A screenshot of a YouTube video of new homes in Victorville, Calif., being demolished. The bank that acquired the development in a foreclosure decided that the homes were cheaper to demolish than to sell.
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Bulldoze the ‘burbs?
By Eoin O'Carroll | 06.19.09
A story last week in the Telegraph, a British paper, describes how the city of Flint, Mich., a former industrial powerhouse now facing depopulation and plummeting home values, is dealing with vacant housing.
The solution? Bulldoze entire districts, returning the land to nature, and concentrate the population in the urban core.
The Telegraph’s Tom Leonard reports that the idea is the brainchild of Dan Kildee, treasurer of Genesee County, which includes Flint.
He said: “The obsession with growth is sadly a very American thing. Across the US, there’s an assumption that all development is good, that if communities are growing they are successful. If they’re shrinking, they’re failing.”
But some Flint dustcarts are collecting just one rubbish bag a week, roads are decaying, police are very understaffed and there were simply too few people to pay for services, he said.
If the city didn’t downsize it will eventually go bankrupt, he added.
The article reports that the city has already demolished 1,100 abandoned homes, and that Mr. Kildee estimates that another 3,000 will need to come down. Overall, local officials believe that the city will need to contract its area
Additionally, the city is buying up homes in upscale neighborhoods, which it will offer to people living in areas that it wants to demolish. But nobody will be forced to move, according to Kildee.
Kildee met with Barack Obama during his presidential campaign, and has been approached by the government to look into applying his strategy to other Rust Belt cities (prompting the Drudge Report to link to the story with the headline, “OBAMA ERA: BULLDOZE SHRINKING CITIES?“)
Razing declining neighborhoods doesn’t seem to be a priority right now for the Obama administration, but Harvard urban economist Edward Glaeser thinks it should be. Writing in the New York Times’s Economix blog, Professor Glaeser argues that some cities just aren’t going to come back.
These cities, he writes, would do well to focus their investment on people, not on infrastructure:
After all, the job of government is to enrich and empower the lives of its citizens, not to chase the chimera of population growth targets. Just once, I want to hear a Rust Belt mayor say with pride “my city lost 200,000 people during my term, but we’ve given them the education they need to find a better life elsewhere.”
Glaeser points out that the distribution of America’s population was very different a century ago. In 1900, the 20 largest US cities were on waterways. But the advent of the automobile made it possible to travel over land cheaply, and people migrated in droves to the wide open of the Sun Belt. (The rise of air conditioning probably helped, too.)
But now there’s another shift underway, as migration to America’s southern tier is slowing and as more Americans are moving back into city centers, a trend that predates, but was accelerated by, the subprime mortgage crisis. As urban strategist Christopher B. Leinberger wrote in the Atlantic in March 2008, the growing number of vacant and abandoned malls, office parks, and McMansions threaten to turn suburbia into the next slum.
Many sustainability experts have noted that urbanites use far less energy than their suburban counterparts. New Yorker writer David Owen observed in 2004 that, if New York City were granted statehood it would rank 51st in per-capita energy use, thanks in part to public transit and other shared resources, but mostly because its compactness forces people to be energy efficient. No matter what your politics are, when you don’t need to get in a car just to go pick up a quart of milk, you’re living a greener lifestyle.
In the meantime, at least one perfectly good suburban housing development has already been demolished, not by the government, but by a profit-seeking enterprise.
In May, a video surfaced on YouTube of new houses in Victorville, Calif., being knocked down by a backhoe. Apparently, Guaranty Bank of Austin, Texas, which acquired the 16 properties through a foreclosure sale, believed it was cheaper to destroy the homes than to sell them.
Maura Judkis, the eco-blogger at US News, reported that the appliances were removed from the homes before they were wrecked, and some of the wood was sent to be reused for construction projects in Mexico, while the rest to be ground up for mulch.
