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While protecting farmland is key, I know that something must be done to effect the trend of urban sprawl. Coming up with some type of solution to this issue that has long term sustainability has been difficult. History has shown us that everyone who explicitely tried to target urban sprawl has bitten off too much to chew. Concepts like new urbanism, Vancouverism, and all the other various “isms” have attempted to make a systematic change in the way people look at cities and the way people choose to live. Frankly, people are not going to make significant changes to the way they live simply because you come up with some fancy name and some urban planners thell them that that is the way it should be done. This is where these solutions have gone wrong. Too much scope and too many stakeholders.
I contend that we simply make the end of urban sprawl a business decision. Ater all, business typically holds the most power in a society. Throughout the many posts I have made on this blog I wrote many times of the effects that real estate values have on urban sprawl. By catering to city core real estate developers, I believe we could significantly reduce urban sprawl.
Plain and simple, developers want to make money. In order to make money, they typically want to build big. By adding a dozen stories to their building, they are going to be able to make more money on a project. This is why I believe the city needs to change its zoning laws. By allowing more units to be placed on the same property, density will certainly increase and condos can be sold with smaller margins. This should result in more, cheaper housing available in the downtown core.
Now, how sustainable is this. The opportunity is certainly there. Changing city zoning will, without a doubt, cause developers to build taller buildings. This in turn increases the density in the downtown core. Also, building a condo building in the downtown core will become more profitable, reducing the benefit of building in the suburbs. As for people and capital, they tend to come together. If the government was to change the zoning rules, developers with significant capital would come to them.
Of course, while there is always a risk of a real estate collapse or recession hurting the demand for these condos, well priced condos at the bottom of the market tend to perform better in these types of markets. First time buyers would still be buying in this situation.
Overall, I believe that there is the potential for simple changes in zoning rules to take a big bite out of urban sprawl.
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One more of these.
Find a New Place to Park
I was reading the newspaper the other day when I came across an article on parking in downtown Vancouver. Of course, the first thing I thought was that they were trying to reduce congestion in the city and trying to reduce pollution from commuters across the Lower Mainland. By limiting the amount of on street parking, city officials were also on the way towards taking a bite out of urban sprawl. The underlying effect is clear. When it is tougher to find affordable parking in Vancouver, the cost of the commute rises. When the cost of the commute rises, people are less willing to live further from their job. The difference in parking costs of $10/day adds up to $200/month and significantly narrows the gap between suburb and city rent costs.
Now, how sustainable is this solution. Once again, there is no doubt that the opportunity is there. Tens of thousands of people a day drive into Vancouver for work and need a place to park. If the demand for parking outpaces supply even greater, costs will rise and people will look for alternatives. The people envolved in this solution is another important factor. Government officials must be interested in using this solution or it will go nowhere. A good thing is that costs are extremely minimal.
There are some negatives to using this solution to fight urban sprawl. While increased parking costs may get people off the road, many will simply use other transportation alternatives. Also, when parking spaces are lost, people are unable to patronize businesses. Fearing a lack of customers, many businesses may decide to locate out of the city, increasing the effects of urban sprawl.
There is no doubt that this solution has the potential to reduce urban sprawl, but it must be implemented in combination with several other options.
Just a quick message to let you know about this video I found. It was on the website TED Talks and deals with the problem of urban sprawl. James H Kunstler dissects suburbia and discusses how we should go about fixing what we have destroyed. It is a really entertaining video, let me know what you think.
I truly believe that something needs to be done to save our local agricultural land. I would love to be able to say that we can work together to make BC a “local produce only zone” in which all our citizens decide that they want to support our local farmers, but I know that the majority of people would not be willing to pay the premium required to eat locally. I would also love to say that the owners of the land know whats best for it and will avoid selling their property to developers at all costs, but that’s not true either. Sometimes, you just have to argued for the public good and rely on good-old-fashioned protectionism to do what’s best for society.
This is the idea that the first aspect of my suggested solution is based on. By instituting a strong government protection on the land, it will be around for future generations to enjoy. Now, I know what you’re thinking. How are a bunch of privately owned farmers’ fields beneficial to society as a whole. Well, this is where my solution comes in. I suggest that the provincial and federal governments take it upon themselves to introduce a policy of mixed use farmland. Farmland that, through the use of networks of hiking/horseback riding trails running throughout, can be of greater value to the entire society.
