The Inherent Value of Density (...And The Cost of Sprawl)

[@mariusfacktor3597]

These guys did the math and got to the bottom of why many cities are financially struggling. Notice they didn't need to scapegoat immigrants, or the Federal Reserve, or Airbnb, or Blackstone, or Reagan, or Obama. They didn't need to solve a corruption scandal or cut city workers' pensions. They just looked at where money comes in and goes out per acre, and they added it up. No gimmicks.

[@urban3]

This is true. But I (Joe) would like to add that AirBnB can be a problem when they are assessed as 'houses' and not as the commercial product that they are. We've seen this issue in places - but that's a video for another day. Thanks for your observation on our work method! Happy holidays!

[@mariusfacktor3597]

@@urban3 Interesting! Looking forward to your future videos!

[@marshall2389]

I do wish it talked a bit more about how the values of those properties was calculated. Is that the cost to purchase that property? Is that the tax revenue collected by the city each year from that property? I'm guessing it's the latter based on the analysis provided.

[@mariusfacktor3597]

@@marshall2389 I think the chart at 2:14 is assessed value. So how much that land + structures are worth today.

[@urban3]

@@marshall2389 The assessors (or appraiser, depending on the state you're in) puts the value on the properties. The taxes are applied to the value, the same way that you are taxed when you buy a toaster. The rates vary on location and government. Don't over think it. The assessors put value on things, people pay a % tax on that value, and that's it. However, there are matters to be discussed in future videos, on how the assessors determine value. But all that is out of our hands when we get the data. Everything that you see in this video is straight from the governments we analyze.

[@daveschlegel7537]

Amazingly concise yet comprehensive summary of the math and value of not only density, but doing the math as well. Will be sharing with folks!

[@rightwingsafetysquad9872]

Everything said makes perfect sense. The problem is that observed reality shows that it's not true. With rare exception it is cities that are struggling and suburbs are doing well. And the less dense the suburb, the better they're doing. Exurbs are the new suburbs. Pick almost any city in America: Los Angeles, Dallas, Cleveland, Portland, Kansas City, Atlanta... If you find exceptions, it will be for cities that are actually smaller than some of the suburbs of the larger cities like Lexington, KY or Winston Salem, NC.

[@Terrranfear]

By what metric are you measuring this reality?

[@dalehalliday3578]

I think it was Chuck Marohn of Strong Towns who compared an old style strip of commercial properties on the main street versus an adjacent strip of commercial properties bulldozed and a shiny new fast food restaurant, complete with parking and take out was put it. The old strip paid something like or double or triple the taxes per acre the new place did. Moral of the story -- protect your old style strips of commercial mixed use properties. They pay their way.

[@frentz7]

What *should* a city be like? What would be good for the people? .. well now that's a different question. This is about money.

[@ActiveTowns]

Brilliant video team! I'll be sharing this with my Active Towns Community today. 🙌

[@Zalis116]

I've seen this math done before, and it certainly makes intuitive sense. But in a lot of US cities, many low-density, car-centric suburban areas have politically seceded from their core cities. That means that they wouldn't be getting tax revenue from the central/walkable districts and all the dense housing and commercial districts there. So by urbanist logic, these suburbs should theoretically be completely insolvent, falling apart, and unable to provide acceptable services and infrastructure. Yet in practice, it's the opposite; the suburbs are nice, well-maintained areas with good-quality-roads and excellent schools. Meanwhile, in the denser, inner-city areas, the roads are potholed to oblivion, the schools are terrible, and so on. I'm thinking of places like the Kansas City suburbs of Overland Park, Lenexa, and Olathe as my examples here.

[@electron6825]

I'm curious on how dense but poor performing cities also factor into all of this.

[@JasonAtlas]

If you pick an example city we could have a closer look. I'd expect it to be broadly untrue that they are financially viable once splitting, with the exception being some sort of funding loophole or outside interference.

