“It’s going to take a historic effort to close the gaps in housing supply that are close to the places where people work, shop and entertain themselves and where there may also be options for walking, biking or taking mass transit.”
![](https://mountainx.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/10/OPINION-1-Ben-Brown-330x410.jpeg)
“It’s going to take a historic effort to close the gaps in housing supply that are close to the places where people work, shop and entertain themselves and where there may also be options for walking, biking or taking mass transit.”
“Take, for instance, objections recently raised in the Mountain Xpress to increased housing density, open-space reduction and infill construction.”
“So, sorry, but local development will proceed, and my view is that our city and county are doing all that they can to preserve our unique local identity and still allow for affordable housing, environmental protections, family farm protections and all of the many factors that make WNC a place in which we want to live.”
“This proposal to deregulate developers within city limits is dressed up with idealistic-sounding justifications like providing affordable housing, improving flooding and fighting sprawl.”
“Asheville is changing, and since affordable housing is already in short supply, every neighborhood has a responsibility to accept its share of new, denser residential projects, despite the inevitable protests by vocal citizen groups.”
“No one I know is against apartments. In fact, we have many on every block, and they are welcome neighbors.”
“Housing is in short supply and unaffordable. Rather than take an honest and comprehensive look at the issues, barriers and contributors to the problems, however, we in Asheville have smugly chosen the easy way out.”
“But we’ll become just another city gone too far if we don’t balance short-term investment with the investments that will make us outstanding for generations.”
In the late ’70s, Oregon embarked on a strategy to limit urban sprawl and became the first state to adopt an aggressive “Smart Growth” methodology of zoning. Its goals were exemplary but failed to anticipate that the most “efficient” way to populate the cities was directly opposed to the way that people actually wanted to […]