My inspiration for this is taken from Barnston Island. For those of you who have never been there, Barnston is the unofficial family bicycling destination in the lower mainland. On a nice weekend in the summer, over 500 cyclists a day will take the short ferry ride from Surrey to ride the 10km loop around the island. It is a true family friendly destination and it is not uncommon to see grandparents in their 70′s riding beside grandchildren on training wheels. These people get to leave the fast paced city behind for a couple of hours and enjoy the amazingly beautiful landscape on this agricultural paradise. I truly believe that this solution could be what makes saving agricultural land a community issue and not something just for environmentalists.
Now, how viable is this portion of my potential solution. For starters, I truly believe that the opportunity is there. Recreational public land is in high demand and people are always looking for ways to get out of the city and enjoy life in the country. These trails would give a safe place to walk or ride that would give a greater number of people a vested interest in the land. The availability of People and Capital are somewhat questionable as well because this would rely entirely on government actions and financing. A non-profit organization would take over maintenance after the trails are established, but because of zoning issues and the high initial investment, the government must be fully involved in the implementation of this plan.
Now, it is also important to look at potential difficulties in the implementation of this solution. This plan assumes that the government is supportive of keeping agricultural land as is. While government bodies like Metro Vancouver (formerly the GVRD) offer their support for saving agricultural land, there may be a hidden agenda. Landowners in the ALR pay drastically reduced property taxes while residential and industrial developments represent a significant increase in a cities tax base. The desire of public servants to increase their tax base may outweigh the desire to save agricultural land. Another difficulty is the potential backlash from landowners. Knowing that implementing a dual-use policy will most likely prevent the property from ever developing, landowners may be unreceptive to the introduction of these trails.
Overall, I believe that combining recreation with agriculture will go a long way to protecting agricultural land through gaining a vested interest from a much larger crowd.
Earlier I began a discussion of the relationship between urban sprawl and several other social problems in Vancouver. This is part 2 of that post and this is an analysis of what has been done to tackle another social issue.
A New Way to Live: Make Better Use of What We Have
A recent trend in Vancouver and many other urban areas is the revitalization of some of the cities least desirable areas. Many of these revitalizations are, at least in part, undertaken to offer low cost urban housing to people in need. Projects like the Woodard’s Building (http://vancouver.ca/bps/realestate/woodwards/) and the restoration of the Chinese Freemasons Building (http://vancouver.ca/commsvcs/planning/chinatown/program/residential.htm) have gone a long way to revitalize these underutilized neighbourhoods. These projects, undertaken with a goal of reducing homelessness and reducing costs of living in Vancouver also have the potential to make a lasting effect on urban sprawl. This practice of making better use of the urban resources we have is important to fighting sprawl and making a more pleasant centre.
Now, how can this solution help reduce urban sprawl. While building in higher densities is a useful way to reduce sprawl, resources act as a barrier to widespread adoption. New high-rise buildings are incredibly expensive to build, passing these exorbitant costs on to buyers, who in turn run for the suburbs. By using this social housing restoration model, we will be able to make better use of the buildings that we have and sustainably increase the density of the neighbourhood. By creating affordable places to live out of significantly underutilized pieces of real estate, we are able to keep people from heading east to more affordable housing.
Now, let’s look a little deeper into whether a systematic adaption of this building concept is likely. Once again, there is clearly an opportunity present as there is a need for affordable housing in Vancouver. The problem is, the opportunity may be too large. There are tens of thousands of people in the lower mainland who would love to get there hands on a low rent condo in downtown Vancouver. The availability of capital and people is another potential difficulty. While there are always business people with money who are looking to make a profit, it is questionable whether a large number of them would be willing to take cuts in their profits to be socially responsible.
Overall, I believe this could be a sustainable solution to this problem, but I question whether the scope could be large enough to make a real effect on the effects of urban sprawl.