Still, it all seems such a waste. Given how hard it is to predict future migration patterns, perhaps we should build new homes – such as prefabricated houses – that can be easily disassembled and rebuilt elsewhere.
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2. Alan | 06.19.09
In areas with lots of blighted vacant homes a reverse property tax (charging more for derelict homes than non-derelict homes) can help convince the land owner to tear the junk down, or give the property over to someone who can use it.
However I doubt we are going to see big migrations to the cities. Most cities I’ve been in have nothing in the way of services. Sure in nyc you can get a quart of milk on the corner, but you can’t get anything but mugged on the corner in Miami.
3. Mark | 06.20.09
I lived in NYC for 10 years. It’s a very expensive place where most people live in old, outdated, small, inefficient housing. Housing prices are amongt the highest in the country, whilst the subway was built 100 years ago and hasn’t been brought up to modern standards. It’s in desperate need of updating, but with the cost of that in the $Billions, a “new” subway isn’t going to happen. New York City is an urban jungle with advertising everywhere, all buildings and pavement, and very little in the way of open space, parks and public amenities. Even its riverfront is lined with freeways, and the rivers are polluted! NYC is a playground for millionaires and corporate bigwigs, but for the poor and working class it’s an urban nightmare.
4. Martin | 06.22.09
I had lived in Milwaukee from 1985-2009. I decided to move to Poland and am quite happy here. With a monthly travel card costing just $21 I can reach any part of Warsaw. This includes travel on train, subway(metro),buses, and trams (light rail). I have a store near by that is small and offers all the groceries I may need. Europe (not all of it) has some nice alternatives to life in the USA.
5. Sonya Finkey | 06.22.09
This is a startling but interesting idea! Let the local governments give it a try and begin little by little. Why not condemn the abandoned areas, hold auctions for building materials and sell what’s left to scrap dealers? This would help fund the projects. Why not let volunteers get a tax break for clean-up and planting indigenous trees, shrubs and grass? Or, let prisoners do the work as community service and training? Why not try forestry as an industry on the vacant land? I see it as a chance to start fresh.
7. annoyingposterdude | 06.22.09
@ Mark.
Come back to NY to see the changes, and don’t spend all your time in Manhattan. You might leave with a different opinion of city living. I reside in Forest Hills and love it here. BTW - Nothing wrong with a “small” living space that fits your needs and is built to last. Poured concrete walls give you a lot of privacy and will last a lot longer than McMansions.
8. vincas | 06.22.09
@martin,
i made a similar move from los angeles to lithuania, and like you see many benefits. my family lives in an old part of the capital, vilnius, we don’t have or need a car (very welcome from my multi-hour commute in LA), work is a 10 min walk away, our local corner store, a large park with a river and playground for our baby are just minutes away.
however, the sprawl is occurring here too…
9. Mike Wright | 06.22.09
Yes, everyone can’t live in 4000 square foot McMansions. But I for one REFUSE to be forced to live in urban tenements like rats, either.
Will someone just come out and say that we’re going to need population control on this planet since we’re determined to overpopulate? Sure, every human life is a beautiful thing, whatever - but x 10 billion and you’re got a beautiful problem.
2 or 3 billion people was MORE than enough.
10. Michelle | 06.23.09
This is a really interesting idea. It would help to relieve the glut on the housing market, as well. I think this might be something that would have even more potential if it got kicked around a bit on the public stage, as I’ll bet there are lots of great ideas out there as to what might be done with the land, with the remains of the demolished homes, etc. Just leaving an abandoned, demolished wasteland seems kinda sad. It’s not like you get fertile fields if you knock down all the homes on a given block.
That having been said, I wish the people who insists that everyone needs to be living in big cities give it a rest. I live in a quirky suburban town, in a small two bedroom apartment. I don’t own (or want) a McMansion — I want a slower pace, wider roads, and green spaces that aren’t confined to special blocks here and there amid the concrete.
Not everyone is going to be able to be happy or healthy in an urban environment.
