On the Not In My Back Yard to Yes In My Backyard spectrum, I am definitely on the YIMBY end. I firmly believe that one of the most corrosive elements of modern American society is how expensive housing has become. It has vastly outpaced inflation and has locked a huge swath of Americans out of the ability to afford rent or buy a home where they want to live. It makes moving for whatever reason (job, schooling, family, etc) much harder. I believe that it is one of the biggest contributors to political disfunction and the rise of extreme political division.
I live in Boulder, Colorado, which has a long history of open space preservation. In order to prevent increasing sprawl and encroachment of the iconic Boulder flatirons, in 1959 the city passed the "Blue Line" ordinance that prevented city water from being delivered above a set altitude This made development above that line much more difficult. In addition, the city and county have made large land acquisitions over the years that has basically encircled the city of Boulder in publicly owned open space.
I want to stress that there's a difference between NIMBYism and preservation. I think one of the best things about Boulder is how close outdoor space is. Starting from my front door on a bike I can be on rural country roads or mountain bike trails in five to ten minutes. But preserving open space doesn't mean that already developed space can't change or get more dense. This is where environmentalism can descend into NIMBYism.
The problem is that choosing to preserve open space and preventing increased density means that any new development has to happen somewhere else. Of course, that's the hope of a true NIMBY, but it's selfish, shortsighted, and inconsistent with true environmentalism. Preventing more density in an existing neighborhood means that new development requires converting existing undeveloped open space into developed land. This means more roads, more people living farther away from destinations, more pollution, and less natural open space.
For a long time the Boulder city council was dominated by members of PLAN-Boulder, the group largely responsible for the Blue Line and other environmental efforts in the last few decades. However, in recent elections more development friendly people have been elected, displacing PLAN-Boulder endorsed council members. I think the most obvious explanation is that as more and more people in the community are finding themselves priced out housing in Boulder, the status quo, which is what PLAN-Boulder represents, is less attractive to voters.
Regrettably, and I often contemplate deleting my account, I am on Nextdoor, which is Twitter for old people. The Boulder Nextdoor is a NIMBY echo chamber. Almost daily there is a post from someone lamenting a new building, or something that's been gone 25 years. Posts complaining about the current council have been frequent lately, and on one of them they linked to a new group: Boulder Action. I was curious, and I clicked on the link. Now, dear reader, you get to travel with me into the mind of a Boulder NIMBY.
On the homepage (see the bottom of this post for a screenshot) they have an info box about Density, Growth and Housing. Let's look at each bullet point:
- Our city just feels too crowded. Not to belabor the point, but one person's too crowded is another's too empty. This is almost meaningless and impossible to measure. It's vibes. More specifically, how do they propose making it "feel" less crowded: depopulation? The only American cities I can think of that depopulated did it for negative reasons such as loss of jobs, or major pollution events. Is that what they want?
- It seems more dense, over-built and less pedestrian-friendly. Vibes! Whoever wrote this copy needed an editor. Two of these topics can be measured (there's no "seems" at all): density and pedestrian-friendliness. Measuring density is obvious, but for pedestrians, I'd think that this can be measured by ability access to destinations by foot and the danger of being injured as a pedestrian. I think that more density correlates with pedestrian friendliness, but it would seem that they don't, which is a tell I'll return to later on
- Small, local businesses are struggling. This may be true, but this needs data compared to local and national trends. Is it any more true now that it was before? Can it be explained entirely by the city council encouraging development? Without data, this is just a vibe.
- Although a lot of housing is being built, much of it is not affordable and not suitable for families. I'd take issue with "a lot of housing," but it probably feels that way to NIMBYs. The cost of the new housing is definitely higher than most would like, but some of the solutions to make building housing cheaper (removing single-family zoning, easier permitting process, no parking minimums, higher density limits, etc) are anathemas to NIMBYS. Their preferred policies directly contribute to the high cost of building housing. Furthermore, the single-family neighborhood of detached homes is not the only suitable place to raise a family. The second half reveals the lack of imagination of the Boulder NIMBY; they can't fathom that not everyone wants to live the way they've chosen to live
- Building height restrictions and some of our light industrial areas are in danger of being eliminated in the service of more housing. Maximum building height is a special topic for the Boulder NIMBY. Being able to see the mountains from anywhere in Boulder is super important to them. I find it fascinating: "we'd like to build more housing so people can afford to live here," and the NIMBY answer is "no, I need to see the mountains from everywhere." I'm not sure about the concern about light industrial areas except as a way to argue against zoning/development changes in general
- Our neighborhoods are threatened by a city council majority who clearly want to increase occupancy and make changes to our zoning regulations, eliminating single family zoning. Well, yeah, duh. Single family housing is probably the top reason why there's a housing crisis. The problem is NIMBYs act like getting rid of single family housing means iron foundries will be built in residential areas. No one wants that, but would it be so bad to have more (any?) missing middle housing in residential neighborhoods? Will a triplex cause your neighborhood to descend into a slum? A corner coffee shop or salon/barber wouldn't ruin your neighborhood, I guarantee. Notice that they cite the "city council majority." I remember voting for the city council and many of the current members openly campaigned on doing the things these NIMBYs dislike. This is how democracy works, folks
- Driving through cross-town traffic during the day is daunting. Here's the big tell of these NIMBYs. They expect to be able to drive in town during the day and not encounter traffic. Above they complain about the city seeming less pedestrian-friendly, and here about traffic. Any measure to make the city more car friendly is certain to be less pedestrian friendly. They want to be able to drive without traffic, and want a pleasant walk where they choose to walk, and they don't care about where other people might want to walk if it makes their drive "daunting." The only want to accomplish that is if their walks never go to any destination one might drive to because cars and pedestrian accommodations are opposites in cities. Making space for cars means taking it from pedestrians, cyclists, and other modes of transportation
There's more on that page, but I'm going to stop here. I think all of this boils down to NIMBYs being selfish and not accepting that places change. I saw the graphic below some time ago, and I think of it often when hearing NIMBY complaints about change. Things (vibes!) were just better in the past, and anything that is change is bad.
Finally, because the group is so new I suspect that the Boulder Action webpage will experience change in the near future. I've put a screenshot of how the page looked when this post was written here.