[@noahjohnson8740]

Which taxes go to which governments though? Obviously property taxes come from where they are located but income tax will come from where the person lives even if they generate that income somewhere else

[@AndyInTheFort]

What you are describing is what Strong Towns calls "the illusion of wealth." Just like using a credit card to buy a flashy purse and sports car, these cities have used debt to build all that flashy infrastructure. And unlike the credit card, it's not a literal measurable debt (although in many cases it is), it is a debt to the future generations who will be responsible for the insurmountable challenge of replacing all of that infrastructure when it reaches the end of its lifecycle. And I don't think it's as intuitive as you think. Just ask yourself, why are those KC suburbs so much flashier and nicer than the historic core of KC? What happened to the urban core? Easy answer, right? Population loss in one area, population growth in another. That is what is intuitive: cities fail when they lose population, and they succeed when they grow their population. The unintuitive thing is: It doesn't have to be like that. And in fact, it's best if we don't have a financial system that relies on constant population growth to succeed. For one reason, growing population is not a "success" if the infrastructure used to support that growth cannot pay for itself. And second, infinite population growth is not a guarantee. So we shouldn't design our city's capital maintenance budget on the assumption that our city will never, ever stop growing. And yeah, I do think those suburbs will eventually fail. If it's not a plateau or decline in population that does it, it will be because of their infrastructure debt. It's happening to my city right now.

[@AltereggoLol1]

Yep, this is just another propaganda channel

[@AndyInTheFort]

I have been doing the math for my own community and the county gave me a big spreadsheet with every parcel on it. But there's a bunch of junk data that I have been trying to fix up, line by line. So far, our downtown has the most productivity in the entire county, and it's not even close. The most valuable piece of empty land is a parking spot in our downtown, which the city gives away for free. Wal-Marts tend to be "okay, not great" compared to other developments. Duplexes perform amazingly and I think they are the easiest thing to get past the planning commission, so they have been my goal. We do have quite a large downtown for a city of our size, and one surprising thing I found was that one development in downtown underperforms the rest of the neighborhood, it is about equal to our gigantic Target. I think it may be because the downtown development has a lot more parking than people realize, which is one thing my analysis might struggle with, which is the concept of public areas such as roads, parking, and alleyways not being captured in the "acre" portion. Our big downtown bank building (#1 parcel in the county) uses city-provided parking on other parcels, so how fair is it compare to a development that has private parking? I also have an Esri subscription and want to map the data, but don't know what I'm doing with the software. I do have a friend in the city who can show me how to do it though, I just need to finish cleaning up all the junk that the county gave me. We are also in a municipality whose revenue is 85% sales tax, which is a hurdle I am not afraid to confront, but is worth mentioning. I think a big obstacle, for us, is that much of our local politics is based around a group of BANANAs that view cost-saving measures as communism. We didn't take care of our historic alleyways (originally paved as bicycle infrastructure in the 1890s) for a hundred years, and then they were opposed to the city using federal money to repave them. They were against connecting schools to neighborhoods and painting crosswalks (also with federal funds, 0% match). And they have 2, maybe 3 votes out of 7 in our local government ("board of directors" form of government). Anyway, we need actual financial acumen in our city. There are those who support a "balanced budget" but don't know what that actually looks like. I wish we could afford to hire Urban3 so I could have outside data to help me proselytize, but we are already on the brink of bankruptcy and I have to do the work myself.

[@Jacksparrow4986]

I don't know you or where you live but feel the urge to thank you for the effort you're putting in.

[@Nphen]

Thank you so much for those local efforts. It's insane to me that local officials would refuse Federal grant money on ideological grounds. They're harming their constituents based on a for-profit right wing fear machine. Godspeed to your efforts, Inshallah there will be pedestrian safety in your community.

[@hia5235]

In what way is a one stop shop not best for busy people in which Time is the main concern

[@jake9674]

"painting our crosswalks" yeah we all know what you mean, stop lying

[@Jacksparrow4986]

@@jake9674 no idea what you are talking about

[@gr8bkset-524]

In addition to what the author of this video says, sprawl requires that inhabitants drive. Owning a car cost an average of $10000 a year, even though a car fets used one hour, or 4% Of a day and sits unused 96%. For the average American who makes $55000, owning a car cozt 20% of their income. An average American commuter works 1 day a week to own a car. The solution should be for workers to live so close to work that they don't need to own a car. When they need a car one can be by the hour. With this model of car sharing, one car can serve +10 people .

