While cities are warming up the bulldozers, distinguished housing analyst Alan Mallach was quick to call out the misleading title of a New York Times article suggesting city officials actually prefer razing buildings to redevelopment.  Mallach goes on to describe abandonment and blight as a major problem in cities, but he balances the argument by looking at the possibilities of mothballing properties.  Demolitions have to be done with care and analysis, as Mallach states:

First, which properties are they demolishing? Is it simply about quantity, or are they focusing on where demolition will have the greatest impact on stabilizing blocks and furthering neighborhood revitalization efforts. Are they being sensitive to neighborhood fabric, or are they, as some cities have done, focusing on the so-called “100 worst buildings” or responding to complaints, rather than targeting their efforts?

In a Brookings Metropolitan Policy Program research paper Mallach dives into how large-scale demolition needs to be carried out in a strategic manner in order to achieve the best impact on the surrounding neighborhoods.  Within his recommendations is an important step utilizing a decision filter to identify if an abandoned property is fit for demolition or not.  Some of the filters are worth noting here, particularly neighborhood and building characteristics.  Neighborhood evaluations include examining the physical context, where a heavy regard for the urban design of the neighborhood is weighed against the potential loss of an abandoned building.  Closely related are emerging trends and revitalization activities where knowledge of local activities such as other neighboring redevelopment projects already underway or speculative buying trends should be identified while asking what would happen to these efforts if the abandoned property is either demolished or not demolished.  Such a decision filter is essential for any large scale demolition plan and can lead to identification of redevelopment worthy abandoned structures.

Abandoned Home in Woodbridge, Detroit, MI. Photo by David Mieksztyn.

When looking at recent developments in the fight against blight in Detroit, a major step towards creating the conditions for such an evaluation process has begun with one of the first acts of the newly created blight task force.  They began an interactive parcel survey of the entire city which will allow for each property to be analyzed and evaluated for demolition.  Such a database will allow for building criteria framed by Mallach’s decision filters; with self explanatory categories like the quality and character of the building, the active condition, and adjacency to other blighted structures.  The true effectiveness of the survey will be how well it is utilized by local community groups who are better judges of evaluating an individual abandoned structure’s long term potential within the larger neighborhood.  The Detroit Land Bank is operating in such a manner utilizing Neighborhood Stabilization Funds and working with local community development groups to target historic homes fit for middle class householders.  The land bank teamed up with Detroit Central Christian Community Development Corporation to identify properties fit for rehabilitation since they knew what properties fit the criteria. 

Abandoned Property Identified, Now to Finance the Mothballing

The logistics of mothballing properties for later redevelopment is a resource intense process.  A lengthy description of the mothballing process is laid out by the National Park Service related to historic preservation.  At its core is the mission to preserve the building from physical deterioration and to provide the necessary security to assure the property is not vandalized or compromised in any fashion until redevelopment is feasible. Since it is more costly to mothball or preserve a structure than to demolish it, there is little wonder why demolition is preferred, especially with the immediate results seen within the neighborhood.

The city of St. Louis, MO may have devised a funding strategy which solves the mothball funding hurdle.  In late October 2013, a bill was filed creating a building preservation fund with the goals of mothballing buildings.  The funds come from new fees associated with permits related to electrical, plumbing and mechanical projects in St. Louis.  The city is looking to leverage $500,000 per year to mothball properties.  The success of a program like this may help other cities devise similar methods to properly preserve the abandoned properties in need of keeping for the future.

The call to remove blight from inner cities is gaining a lot of steam as the way to stabilize neighborhoods, and it is certainly a good strategy when accomplished within a larger planning effort.  Now though is the time to make sure the preservationists are heard.  Now is the time communities who have planned for the redevelopment of key buildings are well equipped for the challenge of securing these properties.

Town Center in Macomb County, MI is a planned community of similar attributes: surrounded by farms, far away from the metropolitan core (Detroit), and with a unique set of zoning regulations compared to the township.  However, the timing differs significantly between the two locations, with Town Center having suffered developing around the time of the housing crash.  Halted construction painted a scene of unfinished residential streets, half built homes, and the pioneer residents scattered about an otherwise rural landscape.

