A few things to know this week: May 1, 2020
Happy Friday, friends! Every week we collect some of the best things that members of our Verdunity team read, watched, or listened to over the course of the week. Plus a new episode of the podcast!
New on the Go Cultivate! podcast:
Are We Doing This Right? – Parking Minimums Edition
Our “Are We Doing This Right?” series returns to take on parking minimums. They might seem like a harmless feature of your zoning ordinance, but they play a huge role in shaping the physical environment of your community. Intentionally or not, parking minimums adversely affect the viability of public transit and local businesses, housing affordability, regional ecological health, and the fiscal strength of the cities that enact them.
Check out our recent coronavirus-related episodes:
Reclaiming the streets – with John Simmerman
Small development, trust, & strong local economies – with R. John Anderson
How local governments should respond to the small business crisis – with Basel Musharbash
Leveraging federal emergency management funding: COVID-19 edition – with Laura Clemons
This week’s other things to know:
Government’s Innovation Surge Shouldn’t End with the Pandemic (Governing)
State and local government agencies have had to adapt quickly to respond to CV-19. Things like working from home and holding public meetings online that were previously labeled as "not feasible" were implemented in a matter of weeks, and in some cases, just a few days. Cities all over the country are coming up with new ways to provide services to citizens, businesses, and developers in this constrained environment, and the pressure to do more with less will intensify even more as the post virus recession plays out. As this article suggests, the innovation surge in local government shouldn't (and really can't) end any time soon. – Kevin
What Covid-19 teaches us about how to fix freeways (City Observatory)
This is one of my favorite articles I've seen in a while, clearly explaining complex traffic engineering concepts in a simple way. In it, Joe Cortright shows how, during COVID-19, one particular freeway is actually moving more traffic with higher speeds during rush hour WITHOUT traffic jams. Its a powerful explanation of why measures like congestion pricing to manage demand of roadways can make freeways a better, smartly used resource for all its users. – Tim
How to Sharpen Our Fiscal Tools to Fund Infrastructure (Governing)
Cities and states have massive amounts of roadways, utility lines, and other infrastructure that is in need of repair. These liabilities have piled up because our development pattern does not generate the tax base required to pay these costs. Tools like our land use fiscal analysis can help communities shift development policy and capital project investments to improve ROI and close this gap over time, but additional measures are needed to provide more revenue in the near-term.
A popular talking point is that more federal money is needed to fund these replacements. I'm personally quite skeptical about another infrastructure stimulus bill, unless the money is directed toward maintenance projects and local leaders are given the ability to determine what projects will help their community the most. There are other ways to close the infrastructure funding gap besides deficit funding. This article outlines several options we should be considering to better align revenue streams with costs. – Kevin
Report: Density Done Right (Ryerson City Building Institute)
Hat-tip to Treehugger for putting this on my radar this week. There’s an excellent new report out making the very well-rounded for distributed urban density, featuring a number of case studies and examples of applications of “gentle” forms of density. The term “density” itself often conjures images of highrises; the “tall and sprawl” pattern is explicitly not the vision presented in this document. And for a number of good reasons relating to housing affordability, “livability,” environmental sustainability, and infrastructure cost burdens. Give this short, densely-packed report a read this weekend; it’s definitely worth it. – Jordan
Street Food (Slate)
While states are starting to contemplate, or actually enact, plans to re-open public establishments, it is important to think of the greater good over narrowly-defined economic gain. This write-up touches on some of the different practices that public gathering places (diners, restaurants, schools, churches, etc.) can use to mitigate social contact by reclaiming land in the form of repurposed parking lots. Reclaiming land that city codes have long required these places to hold for parking might just be a small saving grace to your local diner or favorite sandwich shop given the ample space. Repurposing these spaces might also convince city and county officials that the space is better used as gathering spaces for people, rather than subsidized storage for their cars. The fine line between community and personal space will be something that is relevant for long after this initial wave of re-opening. Cities, as well as individuals, will have to take a step back and re-evaluate what changes to make in the way they conduct business. – Ryan
Lithuanian capital to be turned into vast open-air cafe (The Guardian)
Touching on Ryan's share from this week, here's a concrete example of how a city in Lithuania is making public space available to private business in order to not only help them resume business, but also promotes a new life for outdoor spaces like plazas. Think of the places in your community where this could happen—how could cities change policies to provide flexibility for this idea, or to allow it along street frontages? The time to experiment is now! – AJ
Do you enjoy these weekly roundups? (Why wouldn’t you?) You can get them sent straight to your email inbox every Friday, if you’re into that.
State and local governments are already discussing service cuts and making decisions about what precious dollars will be spent on or invested in. This article makes the case for why funding for local businesses should only be kept off the chopping block, but should be a priority. We agree! – Kevin
Analysis: You didn’t think a pandemic could stop highway planning in Texas, did you? (Texas Tribune)
While we're on the subject of questioning expenses, I have to wonder about this one. Despite reports from the Texas state comptroller about significant drops in sales tax and oil drilling revenues and a deep recession ahead, TxDOT just voted to move forward with using its $3.4 billion discretionary fund on the I-35 interstate expansion project in Austin. Congestion on I-35 is certainly a problem worthy of attention, but in light of everything going on, I can think of myriad other ways these dollars could be used. – Kevin
Sidewalks are Public Health (Streets.mn)
If you're like the rest of us, you've been looking forward to that daily respite from the office (makeshift or otherwise) to get a quick walk in and enjoy some sun. If it hasn't made you rethink the way sidewalks are typically designed and installed in communities, well, I have to ask why the heck not. One clear thing that's emerged from the increase in foot traffic in our neighborhoods is this—sidewalks are being designed and installed all over the nation to check a box. Rarely are they designed and installed to actually function properly and comfortably for regular usage. Isn't it odd that we require developers and builders to put them in, but we don't guarantee their functionality in that process? Talk about a fiscally unsustainable approach. As the article states, sidewalks are public health. This should be a worthwhile investment now more than ever. – AJ
Please note: We encourage our team members to share their thoughts in these newsletters; opinions expressed individually are not always necessarily reflective of the views of the company as a whole.
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Hey, friends in local government:
Have thoughts on any of the links above? Think we missed something essential? We’re discussing these topics and more over on our brand-new online community, exclusively for local government employees.* Sign up for the Community Cultivators Network and join the discussion!
* The network is currently only for those wonderful folks out there who work in local government. If you’re not currently working for a city, town, or county, we still love you (and are sure many of you would add value to the community), but we want to keep our commitment to making this a community focused specifically on our friends working in local government. Thanks for understanding!