11. Michelle | 06.23.09
I am originally from Lapeer, Michigan…not even 30 minutes away from Flint, Michigan.
You have not driven through areas where the sidewalks are crumbling, or non-existant, the roads sometimes more gravel and dirt than pavement, areas where the houses are boarded up, falling apart, businesses and strip malls almost completely empty. Blight, drug dealing, poverty, and an infrastructure that is falling apart (but thankfully, not as destitute and desolate as Detroit)…
I remember a time when Flint was more than what it was. The problem has to do with the fact Michigan was, and still is in many ways, a one pony economy…having thrown its fortunes and future with the auto industry. Michigan did not diversify after the gas crisis of the 70’s…which was a mistake I am not entirely sure it will ever recover from. In a bad economic climate, Michigan is the first to go under…and the last to come back.
Given the depth and breadth of the problems in Flint, Detroit, and other cities with such serious infrastructure problems, I can only say, “Why not?” Why not try, on a small scale, to see if an idea such as this will work? If there is no money to maintain an adequate police force, public services, why not focus on particular areas, and get rid of buildings that are dangerous and abandoned?
I wanted to move back to Michigan. Michigan is my home, and that is where my family is. Friends have urged me not to return, having lost jobs and having difficulty finding work. It sadden me to see billboards, as I was leaving Michigan, for pawnshops and ‘cash for gold’. It was difficult to listen to a man in line at the store talking about having been an engineer for 21 years, being laid off, and unable to find work for the past six months…with his wife in a similar position…having lost her job after over 20 years…and trying to hold things together as their daughter attends college…trying to save money by shopping at Save-A-Lot, Aldi, and buying their clothes from Goodwill…something they had never done before.
As much as I miss my family, friends, home, everything that is familiar…at least out of state…I have a chance at being able to do more than just barely survive while praying things will improve soon. Flint’s economy…Michigan’s economy is not improving markedly anytime soon.
12. Mike Morgan | 06.23.09
We’ve left the world of business as usual. We will never return. I’m glad to see city managers bulldozing unsellable houses. James Kunstler of Kunstler.com writes that suburbia is the greatest miss-allocation of money and materials in the history of American and probably mankind. He predicted that the burbs would become the new slums of America. I suspect we will see much more of this activity in the future. In a future with much less energy the burbs have no future and no way to recover. Many will probably simply rot into heaps. America, welcome to your new future: Economize, Localize and Produce. ELP can be found at theoildrum.com and is the new business as usual. Have a look there.
13. Frank | 06.23.09
lighten up Mike! New York is a big playground, with parks everywhere-ever heard of the one called “Central”? How about “Prospect”? And now with the new bike lanes everywhere you can get from neighborhood to neighborhood without going down into the big scary subway, that somehow manages to move millions of people quickly and cheaply without crashing. I live in a hundred year old suburb that has a convenient train connection to NYC where I work. I just got a folding bike that I take on the train and pedal to the office. Cities and suburbs work great together!
14. GetMyHomesValue | 06.26.09
I think it’s a matter of preference as with all things. I personally don’t like big-city living with smaller living spaces and less ‘natural’ scenery. But it pays (or costs more) to live close to it. The closer I can live to the city while still being in the burbs - the better for me. But I know I’m going to pay a lot more for my home with a location like that vs. being way out in the middle of nowhere where I could have all the scenery and space I want, but less convenience.
15. yo | 07.15.09
didn’t you know that the US is actually a 3rd world country?
It’s just been dressing nice.
16. DUNOTS | 07.16.09
Regarding overpopulation, which no. 9 had mentioned:
Species will grow to fit the resources. Just because humans are more R selected than K selected does not mean it’s not the case for us. If there’s room, and there’s food, the population will keep growing. This is, by and large, an adaptive trait. Organisms that reproduce more will tend to be more present, so it’s a pretty short step to reproducing as much as possible up to the carrying capacity.