With a recent surge in construction finally, something is surprising the few residents of Town Center.  Homes that are going up now are of an inconsistent design compared to the extremely strict zoning guidelines for pre-housing bubble burst Town Center.  The developers are saying they are still meeting the regulations, and as this plays out Town Center will serve as an interesting study regarding new urbanist zoning post housing collapse.  As a partially developed site like Town Center continues to sit, an eagerness to build may be resulting in relaxed regulations.  A new urbanist planned community as such may not be in any position of being too picky over precise architectural conformity.  These early homeowners do in fact have a beef if all of a sudden their desired neighborhood does not come to fruition, especially when homes start going up that are not within the planned community’s guidelines.

The highlight of the coffeehouse, its “lifeblood” according to Dr. Green, was conversation. Interaction with strangers was what made the coffeehouse flourish because the agent of coffee provided the mental and physical boost to ramble on for hours. An atmosphere ensued that helped add to the greater socialization of all involved. Democracy in action was found inside coffeehouses, resulting in the sharing of great ideas between people in the topical realms like the metaphysical, philosophical and of course political.

Today it is hard to imagine the city without a coffee shop, but to what degree does it still provide this level of active socialization? People could just learn from here on how to make coffee and go on with their lives, not needing to go to a coffee shop. Of course we can now point towards the internet as the source of our information gathering (especially since you are reading this article on the internet right now). Yet right now there are some readers in a coffeehouse reading this. The point here is not simply that coffeehouses are great places for public interaction, this is understood. But to what degree of interaction is it currently? Where do we practice such open speech and engagement of strangers in person and in public these days?

Coffeehouses are still romanticized places inside the urban fabric providing a space that meets our need for conversational loitering. It looks like we have nothing on the coffeehouses of the past though.

From this article highlighting the third annual Karachi Literature Festival, one of the featured talks titled ‘Megacities’ dove into the weighty issue of anti-poor urban planning initiatives.  As is the case for most global major cities, the poor are pushed out of the city core when development runs roughshod in their former beat down and dreary neighborhoods, erecting in its place upscale living and high end shopping.  Sadly, there is a destination on the periphery for the poor, as Karachi has the largest slum in South Asia, the town of Orangi.

Contrasted against the urban renewal efforts of the past in the United States, present development in Karachi takes on a more bullish approach towards improving the city.  Nausheen Anwar, urban studies academic and moderator of the talk, described influential cites like Dubai that provide the benchmark for high end development.  He points out however that it is the culture of the elite and not just the local governments that are inducing the change.  It is said in the article that about 60% of Karachi’s population suffers from living in unplanned areas.  It is this kind of disregard for those who are displaced that is most disturbing.  If the poor are at least planned for, even in the abysmal form of high rise towers of urban renewal past, there is at the least a frame to work with involving an intentional planning strategy.  The absence of any strategy is truly alarming.

Arif Hasan, town planner and historian, cites a new development along the water called Port Grand.  Though not entirely opposed to Port Grand in principal, Hasan points out that established cultural activity has come to an end in the area as a result of blockades and a gated district that planners created.  Intentional separation of the classes through urban design hinders public cultural interactions, further distancing the haves and have not’s.

Port Grand in Karachi, Pakistan

Hasan is not unfamiliar to raising action on the behalf of the community.  He led a petition and protest against the since abandoned Karachi Waterfront development, contending it would limit access to the beach area for many citizens of Karachi.  The petition specifically outlines the gentrification process of the beach area.  It is argued in point number four of the petition that the lower classes would “not be able to afford the cost of the expensive entertainment being proposed and will be excluded simply by the nature of developments that are to be implemented.”  Hasan clearly states in the petition that the waterfront development is not wrong, but that the issue of access is at hand.  It is voices like Hasan’s that are needed to help give voice to the lower class and have their concerns spoken for, and hopefully see them entering into the planning process.

