. But it bounced back, adding nearly 400,000 jobs between 1993 and 1999. Aerospace never fully recovered, but other parts of the industrial belt—including the port and the apparel and entertainment industries—grew. An entrepreneurial class of immigrants—Middle Eastern, Korean, Chinese, Latino—launched new businesses in everything from textiles and ethnic food to computers. The pro-business mayoralty of Richard Riordan and the governorship of Pete Wilson restored confidence among the city’s beleaguered companies.

    Then progress stalled. Employment stayed relatively flat from 2001 until 2005, when Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa was elected, and then started to drop. As of this March, over the entire L.A. metropolitan area, which includes adjacent Orange County, unemployment was 11.4%—the third-highest unemployment rate of the nation’s 20 largest metro areas.

    Why has Los Angeles lost its mojo? A big reason is a decline in the power and mettle of the city’s once-vibrant business community. Between the late 1980s and the end of the millennium, many of L.A.’s largest and most influential firms—ARCO, Security Pacific, First Interstate, Union Oil, Sun America—disappeared in a host of mergers that saw their management shift to cities like London, New York and San Francisco. Meanwhile, says David Abel, a Democratic Party activist and publisher of the influential Planning Report, once-powerful groups like the Los Angeles Chamber of Commerce and the Los Angeles County Economic Development Corporation lost influence.

    The machine that now controls Los Angeles by default consists of an alliance between labor and the political leadership of the Latino community, the area’s largest ethnic population. But since politicians serve at the whim of labor interests, they seldom speak up for homeowners and small businesses.

    Mayor Villaraigosa, a former labor organizer, has little understanding of private-sector economic development beyond well-connected real-estate interests whom he has courted and which have supported him. He has been a strong backer of L.A. Live, a downtown ports and entertainment complex, and other projects that have benefited from favorable tax treatment and major public infrastructure investments. He’s currently supporting a push to build a new downtown football stadium, though L.A. has no professional football team. His biggest priority is to build the so-called subway to the sea, a $40 billion train line to connect downtown with the Pacific.

    But L.A.’s downtown employs a mere 2.5% of the region’s work force; New York’s central business districts, by contrast, employ roughly 20%. “To put the entire focus of development on downtown L.A.,” says Ali Modarres, chairman of the geography department at Cal State Los Angeles, “is to ignore the historical, cultural, economic [and] social forces that have shaped the larger geography of this metropolitan area.”

    Moreover, the mayor’s accent downtown is on housing, not manufacturing. And as Cecilia Estolano, former head of the Community Redevelopment Agency, points out, “downtown housing simply doesn’t create the jobs that small manufacturers do.”

    Meantime, business-strangling regulations proliferate, often with support from a powerful and well-heeled environmental movement, which Mr. Villaraigosa counts on for political support and media validation. There are draconian moves to control emissions at the port from ships and trucks. Also harmful are the city’s efforts to expand the unions’ presence from the docks to the entire network of trucks serving the port—essentially forcing out independent carriers, many of them Latino entrepreneurs, in favor of larger firms using Teamster drivers.

    Such policies could backfire, says economist John Husing, leading shippers to transfer their business to cheaper and less heavily regulated ports such as Charleston, Houston, Savannah and other growth-oriented southern cities. This is particularly dangerous given the planned 2014 widening of the Panama Canal, which will make Southeastern ports far more competitive for Asia-based trade. Mr. Husing notes that L.A.’s port is the largest generator of blue-collar employment in the region.

    Even some liberal Democrats are beginning to realize that the current system isn’t sustainable. Writing recently in the Los Angeles Business Journal, Roderick Wright, a Democratic state senator from south Los Angeles, compared the state and local governments with the Mafia. The “vig” that government takes from local businesses, Mr. Wright argued—both in taxes and in the cost of regulation—has undermined job creation, particularly in working-class districts like his. He also warned that renewable-energy mandates recently imposed by the state would boost the cost of energy in the region, already 53% above the national average, by an additional 20% to 25%.

    Who will challenge the machine and its ruinous economic policy? It’s not likely to be the city’s enervated business sector. But the city’s working and middle classes might, says Ron Kaye, former editor of the San Fernando Valley–based Daily News. He points to the city’s remaining middle-class homeowners, who are concentrated in the San Fernando Valley but also occupy a number of diverse neighborhoods. “These are the places that reflect the whole idea of L.A., as opposed to the Villaraigosa vision of a city of apartment dwellers,” Mr. Kaye says.

    It is uncertain if Los Angeles will experience the Sunshine Revolution it so desperately needs. What is certain is that only when the machine and its masters no longer dictate L.A.’s fate can this diverse and dynamic region resume its ascent toward greatness.

    This piece originally appeared in the Wall Street Journal and is adapted from the Summer 2011 edition of The City Journal.

    Joel Kotkin is executive editor of NewGeography.com and is a distinguished presidential fellow in urban futures at Chapman University, and an adjunct fellow of the Legatum Institute in London. He is author of The City: A Global History. His newest book is The Next Hundred Million: America in 2050, released in February, 2010.

