Never Pick a Fight When You're Severely Outgunned

If you've read this blog for any period of time, you know that it has some enemies: Brueggman, Wendell Cox, Joel Kotkin, and Randall O'Toole. The bone to pick isn't in the disagreement with their opinions, it is rather with the inconsistencies of logic and rhetoric to the points their making. In my estimation, this is the tell tale sign of corruption, and in this case, that means corruption of thought. They represent other interests while pretending to represent the "common man." Only if that common man happens to be the Koch Brothers, et al. If you are a common man, are you worth multiple billions? Want to know how morons get loud microphones in a supposed meritocracy? Well, there is your answer.

With that said, Randall O'Toole decided to take up the case for free parking in response to a New York Times article entitled "Free Parking Comes at a Price" by Tyler Cowen, since they're such staunch free marketeers and libertarians. Oh wait, their is the first case of logical dissonance.

Then came the response to the response, and this is by the parking guru himself, Professor Donald Shoup, who came out with all guns a'blazin':

Before I examine your misunderstanding of what I have written, I will first summarize the three basic parking reforms I recommend in The High Cost of Free Parking: (1) remove off-street parking requirements, (2) charge market prices for on-street parking to achieve about an 85-percent occupancy rate for curb spaces, and (3) return the resulting revenue to pay for public improvements in the metered neighborhoods.

I will quote ten extracts from your post, and comment on each of them.

1. “Shoup’s work is biased by his residency in Los Angeles, the nation’s densest urban area. One way L.A. copes with that density is by requiring builders of offices, shopping malls, and multi-family residences to provide parking. Shoup assumes that every municipality in the country has such parking requirements, even though many do not.” (ed. note: They do love to quote Los Angeles as the densest urban area don't they? A statistic itself that is meaningless because of where they choose to draw the boundary for where to take that measure. Is it dense at the block level? At the neighborhood level? At the City level? Not really. They go with the metropolitan area. Then they'll turn around and use LA as a model for success when that rhetoric suits their nefarious purpose.

Even Houston, which does not have zoning, has minimum parking requirements, and they resemble the parking requirements in almost every other city in the United States. Houston requires 1.25 parking spaces for each efficiency apartment in an apartment house, for example, and 1.333 parking spaces for each one-bedroom apartment. Here is the link to the minimum parking requirements in Houston’s municipal code: http://tiny.cc/iaj35

Does the Antiplanner, who is “dedicated to the sunset of government planning,” really believe that government planners know exactly how many parking spaces to require for every economic activity at every site in every city, no matter how much the required parking spaces may cost and no matter how little drivers may be willing to pay to use them? Does the Antiplanner really support Houston’s minimum parking requirement of 1.333 spaces for each one-bedroom apartment because he believes that Houston’s government planners can accurately predict the “need” for parking at every apartment to one-thousandth of a parking space?

Read the rest of his response here.

America 2050: Urban or Suburban?

Greg Lindsay of Fast Company covered a debate between Chris Leinberger (urbanist) and Joel Kotkin (suburban partisan) held by the Forum on Urban Design in Manhattan. They threw some statistics at each other, but ultimately Kotkin was reduced to his tired old crutches:

• that suburbia was actually driven by the invisible hand of the market, willfully ignorant of the invisible arm government played in pushing over-suburbia along; and
• and that delivering functional and aesthetic urbanism to a wishful pent-up market is somehow social engineering or manipulation.

What he fails to recognize is that planning today no longer represents the large-scaled version of 20th century, he so rails against. Of course, we won't allow the truth of a changing world affect his personal biases.

If suburbia was actually market-oriented, why is it the same everywhere? To answer my own rhetorical question, it is because it is not market-oriented, but built out of the same underlying genetic code of suburbia. The same parking formulae, the same single-use zoning, the same traffic impact analyses, etc. All of which constructed based on suburban models, thus producing more suburbia. Being disconnected from reality is why it has failed us.

People are different. We have different needs, wants, and preferences, and a market-responsive city would reflect those various emotional desires and the degrees to which segments of the population value them.

I do agree with him in one aspect however, that the future of urbanism is in cities like Dallas, but not for the reason he thinks. He believes that the future somehow lies within the current iteration of Plano:

Kotkin believes the next hundred million Americans will largely eschew “superstar” cities such as New York, Boston, San Francisco and the west side of Los Angeles because of housing costs. They'll opt instead to live in "cities of aspiration," such as Dallas, Houston, Charlotte and Atlanta. His America in 2050 looks a lot like the Dallas suburb of Plano, Texas, which has the highest household median income and the highest percentage of residents with college degrees of any American city with more than 250,000 inhabitants.