Gauging the hipster quality of a city actually is key for the attracting of the creative class.  It isn’t something that a city can enact as a policy, it isn’t exactly the kind of thing that you remedy by bringing up in some city board meeting and creating a non-binding resolution of  hipster intent.  It is something though a city should monitor.  Particularly if there are overly restrictive policies in place that damper youthful creative expression.  Here are a few highlights from the CultureMap Austin article in light of urbanity:

• Density of hipster activities is critical, as the example from Burlington, Vermont demonstrates.  Because it is a small town a large amount of hipster activity (“local brew pubs, art galleries,…dive bars” to name a few) are all within a few city blocks.  With a stress of multi-modal transportation in this culture, keeping things close helps people to share ideas and experiences by simply walking or bicycling .
• Adaptive reuse made simple, as in not making it too hard with many hoops to jump through to turn an abandoned building into a place of creativity.  Detroit is cited in the article for its ample amount of abandoned properties, and what helps the hipster who prefers to reuse a building is not only supply but a local municipality with a bit of a laissez faire approach towards a hipster’s at times non-traditional methods of reuse.
• Music venues are key, and the promotion of public spaces for music performance should be encouraged.  Fostering an environment that likes to be loud (or unplugged) is key to accommodate the neighbors who go to bed at 8 in the evening.

Though there are certainly other characteristics to watch, each city will have to understand what it’s specific scene is like.  Retention of hipsters is also a priority to note for the long run, fostering an environment where young adults can not only find themselves for a brief period in life, but truly consider making there homestead there for the long-haul.  Just like the longevity of the 1925 sewing machine they joust bought.

One take on this program provides what I would consider a fair assessment of the challenges ahead, especially at local levels.  Thomas J. Fitzpatrick IV of the Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland describes these challenges in this well researched article.  I highly recommend reading this through, but essentially Fitzpatrick covers what the REO to rental program will face in weak housing markets, specifically the Midwest.  Particularly interesting are issues of local government compliance, where code and building inspections will have to occur in greater frequency to track these rental properties.

One of the other concerns is bulk buyers and their willingness (or lack of) to stabilize these properties.  Investing into vacant homes and providing good landlord services is not a guarantee.  Reuters now reports that Fannie Mae’s strategy will in fact be bulk sales, maybe 500 to 1,000 REO properties at once.  These large sales “will saddle investors with unwanted, less attractive or unfamiliar properties,” which only compounds the situation of bulk buyers who may already not be too interested in filling vacancies at a quick enough pace for the local communities.  The Reuters article highlights in contrast to this approach Freddie Mac’s proposed strategy, where investors will be able to “cherry-pick” properties that they will find suitable for the rental conversion based upon their intimate knowledge of their local area.

Fitzpatrick offers three recommendations for the issues he raises in his article, leading to proper actions that local governments can take for markets witnessing a low demand for rental housing and/or having to deal with bulk purchasing investors who may not ‘invest’ back into the community.  And for the federal agencies involved, there should be a clear, cohesive plan developed to help both buyers and local government alike from the get go and not create differing systems of implementation.  Doing this process slower but right will be better than moving too fast on a program of a national scale.

The Inner-Ring Rental Home Kingdom

The physical conditions of rental homes, of the single family or duplex variety, are a major concern for citizens in both inner-city and inner-suburb.  Recently in the city of Warren, MI, which borders Detroit to the north, an initiative has begun to get more owners of rental homes to register their properties with the city.  The fees involved with registering are a revenue generator for the city for sure, but the process ultimately results in city inspections that ensure the house is up to code.  Also involved in the process is obtaining up-to-date records of where the property owner lives.  Warren is an inner ring suburb, and as per usual of such cities is a housing stock that is smaller post-war homes that have now become ideal rental properties as compared to owner-occupied units.  Warren is reacting to a growing presence of slumlords that in turn are adding to the amount of dilapidated homes.

Warren and other suburban municipalities have to confront the sorts of rental issues that the central cities have dealt with for quite some time, albeit without the same density of units and perhaps more importantly without the intentionality of having these rental units in the first place.  Bernadette Hanlon’s 2010 book Once the American dream: inner-ring suburbs of the metropolitan United States talks much about the reasons why inner-ring suburbs face the challenges they presently do.  Hanlon points out that the modern-day home is indeed “more than twice the size of the average house built in 1950” (P.47).  These homes were, however, single-family homes, and intentionally so.  With the change in American preference for larger home size the inner-ring suburb has become ideal for rental homes because of their physical characteristics.  Ironically enough, some of the owners of these homes often live in the exurb inside the larger, newer home, and may consider the old neighborhood in a less desirable light in comparison to their McMansion paradise.