    Photo by pinchof

  • Permeable Pavement: Looking Below The Surface

    How can we prevent situations where environmental ‘solutions’ end up in failure? The tale of problems encountered with the misuse of pervious pavers (also known as porous or permeable pavers), used as an eco- friendly option, provides some answers.

    Low impact sidewalk and street installations can become economic problems. Why? Because failed environmental solutions placed on public property are then replaced with conventional construction, using tax dollars. The EPA Section 438 mandating all owned and leased Federal Facilities be converted into low impact development promotes permeable pavement, that is, paving that allows rainwater to pour through it, instead of running off at high speed to an inlet and overloading the storm sewer system, taking pollutants downstream with the water, and eventually infecting our streams and oceans. To understand more about it, read reporter Dave Peterson’s exposés in the Minneapolis Star Tribune.

    On the surface, permeable pavers seems logical: pavement that allows rain to fall through. But what happens after the rain falls through the pavement – where does the floodwater go? A sub-base is needed to support the pavement. The rainfall must fall not only through the pavers, but also through the ground below. If you were to place permeable pavers on your back yard patio, supporting the weight of people and furniture would require very little sub-structure. If your lot was made of sandy soil that allows rain to quickly filter through, better yet. But if the ground underneath is clay or rock, the water must be retained or piped off with a sub-drainage system. If this is starting to sound expensive, as we say in Minnesota, you betcha!

    This sub-surface material must be sponge-like, and allow a conduit for water to either pass through to a piped system to be transported elsewhere, or have enough small void areas to retain the water until it can slowly be filtered through its lowest layer seeping back to the earth. To create a ‘base’ with properties that has ‘void spaces’, plenty of rock and large stone is used.

    Of course this means digging a very deep channel under the proposed pavement, moving (removing) the old soil and hauling in this sub-base material. A 100 foot long 30 foot wide road would require a five foot deep excavation with 555 cubic yards of soil to be removed, and almost the same in sub-base to be hauled in. Since a large dump truck holds up to 20 cubic yards (typically less), that small section of street would require at least 27 trips to and from the destination with 27 truckloads of rock, no doubt consuming massive amounts of petroleum.

    Anybody who has been in Minnesota in the winter knows that during, those seven months of freezing weather, cold is redefined. Water expands about nine percent as it freezes, so 555 cubic yards of water would increase about 50 cubic yards. Where does the water go? Up! Water pressure can lift pavers and cause havoc in the winter, so before cold weather sets in it is recommended that the liquid be vacuumed out of the sub-surface and hauled away. Now how much energy does that take?

    People and patio furniture are not that heavy, certainly not as heavy as a bus, which weighs somewhere between 26 and 40 thousand pounds transferred to the tires, depending upon the size and how many it is carrying. This weight is then transferred to the pavement, which is on top of rocks and stone that are intentionally ‘loose,’ to hold water.

    There is another problem with permeable pavement in some applications: water settles to a level surface. A few years ago we designed a low-impact, clustered neighborhood in Minnesota. At the ‘consultants’ meeting with the developer, the young engineer pushed the permeable paver idea. We had designed the neighborhood by harnessing the natural grade, embracing the heavily wooded site’s natural drainage to save most of the existing trees on the steep slopes. In other words, we planned to use what nature provided, eliminating much of the grading, costs and environmental impacts. On this site there were some fairly steep grades, in many cases exceeding a five foot drop in its length along private drives.

    The engineer aggressively insisted on permeable pavers. His idea was to create a five foot deep sub-base under the private drives (26’ wide) and run the gutters of the roofs underground to the sub-surface drainage system. In such meetings it is not polite to scream, “Are you out of your mind?” Instead, after the meeting I told the developer to kill the idea for being far too expensive. The developer did not heed my advice, and when the economics of the engineering was done, the cost escalated out of control. Several months of the engineer trying to (unsuccessfully) convince the city that the permeable pavers was a great solution caused the project to be delayed. By the time it was approved (with the natural drainage solution), the recession was in full swing and the development went dormant.

    From a personal experience, when I built my Green Certified home in 2008, MNGreenstar provided points for permeable pavement but only if the underlying base held the storm water underneath. The soil of my lot is sandy, and could have quickly absorbed the rainwater, allowing a fairly cheap sub-base, but the ‘green’ certification did not allow for compromise. The green certification ‘all or nothing’ approach meant that my sub-surface would have added $5,000 to the construction to get a few green ‘points’ encouraging the ‘nothing’ side of the equation. So, instead of designing the driveway with permeable pavement, we used sculpted landscaped strips (like the driveways of yesterday) to reduce the paved surface area and the overall costs. It is not unusual to see people taking pictures of my ‘low impact’ driveway, which adds curb appeal and value, however, we gained no green points for this logical solution.

    Why the motivation to push permeable pavement? In many cases it might indeed make sense. One reason is profitability, not by those selling the pavement alternatives, but by the consulting industry that specifies materials charging fees based upon a percentage of the construction cost. Permeable pavers and other ‘green’ alternatives can add a considerable amount to costs, and to the profitability of a consulting firm. If all bids were based upon rewarding solutions that cost less, with a penalty for solutions that cost more, consultants would truly deliver on the promise of sustainability; development costs and future maintenance burdens would plummet, while the environment would benefit. If we rewarded engineers employed by government agencies by allowing them to share a percentage of the money they saved by introducing green solutions that are cost effective, it would bring about change overnight.

