Highrises in Rutland

[Administrator]

Quick report on the Rutland meeting...

Rutland Urban Centre City Hall Presentation

Duane, Matt and I, John, attended the City Hall Presentation which was quite informative. About 25 – 30 people showed up to the meeting, which was disappointing for me as I expected more. ( ? Is this him ) Gary Stephen, Acting Manager, Policy / Research and Strategic was the speaker with Trevor [ what was his position again? ] presenting the software driven 3D Rutland Urban Centre model. Gary went over the current OCP and Rutland sector plan showing the current zones within those plans and what would be allowed in the future under those plans. Continuing, he discussed the possibility of higher buildings within the urban center while Trevor showed several 3D mock ups of buildings massing situated in the Rutland Urban Centre varying in heights from the current 4 storey allowance all the way up to 12 stories. This was quite interesting and it is great to see that the City using this technology to help plan and visualize future development within the city. Future software upgrades will also allow 52 week shadow analysis on any proposed building. All this technology will allow for a higher quality development / community analysis in the future.

After the presentation the floor was opened for comments and discussions. There were quite a few people who offered varying opinions ranging from support for a greater densification of the Rutland town center to outright call of ending all new development. Also present was Mr. John Zeger who came up with a curious comment regarding traffic. A previous attendee ( who was part of the Rutland Association ) mentioned how a greater density would promote few car trips ( among other position comments ). Mr. Zeger rebutted that with the quote of a US Government study that says that for each point of densification there is a related rise of traffic by 0.8. He used that study to show that the reduction of car trips accompanying densifications is a myth. I found myself confused for a second because it seemed that Mr. Zeger contradicted himself and upon further reflection I realized that the stats of his quoted study showed a 20% REDUCTION in traffic for each point increase in densification. Now maybe, Mr. Zeger did not explain the study very well and I may be mistaken but if that figure is correct I will take that 20% traffic reduction!

All, in all, it was a very good presentation and meeting. There were some very valid points raised for the city staff and the commencement of the study and dialogue should yield some promising changes for the Rutland area – an area with a lot of potential.

[guest]

He said that for every 1 percent increase, there is an .8 percent increase in traffic. 100 percent increase, 80 percent increase in traffic. You cant have an increase in traffic and a decrease at the same time.

"I realized that the stats of his quoted study showed a 20% REDUCTION in traffic for each point increase in densification"

How you came to this conclusion I do not know. Logically, for every 1 percent decrease, this will result in a .2 percent decrease in traffic 10 percent decrease, results in a 2 percent decrease in traffic.

I dont know if you truly did not understand what he was trying to say, or if you are just trying to discredit him and twist around this words in your favour. But i found it very easy to follow. What should i be thinking?

[Matt Phillips]

in response to your post Mathos, i see what you are talking about with people still driving cars even if their destination is in walking distance, but this is still an improvement over people driving 20 minutes to get somewhere.

that is 10x the distance that the car is going and polluting, and that it 10x as much city which the vehicle is passing through, increasing traffic.

so with it being 2 minutes rather than 20, it still wouldn't be so bad for cars.

anyways, people wish to move to kelowna, because they have money, they like it here, and they wish to live here.

if they cannot live in kelowna however, then they would have to live in winfield or westbank, or on the outskirts of town.

this would increase urban sprawl, as well as city traffic, and pollution.

therefor, in order to accomodate the residents who will live in the kelowna area, Kelowna must give them housing.

you cannot stop growth in a city which is ranked as one of the nicest places to live in the nicest province, in the nicest country.

Kelowna attracts thousands of people from all over the world.

[guest]

"Kelowna must give them (people who wish to move here) housing." That notion is at the root of most of our city's problems -- be it traffic congestion, air pollution, crime, loss of community identity, etc. Just why must we give them housing and continue to suffer the urban degradation that comes with uncontrolled growth? The idea of providing housing for anyone who wants to live here comes with a very large price tag -- the sustainability of our community! Yes, Kelowna is a desirable place to live, but it won't be much longer if it continues to grow at its current pace. The position that you are supporting is that the most important thing for Kelowna is to grow and to hell with the quality of life of existing residents. Who then is this growth going to benefit? Maybe a few developers and businessmen, that's all. The majority of us will suffer.

[Matt Phillips]

my point is that people are going to move here regardless.