He is wrong, not with the Where, but the What and the Why. The future of American Cities lies within the Metroplex because of the disconnect between a very high potential and that very same existing format Kotkin believes is the future.

Dallas represents the future as we reconstruct a city that can keep the talent it exports and even begin importing some. It is the future because of the gap between ambition and reality. Only listening to Kotkin and his ilk is what keeps us from getting there.

His claim here illustrates his own bias. He sees the world through his frame and projects that as reality on all others. He wants market manipulation and social engineering. Whether it makes him money for consultancy or out of mere (and logically deficient) contrarianism, I don't know.

He likes suburbia so we must all live in it. We're just trying to offer choice, allow users to define their own lives, and make cities work to their utmost potential in delivering all of our emotional needs and wants, efficiently, effectively, and elegantly.

And that undermines Kotkin's precious worldview.

New Urbanism is Terrorism!!!!111111ONE!!!!1

Wow.

"Sometimes life just gives you a moment." ~ Lester Freeman. What? I've use that quote before? Shut it.

I just came across this literally, extraordinarily, not-from-this-planet-are-you-Vincent articles. You know you have found the death rattle of suburban sprawl when its voice boxes have resorted to shrill hysterics such as "Obama is going to take your house and your car, run you, your kids, and your dog over with said car and then light the house on fire." Just think, if we had a pure libertarian system, we could even then watch a fire engine drive right on by, because you subscribed to the wrong private emergency/fire department. What a world.

Okay. First of all, is the Tulsa Beacon a legitimate newspaper? Probably not, since the real news source in Tulsa is the Tulsa World. Their website looks to be straight out of the quality reminiscent of white supremacist, militia groups...aka militants, aka terrorists.

So it isn't a surprise that one of the "leading" morons in stupidity, I mean, defense of highway construction, "growth" for the sake of growth like cancer type of development, Randall O'Toole is striking out to thorny rose bush branch to a similar demographic that might take up arms against such horrifying things, like children being able to walk to school, city schools having enough tax base and density to support themselves, LOWER TAXES because of reduced infrastructure per capita, etc etc.

First, a warning. I despise these people. Not because I disagree with them. I'm happy to engage in debate with intellectually honest people with whom I may disagree. People like O'Toole are absolute scum and prepare yourself for an article filled with scorn and complete lack of respect. Furthermore, since we know that the Tulsa Beacon is a rag unworthy of serious response, this will not be terribly serious.

Let's go through the article shall we, because OH MAN is it a doozy:

PlaniTulsa threatens American freedoms

EEEEEK! Take up arms!!! My career is threatened!!!

Randal O’Toole, a scholar from the CATO Institute, said PlaniTulsa looks a lot like what Portland, Oregon did beginning 20 years ago when it embraced New Urbanism.

And that should worry people in Tulsa.

Get out the pitchforks!!!

O’Toole spoke Saturday in Tulsa as part of a forum sponsored by OK-SAFE. A former professor at Yale University, O’Toole has written several books, including Gridlock: Why We’re Stuck in Traffic and What to Do About It.

Why what else? More Highways!!!! That is the proven solution, amiright? /High fives self. Winks at well-heeled representatives of the highway construction industry.

“I want to talk about the American dream,” O’Toole said. “To own a home, start a business, to have mobility and own property. ‘Smart growth’ is a threat to the American Dream. That’s what PlaniTulsa is all about.”

Yes. That is the American Dream you rubes. George Washington didn't lead his band of Oompa Loompas across the chocolate river Styx so people could have the right to live without a car or without a home mortgage. How dare we want actual choice in our lives. OBEY. REMAIN MISERABLY STUCK IN TRAFFIC BECAUSE MY WALLET DEPENDS ON IT WHILE I MISREPRESENT CONCEPTS LIKE MOBILITY.

The average person in American (sic) travels 19,000 miles a year and 85 percent of that is by automobile, O’Toole said. “They (the Obama Administration) are trying to coerce people out of their cars.”

Well. Point proven Randy. Everybody is in cars. That's clear choice in the market place right? That doesn't have anything to do with a bloated Federal Transportation Budget that allocates $40 billion to highway funding, would it? You see any of that loot per chance, Randy? Keep fooling everyone that this is "market forces" at work.

Let's look at it another way. If every American drives 19,000 miles per year, that equates to cool (approximated) $855 billion dollars spent by Americans every year for gasoline, let alone oil, general maintenance, car payments, insurance, various other losses due to collisions, taxes dedicated to road construction and maintenance, as well as various externalized long-term costs such as pollution. That's $855 billion we could have in our savings accounts to put towards college educations or all those new houses you want us to buy. See any of that money, Randy?