    Can this be done? Absolutely. The technology and educational materials have been developed for this overhaul, but it would take effort and investment, since we’re currently in an economy where up to 65% of the architectural and land consultants are unemployed, and those remaining are not exactly overloaded with work.

    The EPA Section 438 is the Federal agenda to rebuild existing facilities and have all new construction (including all military bases) comply with low impact standards. On some new construction and redevelopment, permeable pavement could be effective, but it is unlikely to be cost effective where heavy loads, bad soils, and/or frigid weather occur.

    The decreased pavement width of New Urbanism is a start in the right direction, as long as safety and functionality are maintained. Combined with the reduced ‘length’ of infrastructure in plans like Prefurbia, it is entirely possible to reduce the environmental impact of newly paved development by about 30%, and of re-developed areas (i.e. EPA Section 438) by more than 50%, while increasing function and value. Now that we have the knowledge to do so, isn’t it time to start reaping the benefits of design techniques that reduce pavement without harming function?

    Photo by Mockney Rebel; “Pavement Archeology”

    Rick Harrison is President of Rick Harrison Site Design Studio and Neighborhood Innovations, LLC. He is author of Prefurbia: Reinventing The Suburbs From Disdainable To Sustainable and creator of Performance Planning System. His websites are rhsdplanning.com and performanceplanningsystem.com.

  • Why America’s Young And Restless Will Abandon Cities For Suburbs

    For well over a decade urban boosters have heralded the shift among young Americans from suburban living and toward dense cities. As one Wall Street Journal report suggests, young people will abandon their parents’ McMansions for urban settings, bringing about the high-density city revival so fervently prayed for by urban developers, architects and planners.

    Some demographers claim that “white flight” from the city is declining, replaced by a “bright flight” to the urban core from the suburbs. “Suburbs lose young whites to cities,” crowed one Associated Press headline last year.

    Yet evidence from the last Census show the opposite: a marked acceleration of movement not into cities but toward suburban and exurban locations. The simple, usually inexorable effects of maturation may be one reason for this surprising result. Simply put, when 20-somethings get older, they do things like marry, start businesses, settle down and maybe start having kids.

    An analysis of the past decade’s Census data by demographer Wendell Cox shows this. Cox looked at where 25- to 34-year-olds were living in 2000 and compared this to where they were living by 2010, now aged 35 to 44. The results were surprising: In the past 10 years, this cohort’s presence grew 12% in suburban areas while dropping 22.7% in the core cities. Overall, this demographic expanded by roughly 1.8 million in the suburbs while losing 1.3 million in the core cities.

    In many ways this group may be more influential than the much ballyhooed 20-something. Unlike younger adults, who are often footloose and unattached, people between the ages of 35 and 44 tend to be putting down roots. As a result, they constitute the essential social ballast for any community, city or suburb.

    Losing this population represents a great, if rarely perceived, threat to many regions, particular older core cities. Rust Belt centers such as Cleveland and Detroit have lost over 30% of this age group over the decade.

    More intriguing, and perhaps counter-intuitive, “hip and cool” core cities like San Francisco, New York and Boston have also suffered double-digit percent losses among this generation. New York City, for example, saw its 25 to 34 population of 2000 drop by over 15% — a net loss of over 200,000 people — a decade later. San Francisco and Oakland, the core cities of the Bay Area, lost more than 20% of this cohort over the decade, and the city of Boston lost nearly 40%.

    In contrast, the largest growth among this peer group took place in metropolitan areas largely suburban in form, with a strong domination by automobiles and single-family houses. The most popular cities among this group — with increases of over 10% — were Las Vegas; Raleigh, N.C.; Riverside-San Bernardino, Calif.; Charlotte, N.C.; Orlando, Fla.; San Antonio, Houston and Dallas-Fort Worth, in Texas; and Sacramento, Calif..

    Furthermore, most of the growth took place not in the urban centers of these regions but in the outlying suburbs. This cohort expanded by more than 40% Raleigh’s suburbs — 37,000 people — over the decade. Houston’s suburbs gained the most of any region of the country, adding 174,000 members of this particular generation.

    These findings should inform the actions of those who run cities. Cities may still appeal to the “young and restless,” but they can’t hold millennials captive forever. Even relatively successful cities have turned into giant college towns and “post-graduate” havens — temporary way stations before people migrate somewhere else. This process redefines cities from enduring places to temporary resorts.

    Rather than place all their bets on attracting 20-somethings cities must focus on why early middle-age couples are leaving. Some good candidates include weak job creation, poor schools, high taxes and suffocating regulatory environments. Addressing these issues won’t keep all young adults in urban settings, but it might improve the chances of keeping a larger number.

