What's So Bad About the System? Part I
Unlike a lot of other blogs, I figure since we're Satan's minions we can be somewhat innovative: complain AND offer solutions.
But in order to suggest solutions, it seems to me that we need to identify the problems. So, in an attempt to goad my fellow devil's advocates, I invite a methodical listing and discussion of the chief problems with Oregon's land use planning system.
The hope is that our combined expertise and observations might eventually be read/heard, given that I fear Beelzebub is right in being cycnical about how the issue will be addressed by the review committee. So I'll go first!
Thesis 1: The Urban Growth Boundary Concept is Antiquated and No Longer Appropriate
30 some-odd years ago, the State decided that planning to avoid "California-style" sprawl was necessary to avoid "misuse" of natural resources such as farm land and forest land. Metro areas like Portland metro drew what are now called urban growth boundaries (UGBs) around broad swaths of land, with a core developed city as well as then-undeveloped land between the core and distant, developing suburbs in anticipation of future development.
Back then, when the word suburb was used for Portland, communities such as Milwaukie, Gresham, Beaverton, Lake Oswego and West Linn quickly came to mind. Today's suburbs such as Hillsboro, Tualatin, Wilsonville, Oregon City and others along the periphery were more like what are now called exurbs - very distant "bedroom" rural communities. They were to be brought into a suburban fold in the future as development filled in between the inner ring of suburbs and these outer communities.
And here is the clincher: There was so much vacant land in between the outer and inner suburbs that development could be easily located in the "in between" and steered away from going beyond the outer periphery. The problem, however, is that the regional approach to the UGB neutered individual city ability to plan their own growth from the inside and out towards other 'burbs.
Development happened all over the place in a big California-style sprawl within the UGB. That helps explain TV Highway, Pacific Highway, McLoughlin Corridor, and a few other corridors of patchwork development that today's planners abhor nearly as much as the sight of George Bush drinking a full-fat milk latte at Wal-Mart.
Today's UGB, set by considering 20-year need for land, does not contain abundant and appropriate land for development because review processes, planning, litigation and comprehensive plan implementation are all very time consuming and costly. New development in the metro area is, therefore, becoming more and more determined by incremental additions of land at the margin of the UGB rather than development of remaining parcels inside.
All of this narrative has a point and it is this: The land use planning system needs to acknowledge that the UGB system was originally put in place to keep development well within a broad, development-sanctioned inventory of land dotted by small communities that would eventually grow together. Because forecasting and planning are inherently wrong - crystal balls are bad public policy if used too much, as they are in Oregon - UGBs now act like a 32-inch belt on a 40-inch waist that gets loosened one notch at a time, but only after millions of dollars in attorney, consultant and city/county/Metro staff hour fees.
I acknowledge that this thesis is far from complete - the failure of the UGB concept is multifaceted (review process, planning goals, loc\al vs. regional approach, etc.), but it's a start and I invite someone else to chime in. I'm staring at you, Beelzebub.
Unlike a lot of other blogs, I figure since we're Satan's minions we can be somewhat innovative: complain AND offer solutions.
But in order to suggest solutions, it seems to me that we need to identify the problems. So, in an attempt to goad my fellow devil's advocates, I invite a methodical listing and discussion of the chief problems with Oregon's land use planning system.
The hope is that our combined expertise and observations might eventually be read/heard, given that I fear Beelzebub is right in being cycnical about how the issue will be addressed by the review committee. So I'll go first!
Thesis 1: The Urban Growth Boundary Concept is Antiquated and No Longer Appropriate
30 some-odd years ago, the State decided that planning to avoid "California-style" sprawl was necessary to avoid "misuse" of natural resources such as farm land and forest land. Metro areas like Portland metro drew what are now called urban growth boundaries (UGBs) around broad swaths of land, with a core developed city as well as then-undeveloped land between the core and distant, developing suburbs in anticipation of future development.
Back then, when the word suburb was used for Portland, communities such as Milwaukie, Gresham, Beaverton, Lake Oswego and West Linn quickly came to mind. Today's suburbs such as Hillsboro, Tualatin, Wilsonville, Oregon City and others along the periphery were more like what are now called exurbs - very distant "bedroom" rural communities. They were to be brought into a suburban fold in the future as development filled in between the inner ring of suburbs and these outer communities.
And here is the clincher: There was so much vacant land in between the outer and inner suburbs that development could be easily located in the "in between" and steered away from going beyond the outer periphery. The problem, however, is that the regional approach to the UGB neutered individual city ability to plan their own growth from the inside and out towards other 'burbs.
Development happened all over the place in a big California-style sprawl within the UGB. That helps explain TV Highway, Pacific Highway, McLoughlin Corridor, and a few other corridors of patchwork development that today's planners abhor nearly as much as the sight of George Bush drinking a full-fat milk latte at Wal-Mart.
Today's UGB, set by considering 20-year need for land, does not contain abundant and appropriate land for development because review processes, planning, litigation and comprehensive plan implementation are all very time consuming and costly. New development in the metro area is, therefore, becoming more and more determined by incremental additions of land at the margin of the UGB rather than development of remaining parcels inside.
All of this narrative has a point and it is this: The land use planning system needs to acknowledge that the UGB system was originally put in place to keep development well within a broad, development-sanctioned inventory of land dotted by small communities that would eventually grow together. Because forecasting and planning are inherently wrong - crystal balls are bad public policy if used too much, as they are in Oregon - UGBs now act like a 32-inch belt on a 40-inch waist that gets loosened one notch at a time, but only after millions of dollars in attorney, consultant and city/county/Metro staff hour fees.
I acknowledge that this thesis is far from complete - the failure of the UGB concept is multifaceted (review process, planning goals, loc\al vs. regional approach, etc.), but it's a start and I invite someone else to chime in. I'm staring at you, Beelzebub.
posted by Screwtape at 7:34 AM
1 Comments:
I'll bite, although I don't have time for such a all encompassing subject. I would agree with your basic thesis that the UGB is antiquated, and was really a blunt instrument approach. Unfortunately, that is the instrument most widely copied by other areas adopting portions of our land use system. In Oregon, these boundaries have become Maginot lines for special interest groups such as 1,000 Friends.
I would prefer to see a more responsive way to internalize externalities into the land use system, through mechanisms such as specific area SDCs.
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