[@Nphen]

Makes me feel better about the $5k per year average to keep each of mine and my wife's cars on the road. We have a 2018 C-Max and a 2022 Escape hybrid. Both bought used. Much cheaper & lighter than full EV, but still save on brakes, fuel, and maintenance. With no train service to other cities in Michigan, and limited mass transit in all metro areas, cars are a must-have for many families. Every oversize Silverado, Suburban, Expedition & F150 isn't just burning up gas & brakes, they're burning up expensive tires and polluting. Car dependence is a Federal, State, and local issue. The ultimate quagmire.

[@ianmcdougald8171]

this was a great video, please keep em coming!!!!

[@deadcarbonboy]

Just when we needed them most, they returned!

[@MAAnderson22]

Great video, thank you for all the work you guys do. Stay safe in WNC.

[@BlueGrovyle]

New Urban3 video? No way.

[@andrewh88]

Same lol hoping to see more from them

[@rodh172]

BRAVO ON THIS ONE, BRAVO!!

[@ryandraper5241]

Subscribed! Happy to see more content. Saw you speak at UNCG a few months ago, keep up the good work!

[@scotthartman9834]

Love!

[@EmperorNefarious1]

I wrote a paper about tax density in my community for my economic developlemnt class. Compared all kinds of properties and noticed how a rundown underperforming urban lot was providing more tax per acre than the successful strip mall. And how lot size is more important than home value by comparing 3 five bedroom homes that sold for about the same amount but had vastly differnt lots. Halfing lot size quadrupled tax per acre. My professor was pleased and both of us learned something.

[@urban3]

Can you please email the paper over to Joe at [e-mail]

[@EmperorNefarious1]

@@urban3 I will.

[@MyApps-uf1dz]

as long as planners "help developers make FINANCIAL decisions", we will be deep in the shit and only getting deeper

[@spencer4732]

awesome video!

[@WCRMcG]

Does this take into account sales tax collected from businesses? Would Walmart still rank as low?

[@urban3]

We will follow up with a Sales Tax production video. Spoiler, main street is still more productive. But we'll show the math.

[@Robert-fx3ng]

75% of violent crime occurs in 2% of counties in the USA. Population density has a down side.

[@JessieJussMessy]

Cuz too many people are close together, more chances for violent crime and everything else occurring in abundance with higher pop densities 🤓

[@edjones38120]

I’m so happy to see a video that talks about the financial impact of building the standard American pattern. The low density pattern has such a large effect on our lives each day and I wish more cities built more density.

[@Never-ending_]

Why don't you just move to a city?

[@4k0y0t3]

Have you looked at sprawled mixed use areas? Kind of like the “perfect towns” they made decades ago? I have a theory that suburbia is scoring so low due to a lack of local businesses within walking distance to support the population. Also I understand that we can look at your explanation as the more dense the housing, the higher profit per acre. The problem with this is that most people don’t like being crammed together. Look at the urban exodus in the past few years. Instead of trying to get people to live on top of each other, maybe we can make suburbia profitable enough to sustain the population of a given area. This is a huge topic of local governments and a lot of them are failing to understand the consequences of pure suburbanism. You need commercial industries to support the population.

[@tann_man]

Spreading lots of people far enough to not "be on top of each other" is very costly for infrastructure provision and maintenance. It also makes many businesses and walking to them less viable. You need a min threshold of density - at least as dense as a traditional village to stay out of the red.

[@4k0y0t3]

@ I agree. I’m not saying every home needs an acre of land, but we can have a moderately dense population without sharing walls and ceilings. The key here is raising suburban value to a point where it’s maintainable, not the most profitable. The most profitable will always be hotel styles with commercial use in the building because of how dense it is. I am proposing that we combine the most profitable and least profitable styles to meet in the middle. It only needs to break even to be a viable option but I’m sure we can make it at least slightly more profitable. Then the only limitation is time and local governments can just wait to see their wealth grow.

[@urban3]

@@4k0y0t3 It needn't be a hotel to be profitable. The key is infrastructure consumption and quantity of infrastructure. New Urbanist projects in suburban environments perform quite well on an ROI basis.