    Our findings may also give pause to those developers who often buy at face value the urbanist narrative about an city-centric real estate future. In the last decade, many developers have anticipated  a continuing tsunami of wealthy young professionals, as well as legions of “empty-nesters,” flowing into the urban cores. This led to a rash of high-end condominium developments. Yet in the end, the condo market turned out far less appealing than advertised, crashing virtually everywhere from Chicago and Las Vegas to Atlanta, Portland and Kansas City. This has left many investors with empty units, distress auctions or far less profitable rentals.

    One hopes the development community might still learn something from that failure. But the Urban Land Institute among others increasingly maintain that vast new frontiers for new high-density growth will develop in the inner-ring suburbs. Yet in many areas with strong central cores, such as New York, Seattle and Chicago, inner suburbs usually grew slowly, particularly in comparison with the further out peripheral expanses.

    Critically, the notion of mass suburban densification is likely to meet strong resistance from local residents. This will be particularly marked in attractive, affluent “progressive” areas like the Bay Area’s Marin County, Chicago’s North Shore suburbs and New York’s Hudson Valley. People who move to these places are attracted by their leafy, single-family-home-dominated neighborhoods and village-like shopping streets. Nothing short of economic catastrophe or government diktat would make them accept any intense program of densification.

    Of course, some urbanists claim that the new millennial generation, born after 1983,  will prove “different” from all their predecessors. Yet research to date finds older millennials may prove more attracted to suburban living than many density advocates suggest. According to a survey  by Frank Magid and Associates, more millennials consider suburbs as their “ideal place” to settle than do  older groups.

    As generational chroniclers Morley Winograd and Mike Hais have noted, the fact that most millennials plan to get married and have children only reinforces this trend over time. Another problem may prove that millennials may be running out of ideal urban options.  Back in the 1990s it was far easier to buy a home in one of the nation’s handful of really attractive cosmopolitan urban settings — for example,  brownstone Brooklyn, Northside Chicago, LA’s beach communities or San Francisco. Today these areas suffer some of the highest housing prices relative to incomes of any places in the country.

    Rather than blindly accept the vision of a mass movement back to the urban centers, developers might focus instead on what kind of housing, and community, addresses the needs and affordability concerns of millennials as they move into full adulthood. Over the next ten years, the number of millennials entering their mid-30s will expand by over 40 million   – a population larger than those of elderly residents who will be old enough to give up their homes.

    This large group is also most likely to continue moving to the lower-density, more affordable South and  West. These areas already boast disproportionate percentages of millennials, Hais and Winograd report.

    It’s time for developers and planners to look more closely at how young adults as they enter their 30s vote with their feet. Unless there has been a mind-numbing change in attitude or an unexpected return to good governance in cities, young adults entering middle age will continue their shift toward suburban and lower-density areas in the decade ahead, upending the predictions of most pundits, planners and development experts.

    This piece originally appeared at Forbes.com.

    Joel Kotkin is executive editor of NewGeography.com and is a distinguished presidential fellow in urban futures at Chapman University, and an adjunct fellow of the Legatum Institute in London. He is author of The City: A Global History. His newest book is The Next Hundred Million: America in 2050, released in February, 2010.

    Photo by mamamusings, Liz Lawley, Upstairs Window – Encroaching fog

  • The Evolving Urban Form: Chicago

    Looks can be deceiving. No downtown area in the western world outside Manhattan is more visually impressive than Chicago. Both the historic Loop and the newer development north of the Chicago River, especially along North Michigan Avenue have some of the most iconic structures outside of emerging Asia. Yet these vertical monuments mask a less celebrated reality: that of dispersing, low density urban area.

    Chicago Combined Statistical Area: Let’s take a close look at the 2010 census data. Overall, the combined statistical area, which includes the metropolitan area (Note 1) and two exurban counties added nearly 365,000 people, for a growth rate of 3.9 percent. This is well below the national growth rate of approximately 10 percent (Map, Figure 1). Chicago followed the general trend of with growth being greatest in the outer suburbs while declines took place both in the inner suburbs and the historical core municipality (Figure 2).

    Massive Core City Loss: The historical core city of Chicago lost but 200,000 people, and fell to a population of 2.7 million, the lowest count since the 1910 census. The population is down 925,000 from 1950 and at the current rate would drop at least 1 million from the 1950 peak by the 2020 census.  Chicago is at risk of joining London and Detroit as the only two historical core municipalities in modern times that have lost more than 1 million people.

    Inner Suburbs: As in New York and Seattle, Chicago’s inner suburbs grew slowly. The inner suburbs include the part of Cook County that is outside the city of Chicago as well as Lake County, Indiana (home of Gary), which shares the city of Chicago’s eastern border. The inner suburbs added fewer than 30,000 residents and grew only one percent.

    This suggests some limitations to the newly developing mantra that has inner suburbs will be the locus of future growth although there are scattered inner suburbs in other cities (such as Hoboken, New Jersey) that did see growth. Perhaps the old mantra, about people returning to the city from which they had never come was finally quashed by the realities of the 2010 census.   