The problem is that we’ve more or less figured out ways to extend the carrying capacity beyond sustainability. And suddenly, this adaptive trait is maladaptive now that the environment has changed. And things like improved agriculture and housing technology serve to further facilitate the logarithmic growth of the population.
I’d have to say that the problems of overpopulation, climate change, and sustainability are all of a kind. And depending on how far you want to go with the idea of evolutionary psychology (which, please, not too far), economics and society may be in there as well. Something drastic will have to be done to address a host of traits we have which are no longer adaptive in an environment that is starkly different from the one humans lived in thousands of years ago.
17. Janina | 07.16.09
Here’s an idea -
Make these homes available to anyone from anywhere (locally, nationally, or internationally) who wants to live in them, with a low price and the new owner’s commitment to repair, maintain, pay taxes, etc. Then do economic development projects surrounding those newly-filled communities. We keep complaining about homelessness and poverty, why not make better use of these resources?
18. Chris | 07.16.09
Those that push urban living don’t care about your happiness - they are happy, and so should you be. Small towns are perfect for some - and should be brought back - self sufficient and built not to feed on massive power structure, but smaller power generating stations scattered throughout the town. Variety and diversity are the keys to health - not conformity into mass urban meccas.
19. Madam_S | 07.16.09
The Victorville houses were demolished not because it was cheaper than “selling” them. They were unfinished. The bank decided, instead of investing in finishing unsellable houses, it was better to raze them. I can totally understand this calculation. It’s just unfortunate that we’re tearing down houses when we have thousands of homeless people (perhaps 30,000 in Los Angeles County alone).
20. JL (France) | 07.16.09
Apparently Guaranty Bank of Austin did not think of letting the owners stay in their homes and pay smaller sums for longer periods. And why in the first place have helped the banks with money they did not deserve and not the home owners who could then have repaid their debt with government money. The money would then have finally reached the banks, rescuing the owners on its way. Or does that sound stupid to an economist ?
21. Avery | 07.16.09
Interesting that some comments have referred to the “natural” scenery of the suburbs. It is my opinion that to be truly natural there should not be mowing, trimming or manicuring. However, that does not mean that I don’t appreciate well cared for greenery, I just prefer it to be in the form of a nice park which benefits more people while requiring fewer resources to maintain than a burb’s worth of back yards.
22. David James | 07.16.09
in Germany, after the wall came down, there was a large net drop of population in the east ( the young moved west for jobs, the old arent having children ) in some of the eastern regions where they are having to deal with drops of 10% + so this sort of reverse urbanisation is something they are having to deal with, but in their case for the long term.
23. Chris | 07.17.09
You’re all scaring the heck out of me. Are we really so eager to live in a world where we don’t have the right to choose where we live, how we live? Imagine this utopia. Is life going to be worth living if we have to all march in line in hopes of achieving an egalitarian and innocuous existence? I’m very happy that we as a nation enjoy the prosperity and security that allows us to look into the future and be critical and proactive when it comes to issues like the environment, energy, education, demographics, etc. However, sacrificing our constitutional freedoms for a pie in the sky is just cutting off your nose to spite your face. Count to 10 people. Go smell some roses.
24. Froggy | 07.17.09
Personally, I think selective breeding and radical population control is a really, really good idea.
Unfortunately the IQ of the average person isn’t high enough to figure that out. Which is a really, really good reason for selective breeding.
O.K., now every knee jerk moron with an IQ of 50 can rant about nazi this, or nazi that. lol.
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1. Mike McFadden | 06.19.09
I’m reminded of the Asimov novel, “Caves of Steel”, where Earth’s population lives in vast underground urban apartments. No backyards, no streets just corridors and totally efficient mass living spaces. Of course, one theme of that book was the overpopulation of the planet and humankind’s removal from nature. Probably not what the proponents of diminished suburbs have in mind.
By the way, is New Yorker writer David Owen’s last name pronounced ‘Eoin’?