O’Toole said Obama wants to raise gasoline taxes to fund light rail systems all over the country. Through extensive study, O’Toole showed that city after city that has invested in light rail has lost millions if not billions in inefficiency.

That's clearly inefficiency. Fixed alignment public transit that has been proven throughout the country to leverage around a billion $ in private investment in and around transit lines for every $100 million spent. By the way, that is private investment seeking profit. Public builds infrastructure. Public spending on infrastructure guides the private market. Invisible hand, invisible arm, Randy. Learn how cities work. Or maybe you don't want to and simply want to rabble rouse.

At this point, o'TOOLe might as well just say, "did I mention to you that the President is black?"

In January, Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood ended cost-effectiveness rules for federal transit grants - in essence saying he was willing to fund rail projects no matter how much money they waste.

No mention that those "cost effectiveness" rules were specifically designed to undercut the legs from transit as they intentionally ignored all the spinoff benefits of transit. Those rules basically asked, "does it immediately reduce traffic?" To which the answer is always and only that highway capacity and only road supply was the way to alleviate congestion. Of course, as we know that only is true in the short-term and that transit is far more (and only) effective in the long-term when the city can adapt to its new "bones."

Who sounds more logical AND truly conservative, o'TOOLe or Lewis Mumford:

"The purpose of transportation is to bring people and goods to places where they are needed, and to concentrate the greatest variety of goods and people within that limited area, in order to widen the possibility of choice without making it necessary to travel. A good transportation system minimizes unnecessary transportation; and in any event, it offers change of speed and mode to fit a diversity of human purposes."

Dallas invested $550 million in light rail and the cost per year per passenger is $12,250 - enough to buy every passenger a car of their own and eliminate light rail, O’Toole said. In Austin, Texas, the bus system was operating in the black and had $200 million in the bank when it started a commuter train system.

“Then they went broke, using up the entire reserve,” O’Toole said. “The director resigned in disgrace.”

Yes, DOTs aren't broke are they? Nor are cities and suburbs because they have spread the tax base too thin across an overextended infrastructure.

Proponents, like Tulsa City Councilor Rick Westcott, argue that they just want to offer people a choice.

O’Toole said flying costs 14 cents a passenger mile. A bus costs 15 cents a passenger mile and a car costs 15 cents a mile. Amtrak, the heavily subsidized passenger rail service, costs 60 cents a mile and high-speed rail costs more than 75 cents a mile.

More intentionally ignoring the spinoff or externalized costs. So you are saying, people shouldn't have a choice? American Dream at work. Airlines are all profitable as well right, Randy?

A ticket from Orlando to Tampa in Florida (86 miles) costs $50 on high-speed rail but $20 on a Greyhound bus.

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH. Lemme hop on a greyhound bus. Those are pleasant trips. You know what, let's get rid of first class on planes as well because no one should pay for comfort or quality of experience. American Dream. Or Dreaming Americana.

If high-speed rail is offered between Tulsa and Oklahoma City, the ticket would cost four times the price of a bus ticket and save only about 20 minutes.

The chance of high speed rail linking Tulsa and OKC any time soon is remote. Why even bring it up. Well, he's rabble rousing. THEY TOOK ARE JOBS!!!! (sic) High speed rail is intended to link regional economies in a way that regional airlines have proven incapable, ie Dallas/Houston/Austin. San Fran to LA.

O’Toole said American freedoms are already dwindling in terms of property rights.

Comin' to get ya'. Boogie man. Boogity boogity boo.

And he wants to take away choice, freedom of mobility, housing options, living arrangements, etc. Buckle in kids, you ain't leavin' that car.

Urban planners in Oregon place restrictions on building new homes in rural areas, including: the site had to have at least 80 acres and it had to be a farm that earns at least $40,000-80,000 a year. Only 100 homes were built in the first year of those restrictions.

That was a conservative Republican Governor who implemented that AND the people of Oregon support it. That's called representative democracy. Do these people sit around and worry about a domino effect? Are they going to call Mayor Bloomberg, Ho Chi Minh now?

O’Toole said the new urbanists want people to build up, not out.

No. We want to diversify markets. We want people real choice. We want those who like walkable urbanism to have the opportunity to live in places like that. We want efficient, lovable, and sustainable cities. We want markets that don't impinge on the rights of others. We want lower taxes and less infrastructure and implicit waste.

“If my house burned down, I wouldn’t be allowed to rebuild it,” O’Toole said. “I would have to build an apartment.

