Anonymous
01/26/2020 08:53
Subject: Is there a coherent argument that loosening zoning laws will lead to affordable housing in DC?
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:There are three-bedroom apartments that are more difficult to rent. They are great for families, lots of fun. We had a house in the suburbs, the kids rarely played in the yard. I don’t get why people think raising kids in an apartment is such a tragedy.
Our kids would play in the backyard all day everyday if they could. They want to go out there when it's 10 degrees. They want to go out there when it's 110 degrees. No one gets more use out of backyards than children.
You have some unique kids for this millennium. We never used our yard when we were kids. I bought a house with a big yard and the kids never wanted to go out there and play. They jump on a trampoline, there's a soccer field a 2 minute walk away, and they ride their bikes in the street. I filled in my current townhome backyard with rocks so I don't have to deal with it. Count me among the people that view a yard as just one more thing to maintain. Glad your kids enjoy the yard, though.
I don’t think so. All their friends love playing outside too. I think the issue here is that you are lying about having kids.
The annoying part is people (this Mayor) making decisions for others. Ie, all single family houses are selfish and bad. Couple more steps to reeducation camps.
LOL - please provide a citation for where the Mayor has said this? Or even provide a citation from an elected official in one of the handful of places that have eliminated single family zoning designations (which is very different from banning single family homes and has not even been proposed in DC).
The Mayor's office and the Office of Planning led a planning session at Wilson High School about 6 weeks ago, in which speakers praised the elimination of single family zoning and there was a charette (charade"?) station about 'gentle density' in Ward 3, which would eliminate most single family residential zoning.
The guy whose thesis the Mayor is relying on seems to be another loon. He wrote a paper with his dream list for cities and office of planning is acting like his theories are proven science/fact.
Anonymous
01/26/2020 03:41
Subject: Is there a coherent argument that loosening zoning laws will lead to affordable housing in DC?
Nobody “needs” a SFH. Just because you are able to afford one thanks to your white privilege and generational wealth, does not make it right.
There needs to be more options in expensive areas for marginalized people and low income families. It’s not fair to keep building McMansions to keep people of color out of neighborhoods.
The sooner we can stop building new SFH’s, the better for society.
There needs to be more options in expensive areas for marginalized people and low income families. It’s not fair to keep building McMansions to keep people of color out of neighborhoods.
The sooner we can stop building new SFH’s, the better for society.
Anonymous
01/25/2020 17:36
Subject: Is there a coherent argument that loosening zoning laws will lead to affordable housing in DC?
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:There are three-bedroom apartments that are more difficult to rent. They are great for families, lots of fun. We had a house in the suburbs, the kids rarely played in the yard. I don’t get why people think raising kids in an apartment is such a tragedy.
Our kids would play in the backyard all day everyday if they could. They want to go out there when it's 10 degrees. They want to go out there when it's 110 degrees. No one gets more use out of backyards than children.
You have some unique kids for this millennium. We never used our yard when we were kids. I bought a house with a big yard and the kids never wanted to go out there and play. They jump on a trampoline, there's a soccer field a 2 minute walk away, and they ride their bikes in the street. I filled in my current townhome backyard with rocks so I don't have to deal with it. Count me among the people that view a yard as just one more thing to maintain. Glad your kids enjoy the yard, though.
I don’t think so. All their friends love playing outside too. I think the issue here is that you are lying about having kids.
The annoying part is people (this Mayor) making decisions for others. Ie, all single family houses are selfish and bad. Couple more steps to reeducation camps.
Yeah so let's pass a law that lets people build SFH or duplexes.
Anonymous
01/25/2020 14:16
Subject: Is there a coherent argument that loosening zoning laws will lead to affordable housing in DC?
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:There are three-bedroom apartments that are more difficult to rent. They are great for families, lots of fun. We had a house in the suburbs, the kids rarely played in the yard. I don’t get why people think raising kids in an apartment is such a tragedy.