Whenever people talk about social problems and how to fix them, you will undoubtedly here someone ask whether the problem is truly a problem or just a symptom of a deeper societal ill. I contend that urban sprawl in the Lower Mainland is not only the problem, but is also the cause of several other social ills facing the people of Vancouver and the suburbs. Pollution from automobiles, high costs of living, environmental degradation, poor diets and homelessness are among others can all be at least partially attributed to urban sprawl.
I decided that thinking about some of these other issues might be a good way to gain greater understanding of this problem. By looking at potential solutions implemented to solve these other “problems” and deciding whether they could have any effect on limiting urban sprawl, I hope to find new ways of looking at the main cause of agricultural land destruction.
A Change in our Eating Habits
The first attempted solution I chose to look at was originally targeted at reducing pollution from transportation and improving the diets, and consequentially the health, of people. Through locally based diets like the 100 mile diet (http://100milediet.org/), people are encouraged to only eat food produced/grown within 100 miles of their home.
Now, how can this solution help reduce urban sprawl. As I have talked about earlier, one of the main causes of urban sprawl is the comparatively low value of agricultural real estate. This low value is a result of the death of the local agricultural industry at the hands of cheap imported produce. This change in consumption and spending habits of the majority of the population has significantly harmed the market for local food producers. I believe that this type of diet, if widely adopted could have a significant mitigating effect on urban sprawl. This is where we run into problems. Plain-and-simple, this type of solution cannot be sustainable and significant in its effects if it is not practiced by a majority of the population.
Now, let’s look a little deeper into whether a systematic adaption of this diet is likely or even possible. There is no doubt that there is an opportunity for this solution to catch-on. People are aware that the processed food they eat is bad for them and that the food found in grocery stores travels thousands of miles to get to them. There is also the pro-local sentiment that typically radiates through society. People are typically more willing to help out a local business than they are a foreign corporation. The problem is, that this solution lacks the people and capital needed to make it a success. The failing agricultural industry has be left without any advocacy funds and big business are the ones that are benefiting. These type of widespread adoptions of new lifestyles typically take a lot of money and a lot of people advocating, neither of which are at the disposal of the parties involved.
While the current and future expected adoption of this diet may allow the survival of select niche agricultural producers, I believe it is highly unlikely that this type of solution will result in significant portions of the provinces agricultural land becoming sustainable.
A New Way of Living
……………… Stay tuned for the next possible solution………….
The interesting thing about potential solutions to urban sprawl is that they tend to revolve around a massive mobilization. Over the next few days I am going to attempt to take a different approach to the issue than most. I believe that it does not take a complete change in the way everyone lives to mitigate the effects of this sprawl on our farmland. I believe that a select few can make a huge difference.
The concept of “Vancouverism” is an interesting idea that was implemented by a select few. For starters, what is Vancouverism? Well this is how the New York Times describes it:
“Vancouverism is characterized by tall, but widely separated, slender towers interspersed with low-rise buildings, public spaces, small parks and pedestrian-friendly streetscapes and facades to minimize the impact of a high density population.”
The concept of “Vancouverism”, before the term was coined of course, was implemented by world famous Vancouver artitect Arthur Erickson. Project 56 was his plan to turn Vancouver into a modern metropolis.
Project 56
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I thought it would be useful to discuss why this issue matters. There are several ways that urban sprawl, either living in it or observing it, negetively effect our quality of life. In no apparent order ………….
- Increased Pollution from Commuting – people living further away from their work and spending more time on the road
- Habitat Loss – many animals rely on agricultural land to survive
- Increased Obesity – neighbourhoods located a long ways from everything make walking impractical
- Reliance on Processed Foods – without a local source for produce, people turn to processed food
- Reduction in Recreational Land – places like Barnston Island unavailable for public use
- Infrastructure Development - urban sprawl requires larger, more costly connection networks (roads, transit) to be built
- Sight Pollution – beautiful natural landscapes replaced with McMansions, big box stores and warehouses
- Agricultural Real Estate Prices - development speculators cause market value of farmland to skyrocket
- River + Ocean Pollution - Run-off from ”concrete jungles” takes harmful chemicals into bodies of water
- Increased Pollution from Food Tranport - lack of ability to source local produce cretes 3000 mile salads
