Brewster McCracken is pushing city council to create a program to build more parking garages downtown. There are already a lot of parking garages downtown, and every new development includes several floors of parking, but it is often not profitable to open these garages to the public. Similarly, it doesn't make economic sense for developers to build public parking garages. According to the Statesman, McCracken estimates that the proposed Seaholm garage would cost $3.78 million to build and would generate a $3.3 million profit over 30 years. How much would $3.78 million in the bank generate over 30 years? When parking is in high enough demand that it makes financial sense for other buildings to open their garages to the public, they probably will.

We love to see the city interested in promoting progress downtown, but subsidizing parking promotes a car friendly downtown, not a pedestrian friendly downtown. More parking garages downtown means it is easier for people to drive downtown, which means there will be more cars downtown, which means it will be less pleasant to walk downtown. More parking garages downtown means there is less reason to take public transit downtown. More parking garages downtown means less space for other buildings downtown - less retail, less offices, less apartments, which means all of them will be more expensive, which means less people will be able to afford to shop downtown, work downtown and live downtown. More parking garages downtown means more blank concrete walls facing the street, more driveways crossing the sidewalks and more SUVs driven by suburbanites used to driving on pedestrian-free streets. More parking garages downtown means less pedestrians downtown.

Image from Matt Wright on Flickr.

Bag the Bags Coalition is urging city council to pass an ordinance banning the use of plastic bags by large retailers and instead require those retailers to offer compostable bags. In April, city council passed a resolution directing the City Manager to evaluate and recommend strategies within 90 days for limiting the use of non-compostable plastic bags and promoting the use of compostable plastic bags, recyclable paper bags or reusable checkout bags. 90 days have passed, but as far as we can tell, no strategies have been recommended.

Each year, an estimated 500 billion to 1 trillion plastic bags are consumed worldwide (over one million per minute) and billions end up as litter. Only a small percentage (1-4%) are recycled. In Austin, the city will not take plastic bags for recycling, but some grocery stores will. Most plastic bags end up in landfills, and a lot end up in the ocean. Plastic bags never biodegrade - they photodegrade over hundreds of years, breaking down into tiny toxic particles that contaminate the soil and waterways and enter the food chain when animals accidentally ingest them.

San Francisco is the only U.S. city to ban plastic bags so far. Ireland imposes a tax on plastic bags that is similar in amount to the estimated cost of recycling a plastic bag (around $0.15), which has reduced consumption of plastic bags there by 90%. Several environmental groups support the ban. The plastics industry does not.

Image from AHKnight on Flickr.

Lee Nichols has a nice article in this week's Chronicle about destruction of the urban forest resulting from infill development. Mature trees are a key factor that makes older neighborhoods more pleasant than suburban sprawl. Unfortunately, large trees are often taken down when an old house is replaced with a larger new house. Austin's Tree and Natural Area Preservation Ordinance requires a permit for removal of a tree with a 19-inch diameter. Removing (or killing) such a tree without a permit can result in a fine up to $2,000. Of course, $2,000 isn't much of a deterrent when building a million dollar house, but the Chronicle article doesn't come up with examples of builders intentionally violating the law. All the builders they discuss all appear to have removed trees with the blessing of the city. If you know of a tree that has been or may be illegally removed or damaged, call the City Arborist at 974-1876 or email michael.embesi[at]ci.austin.tx.us.

Tree advocates have come up with some suggestions for tweaking the ordinance. We have a few additions:

1. The city should compile a list of protected trees. No need to spend a lot of money doing it - Austin has plenty of volunteer tree-huggers. Put a form on the city website allowing people to submit the location of protected trees and a photo showing the tree. That way we would at least know if someone has taken down a protected tree.

2. Change the penalty. In addition to the fine, put violators on a block-list so that they can't get any more building permits for one year if they take down a protected tree.

3. Tell the city arborist to stop authorizing builders to remove protected trees.

Part of the problem is that builders are limited by setback restrictions so that they can only build within a compact footprint on any lot. Most builders (and homebuyers) want to keep big trees on their lot, but they want a big house more. Enforcing these suburban-style setback regulations is resulting in the loss of our urban forest. If we eliminated the setback rules, but strictly enforced the tree preservation rules, we could allow urban infill and maintain the urban forest. Trees are more important to our neighborhoods than making sure every house is 25 feet from the front lot line.

