accel2’s Recent Comments

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  another day, another troll

  If we moved out of NYC to somewhere cheaper and "better", does it mean we'd be as ignorant and as bad a speller as you?

  Just wond'rin.On An interview with Majora Carter, founder of Sustainable South Bronx posted 3 years, 1 month ago 10 Responses

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  Coffee

  I am no expert, either, but there are a ton of non-Starbucks, non-deli swill coffee options in NYC.  In my own corner of Brooklyn, not far from Downtown (though rather distant from Williamsburg), coffee shops can be found every few blocks.  For example, Gorilla Coffee on 5th Avenue in Park Slope is all organic coffee.  Flying Saucer on Atlantic Ave (not far from the wonderful Sahadi's you mentioned) is very popular and funky (can't vouch for the quality of the coffee but the yuppy brownstoners around here I'm sure can be snobby about their coffee).  Ozzie's Coffee is a Park Slope institution.  etc.
  On Lessons on how to live from the NYT food section posted 3 years, 2 months ago 9 Responses

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  Have to agree

  Have to agree with the previous posters to a large extent.  I'm sure some blame can lay with the career bureaucrats within ACOE, but if they get their dictate from politicians then that's that.

  I work within a city agency in NYC and let's say I am an environmentalist within a very non-environmentally-aware agency.  A lot of advocates can't understand how backwards our agency is.  But the fact of the matter is that if the mayor were to decide that he was setting a new policy course for our agency, the agency would change its tune in a minute.  There isn't really a nefarious conspiracy in the agency -- may be some of the higher-ups here are not the most environmentally aware, but if the mayor told them to change agency policy to favor sustainable solutions, they would make it happen immediately.On The Army Corps of Engineers is the real culprit behind New Orleans' devastation posted 3 years, 2 months ago 9 Responses

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  Back and forth

  Patrick,
  We'll have to agree to disagree.

  It should be clear that once a sufficient quantity of something is provided, prices go down.  If the market has not provisioned enough affordable housing yet, it is mostly because insufficient housing has been built.  Does it cost money to build housing?  Yes.  But there is only so much demand to go around - so if you build more luxury housing, the cost of less-than-luxury housing goes down.  I agree that current zoning, taxation, and regulatory regimes make it far from a free real estate market, for better and worse.  However, I firmly believe that building more housing, no matter whether it's "affordable" or not (and "affordable" housing drives up the cost of all "non-affordable" housing to all those not lucky enough to get the affordable housing), will bring housing costs down.  When people were vacating New York City in the 70's, brownstone fixer-uppers uptown and in Brooklyn became quite cheap.  Now they are selling for $millions.

  I come from a progressive background and am the furthest thing from a libertarian (I am also the furthest thing from a greedy real estate developer - I work as a sustainable transportation planner).  But if you claim to want one end (affordable housing) and the means you are promoting (increased government intervention and regulation) have never proven themselves to result in that end, whereas providing increased supply HAS, then who is the REAL progressive, you or me?
  On The built environment posted 3 years, 6 months ago 9 Responses

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  Cities & deregulation

  The thing that's great about reforming land use (in cities and elsewhere) is that most knowledgeable people agree that the solution is LESS regulation, not more, of land use.  So it can't be portrayed by conservatives or NIMBYs as yet another attempt to impose new taxes, new regulations, new paperwork, new bureaucracy.  The goal is actually to streamline things and let the market have more say in what is built and where it's built.

  So, for example, in response to Bookerly's note that housing affordability is a major issue, the problem is not cities themselves but rather simple supply and demand.  Through zoning, cities put caps on their housing supply, driving up costs for everybody, low-income to high-income.  The solution to high housing costs in cities is to allow more housing to be built - ANY kind of housing.  Even if it's all new luxury housing, that will drive prices down in the whole market because there will be more housing to go around.

  I'm not a radical neo-liberal or libertarian, I do believe that some controls are obviously needed on land use, but just enough to ensure orderly, reasonable, safe, fair, healthy development in our cities.

  This was another great Planetizen article that Dave had linked to previously, that kind of gets at what I'm talking about:
  http://www.planetizen.com/node/19010On The built environment posted 3 years, 6 months ago 9 Responses