Our kids would play in the backyard all day everyday if they could. They want to go out there when it's 10 degrees. They want to go out there when it's 110 degrees. No one gets more use out of backyards than children.
You have some unique kids for this millennium. We never used our yard when we were kids. I bought a house with a big yard and the kids never wanted to go out there and play. They jump on a trampoline, there's a soccer field a 2 minute walk away, and they ride their bikes in the street. I filled in my current townhome backyard with rocks so I don't have to deal with it. Count me among the people that view a yard as just one more thing to maintain. Glad your kids enjoy the yard, though.
I don’t think so. All their friends love playing outside too. I think the issue here is that you are lying about having kids.
The annoying part is people (this Mayor) making decisions for others. Ie, all single family houses are selfish and bad. Couple more steps to reeducation camps.
Replacing single-family homes with apartments and condos is basically telling people with children to GTFO.
There's a cliche in NYC about this. "Raising a baby in NYC apartment is like growing an oak tree in a thimble."
Anonymous
01/24/2020 12:47
Subject: Is there a coherent argument that loosening zoning laws will lead to affordable housing in DC?
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:I hear this constantly asserted, as if it were self-evidently true, but cannot figure out how it could possibly be correct.
There's 700,000 people in the District. There's 5 million in the suburbs. If you add 30,000 housing units in DC, they will instantly be soaked up by people in the suburbs looking for shorter commutes.
As people move into DC from Falls Church and Rockville and Fairfax, their old places will open up for other people. Other people will move into those places from suburbs even further out, which will open up slots in places like Chantilly or Columbia or wherever else those people are coming from and that would put downward pressure on housing prices in the suburbs they've left.
But how does any of that lead to affordable housing in DC?
It has nothing to do with affordable housing. It's about developers giving campaign contributions to Bowser & Co. and Bowser & Co. allowing developers to write housing policy in DC.
This is exactly right. It's not about affordable housing at all. That's just a market-tested phrase to try to sell the public on a massive giveaway to developers at the expense of stable and transitional neighborhoods. When the Office of Planning speaks of up-zoning "high opportunity areas," they mean areas of opportunity for developers to make even higher margins.
Anonymous
01/22/2020 14:10
Subject: Is there a coherent argument that loosening zoning laws will lead to affordable housing in DC?
Anonymous wrote:I hear this constantly asserted, as if it were self-evidently true, but cannot figure out how it could possibly be correct.
There's 700,000 people in the District. There's 5 million in the suburbs. If you add 30,000 housing units in DC, they will instantly be soaked up by people in the suburbs looking for shorter commutes.
As people move into DC from Falls Church and Rockville and Fairfax, their old places will open up for other people. Other people will move into those places from suburbs even further out, which will open up slots in places like Chantilly or Columbia or wherever else those people are coming from and that would put downward pressure on housing prices in the suburbs they've left.
But how does any of that lead to affordable housing in DC?
It has nothing to do with affordable housing. It's about developers giving campaign contributions to Bowser & Co. and Bowser & Co. allowing developers to write housing policy in DC.
Anonymous
01/22/2020 12:43
Subject: Is there a coherent argument that loosening zoning laws will lead to affordable housing in DC?
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:There are three-bedroom apartments that are more difficult to rent. They are great for families, lots of fun. We had a house in the suburbs, the kids rarely played in the yard. I don’t get why people think raising kids in an apartment is such a tragedy.
Our kids would play in the backyard all day everyday if they could. They want to go out there when it's 10 degrees. They want to go out there when it's 110 degrees. No one gets more use out of backyards than children.
You have some unique kids for this millennium. We never used our yard when we were kids. I bought a house with a big yard and the kids never wanted to go out there and play. They jump on a trampoline, there's a soccer field a 2 minute walk away, and they ride their bikes in the street. I filled in my current townhome backyard with rocks so I don't have to deal with it. Count me among the people that view a yard as just one more thing to maintain. Glad your kids enjoy the yard, though.