[@Nphen]

The best thing suburban towns & cities can do is to get more housing near a current business district with reduced parking requirements. Build townhouses in an empty mall or stripmall parking lot. Encourage ADU on single family lots, and allow duplex, tri, quad, and small apartment buildings in single family zones. Preferably without specific approval. Some cities offer free architectural plans for ADU. Traditional small-town downtowns can encourage owners to renovate upper floors into housing and put out proposals for condo & apartment towers in or near downtown. Open up subdivision cul-de-sacs to main roads and provide ample bike paths, preferably not in road gutters.

[@Never-ending_]

Urban sprawl has 30% more kids. Does that add to the value of a county? Money isn't everything. We are not a chart.

[@alessandromaisano7628]

Amazing, as always! Would be great to see some sources related to the data and methodologies applied/shown in the video

[@urban3]

The assessed value comes from the government. The acreage is from the cadastral layers in the GIS from the City or County, and then we divide one into the other, and then convert it to a 3D model. Think of it as a bar chart that is sitting on a map. That's all.

[@TheMightyAbs]

and yet every person living in the community would prefer to have a low density house to live and be surrounded by other low density housing.

[@urban3]

We're not arguing preference. We're arguing the math that subsidizes the preference. Also, it's not a true 'market' if it is heavily subsidized. And that's even being generous, as most communities cannot afford the subsidy. But, if they want to do the math and vote themselves into insolvency, then by all means, go for it. Just don't construe personal preference with economic benefit without doing the math.

[@speciesofspaces]

Only issue with density is human adaptation. It should be utopia to have more people sharing more densely packed spaces yet the way humans tend to remain highly inefficient a la individual needs and wants makes this utopian model quite hard to fathom. Instead it seems more likely one gets density with still very high levels of individual consumption and less sharing etc. Therefore the infrastructure as it grows would require greater and greater efficiencies on a huge scale. Something no large city can manage up to this point. What seems to occur then are subgroups within the density itself which more or less introduce incoherence and so as energy systems are made more complicated through redundant needs and uses the whole system looks less like an organized whole and more a patchwork of wasted energy etc. Not to say density is inherently bad among humans but it is still very wasteful of energy and the system at large. The analogy is not an ant colony or termites but a messier kind of thing with conflicting desires. Maybe democracies just aren't well designed for these kinds of large populations of development as it seems to require more centralization. The waste is built-in from the start as each person in these densely packed cities would still want more independence of movement and freedom of choice. For example, here in the US it is almost impossible to imagine a calendar of weekly vehicular movement according to neighborhood and registration where only certain folks would be permitted to use the roads on certain days and others not etc. This kind organization on all levels of energy flow would be required for greater and greater efficiencies to occur via greater density.

[@usernameryan5982]

Can you do a video on Houston? They seem to have such low density especially on the urban fringe yet their debt seems to only be around 20 billion. Is it because it’s still growing? Can you model what the debt obligations would be with zero population growth? Is it because it has higher property tax rates? Thanks

[@tintin_999]

Nice graphic, but would it be better if the red (negative) properties weren't just flat and red, but were depicted as red canyons?

[@vivalaleta]

My teenage sister convinced me to write STOP URBAN SPRAWL on the new streets that were for a new neighborhood next to the highway. Her heart eas always in the right place.

[@FastlaneProductions1]

Well the value that Walmart provides is that it provides cheap groceries. How can one fairly measure that against the tax revenue of a hotel?

[@adrianc171]

Can you do a video on the historical land valuation growth rate of the different uses

[@JeredtheShy]

When you acknowledge and research the reasons people just about kill themselves to afford single-family homes, accept those reasons as okay and something that the housing market needs to provide, and then discuss higher density solutions to those problems and needs, then I'll listen. So long as you keep acting like people are stupid and that they live in houses because they are vaguely evil and that the only thing that matters in the world is how much tax money a given square foot of land provides, you are the problem, and you'll get ignored. I did not watch yet another video on the subject with the same predictable conclusions because that is not my job.

[@AltereggoLol1]

thank you, it gets so tiresome to hear the same smug leftist arguments over and over

[@darklazerx7913]

This is true, but its still a simplification. Obviously since people who live in houses drive to those other places, and buy there, they will also make more money. If the city is poor, or rich also depends on who the people are living in the city, typically richer people prefer living in houses.