    Outer Suburbs: The outer suburbs, which include the remaining counties of the metropolitan area, grew at a rate of 16.5 percent, actually grew faster than the national average of approximately 10 percent. The outer suburbs added more than 500,000 people. The largest growth, 175,000 was in Will County, to the south, one of the five “collar counties” that used to define the boundaries of the metropolitan area. McHenry County, the most distant of the collar counties added 100,000. The fastest growth was in far suburban and also southern Kendall County, which more than doubled in population.

    Chicago Metropolitan Area: Overall, the Chicago metropolitan area added approximately 360,000 people and grew 4.0 percent from 2000. This is well below the national average population growth rate, however was above that of the Los Angeles metropolitan area, once among the  nation’s of leading growth areas until the last decade.

    Historical Trends: The city of Chicago, like other historical core cities, had previously been dominant in its metropolitan area. The earliest Census Bureau metropolitan area (“metropolitan district”) estimates from 1900 indicated that more than 90 percent of the region’s population was contained in the city of Chicago. By 1950, the city of Chicago had fallen to 66 percent of the metropolitan area as defined in that year.  The city of Chicago now has only 28 percent of the combined statistical area population of 9.7 million (Figure 3, Table and Note 2).

    CHICAGO METROPOLITAN AREA
    POPULATION TREND BY COUNTY: 2000 TO 2010
    1900 1950 2000 2010 Change: 2000-2010 % Change: 2000-2010
    HISTORIC CORE MUNICIPALITY
    Chicago   1,698,575   3,620,962   2,895,671 2,695,598 -200,073 -6.9%
    INNER SUBURBAN      178,052   1,255,982   2,965,634 2,995,082 29,448 1.0%
    Cook County, IL      140,160      887,830   2,481,070 2,499,077 18,007 0.7%
    Lake County, IN        37,892      368,152      484,564 496,005 11,441 2.4%
    OUTER SUBURBAN      378,896      884,980   3,237,011 3,770,425 533,414 16.5%
    DeKalb County, IL        31,756        40,781        88,969 105,160 16,191 18.2%
    DuPage County, IL        28,196      154,999      904,161 916,924 12,763 1.4%
    Grundy County, IL        24,136        19,217        37,535 50,063 12,528 33.4%
    Jasper County, IN        14,292        17,031        30,043 33,478 3,435 11.4%
    Kane County, IL        78,792      150,388      404,119 515,269 111,150 27.5%
    Kendall County, IL        11,467        12,155        54,544 114,736 60,192 110.4%
    Kenosha County, WI        21,707        75,238      149,577 166,426 16,849 11.3%
    Lake County, IL        34,504      179,097      644,356 703,462 59,106 9.2%
    McHenry County, IL        29,659        50,656      260,077 308,760 48,683 18.7%
    Newton County, IN        10,448        11,006        14,566 14,244 -322 -2.2%
    Porter County, IN        19,175        40,076      146,798 164,343 17,545 12.0%
    Will County, IL        74,764      134,336      502,266 677,560 175,294 34.9%
    CHICAGO METROPOLITAN AREA   2,255,523   5,761,924   9,098,316 9,461,105 362,789 4.0%
    EXURBAN METROPOLITAN COUNTIES        75,540      150,332      213,939 224,916 10,977 5.1%
    Kankakee Coiunty, IL        37,154        73,524      103,833 113,449 9,616 9.3%
    La Porte County, IN        38,386        76,808      110,106 111,467 1,361 1.2%
    CHICAGO COMBINED STATISTICAL AREA 2,331,063 5,912,256 9,312,255 9,686,021 364,150 3.9%
    Data from the US Census Bureau

     

    Since 1950 (Note 3), all of the growth in the Chicago area has been in the suburbs. By 2000, both inner suburbs and the outer suburbs each had more people than the city of Chicago. Today the outer suburbs, with forty percent of the region’s population, represent the largest demographic force in Chicago (Figure 4).

    We do not usually associate Chicago with the dreaded term “sprawl” but Chicago now stands as the third largest urban agglomeration in the world in land area, trailing only New York and Tokyo. The Chicago urban area covers more land than Los Angeles, which has a far higher urban density.

    Dispersing Employment: Chicago’s dispersion extends to employment. Despite having the second strongest central business district in the nation (after Manhattan), jobs are rapidly decentralizing. Last year the Downtown Loop Alliance reported that private sector employment in the Loop fell 20 percent during the last decade. Overall, the downtown area of Chicago now represents approximately 10 percent of regional employment, barely half the percentage of Manhattan or Washington, DC.

    American community survey data from 2009 indicates the total employment in the North West corridor along Interstate 90 has at least as much employment as downtown Chicago. This corridor, anchored by the edge city (Note 4) of Schaumburg, is typical of emerging suburban centers around the nation. Only two percent of workers in this corridor use transit for commuting.

    Another corridor, along Interstate 88 (anchored by Lisle and Aurora) has at least two thirds the employment of downtown, with only one percent commuting by transit. The North Shore corridor encompassing parts of northern Cook County and Lake County is of similar size to the Interstate 88 corridor and has a larger transit work trip market share of five percent.

