A few things to know this week: November 15, 2019
Happy Friday, friends!
Every week, we round up some of the things we read, listened to, or watched that really caught our attention. Here are just a few things we think you should know this week:
This week's things to know:
1. Texas city adopts street grid and code
Here’s a nice write-up on the impressive and atypical work our friends in Bastrop, Texas, are doing to address fiscal and environmental sustainability through land use regulation. There’s even a nice shout-out to Verdunity’s work with the City: Bastrop recently conducted a fiscal analysis of revenue per acre and productivity. The analysis, by the Dallas firm Verdunity, looked at whether each parcel in the city was “revenue positive,” measuring return-on-investment of the city’s development patterns. Like many cities, Bastrop has grown in a “drivable suburban” form. “The current development is not fiscally sustainable. We’re $7.2 million upside down now,” says City Manager Lynda Humble. “The goal is that everything built at least pays for itself going forward.” – Jordan
(Want to hear more about this story from some of its main characters? Check out our podcast interviews with Lynda Humble and the Bastrop team.)
2. Transportation and housing issues go hand-in-hand, experts on Perimeter panel say
This article about Atlanta gives a good real-life example of the relationship between housing, transportation, and affordability. It outlines Atlanta's growth in downtown and North Atlanta, and relative lack of growth south near the airport. Buckhead, one of the areas most expensive commercial areas, lacks affordability leaving workers to commute from long distances and increasing traffic in the area. Some solutions included bringing attention to the city's underused bus network and increasing housing in areas served by that same transit. – Tim
3. Cincinnati wants to calm traffic with street mural program
Cincinnati is launching efforts to support their Vision Zero policy by calming traffic through their street mural program. Unlike many of the initiatives we have seen lately related to crosswalks (some of which have unfortunately raised eyebrows at FHWA), these will be placed mid-block, at bump-outs, and in the middle of intersections. Even better, the City will pair up neighborhoods who cannot fund their murals with potential sponsors. It’s a great example of a very low cost (the most recent one was $500!) project that can unite and promote safety. – AJ
4. Here's What Happens When a Handful of Developers Control the Housing Market & When We Make It Hard to Build, We Give Developers More Power Over Our Communities
This pair of articles written by our pal Daniel Herriges over at Strong Towns both deal with the outsize amount of power that a few large developers have over our communities (and who ends up bearing the negative ramifications of that dynamic). The first examines the reality that most housing markets in the US are dominated by an oligarchy of just a few developers. The second picks apart a development culture that favors the big and powerful, and weeds out the small and locally-rooted. – Jordan
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.
Chesterfield County, Virginia, has some big plans for their transportation network: a $64 million dollar "SuperStreet" makeover of one of their intersections. This is more than the county contributes to their transit agency, in only one project! The officials use traffic projections to justify the project, saying that today's 44,000 ADT will be over 100,000 in 2036. There’s reason to find those numbers dubious, however. That and the pedestrian- and bicyclist-unfriendliness make this project another example of business as usual, and about as un-resource-conscious as one can be. – Tim
Don’t miss: Chuck Marohn is bringing the Strong America Tour to DFW.
Verdunity is proud to be co-sponsoring Chuck Marohn’s visit to Dallas on Friday, November 22. The event is FREE and takes place from 1:00-3:00pm at Bryan Tower. Spots are very limited so sign up soon by following this link!
In the area but can’t make it to Dallas? There are also events in Shreveport, Fort Worth, Denton, Duncanville, and Fate, between November 20 and 22. Check out the Events page on Strong Towns for the most up-to-date info.
Want to learn more about how fiscal analysis can help you make your city stronger financially?
We created a new sister website showcasing how we use math, maps, and money to help cities communicate your resource gap and explore ways to increase tax revenue and improve service efficiency without necessarily raising taxes.
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!