[@GodGuy8]

I dont have a real estate background so im having trouble understanding how the tax value per acre means? are you trying to say that if the land was sold it would cost that much? I get that you are saying that vertical urban growth is more valuable to to a city council than urban sprawl. just need to watch more videos i guess

[@LimitedWard]

Cities raise tax revenue by charging property owners based on the value of their property. The more productive the property, the higher it's assessed value, and therefore the higher the tax revenue for the city. What Urban3 is doing here is providing an objective measure of how much tax revenue is generated for each acre within a city. The findings here show that denser mixed use neighborhoods are more productive and therefore net more tax revenue for the city. This then helps fund the ongoing expenses of building and maintaining the city's infrastructure and services. Lower density single use neighborhoods net far lower tax revenue, and in many cases are actually a net negative because the cost of maintaining the infrastructure and services in that neighborhood exceeds the revenue raised through property tax. This makes sense intuitively: the more sprawled out your city, the more infrastructure is required to service every home and business.

[@GodGuy8]

@ ok wow was not expecting such a thorough response thank you so much it is appreciated!

[@Luis-vx1tx]

What is Urban3's opinion on a land value tax?

[@urban3]

It's an option that needs more consideration and conversation. Definitely. Simply put, our opinion is that communities need to have an honest conversation about land use economics and do the math on the choices they make.

[@tann_man]

It's better than property tax but still not good. You're still taxing land which means you are punishing owners of land for improving the land. This disencentivizes land improvements.

[@urban3]

@@tann_man Land Value Tax is less of a punishment than regular property tax. Here's Marohn talking about it: kzbin.info/www/bejne/oHq5qqetesmfi8k

[@tann_man]

@@urban3 We agree. Better than regular property tax because its less punishing but still punishment nonetheless

[@TheEternalHermit]

Land development is influenced by the value and centrality of the land itself. So the single family homes are built on land that due to its location is less productive to begin with. During the real estate boom of the early 2000s I remember seeing farmland bought up and converted into single family subdivisions. Now my question is, if it were more profitable for developers to buy that and build it into multi family homes, why would they not do that? The answer is, it was likely not more profitable because there would not be enough renters. If I had a large sum of money, I think I would prefer to put it in the stock market over becoming a landlord. My sense is that it might underperform the stock market it might overperform it by a small amount but that will more than be made up for by the inconvenience. So even if zoning laws were not in the way, I do not think all of these suburbs would be developed into multi family homes. Maybe in places like San Francisco they would but in most places I do not think so. Even in San Francisco though, have you seen the opioid zombie hellscape that is downtown San Francisco? With the city authorities exhibiting such a complete dereliction of duty on matters of public order, can we really blame people for voting to maintain zoning laws? I am just saying, I think there is a reason Japan is much more walkable and has much better public transit than the west. It's because the Japanese commit very little crime and such a way of life is viable in Japan. In Japan you can ride the subway without dealing with smelly, aggressive, mentally ill homeless people.

[@lephtovermeet]

This is what pisses me off: cities should be cheaper than suburbs as more people are sharing infrastructure and city services (roads, electric lines, emergency services etc), and yet cities on average are more expensive than suburbs as cities are effectively forced to subsidize net negative suburbs, and the irony is most people in the suburbs actually blame and demonize cities. If tax revenue was utilized proportionally, suburbs would need 10-20% a year in property tax, every singe road tolled, $500 a month water bills etc. to be solvent.

[@BigRodd91]

There's a principle called, "Supply and Demand" in economics. You should look that up.

[@lephtovermeet]

@BigRodd91 then why isn't supply rising to meet demand? Oh right because the world doesn't actually behave like your average classical into evon book.

[@socal33]

Maybe, just maybe, people don't want to raise a family in a dense urban development??? If everything was about cost, then we'd live like chickens packed into barns. Seriously, there's a disconnect with people who only look at numbers and not happiness, choice, and livability. I've lived in dense urban, suburban, and now rural. I'll take rural over urban and why? We make the food that the dense urbanites need to live. Literally, we provide you dense urbanites with power and food. Without us rural towns, you'd be dead.

