Comments on: Libertarians Against Sprawl

By: intricatic

intricatic — Sat, 08 Aug 2009 15:23:57 +0000

I agree fully. I have become in my old age sick and tired of urban planning; in south florida, it’s taken to such an extreme degree that one might think the houses are actually modeled in plastic and airlifted into their new lots. Lo and behold, it is the politicians who do the community planning and they do not hide this fact from the public.

One of the most ironic aspects of urban and community planning is that it infringes on the natural wildlife and destroys the environment of the everglades. Yet, the same politicians take up environmental causes and discuss climate change as if they had nothing to do with the sprawling communities pushing ever westward into the sea of grass.

By: Alex Peak

Alex Peak — Mon, 08 Jun 2009 07:57:55 +0000

Very interesting.

Although I feel compelled to add that one can hold that existing restrictions on mixed use development should be eliminated (along with the state) and simultaneously say, “You’ll take away my car when you pry my cold, dead foot off the gas pedal.” I don’t think there’s a contradiction here.

Cheers,
Alex Peak

By: rmangum

rmangum — Wed, 03 Jun 2009 01:47:03 +0000

Fighting sprawl, suburbanism, and car culture by rolling back government: the problem is how to simultaneously pitch this to libertarians and liberals.

By: Kevin Carson

Kevin Carson — Sat, 30 May 2009 17:58:53 +0000

PML: Critics of the food mile movement, who argue that it takes less fuel per pound to ship factory farmed produce in trucks or container ships than to ship much smaller loads locally, make a similar mistake: they count the “last mile” distribution system twice against local production. Once that factory farmed stuff gets trucked in, it still has to be distributed by pretty much the same last mile system as the local stuff.

By: P.M.Lawrence

P.M.Lawrence — Sat, 30 May 2009 10:03:52 +0000

You might be interested in The Fallacy of Locally Grown Produce (found via this). It rather misses the point by asking "what is the optimal way to distribute from these suppliers?" and concluding "it isn't optimal to source locally" - there is an inadvertent bait and switch between "distribute" and "source", since the former assumes the sources themselves are given. The proper question would have been, "what sources should we set up to make supply optimal for the demand?" (as this, this and this reply seem to understand). With that perspective, it's pretty obvious that it makes sense to switch to producing in the locality of the consumers, even if current sources aren't set up to make local distribution optimal. In fact, when that sort of suboptimality happens, it shows that producers aren't yet in the best places for the consumers (or vice versa). And, of course, you get more of that kind of suboptimality from regulating where the consumers live and where the producers work to keep them apart.

By: sidburgess

sidburgess — Sat, 30 May 2009 00:27:55 +0000

Well spoken my friend. I am looking forward to a new revolution, one that takes place in our codes of our cities and towns. We need to remove the influences of cookie cutter DC planning initiatives and incorporate a system of strong freedom in land use and local solutions/demand.

By: gplauche

gplauche — Fri, 29 May 2009 19:44:52 +0000

Hey, I’m in the ”You’ll take away my car when you pry my cold, dead foot off the gas pedal” crowd but am opposed to zoning laws that encourage sprawl. I’m not fond of government transportation and prefer the independence, empowerment and convenience of using my own car most of the time. Granted, I live in Nebraska which doesn’t suffer from much congestion, so I’m not bothered much by rush hour traffic. However, as you know, government transportation isn’t a libertarian solution to the sprawl-caused-by-zoning-laws problem. If we didn’t have so much sprawl and I could get to where I wanted to go most of the time without using my car, then I would happily do so. But given that sprawl exists, I’ll prefer to use my car and oppose government attempts to interfere. Of course, like you, I’m also opposed to government attempts to reverse sprawl, since that too would constitute aggression. Just get government out of the way and let nature takes it course.

By: Market Urbanism

Market Urbanism — Fri, 29 May 2009 19:44:21 +0000

I’m glad to see this discussed more in libertarian circles as of late. This is the topic of focus at my blog, “Market Urbanism” http://marketurbanism.com where I discuss government’s roll in sprawl and unaffordability. On this subject, I agree that free market folks have more in common with the likes of Kunstler than with Stossel. (But, we differ in solution…)

Currently, I’m writing a series of posts about Murray Rothbard’s thoughts on the subject.

By: Michael Bindner

Michael Bindner — Fri, 29 May 2009 15:27:00 +0000

The entire enterprise of road building is statist on the face of it, at least on roads that are public. This reminds me of the old canard of a gentleman asking a lady if she would marry him if he gave her a three carot diamond, to which she responded yes. He then asked her for a quickie for fifty pounds, to which she replied indignantly “what kind of woman do you think I am?” His response was, “what you are is obvious, now we are simply negotiating the price.”

Abolishing government is not the first step toward liberty – it must be the last. The first step is take away the need for government intrusion and then to find non-governmental means to do these things. Only then can we actually abolish government.

Aside from the last bit, however, everything else in the article rings true. I suggest that finding a way to better integrate employers into housing and urban planning is the key to this equation.

By: darianworden

darianworden — Fri, 29 May 2009 15:11:48 +0000

I’m a fan of cars, but like everything else transportation would be better in a freed market. I doubt that we would see as many homogeneous residential developments, retail outlets, and office parks with cars-only transport between them if development reflected market demand and not central planning. If a lot of daily commutes and grocery trips were taken off the roads, they would be a lot more pleasant.

I noted some other negative social effects along these lines in an article I did last year.