    Downtown, on the other hand, has the third largest transit work trip market share in the nation, following Manhattan and Brooklyn. In 2000, 55 percent of people working downtown (the larger downtown including the Loop, north of the River and adjacent areas to the west and south) commuted by transit. This illustrates the strength of transit for providing access to the largest, most dense downtown areas in contrast to dispersed suburban areas.

    Perhaps more telling, the number of jobs and resident workers (the “jobs-housing” balance) in the city of Chicago are converging toward equality. According to American community survey data, there are 1.1 jobs in the city of Chicago for each working resident. This is substantially less, for example, than Washington (2.6), Atlanta (2.0), Boston (1.7), San Francisco (1.4) and Baltimore (1.4).

    On the other hand, two of the three large suburban corridors have higher ratios of jobs to workers than the city of Chicago. The Interstate 88 corridor has 1.3 jobs per worker, while the North Shore has approximately 1.5 jobs per worker. The Interstate 90 corridor has slightly more jobs than workers. These data indicate that Chicago is well on the way to a more evenly distributed employment pattern that has become more common around the nation.

    Middle America’s Leviathan: The Chicago area has been very resilient through the years. After nearly a century as the nation’s “second city,” Aaron Renn points out the area could fall from its much cherished “global city” status. Still, Chicago remains the dominant urban area between the coasts. Virtually all of its Midwestern competition has fallen away (such as Detroit, St. Louis and Cleveland). However, in the longer run Chicago could be displaced by Dallas-Fort Worth and Houston. Nonetheless, the urban area’s visually arresting business district will retain its iconic status even if, overall, the region looks more and more like the rest of highly dispersed Middle America.

    ——

    Note 1: This article uses metropolitan area and combined statistical areas as defined by the authoritative US Office of Management and the Budget.

    Note 2: The 1950 references provided because the closest to the Post-War democratization of homeownership and car ownership and expansion of car oriented suburbanization. Before World War II, most US historical core cities were comparatively dense, while a far smaller share of the population lived in the suburbs.

    Note 3: Figure 3 and the Table show data for the 2010 geographical definition of the combined statistical area. Earlier metropolitan area definitions are also referred to in the text.

    Note 4: An “edge city” is a major employment center outside the central business district (downtown).  “Edge city” became a part of the language as a result of Joel Garreau’s 1991 book, Edge City: Life on the Urban Frontier.

    Photograph: Downtown Chicago from the Air (by author)

  • Are Millennials the Solution to the Nation’s Housing Crisis?

    During his Twitter-fed Town Hall, President Obama admitted that the housing market has proven one of the “most stubborn” pieces of the economic recovery puzzle to try and fix.  The President — as well the Congress and the building industry — should  consider a new path to a solution for housing by tapping the potential of the very generation whose votes brought Barack Obama into the White House in the first place.   

    The Millennial Generation (born 1982-2003) represents not just the largest generation in American history but the largest potential market for both existing and new housing in the United States. There are over 95 million Millennials and over the next five years the first quarter of this cohort will enter their thirties, an age when people are most likely to buy their first home.

    Contrary to what is often written about this generation it is very much interested in owning a home, preferably in the suburbs. Sixty-four percent of Millennials say it is very important for them to have an opportunity to own their own home; twenty percent named it as one of their most important priorities in life, right behind being a good parent and having a successful marriage.

     And, contrary to the usual claims of “new urbanists” (themselves largely members of the older X and Boomer Generations) most Millennials want to live in the suburbs where the current housing crisis is most acute. According to a study by Frank N. Magid Associates, 43 percent of Millennials describe suburbs as their “ideal place to live,” compared to just 31 percent of older generations, most of whom still yearn for the smaller towns and rural settings of an earlier America.  

    Most Millennials already live in suburbs and enjoyed growing up in suburban settings surrounded by family and friends that supported them.  A certain portion, of course, enjoy living an urban life while young, but most tell researchers that they want to raise the families many are about to start in the same suburban settings they grew up in.

    Furthermore, Americans between the ages of  25 and 34, both Millennials and those on the “cusp” of the generational change from X to Millennial,  represent a greater proportion of the overall population in the South and West than elsewhere. These are the very regions that suffered the most from the collapse of housing prices that stemmed from the mortgage financing scandals of the last few years. Unleashing this potential demand for suburban housing in these hard-hit areas would bring two huge benefits. It would stabilize prices for existing homes while at the same time boosting the prospects for new housing construction.  

    The challenge is how to enable the Millennial Generation to achieve its desire to own homes without reigniting the speculation and unsustainable financial leverage that   triggered the Great Recession. Clearly, in the immediate future at least, the current excess of supply in the housing market should mitigate the risk of too much demand chasing too few houses.  As much as they are criticized by the financial industry and its Republican allies, the recently enacted financial regulatory reforms might also provide an additional bulwark against allowing the market to misbehave a second time.

    But the biggest factor may be the lessons learned from experience.  Millennials have borne much of the brunt of the Great Recession and tend to be keenly aware about the importance of living within your means.  Wanting a suburban home does not mean, as many urbanists assert, that Millennials want McMansions. Like earlier generations, especially their GI Generation great grandparents, they are likely to be cautious and frugal home-buyers. However, this frugality and caution does not translate into a meek acceptance or desire for a future as apartment renters, as some suggest will be the case.    