Image from splityarn on Flickr.

Austin’s rising population and stagnant housing supply have resulted in increased housing prices. Even though there are a lot of condos under construction, few have hit the market. Our pal Wells Dunbar over at the Chronicle has a nice article discussing the complicated answers to the problem of affordable housing. One undiscussed simple answer would be to get people to stop moving to Austin. Despite our commenters efforts, that plan isn't working [ed: isn't working yet - keep trying guys!]. The other undiscussed simple answer would be to increase supply. That is difficult in Austin, where every new development (or replacement of an old development) is met with protest and outrage, and requires repeated appeals to various city bureaucracies.

Why are people opposed to increasing the housing supply? We all bemoan the loss of local flavor, but that is seldom enough to motivate action (other than blog commentary). The hardcore fight against new development consists mainly of two groups with economic incentives: the individuals being displaced (and the people fighting on their behalf) and nearby homeowners.

The individuals being displaced see new development as the enemy of affordability because when an old apartment complex is torn down and replaced with a new complex, the new units are more expensive than the old ones. If you are only looking at one apartment complex (which is understandable if you live there), then affordability is being harmed. However, if the new complex increases the local housing supply, then there will be a lower relative price for other housing in the area. In Austin, we haven’t added enough density to meet the influx of people, so we haven't gotten ahead of the curve enough to push prices down. The supply we have added has kept prices from increasing as much as they otherwise would, but prices have still gone up.

The other opponents to new construction are the owners of the other housing in the area. This is often couched in phrases like “loss of neighborhood character” or “increased traffic,” but there is also an economic motivation. New construction down the street increases the supply for people interested in buying the neighborhood, which results in lower prices. Homeowners profit by restricting local supply, because it increases the price of what they own.

If we aren’t going choose a simple answer, what are the complicated answers? The city is going to spend $300,000 studying the question. Some lawyers from UT came up with a few alternatives: get the government to pay for it through public funding or "private" finance tools, or get the government to force the developers to pay for it through tax tools, zoning/land use ordinances and regulatory tools. These may be good ideas, but they don't reduce actual housing prices - they just shift part of the price to taxpayers or developers. There are only two real ways to reduce housing prices: reduce demand or increase supply.

Image from bookgrl on Flickr.

The City of Austin has posted a survey seeking local input about the Downtown Austin Plan. The planning process is being led by ROMA Design Group and is supposed to address issues such as density codes, funding mechanisms, transit routes, and affordable housing. The survey is available in English and Spanish and will be up until Oct. 12 or until they get 10,000 responses. Questions include "If I had $100 dollars to spend on public improvements downtown, I would spend in on _________.", "Where do I take my out of town visitors?" and "What do I dislike most about downtown?" We’re confident that our readers, whose strong opinions about all things development-related are evident in our comments section, will have lots of helpful hints for the folks at ROMA.

Image from the Chaninator on Flickr.

Several state reps, including Joe Farias and David Leibowitz, and Congressman Ciro Rodriguez have recently begun to ask questions about the Texas Department of Transportation's ad campaign promoting toll roads and the use of budgetary funds to lobby Congress. Specifically, they are asking the Attorney General whether TxDOT's actions are legal.

Legal or not, ad campaigns and lobbying seem like a poor use of taxpayer money for any state agency, especially one that is constantly complaining that it doesn't have enough money, but especially one that cuts from its budget any project not involving new highway construction. TxDOT's priorities are out of line with the priorities of the people of Texas, which is why they need an ad campaign and lobbyists. We'd rather cut the ad campaign and lobbyists, and instead get TxDOT some new priorities.

Image from AlphachimpStudio on Flickr.

It seems Chuck Woolery is back from the dead, chillin' at the beach out at Horseshoe Bay. While he's there, he's making ends meet by selling time shares home sites (at lease we think he's selling home sites - we're having a hard time figuring out exactly what is for sale). The commercials have been running on television in California and offering airfare and hotels to potential buyers, leading some Austinites to cry "Californication!" If you heard his style, but you missed the point, it's the video.