First of all that is a lie dependent only upon local building/zoning codes. Now you know how all urban projects feel with antiquated zoning that, oh by the way creates nothing but the homogeneity of sprawl. Zoning. That's all choice right? I thought everybody chose to live in sprawl, right Randy?

“Most Americans want to live in a single family home. Smart Growth will make housing unaffordable.”

Wrong. Unless most Americans is about 30-40%. 3% currently live in walkable urbanism and 30% desire it. That looks like pent up demand the market would like to meet if only it weren't for the barriers of zoning, highways, tax incentives in favor of sprawl.

He said the new urban planners think big residential yards are “a waste of land.” They want people to live in apartments on small lots.

Jumpin Jeezus on a Dinosaur, his schtick is monotonous. I don't want anything. But I KNOW that land always finds its true value. Hence, the precipitous drop in housing values in suburban and exurban areas resulting in everyone owing more than what their house is worth. American Nightmare.

O’Toole said people who already own a home should be okay but their children will be forced by economics to live in high-density housing in overcrowded downtowns.

And they will be forced to wear outward insignias signifying their race and religion. Or is that only Arizona. As a liberaltarian, there was once a time when I foolishly thought Cato was a worthwhile conservative thinktank to balance out my own opinions and thought processes. Until I started reading them. I love how they use Thomas Jefferson as their poster boy. You'd think they might actually read him, however.

In Portland, the population is loaded with couples without children. Families with children live all around Portland where the land use restrictions don’t exist. The City of Portland told one church that wanted to expand that it must be closed on Saturdays, it could have only five weddings or funerals a year and its parking would be limited, O’Toole said.

They're probably all gay too!!!!1111!!!!ONE!!!!!

The Portland light rail system cost $3 billion - more than 30 times the original forecast.

Interesting to take initial projections from the 70's and apply costs for expansion in the 90's and 2000's. Inflation is a funny thing. Too complex for anybody in this audience to question I feel certain.

O’Toole said cities are using TIF districts to subsidize light rail systems. Under a TIF, a private company is forgiven taxes to encourage development.

They're they go. Just givin' away yer money. Even though, that has nothing to do with TIFs whatsoever.

“TIF district fees are just subsidies for contractors,” O’Toole said. “The main winners are downtown property owners.”

He said light rail is “good for some ‘businesses.’”

“Light rail sends crime everywhere it goes,” O’Toole said.

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA. Yep. The old Highland Park, "I don't want no stinkin' light rail, them people will steal my TV on ride home on the DART with it." Where do we mention that the FBI file on per $/Crime maps point directly to Highland Park??? Of course, leaching off the primary "host" city is also not yet a crime.

Another argument against densification is that America is filled with open spaces, O’Toole said. Ninety-six percent of Oklahoma is open space.

Wow. This is the kind of twisted logic and meaningless nonsense I don't think I good dream up in the most chemically altered of states.

“We have a tremendous amount of open rural space,” O’Toole said.

And every inch of it should be paved and dotted with with two-car garages.

Rail service is “1930s’ technology” in the 21st Century, O’Toole said.

The cities in 1930s were full of high speed bullet trains that traveled at 350 mph and modern streetcar that could load the physically disabled and ride whisper quiet and without a hint of pollution.

“The rail networks are all big losers,” he said.

You know what else is, the auto industry.

Randy Bright, a Tulsa architect

and another opportunist...

who specializes in churches, said, “New Urbanism is a movement that is sweeping the nation.”

Like communism. Red Scare, everybody under your desks!!!!!

Bright, who writes a weekly column for the Tulsa Beacon, warned that New Urbanism brings “dire consequences for churches.”

The gay, black, nazis are coming to get you.

New Urbanism, which was born out of environmentalism,

Oh noes. Hippies too! Those people we hated back in the 70s. And perhaps they're witches too. Do they float?

has form-based codes whose goal is to “densify populations and confine growth.”

And turn you all into food. Soilent Green is people.

This strategy inevitably leads to land shortages, higher land costs and limiting of the growth of churches, Bright said. In fact, where New Urbanism has been tried, parking for churches has been curtailed and the search for land to expand has resulted in a bidding war.

Lulz. Higher land costs has nothing to do with desirability does it. Those certainly aren't market forces at work. Everybody in New York City, San Francisco, Paris, London, Copenhagen, etc. is FORCED to live there. Who in their right mind would actually get up and move to one of those cities where you could make fame and fortune?

Bright said he has a series of discussions with a national proponent of New Urbanism who finally admitted she was “opposed to mega churches” and called big churches “profoundly anti-civic.”

How dare they.

“Our churches don’t understand the problems,” Bright said.

Cuz the gay, black, nazi, hippies are gonna burn down yer churches!!!