[@noahjohnson8740]

Land Value Tax would incentivise density

[@carkawalakhatulistiwa]

Soviet microdistrict Vs usa suburbia

[@carkawalakhatulistiwa]

Soviet microdistrict Vs usa suburbia

[@overseer7004]

the validity of tax farming is great and all, but have you considered their are other costs than mere capital; for instance, some land uses on a meta-population level are not sustainable without other supporting structures. yes you may reap the asset tax here, but the necessary people and their attained human capital needs to grow in some place other than the millers floor. of course solvency is key, but it is key across a long time frame for the whole economy of scale & this stinks of a "all is grist to the mill" mind set

[@TransNeingerian]

Growth and profit should not be the top priorities when developing land.

[@TransNeingerian]

Cities should have a mac population per m^2. High population density is the worst thing for any citizen.

[@JeniElbedour]

Welcome to the new world of oligarchy where we are all minions.living in the hive and the owners have their own islands.overseas.

[@noahmontgomery4827]

Most city spending is tied to people and not infrastructure, so this isn't the most accurate picture.

[@barryrobbins7694]

The world’s population is expected to top off by midcentury. Population growth is already low or nonexistent in most developed countries, some countries are declining. The United States would have no population increase if it wasn’t for immigration. The world is going to have to learn how to develop a no growth economy.

[@gvncd]

The UK has a huge housing problem partially because of this. Most housing, even in cities, is made up of ridiculously inefficient (space wise) single family homes with gardens. This is not such a problem for a larger country such as France or the US where there IS enough land to warrant building this way, at least outside of large cities. It is not such a problem in rural areas, but a lot of housing in larger cities where rent and house prices are the most exorbitant are covered in these seas of ubiquitous two or three floor houses that are inexplicably expensive and frankly quite ugly. Traffic inside these cities can be nearly innavigable at times because they are larger due to suburbia. A potential solution would be groups of 4 to 8-story apartment buildings with decently sized balconies surrounded by lots of green spaces and community needs, like schools, hospitals and shops, but also allotments to encourage community food growing. The other main advantage of this is that everything would be relatively nearby, eliminating the need for as many roads and parking spaces, not to mention improving air quality due to lower in-city driving.

[@jct4418]

I strongly disagree with this analysis. This is cherry-picking favorable data, lots of other much more important factors point to the suburbs- health well-being happiness safety and income all look much better in single suburban sprawl over condensed living even in something similar like townhouses. This is the UN international socialist 'humans are cattle" model trying to enforce trends feom top down. Whereas suburban sprawl is at least century old natural trend that reflects people's desires for their own lives and happiness. They don't buy them or move there because they are forced and towns and cities aren't forced to build them, people want them get over it, we won't eat the bugs.

[@jct4418]

If anyone doesn't think this is propaganda ask one thing, where are there houses using more in services than they provide in income- this channel acted as if it was single detached- it's clearly much much higher in government assisted low income compressed housing... Brushing over that was unbelievable - If he wants data, how about the 100 straight years of suburban property value increasing and reselling vs the last 92 years of government built and funded housing projects. None of them reach their expected life span, very little resale value, the quality of life and real value of property everywhere around it drops suddenly and irreversibly. What a shock... The data points a different direction when you consider anything other than pure dollars per acre. 😅

[@cheesefries7436]

Yuck

[@DjChronokun]

S. Korea only builds nearly exclusively high-rise developments, and it is how they are able to make the cities so much nicer than anywhere in the western world, the dollars per acre you can afford to invest in urban development is simply much higher with density, or more accurately, with _intensification_, as it's not just about squeezing people in, it's about having a lot of floorspace per building, and being able to support more efficient infrastructure like urban expressways with free flow interchanges and underground parking structures and so on as each of these things can serve more residents and businesses with a lower total number of lane miles of roadway having to be built to cover the sprawl to achieve equivalent traffic capacity, etc.

[@What-ez6im]

you are measuring value per acre but why not per square foot? you are hiding the key aspect to the value of some of these buildings. being that they are tall and not spread out. if you measured the square footage of the building and factored it into the cost to construct you see that its not much better then the value that the walmart gives.

[@MechaOrangeStudios]

Because a city has finite land area, but you can build up higher to use it more efficiently

[@larslrs7234]

@@MechaOrangeStudios Is it value of land or value of land+building. You can't have it both ways at the same time.