I don’t think so. All their friends love playing outside too. I think the issue here is that you are lying about having kids.
The annoying part is people (this Mayor) making decisions for others. Ie, all single family houses are selfish and bad. Couple more steps to reeducation camps.
LOL - please provide a citation for where the Mayor has said this? Or even provide a citation from an elected official in one of the handful of places that have eliminated single family zoning designations (which is very different from banning single family homes and has not even been proposed in DC).
The Mayor's office and the Office of Planning led a planning session at Wilson High School about 6 weeks ago, in which speakers praised the elimination of single family zoning and there was a charette (charade"?) station about 'gentle density' in Ward 3, which would eliminate most single family residential zoning.
You sound paranoid.
No one from the city - at this meeting or elsewhere - has proposed eliminating single family zoning.
Which would not get rid of single family homes anyhow, particularly since other cities have not changed the form side of the equation but only the function side. Which is to say the same height, density, set back requirements that apply to single family homes today would apply to the lots in the future. But a building on that lot could in some manner be divided into 2 or 4 units or whatever.
So what the neighborhood looks like, or at least could look like, would not change one bit.
What's interesting is that DC already essentially has this law - the allowance of ADU's (Accessory Dwelling Units) essentially by right meant that homes that used to only be one unit could legally be two.
In most cases from the outside you can't tell if someone even has an ADU on their property.
In DC almost all homes already max out their lot occupancy and hit the building restriction line in the front and max out their side and rear yard allowances too - in most instances the only space to add to single family homes in DC is to go up as most homes have not fully maxed out what can be added vertically.
Since most homes don't have that much leeway to add a lot I really don't think you are going to see a lot of single family homes in AU park turned into 4 one-bedroom condos.
But you could see more ADU rental units but that is already allowed.
But since most of the opposition to adding more density in these neighborhoods is actually rooted in (perhaps unconscious) opposition to (a) letting more people live in the neighborhoods and enroll their kids in the schools or park on the streets or (b) letting people who can't afford to pay $1 million-plus for a SFH but could afford a smaller unit there move to the neighborhood, somehow I suspect this PP's rational answer won't end the debate.
Anonymous
01/21/2020 23:04
Subject: Is there a coherent argument that loosening zoning laws will lead to affordable housing in DC?
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:There are three-bedroom apartments that are more difficult to rent. They are great for families, lots of fun. We had a house in the suburbs, the kids rarely played in the yard. I don’t get why people think raising kids in an apartment is such a tragedy.
Our kids would play in the backyard all day everyday if they could. They want to go out there when it's 10 degrees. They want to go out there when it's 110 degrees. No one gets more use out of backyards than children.
You have some unique kids for this millennium. We never used our yard when we were kids. I bought a house with a big yard and the kids never wanted to go out there and play. They jump on a trampoline, there's a soccer field a 2 minute walk away, and they ride their bikes in the street. I filled in my current townhome backyard with rocks so I don't have to deal with it. Count me among the people that view a yard as just one more thing to maintain. Glad your kids enjoy the yard, though.
I don’t think so. All their friends love playing outside too. I think the issue here is that you are lying about having kids.
The annoying part is people (this Mayor) making decisions for others. Ie, all single family houses are selfish and bad. Couple more steps to reeducation camps.
LOL - please provide a citation for where the Mayor has said this? Or even provide a citation from an elected official in one of the handful of places that have eliminated single family zoning designations (which is very different from banning single family homes and has not even been proposed in DC).
The Mayor's office and the Office of Planning led a planning session at Wilson High School about 6 weeks ago, in which speakers praised the elimination of single family zoning and there was a charette (charade"?) station about 'gentle density' in Ward 3, which would eliminate most single family residential zoning.
You sound paranoid.
No one from the city - at this meeting or elsewhere - has proposed eliminating single family zoning.