    In the short run, Millennials will not be able to engineer a turnaround all by themselves; most Millennials can’t afford much beyond the next month’s rent, let alone the down payment on a mortgage. Many are still living with their parents to avoid having to pay rent and the cost of a college education at the same time.

    To address this part of the challenge, the federal government needs to do what it did to revive the moribund housing market in the 1930s. The New Deal created today’s commonly accepted 30 year mortgages with a 20 percent down payment by making them a financial instrument that the newly formed Federal Housing Administration would insure. Before that landmark legislation, home mortgages were rarely offered for more than half of the home’s value and normally had to be repaid in no more than five years.

    As a result that era’s civic generation (the GI or Greatest Generation) was able to afford single family homes with a surrounding tract of land, an offer returning World War II veterans seized with alacrity. These houses now make up much of the country’s inner suburb housing stock.    Today’s housing crisis requires a similarly radical reinvention of the basic home mortgage to be offered to those buying their first home. Under this proposal the length of the mortgage could be extended up to as many as 50 years, reflecting the increased life expectancies — and longer working careers — that most Millennials can expect to enjoy. Since no market for such debt instruments currently exists, it would be up to the federal government to create one through the process of reinsurance, just as it did in 1934.

    To further encourage home buying by Millennials, the federal government should also provide incentives to financial institutions to swap out the principle of the Millennials’ student loans in exchange for a new loan, whose principal would be collateralized by the value of the real estate the former student would be acquiring. The student loan would be paid off as part of the mortgage, making Millennials better able to afford a home and freeing up additional discretionary spending that current worries over student debt curtail. Today’s lower housing prices today might make this package both attractive to investors and financially viable.

    Many economists today argue against the whole notion of encouraging home ownership by anyone, let alone young Millennials. Some point out that when looked upon strictly as an investment choice, the value of a home rarely appreciates faster than the overall stock market.

    This type of analysis, which forms the basis for arguing against any federal policy that would further encourage home ownership, ignores the proven benefits to the nation that derive from home owners committed to the success of their local community.  Voting participation rates among home owners, for instance, traditionally run higher than rates among renters, and neighborhoods of owners tend to be more stable places to raise children. 

    More important still is what homeownership means to the nature of a property-owning republic. Survey after survey shows that home ownership remains a central part of the American Dream and a central aspiration, particularly for immigrants and young people. A policy that works against this ideal presents a political risk that any politician should be wary of taking.

    To restore this part of the American Dream, and to lift the worry of millions of Americans whose house is worth less than what they owe on their mortgage, the Obama administration must take bold steps to restore a vibrant residential housing market.    President Obama, who built his winning margin in 2008 through an unprecedented mobilization of Millennial voters, is the ideal person to combine a plan for economic recovery efforts with meeting the aspirational goals of most Millennials to own their own home.

    To save the housing market, and extend the recovery beyond the financial elites, America will need a new wave of home buyers.  If the President works to tap this resource, he can begin to turn around the “stubborn problem” of the housing market and restore the middle class economy. If he does so, the whole country will soon be tweeting his success.

    Morley Winograd and Michael D. Hais are fellows of NDN and the New Policy Institute and co-authors of Millennial Momentum: How a New Generation Is Remaking America to be published in September and Millennial Makeover: MySpace, YouTube, and the Future of American Politics.

    Photo by 3Ammo

  • The Evolving Urban Area: Seattle

    Lunching at Seattle’s Space Needle, the casual observer might imagine that one of the nation’s most dense urban areas is spread out below. To the immediate south of the Space Needle is one of the nation’s premier downtown areas. In 2000 downtown Seattle had the seventh largest employment base in the country and was one of the most dense. Its impressive, closely packed buildings witness a storied past. For more than 60 years, between 1914 and 1990, downtown Seattle has had the tallest building on the West Coast, Smith Tower, and was the fourth tallest building in the world when built. It held the title for an impressive 55 years, from 1914 to 1969, when another Seattle building briefly took the title (1001 4th Avenue). Later (1985), Seattle’s Columbia Center became the first building on the West Coast to exceed 75 floors, but by 1990 had been passed by the U.S. Bank Tower in Los Angeles (see Elliot Bay photograph and Note 1).

    However, looks can be deceiving.  In 2000, Seattle ranked last in urban population density out of the 11 urban areas in the 13 western states with more than 1 million population (just behind Portland, which ranked next-to-last).  The Seattle urban area’s density was approximately 60 percent below that of Los Angeles, the US’s  densest urban area. Even the Houston and Dallas-Fort Worth urban areas, famous for their great expanse, were denser than Seattle. Updated urban area density data from the 2010 census will not be available for at least a year.

    Nor is the historical core municipality of Seattle particularly closely packed. With a population density of 7,200 per square mile, the city of Seattle is considerably less dense than a number of Los Angeles suburbs such as Santa Ana (12,000) and Garden Grove (9,500). Even so, the city of Seattle is nearly two-thirds more dense than the city of Portland (4,400), despite the latter’s densification claims.