The city would rather have them living inside it, than being on the outskirts and contributing to pollution and traffic among other problems.

we cannot close off the entire valley

[guest]

I wish that you would understand that if there is no place to live, people wont come move here. I think its silly that you keep saying that people are going to move here regardless of wether there is housing or not. the open building land in the outskirts is in the alr. viable agriculture land. the government wont allow it to be developed.

[Administrator]

^ That is simply not true - and the history of city growth ( any city ) dictates that. Also, if you stop building and there is demand for housing whether internal or external - prices will climb even faster. Ever heard of supply and demand - basic economics? The fact is you CANNOT stop the desirability of a city that is attractive to outsiders. We live in a free society – unless of course you propose limiting those freedoms!

Also, regarding Mr. Zeger traffic states – I am correct – it is obvious. Those numbers have to be in relation to some form of baseline. That baseline is most likely a 1 to 1 correlation of single family housing vs. car trips. Therefore, a 1 point increase in density yields a 0.8 increase in traffic from a baseline of 1 giving a 20% reduction. Understand? Again – I will take the 20% reduction. And Matt is correct – people will still use their cars but they will take shorter trips versus someone living in suburban sprawl. How someone cannot understand that is beyond me.

[Matt Phillips]

Let me give you a second reason why a population cap cannot be imposed.

Kelowna is a retirement destination, this means that people move here to retire, and people who have lived here their entire lives stay here to retire.

Kelowna already has a vast majority of senior residents in kelowna (after delivering phone books last weekend, i can see this more strongly than ever before).

with a population cap, kelowna would not have housing to accomodate any new residents, and families would not be able to live here. meanwhile senior citizens would continue to live here for another 20-30 years not contributing anything to the city.

[guest]

You make several errors in logic here. One is that retirees will live for 30 years on average. If the average retirement age is 65, then they would have a live expectancy of 95 which is 15 years beyond the real average life expectancy. No they won't live forever, Matt, and housing will become available from the existing stock on a regular basis. The second error is the implicit assumption that the high-density housing your group seems so keen on willsolve the housing problems here. You keep saying there are too many retirees, yet that type of housing attracts mostly retirees not families with children. That still hasn't sunk in with you it seems.

[Matt Phillips]

many people retire before the age of 65

as of 2000, the life expectancy in kelowna was 84 for women, and 78.5 for men.

that was 5 years ago, therefore the life expectancy will have gone up. therefor, i am correct in saying 20-30 years

if you believe that high density developement will only have elderly moving into it, then who will take their houses? families.

[guest]

My rebuttle to John Skrotzki's latest post was deleted. That is too bad.

[Administrator]

Ah, I did not delete it and no one else deleted it. What are you talking about!

[Matt Phillips]

maybe a computer error

i don't recall a post even being there.

anyways, John, did you read my latest letter to Castanet?

[Dave D]

GROWTH CONTROLS AND HOUSING PRICES

To date, most of the debate over growth controls has focused on a single question: How much, if at all, do growth controls raise the price of housing? Economic theory suggests that local growth controls may increase housing prices in three ways (Dowall, 1984). The first way is to raise the direct costs of construction through unnecessary subdivision or development requirements. A second way is to limit the supply of new housing, thereby allowing home-sellers and builders to act as monopolists and charge higher prices. A third way is to encourage builders to shift to larger, more expensive, and more profitable homes. Growth controls may also generate ripple effects in neighboring communities, as growth displaced from the controlled community spills over into surrounding area's. Empirical studies of the price effects of local growth controls- most of them done in California using housing sales data from the late 1970s to early 1980s- suggest that controls can add as little as 2 percent or as much as 35 percent to the price of housing, depending on the community and the severity of the restriction.
Do to our location here in the Okanagan valley and the demand for housing here I think that this is exactly what would happen if we were to try and control growth to the extreme like some in our community are suggesting, and trying to do.

[Krishna]

Please see CRCP's response to Dave D.'s post:
saveparadise.proboards26.com/index.cgi?board=myths

[Tony D]

The CRCP response is such:

"Elsewhere someone (I think it was Dave D.) quoted a study from the U.S. which said, "Empirical studies of the price effects of local growth controls -- most of them done in California using housing sales data from the late 1970's and early 1980's -- suggest that controls add as little as 2 percent or as much as 35 percent to the price of housing, depending on the community and the severity of the restriction (Fischel, 1990)."