On the Ground and from Within

Warren’s reaction is but one source of a stance against the creation of the inner-ring slumlord, but what other examples exist that can assist in stabilizing these rental communities?  An active citizenry of the rental community is certainly one route, demonstrated by the Baltimore, Maryland group Baltimore Slumlord Watch.  Concerned citizens in this group do what the internet is good at, publicly posting something that was once thought of as hidden.  Making transparent who the owner is of a particular run down property is not entirely flattering for said owner and hopefully leads to public action against such properties.

In a proactive example, rental owners can come together to help each other out and provide a vehicle for dialogue with the citizenry.  The Winnipeg Rental Property Owners Association states the issue at hand rather bluntly:

“We know that there is little public sympathy toward landlords, and the term ‘landlord’ often has negative connotations. We are seen as greedy, uncaring and heartless individuals who get rich by taking advantage of poor families, and contribute to the decline of the inner city through neglect of our properties.”

With that sort of self-characterization follows the goal of such a group:

“We intend to change the way the public perceives landlords, by educating and informing them of the vital contributions we make toward inner-city housing, as responsible rental property owners. We will demonstrate how much better that housing could be, with the right supports and policies in place, and a collaborative effort with our three levels of government.”

A Place to Rent

If cities like Warren want to move forward on the rental housing issue, they must do so with the help of both sides of the issue.  Perhaps a neighborhood watch as intense as the Baltimore Slumlord Watch may not occur in this inner-ring setting.   But the single concerned citizen about a certain property’s condition must be heard, and perhaps community leaders will form out of this process.  That rental property owners may band together on their own to fight for their collective reputations may not happen any time soon either, but perhaps the city could facilitate gatherings for such owners to come together and to discuss between owners their collective concerns and challenges.  Who knows, that process may even be bringing old neighbors back together who once lived down the street from each other.

In Michigan however, the governor believes increasing the gas tax in the state is the route to go in order to improve the state’s infrastructure.  On the surface level this sounds reasonable.  If you decide to drive a vehicle on the road, then you have to pay more to operate the vehicle in order to pay for the maintenance of the road you travel on.  And the state also wants to increase registration fees, directly targeting everyone who wishes to have a private vehicle.

That sounds practical, but the issue at hand is this is not a percentage tax that cuts into people’s incomes evenly, 5% from the rich and the poor and all in-between.  This is instead a solid numerical figure for everyone, like bread going up in value.  That gas would cost more means that for those who can afford a gas increase they will barely blink.  For those who cannot afford an increase in their overall transportation cost, tough decisions will have to be made in their finances.  This can’t be the only course of action to take to increase transportation funds, or simply to become efficient in improving transportation routes.  I will venture to guess that the residents of the state of Michigan are not far off from the sentiment of the nation-wide poll when it comes to a gas tax hike, state or federal.  In tough economic times like in Michigan this cannot be the time to take more money from the economically disadvantaged.

A piece in The New York Times covered what kinds of techniques are being implemented to make parking lots more usable.  The article briefly dives into a number of ways that parking lot design and usage needs to be improved.  Here at the Urbanist Dispatch, John Cruz described the greening of parking lots with greenhouses and farmers markets filling in the vast sea of parking.  There are certainly plenty of cheap opportunities to fill up parking lots and create a sense of place even before a person reaches the distant storefront.

One great perspective drawn out of the NY Times article is that even in a parking lot of a dead shopping center, life can be found.  The article describes the Dutchess County Mall in Fishkill, NY (which lived a short life from 1974 to its official closing in 1998).  The parking lot in its abandoned state would host a plethora of activity from fast food junkies stopping to eat their meal in the car, to the presence of a hot dog truck vendor, as well as a weekend flea market.  An Ohio State University thesis paper describes the observed social behavior in shopping center parking lots.  Talking accounted for 77% of all social behavior observed in the study, while 7% of social activity was play.  Carefully scan a sea of parking next time you find yourself there and don’t be surprised if kids are pulling off skateboarding tricks in the back corner.

Taking notice of the types of social interaction that goes on within a parking lot is crucial to understand what to do with these spaces in the future.  The perception may be that pedestrians struggle to live and move within the landscape of the automobile.  Yet taking advantage of observed actions already going on in parking lots may provide better functionality for these large swaths of land, empty or busy alike.