    The 2010 Census: The 2010 census indicates a continuing dispersion of population in the Seattle metropolitan region (Figure 1). The Seattle metropolitan region, formally the Seattle combined statistical area (Note 2) is composed of the core Seattle metropolitan area (King, Pierce and Snohomish counties) and five exurban statistical areas, Bremerton (Kitsap County), Olympia (Thurston County), Mount Vernon (Skagit County), Oak Harbor (Island County) and Shelton (Mason County).

    Seattle Combined Statistical Area: Population 2000-2010
    Area 2000 2010 Change % Share of Growth Share of Population
    City of Seattle        563,374        608,660           45,286 8.0% 9.2% 14.5%
    Balance: King County     1,173,660     1,322,589        148,929 12.7% 30.3% 31.5%
    Pierce & Snohomish Counties     1,306,844     1,508,560        201,716 15.4% 41.0% 35.9%
    Metropolitan Area Outside Seattle    2,480,504    2,831,149        350,645 14.1% 71.2% 67.4%
    Metropolitan Area     3,043,878    3,439,809        395,931 13.0% 80.4% 81.9%
    Exurban Metropolitan Areas        663,260        759,503           96,243 14.5% 19.6% 18.1%
    Combined Statistical Area    3,707,138    4,199,312        492,174 13.3% 100.0% 100.0%
    Calculated from US Census data

     

    City of Seattle (Historical Core Municipality): Overall, the historical core city of Seattle grew 8.0 percent, from 564,000 to 609,000 between 2000 and 2010, which was one of the healthiest increases among major cities. In adding 45,000, the city still only accounted for 9.2 percent of the Seattle metropolitan region population growth.  The city of Seattle now constitutes less than 15 percent of the metropolitan region population, down from 36 percent 1950 (same geographic area). In 1950, the city of Seattle had nearly two thirds of the population of King County. By 2010, the city of Seattle was less than one third of King County’s population, despite annexations. As the city has continued to decline in its share of the metropolitan region’s population, the impressive downtown area has also lost its dominance and by 2009 had fallen to 8 percent of the metropolitan region’s employment.

    Inner Suburbs: Areas outside the city of Seattle accounted for more than 90 percent of growth in the metropolitan region. The inner suburbs, which include the residential development to the south, north and east of Seattle in King County grew more than 50 percent faster than the city of Seattle, at 12.7 percent between 2000 and 2010. The inner suburbs grew from 1,170,000 to 1,320,000, adding nearly 150,000 new residents, more than three times the city of Seattle increase. King County outside Seattle also captured 30 percent of the metropolitan region’s growth and now has 32 percent of the metropolitan region’s population. The eastern suburbs of King County are home to one of the nation’s largest, most diverse and successful edge cities, Bellevue, as well as the Microsoft campus in neighboring Redmond.

    Outer Suburbs: The outer suburbs, which include Pierce County (Tacoma is the county seat) and Snohomish County grew 15.4 percent, nearly double the growth rate of the city of Seattle. The outer suburbs grew from 1.3 million to 1.5 million, adding 200,000 new residents, more than four times the city of Seattle’s increase. Pierce and Snohomish counties captured 41 percent of the metropolitan region’s growth and now account for 36 percent of the metropolitan region’s population.

    Exurban Areas:  The exurban statistical areas grew nearly as quickly as the outer suburbs. Between 2000 and 2010, the exurban areas increased their population by 14.5 percent.  The exurban statistical areas accounted for 20 percent of the metropolitan region’s population growth. These more distant areas grew from 660,000 to 760,000 people, adding nearly 100,000 new residents. This is more than double the increase in the city of Seattle population. Approximately 18 percent of the population in the metropolitan region lives in the exurban statistical areas, a larger number than residing in the city of Seattle.

    The Dispersion Continues: The dispersion of Seattle, like that of metropolitan regions around the nation and the world, has been going on for decades. The city of Seattle has accounted for only 5 percent of the metropolitan region’s population since 1950 (Figure 2) with suburbs and exurbs accounting for the vast majority of the nearly 3,000,000 increase.

    Despite the pre-2010 census media and academic drumbeat to the effect that metropolitan areas were no longer dispersing, the census revealed a totally different and even inconvenient truth. This does not mean that both residents of the entire metropolitan region, suburbs and core city, should not be proud of an attractive urban area in an incomparable natural setting. Yet, the vast majority of the region’s population and employment growth is taking place outside the core. Seattle is following the national and international pattern to ever greater dispersion.

    _________

    Note 1: Downtown Seattle is on a hill and the newer buildings are generally on higher ground than Smith Tower, which makes the difference in height look greater.

    Note 2: "Combined statistical areas" were formerly "consolidated metropolitan statistical areas."

    Top Photograph: Downtown Seattle from the Space Needle (by author)

    Wendell Cox is a Visiting Professor, Conservatoire National des Arts et Metiers, Paris and the author of “War on the Dream: How Anti-Sprawl Policy Threatens the Quality of Life”