However, he didn't bother to quote a more recent study in 1992 which compared housing prices of seven California cities having growth controls with comparable cities not having growth controls. This study examined each community's home prices every year from 1980 to 1987 and found that "median single-family home prices did not rise any faster or to higher levels in the seven case-study cities than in their counterpart pro-growth cities. Indeed, by the end of the 1980's housing was more affordable in some of the growth control cities than in their corresponding comparison cities." The report concludes that, "Home prices need not be systematicaly higher or increase faster in growth control cities than in pro-growth cities." (John D. Landis, "Do Growth Controls Work? An Evaluation of Local Growth Control Programs in Seven California Cities, CPS Brief Vol.4 No.2 Feb. 1992)

"One explanation for why housing prices would be lower in cities with growth controls is that cities acting to control growth may also be more proactive with housing policies. Indeed, an extensive survey of California's 443 cities and counties found that municipalities with growth controls enacted more affordable housing incentives than cities without growth controls." (Eben Fodor, Better Not Bigger, 1999)"


What we have here between Dave D's post and the CRCP's post are two different views on housing prices from many respected authors (Dowall, Fischel, Landis, and Fodor). It seems that there are points to made on both sides in regards to housing prices. It could be one of those things where we would have to see how Kelowna responds to increased growth.

I would like to know two things, though. The first item being what seven cities in California are being quoted in the CRCP study and lastly, why is there so much comparison with American cities? We live in Canada. I would like to see some Canadian stats. Anyone?

[Dave D]

Yes, I read the entire study. I picked Economic Theory because I think it is the one that best describes what would happened here. Now you need to read [glow=red,2,300]Explaining the results [/glow]on page 7 and 8 of this study which you can read at
www.ucop.edu/cprc/growthcont.pdf - Similar pages


California is like one big city, you can't tell one city from the next. It would be like putting a population cap on only Rutland in kelowna. Thats why it worked in those 7 city's, well kind of worked. That is why I believe that this would not work here. The CRPC also failed to mention that the city of Lodi started limiting growth in 1981, and that it only remained affordable until 1987 when home buyers from the San Francisco Bay Area began moving en mass to California Central Valley and bidding up the price of homes. Again, this is what would happen here in Kelowna.

[Krishna]

Tony D acknowledges that from looking at the various research that has been done that it is no slam dunk that housing prices would indeed go up in the event of growth controls. And why isn't there any Canadian data? Because growth controls is a concept that is only being introducted in Canada recently but has been present in the U.S. since the 1970's.

Dave D is a little more stubborn. He says,

"California is like one big city, you can't tell one city from the next. It would be like putting a population cap on only Rutland in kelowna. Thats why it worked in those 7 city's, well kind of worked. That is why I believe that this would not work here. The CRPC also failed to mention that the city of Lodi started limiting growth in 1981, and that it only remained affordable until 1987 when home buyers from the San Francisco Bay Area began moving en mass to California Central Valley and bidding up the price of homes. Again, this is what would happen here in Kelowna."

Dave D neglects to mention that Lodi's growth controls were the weakest of the seven cities mentioned in the aforenamed study restricting growth to a location but not restricting growth rate. Their growth control initiative, Measure A, which voters enacted in 1981 requiring voter approval of all annexations still provided some growth control until it was ruled unconstitutional by the Third District Court of Appeals in 1989. It has subsequently been replaced by the Growth Management Plan for Residential Development which limits the number of new residential unit allocations to 2% annually.

Instead of using Lodi as your example, Matt, why didn't you talk about the experience of Thousand Oaks. "In 1980 the citizens of Thousand Oaks enacted their Measure A, limiting residential building permits to 500 per year. In the ten years that Measure A has been in place, Thousand Oaks has continued to grow. Significantly, however, this growth has not overburdened sensitive areas, or substantially altered Thousand Oaks' suburban character. At the same time that it has grown, the city has been able to substantially increase the supply of moderately affordable housing as well as undertake several major civic improvements." (Landis, 1992)

Nice job of picking your examples only to suit your a argument, Dave. I hope you can do a better job of fairly examining the research next time.

[michaelp]

bo916 said:

maybe a computer error

i don't recall a post even being there.

anyways, John, did you read my latest letter to Castanet?

Computer error ahahah Pebkac file it under the ID.10T

heheh just kidding couldnt resist
sorry

[Matt Phillips]

the reason why Mr. Zeger is only giving American examples is because in Canada we have something called Mobility Rights. capping the population of cities preventing people from moving there would violate these Mobility Rights.