Revitalizing Downtown Housing
Catch up on the ensuing discussion. Rusty pointed out an unusually cheerful article published in this week’s Creative Loafing.
Amber began a discussion on some of the complexities associated with the housing issues associated with downtown’s revitalization.
I’ve been a believer for the past few years that downtown has been going through a revitalization. From going to CAP Town Hall meetings, to reading the subject of revitalization in general, there have been plenty of reasons to be optimistic. The right set of forces finally came together a few years ago, and a steady change has been working its slow maneuvers ever since. This was one of my inspirations for starting Bloglanta.
As the rate of change increases, so does controversy. Over the next few years, as Atlanta continues to tackle the issue of revitalizing downtown, more housing issues will erupt.
Housing is a ridiculously complicated issue, and society made it that way. In some ways, it was done out of necessity. In other ways, it was done to advance a predominant view of the American Dream.
The Atlanta Neighborhood Development Partnership is behind many mixed-income housing initiatives in Atlanta. The work they do is good because, for the most part, they’re very tuned to the complexities that are overshadowed by all the rhetoric and noise. I once visited the ANDP office to hear a presentation on what they do. I don’t remember most of it, but I do remember Hattie Dorsey explaining to us that gentrification is not necessarily a bad thing.
One comment in Amber’s blog asked about the desired balance between renewal and affordability. In one word, my answer is choice. Part of ANDP’s vision is that more people have more choices of where they want to live. But the word “where” is a bit misleading, because I don’t see it as so much of a matter of place as much as it is a matter of form: high-density versus low-density, cars versus trains versus busses, mixed-use versus lard factories. And then there is everything in between.
Whatever choices individuals make, there is also a public benefit to ensuring a supply of workforce housing. Police officers, firefighters, teachers, waitrons all need places to live, too. If you want these folks working in or near your neighborhood, should they not also have the choice to live close by? Are there ways of accomodating these choices without radical market interventions by the government? To what extent should prices reflect the true costs — both internal and external — of these choices?