[@JohnKerbaugh]

Not all land is suitable for building up, and much of the value has nothing to do with building density but Nash equilibriums. Centralized labor zones without adjacent housing & commuting access will not have the same value. A CPU may be the productivity zone, but it needs the much slower data drive & power hog of a fan. If we do not count the cost of housing or feeding employees against the business of course it comes off looking so good.

[@victorwilson3392]

The problem is the amount of raw infrastructure needed to connect a Walmart to a city vs a high density building. Even if the Walmart generates more revenue compared to cost of construction than the high density per acre building the upsized infrastructure to reach that Walmart is still much greater than the infrastructure to service the high density building. There are simply fewer units of streets, sewers, and power lines required to reach a series of high density developments than a single Walmart.

[@LimitedWard]

The cost of construction has very little to do with tax revenue generated by the city. Walmart generates very little tax revenue for the city compared to a higher density mixed used neighborhood of equivalent size. This tax revenue is needed to keep the lights on, the keep pipes from busting, and keep the fire department funded. Cost of construction is a bigger factor when thinking about how to promote higher density. Developers aren't going to build a productive high density building if it's too expensive. Which is why cities need to think about reducing red tape and adjusting building codes to make it easier to build more productive properties.

[@alexandrep4913]

The question I wonder is, so what? America is so huge that cities are pointless. Most of americas value and trillion dollar companies were spawned in suburbia. Urbanists goofy European cities have not been able to spawn a single trillion dollar company in the last 50 years. So frankly, as a European myself who moved to America. Why is this some weird battle that urbanists are annoying everyone with?

[@JasonAtlas]

I have to disagree because it disagrees with the american dream ive had drilled into my head by megacorps. I am a man so i need a truck. Its important for my grocery shopping.

[@mi12no]

It’s more valuable because you can control people more easily in packed housing buildings. Information brokering is one of the things driving up value.

[@mariusfacktor3597]

That doesn't make sense. Dense housing is more valuable per acre because it earns more money in rent and thus it pays more property taxes to the city. Contrary to your point, it's actually quite easy to control people who live in the suburbs because if you block the road that lets them out, they'll all be stuck. But it's very difficult to control people who are within walking distance to their needs.

[@JasonAtlas]

​@@mariusfacktor3597I remember the pandemic where some cops would sit at the entrances to our suburb and ask where we were going. Wouldn't have taken much effort to close of the effort if he had wanted.

[@dehe82]

Looks like another centralised vs decentralised view on things. A pity humans hate living in density... This is not the solution.

[@olamilekanakala7542]

Given the many loved and thriving dense cities worldwide, you seem to be making a considerable claim there.

[@dehe82]

@olamilekanakala7542 really? If people had a choice, do you think DENSITY is what they'd pursue? Don't mistake necessity for desire.

[@Ty-vk8pb]

@@dehe82 Smart density, yes. Many people move to walkable cities like Amsterdam specifically for their lifestyle upgrade. Likewise many people much prefer the bustle of busy city centres over the slow life in the countryside, and certainly over the ghastly car strips of most small cities in north america.

[@Milkytron]

@@dehe82 If you look at the price per sqft of real estate in any metro area, the most expensive real estate (highest demand) is typically the most walkable and most accessible. So, yes. People demand it and supply of it is lacking, hence the high price.

[@Descriptor413]

@@dehe82 Honestly, yeah. There are a lot of nice things you get in dense places that you can't get in sparse places. Most commercial business models simply don't work in the countryside, even in the age of the automobile, simply because there's not enough population to sustain a business. Ultra-low overhead operations like Dollar General or low level fast food are all that can survive. Meanwhile, the proximity of people in cities, when done well, means you can have exotic businesses on almost every street. You might still call that necessity, but at the end of the day it's part and parcel with properly developed dense city living. And honestly, even if you magically had all that commerce out in the middle of nowhere, through some cartoonishly high subsidy or something, I'd argue you'd still be missing out on other advantages of the city as well. I may be old fashioned, but I actually kinda like other people! They may be inconvenient at times (drastically so even), but to try and take just the good without the bad is often the road to vice, not virtue, and you miss out on the complex beauty of human life. Little more than objectification of others, destined to end in lonely isolation, which sounds awfully familiar in today's world, if you ask me. Humans just aren't built to thrive with absolute convenience, even if it's awfully tempting. It eventually gnaws away at you.