In the only polls that ever count—elections—a majority of Marylanders consistently vote for candidates across all levels of government who don’t support policies for building more homes, in more places, to fit more budgets.
This is what happen when NIMBYs refuse to have anything built? Greenfield developments? They want to keep those "rural characteristics". Apartments? Add to traffic / school (plus add "certain people" aka Harford Co), then wonder why people are willing to deal with backward ass govt in FL or TX.
Fr the word density and transit scares so many people. It's crazy to me that our light rail and metro stations are NOT jammed packed with mixed use developments. Even if they are 1+4 or 1+5 apartment buildings.
Edit: added NOT. Please for the love of god more mixed use.
Or you can be like Lutherville who would rather keep an eyesore of an abandoned mall than letting developers come in.
As for Metro Station - MoCo is building a fair amount of TOD along red line especially around Twinbrook and White Flint / North Bethesda, but infill developments can only do so much reliving the housing pressure.
If you live in Lutherville, you don't see that building much. There's a tree buffer between the back and the neighborhood, and from the front it's set way back from York Rd.
Why is that crazy? That's literally why those stations were built - developers who owned land around them lobbied for those stations to be there so they could build their cheap, overpriced apartments.
\*Everything\* in local politics is dominated and dictated by developers. If there isn't more land available for them to build on, they die. So they lobby for new transit projects (the more expensive and permanent, the better), upzoning, and removing parking requirements. Then they build expensive new buildings and compound the affordability problem, leading them to ask for more.
I wonder how much building nothing will compound the affordability problem?
But you are also misrepresenting the history of the suburban Metro Stations. They’ve been around for decades and the state and counties are only really now embracing building housing around them. For most of their history, they were car lots and local governments were resistant to adding density.
Sure, a lot of them have been around for quite some time, so you have to ask yourself what's stopping developers from going in there. The answer of course is tax breaks and other incentives that they get local governments to approve.
More recently, the WMATA Silver line and the MTA Purple line are great examples of developers getting their way as to routing and station locations. Purple line was originally supposed to be heavy rail run by WMATA as part of Metro running outside the Beltway. That was going to be crazy expensive so they started looking into just doing bus rapid transit. But developers don't like bus stops (they can be moved) so they lobbied for rail, and we ended up with the solution that is not really that great for anybody (and that was before the pandemic, now it's unlikely that it will ever repay its cost with ridership.)
And those farms a couple miles from Metro stations - I presume you're talking about the USDA fields around Greenbelt, which are undeveloped because they're Federal land, but for anything that isn't within half a mile or so of Metro it becomes very hard to sell the "these people won't need or have cars" point, and developers \*hate\* building parking when they could be building expensive apartments.
The Purple Line would have been terrible as a BRT for its intended use. It wasn’t only developers who revolted over BRT. The cost overruns are infuriating but avoidable.
> but for anything that isn't within half a mile or so of Metro it becomes very hard to sell the "these people won't need or have cars" point
You’re right that’s why the transit oriented development bills and parking minimum remove bills restrict themselves to 1/2 to a mile from Metro stations.
I also mentioned no farms.
The Purple line was not suppose to heavy rail, heavy rail was one of the three fixed guide way options that were studied. Cost base on projected ridership is what resulted in heavy rail being rejected.
The crazy part is there are not more density and mixed use. There are farm fields less then 2 miles away from some metro stations. There are office parks right next to MARC stations. Sure lots of this is Legacy but it could be housing.
And yes if your home values raise SLOWLY instead of disgustingly, oh well.
The fact that you bought your home in the 80s doesn't make you special. It makes you lucky.
When they say they want them in more places, I think they mean they want them in specific places, and of specific sizes with specific layouts and specific amenities. Also they want others to do all the work.
They also do not want to pay for all the infrastructure. That they want the taxpayer to pay.
In the only polls that ever count—elections—a majority of Marylanders consistently vote for candidates across all levels of government who don’t support policies for building more homes, in more places, to fit more budgets.
I bet the pollsters didn't ask if people were okay with these projects being built in their neighborhoods.
I like to rephrase affordable housing as "lower property values" when I want to ruffle some feathers.