Which would not get rid of single family homes anyhow, particularly since other cities have not changed the form side of the equation but only the function side. Which is to say the same height, density, set back requirements that apply to single family homes today would apply to the lots in the future. But a building on that lot could in some manner be divided into 2 or 4 units or whatever.
So what the neighborhood looks like, or at least could look like, would not change one bit.
What's interesting is that DC already essentially has this law - the allowance of ADU's (Accessory Dwelling Units) essentially by right meant that homes that used to only be one unit could legally be two.
In most cases from the outside you can't tell if someone even has an ADU on their property.
In DC almost all homes already max out their lot occupancy and hit the building restriction line in the front and max out their side and rear yard allowances too - in most instances the only space to add to single family homes in DC is to go up as most homes have not fully maxed out what can be added vertically.
Since most homes don't have that much leeway to add a lot I really don't think you are going to see a lot of single family homes in AU park turned into 4 one-bedroom condos.
But you could see more ADU rental units but that is already allowed.
Anonymous
01/21/2020 22:53
Subject: Is there a coherent argument that loosening zoning laws will lead to affordable housing in DC?
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:There are three-bedroom apartments that are more difficult to rent. They are great for families, lots of fun. We had a house in the suburbs, the kids rarely played in the yard. I don’t get why people think raising kids in an apartment is such a tragedy.
Our kids would play in the backyard all day everyday if they could. They want to go out there when it's 10 degrees. They want to go out there when it's 110 degrees. No one gets more use out of backyards than children.
You have some unique kids for this millennium. We never used our yard when we were kids. I bought a house with a big yard and the kids never wanted to go out there and play. They jump on a trampoline, there's a soccer field a 2 minute walk away, and they ride their bikes in the street. I filled in my current townhome backyard with rocks so I don't have to deal with it. Count me among the people that view a yard as just one more thing to maintain. Glad your kids enjoy the yard, though.
I don’t think so. All their friends love playing outside too. I think the issue here is that you are lying about having kids.
The annoying part is people (this Mayor) making decisions for others. Ie, all single family houses are selfish and bad. Couple more steps to reeducation camps.
LOL - please provide a citation for where the Mayor has said this? Or even provide a citation from an elected official in one of the handful of places that have eliminated single family zoning designations (which is very different from banning single family homes and has not even been proposed in DC).
The Mayor's office and the Office of Planning led a planning session at Wilson High School about 6 weeks ago, in which speakers praised the elimination of single family zoning and there was a charette (charade"?) station about 'gentle density' in Ward 3, which would eliminate most single family residential zoning.
Eliminating SFH zoning doesn't mean eliminating single-family homes. It means eliminating the regulations that say ONLY single-family homes are permitted in an area.
Anonymous
01/21/2020 09:51
Subject: Is there a coherent argument that loosening zoning laws will lead to affordable housing in DC?
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:There are three-bedroom apartments that are more difficult to rent. They are great for families, lots of fun. We had a house in the suburbs, the kids rarely played in the yard. I don’t get why people think raising kids in an apartment is such a tragedy.
Our kids would play in the backyard all day everyday if they could. They want to go out there when it's 10 degrees. They want to go out there when it's 110 degrees. No one gets more use out of backyards than children.
You have some unique kids for this millennium. We never used our yard when we were kids. I bought a house with a big yard and the kids never wanted to go out there and play. They jump on a trampoline, there's a soccer field a 2 minute walk away, and they ride their bikes in the street. I filled in my current townhome backyard with rocks so I don't have to deal with it. Count me among the people that view a yard as just one more thing to maintain. Glad your kids enjoy the yard, though.
I don’t think so. All their friends love playing outside too. I think the issue here is that you are lying about having kids.
The annoying part is people (this Mayor) making decisions for others. Ie, all single family houses are selfish and bad. Couple more steps to reeducation camps.
Replacing single-family homes with apartments and condos is basically telling people with children to GTFO.
