An engaging conversation can be found in the archives on the East Allegheny Yahoo group about zoning (and libertarianism). I'd like add at this point that that in some cities (San Francisco comes to mind) zoning is used (intently or indirectly) to make landowners rich by controlling and restricting development. This keeps prices high and favors those who got in early. It seriously restricts the market and hinders its functioning. The larger issue I have with zoning however is that it encourages a car-oriented society just as the construction of highways does.
James Howard Kunstler is a good resource on this and I'll summarize his points here (all quoted from article linked below):
James Howard Kunstler is a good resource on this and I'll summarize his points here (all quoted from article linked below):
- For the previous 300-odd years of American history we didn't have zoning laws.
- If you want to make your community better, begin at once by throwing out your zoning laws. Don't revise them -- get rid of them.
- Replace these things with a traditional town-planning ordinance that prescribes a more desirable everyday environment.
- After the Second World War zoning began to overshadow all the historic elements of civic art and civic life.
- Shopping was declared an obnoxious industrial activity around which people shouldn't be allowed to live. This tended to destroy age-old physical relationships between shopping and living, as embodied, say, in Main Street.
- What zoning produces is suburban sprawl.
- The model of the human habitat dictated by zoning is a formless, soul-less, centerless, demoralizing mess.
Here's Kunstler's article
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