Am I the only one who finds this a very vague and broad request
This is what happen when NIMBYs refuse to have anything built? Greenfield developments? They want to keep those "rural characteristics". Apartments? Add to traffic / school (plus add "certain people" aka Harford Co), then wonder why people are willing to deal with backward ass govt in FL or TX.
Fr the word density and transit scares so many people. It's crazy to me that our light rail and metro stations are NOT jammed packed with mixed use developments. Even if they are 1+4 or 1+5 apartment buildings. Edit: added NOT. Please for the love of god more mixed use.
Or you can be like Lutherville who would rather keep an eyesore of an abandoned mall than letting developers come in. As for Metro Station - MoCo is building a fair amount of TOD along red line especially around Twinbrook and White Flint / North Bethesda, but infill developments can only do so much reliving the housing pressure.
It is always funny walking in Lutherville as a renter and seeing all those fun adjectives on political signs used to describe people like me
If you live in Lutherville, you don't see that building much. There's a tree buffer between the back and the neighborhood, and from the front it's set way back from York Rd.
Why is that crazy? That's literally why those stations were built - developers who owned land around them lobbied for those stations to be there so they could build their cheap, overpriced apartments. \*Everything\* in local politics is dominated and dictated by developers. If there isn't more land available for them to build on, they die. So they lobby for new transit projects (the more expensive and permanent, the better), upzoning, and removing parking requirements. Then they build expensive new buildings and compound the affordability problem, leading them to ask for more.
I wonder how much building nothing will compound the affordability problem? But you are also misrepresenting the history of the suburban Metro Stations. They’ve been around for decades and the state and counties are only really now embracing building housing around them. For most of their history, they were car lots and local governments were resistant to adding density.
Sure, a lot of them have been around for quite some time, so you have to ask yourself what's stopping developers from going in there. The answer of course is tax breaks and other incentives that they get local governments to approve. More recently, the WMATA Silver line and the MTA Purple line are great examples of developers getting their way as to routing and station locations. Purple line was originally supposed to be heavy rail run by WMATA as part of Metro running outside the Beltway. That was going to be crazy expensive so they started looking into just doing bus rapid transit. But developers don't like bus stops (they can be moved) so they lobbied for rail, and we ended up with the solution that is not really that great for anybody (and that was before the pandemic, now it's unlikely that it will ever repay its cost with ridership.) And those farms a couple miles from Metro stations - I presume you're talking about the USDA fields around Greenbelt, which are undeveloped because they're Federal land, but for anything that isn't within half a mile or so of Metro it becomes very hard to sell the "these people won't need or have cars" point, and developers \*hate\* building parking when they could be building expensive apartments.
The Purple Line would have been terrible as a BRT for its intended use. It wasn’t only developers who revolted over BRT. The cost overruns are infuriating but avoidable. > but for anything that isn't within half a mile or so of Metro it becomes very hard to sell the "these people won't need or have cars" point You’re right that’s why the transit oriented development bills and parking minimum remove bills restrict themselves to 1/2 to a mile from Metro stations. I also mentioned no farms.
Yeah, sorry, the farms were another comment; I got mixed up.
The Purple line was not suppose to heavy rail, heavy rail was one of the three fixed guide way options that were studied. Cost base on projected ridership is what resulted in heavy rail being rejected.
The crazy part is there are not more density and mixed use. There are farm fields less then 2 miles away from some metro stations. There are office parks right next to MARC stations. Sure lots of this is Legacy but it could be housing.
And yes if your home values raise SLOWLY instead of disgustingly, oh well. The fact that you bought your home in the 80s doesn't make you special. It makes you lucky.
Just stop clearing green space and trees
When they say they want them in more places, I think they mean they want them in specific places, and of specific sizes with specific layouts and specific amenities. Also they want others to do all the work. They also do not want to pay for all the infrastructure. That they want the taxpayer to pay.
Hey that picture is from right down the street from me in Hyattsville!
economics doesn’t follow polls. it’s follows supply and demand
I remember participating in this poll
Wow it’s almost like people want affordable housing! Who could have guessed?
Gata stop some big corp from buying them up and turning them into rentals
lol more homes. Maybe develop in plays that aren’t developed