+1
See here:
https://www.governing.com/topics/urban/gov-seattle-kids-gentrification-series.html
"In Seattle, even before you get to the paramount parental question of schools, the question of housing looms large for families. There’s just not enough of it to go around. There’s lots of new construction, but it’s coming at the expense of single-family homes, which until recently were a Seattle staple. It might be great for a certain stage of life, but most people don’t want to raise their kids in microapartments -- sometimes called “apodments” in Seattle -- above cocktail bars or e-cig lounges. “It keeps dollars per square foot up, so it makes perfect financial sense,” says Tyler McKenzie, president of the Seattle King County Association of Realtors, “but it’s going to drive families away.”
Anonymous
01/21/2020 09:39
Subject: Is there a coherent argument that loosening zoning laws will lead to affordable housing in DC?
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:There are three-bedroom apartments that are more difficult to rent. They are great for families, lots of fun. We had a house in the suburbs, the kids rarely played in the yard. I don’t get why people think raising kids in an apartment is such a tragedy.
Our kids would play in the backyard all day everyday if they could. They want to go out there when it's 10 degrees. They want to go out there when it's 110 degrees. No one gets more use out of backyards than children.
You have some unique kids for this millennium. We never used our yard when we were kids. I bought a house with a big yard and the kids never wanted to go out there and play. They jump on a trampoline, there's a soccer field a 2 minute walk away, and they ride their bikes in the street. I filled in my current townhome backyard with rocks so I don't have to deal with it. Count me among the people that view a yard as just one more thing to maintain. Glad your kids enjoy the yard, though.
I don’t think so. All their friends love playing outside too. I think the issue here is that you are lying about having kids.
The annoying part is people (this Mayor) making decisions for others. Ie, all single family houses are selfish and bad. Couple more steps to reeducation camps.
LOL - please provide a citation for where the Mayor has said this? Or even provide a citation from an elected official in one of the handful of places that have eliminated single family zoning designations (which is very different from banning single family homes and has not even been proposed in DC).
The Mayor's office and the Office of Planning led a planning session at Wilson High School about 6 weeks ago, in which speakers praised the elimination of single family zoning and there was a charette (charade"?) station about 'gentle density' in Ward 3, which would eliminate most single family residential zoning.
Anonymous
01/20/2020 22:39
Subject: Is there a coherent argument that loosening zoning laws will lead to affordable housing in DC?
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:There are three-bedroom apartments that are more difficult to rent. They are great for families, lots of fun. We had a house in the suburbs, the kids rarely played in the yard. I don’t get why people think raising kids in an apartment is such a tragedy.
Our kids would play in the backyard all day everyday if they could. They want to go out there when it's 10 degrees. They want to go out there when it's 110 degrees. No one gets more use out of backyards than children.
You have some unique kids for this millennium. We never used our yard when we were kids. I bought a house with a big yard and the kids never wanted to go out there and play. They jump on a trampoline, there's a soccer field a 2 minute walk away, and they ride their bikes in the street. I filled in my current townhome backyard with rocks so I don't have to deal with it. Count me among the people that view a yard as just one more thing to maintain. Glad your kids enjoy the yard, though.
I don’t think so. All their friends love playing outside too. I think the issue here is that you are lying about having kids.
The annoying part is people (this Mayor) making decisions for others. Ie, all single family houses are selfish and bad. Couple more steps to reeducation camps.
LOL - please provide a citation for where the Mayor has said this? Or even provide a citation from an elected official in one of the handful of places that have eliminated single family zoning designations (which is very different from banning single family homes and has not even been proposed in DC).
Anonymous
01/20/2020 22:37
Subject: Is there a coherent argument that loosening zoning laws will lead to affordable housing in DC?
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:There are three-bedroom apartments that are more difficult to rent. They are great for families, lots of fun. We had a house in the suburbs, the kids rarely played in the yard. I don’t get why people think raising kids in an apartment is such a tragedy.
