Is Upzoning Really All That Bad?

LOS ANGELES—There is a great debate is Los Angeles right now about the best path to growth and greater density. With several pieces of legislation up for vote on one side and developers looking to navigate an outdated masterplan on the other. According to new research from the UCLA Ziman Center for Real Estate, upzoning may be unfairly stigmatized, and actually is a good path to accommodate the massive growth expected in the city—approximately 300,000 people expected to move to Los Angeles in the next several decades.

The school “quantitatively examine[d] where and to what extent Los Angeles has already been changing permissible density of its parcels and neighborhoods, finding that upzoning is “much more rare than indicated by the alarm sounded by anti-density advocates. It also shows that upzoning tends to occur in neighborhoods with smaller shares of single-family homeowners, suggesting that political opposition to density has effectively directed the City's growth.”

“It's first useful to remember that controversies about zoning are as old as zoning itself,” C.J. Gabbe, the author of the research, tells GlobeSt.com. “In his classic 1966 book, The Zoning Game, Babcock quotes William Munro, the vice president of the National Municipal League as saying (in 1931): “Whenever a question of rezoning comes up, the issue is not usually approached from the standpoint of what the city needs, but of what the private owners desire and what their immediate neighbors feel disinclined to let them have.” In Los Angeles today, controversies about zoning are fundamentally about whether and how the city and its neighborhoods should grow and change.

Gabbe adds that upzoning is also a necessity for the growth of a city, and there are limited alternative options. Without housing to accommodate new residents, housing shortages and soaring rents could be a result. “Upzoning is necessary if existing land use regulations are insufficient to accommodate new growth,” he says. “Alternative solutions include more broadly applied policies—like density bonus policies—that allow additional development if real estate developers agree to provide affordable housing or other public benefits.”

The acrimony in between residents and developers is not that the zoning guides is outdated, but rather the best path and vision to accommodate growth in the city. “Everyone seems to agree that Los Angeles's community plans are out of date and need to be updated,” says Gabbe. “The big disagreements are about the future vision for Los Angeles, and thus the content of these future plans. My hope is that these plans leverage growth to enable a more equitable, environmentally sustainable, and economically prosperous Los Angeles.”

Steady gains in the US economy have resulted in net positives for the multifamily sector—will this wave continue for the foreseeable future? What's driving development and capital flows? Join us at RealShare Apartments on October 19 & 20 for impactful information from the leaders in the National multifamily space. Learn more.

LOS ANGELES—There is a great debate is Los Angeles right now about the best path to growth and greater density. With several pieces of legislation up for vote on one side and developers looking to navigate an outdated masterplan on the other. According to new research from the UCLA Ziman Center for Real Estate, upzoning may be unfairly stigmatized, and actually is a good path to accommodate the massive growth expected in the city—approximately 300,000 people expected to move to Los Angeles in the next several decades.

The school “quantitatively examine[d] where and to what extent Los Angeles has already been changing permissible density of its parcels and neighborhoods, finding that upzoning is “much more rare than indicated by the alarm sounded by anti-density advocates. It also shows that upzoning tends to occur in neighborhoods with smaller shares of single-family homeowners, suggesting that political opposition to density has effectively directed the City's growth.”

“It's first useful to remember that controversies about zoning are as old as zoning itself,” C.J. Gabbe, the author of the research, tells GlobeSt.com. “In his classic 1966 book, The Zoning Game, Babcock quotes William Munro, the vice president of the National Municipal League as saying (in 1931): “Whenever a question of rezoning comes up, the issue is not usually approached from the standpoint of what the city needs, but of what the private owners desire and what their immediate neighbors feel disinclined to let them have.” In Los Angeles today, controversies about zoning are fundamentally about whether and how the city and its neighborhoods should grow and change.

Gabbe adds that upzoning is also a necessity for the growth of a city, and there are limited alternative options. Without housing to accommodate new residents, housing shortages and soaring rents could be a result. “Upzoning is necessary if existing land use regulations are insufficient to accommodate new growth,” he says. “Alternative solutions include more broadly applied policies—like density bonus policies—that allow additional development if real estate developers agree to provide affordable housing or other public benefits.”

The acrimony in between residents and developers is not that the zoning guides is outdated, but rather the best path and vision to accommodate growth in the city. “Everyone seems to agree that Los Angeles's community plans are out of date and need to be updated,” says Gabbe. “The big disagreements are about the future vision for Los Angeles, and thus the content of these future plans. My hope is that these plans leverage growth to enable a more equitable, environmentally sustainable, and economically prosperous Los Angeles.”

Steady gains in the US economy have resulted in net positives for the multifamily sector—will this wave continue for the foreseeable future? What's driving development and capital flows? Join us at RealShare Apartments on October 19 & 20 for impactful information from the leaders in the National multifamily space. Learn more.