Outer Loop Envy? The New Mrs. White, ChronBlog
In this fight against unwanted growth, plenty of the small towns can rely on their own zoning laws and other strict construction codes to help guide development. These are tools that have largely been banished from Houston's City Hall.
While hardly a new concept, zoning proponents have typically pointed to other, more world classy one presumes, cities in support of their arguments. The big problems with heavily zoned cities has always been two-fold.
1. They are prohibitively expensive in which to live. Unsaid is that, to new-urbanists, this is a feature and not a bug, serving to keep out the undesirables and ensure that what is built is almost primarily stuff white people like.
2. Segregation in these cities is a huge problem. And, yes, it's a problem that's growing in Houston as it becomes more new-urban as well.
The problem, for the New Mrs. White and her new New-Urbanist friends, is that Houston is not proceeding along the path to Houtopia quickly enough. There are not enough little walkable enclaves filled only with boutique storefronts and coffee shops reminding them of a white-washed version of those European cities they see on TV. Instead, in Houston, we get CVS that dares to want to have a parking lot. In the new Mrs. White's view this mars a project, that won awards despite the fact, that prevent Houston from being inundated with praise from fellow new-urbanist/design types across the country. The only thing worse than not being considered World Class(y) to New-Urbanists, is that thought that you might be ridiculed by other New-Urbanists for not having something they have in their versions of Utopia.
It's the ultimate city-wide game of "keeping up with the Jonses" and it ignores all of the things that make Houston distinct and great. It's also trying to undo years of developmental history without any cost/benefit analysis given to what is being proposed replacing it.
The New-Urbanists won on the issue of light rail. As a result Houston is now saddled with an expensive system that is more suited to becoming a quirky wedding venue than reducing congestion. If they win on the zoning issues, Houston could be in even worse shape.
At least they've given up on the thinly-veiled lie that was "form-based codes" and have owned up to what it is they really want.....full control and say over what is built inside the Loop, how it is built, when, and what private land-owners can do with it. Private property rights be damned.
I can't help but wonder if the Chron has penned a "internal memo" laying out a call to arms in support of stripping away personal property rights in Houston?