Our kids would play in the backyard all day everyday if they could. They want to go out there when it's 10 degrees. They want to go out there when it's 110 degrees. No one gets more use out of backyards than children.
You have some unique kids for this millennium. We never used our yard when we were kids. I bought a house with a big yard and the kids never wanted to go out there and play. They jump on a trampoline, there's a soccer field a 2 minute walk away, and they ride their bikes in the street. I filled in my current townhome backyard with rocks so I don't have to deal with it. Count me among the people that view a yard as just one more thing to maintain. Glad your kids enjoy the yard, though.
I don’t think so. All their friends love playing outside too. I think the issue here is that you are lying about having kids.
All kids love playing outside but I have no idea why you think they need or would even utilize a yard to do so?
We live in a rowhouse but the opposite side of our street is where the neighborhood transitions to single family homes and despite having access to some yards the kids mostly hang out on the sidewalk or walk a couple of blocks to the neighborhood park where there is room to actually play soccer or just goof around.
I suspect the kids in our neighborhood are more social rather than less social and spend more time not less time outside because of their constrained yards.
Anonymous
01/20/2020 22:33
Subject: Is there a coherent argument that loosening zoning laws will lead to affordable housing in DC?
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:There are three-bedroom apartments that are more difficult to rent. They are great for families, lots of fun. We had a house in the suburbs, the kids rarely played in the yard. I don’t get why people think raising kids in an apartment is such a tragedy.
Our kids would play in the backyard all day everyday if they could. They want to go out there when it's 10 degrees. They want to go out there when it's 110 degrees. No one gets more use out of backyards than children.
You have some unique kids for this millennium. We never used our yard when we were kids. I bought a house with a big yard and the kids never wanted to go out there and play. They jump on a trampoline, there's a soccer field a 2 minute walk away, and they ride their bikes in the street. I filled in my current townhome backyard with rocks so I don't have to deal with it. Count me among the people that view a yard as just one more thing to maintain. Glad your kids enjoy the yard, though.
I don’t think so. All their friends love playing outside too. I think the issue here is that you are lying about having kids.
The annoying part is people (this Mayor) making decisions for others. Ie, all single family houses are selfish and bad. Couple more steps to reeducation camps.
Replacing single-family homes with apartments and condos is basically telling people with children to GTFO.
Weird - we know lots of people with kids who live in condos and apartments and there are entire cities that are nothing but that. Our row house also barely has a yard (just a small hardscaped area) and both of my kids are very active in sports and the youngest is quite good so not sure how yards are somehow required for families - we mostly use our small yard to store our supercan and recycling bin.
In any case there is currently no proposal on the table to replace single family homes with apartments or condos.
Anonymous
01/20/2020 20:18
Subject: Is there a coherent argument that loosening zoning laws will lead to affordable housing in DC?
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:There are three-bedroom apartments that are more difficult to rent. They are great for families, lots of fun. We had a house in the suburbs, the kids rarely played in the yard. I don’t get why people think raising kids in an apartment is such a tragedy.
Our kids would play in the backyard all day everyday if they could. They want to go out there when it's 10 degrees. They want to go out there when it's 110 degrees. No one gets more use out of backyards than children.
You have some unique kids for this millennium. We never used our yard when we were kids. I bought a house with a big yard and the kids never wanted to go out there and play. They jump on a trampoline, there's a soccer field a 2 minute walk away, and they ride their bikes in the street. I filled in my current townhome backyard with rocks so I don't have to deal with it. Count me among the people that view a yard as just one more thing to maintain. Glad your kids enjoy the yard, though.
I don’t think so. All their friends love playing outside too. I think the issue here is that you are lying about having kids.
The annoying part is people (this Mayor) making decisions for others. Ie, all single family houses are selfish and bad. Couple more steps to reeducation camps.
Replacing single-family homes with apartments and condos is basically telling people with children to GTFO.