Opinions and Editorials
Read what newspapers, experts and transit advocates
are saying about the critics. We have received permission to reprint
the expanded articles below, for the rest, we have provided you
links in the table below:
Author and public policy analyst Otis White offers his rebuttal
of the "Lexus" argument that critics of public transportation
often use. White points out that the critics conveniently omit external
costs not borne by the driver of the hypothetical "Lexus":
OK, Then, How About a Yugo for Everybody?
Doing the Math on Public Transit
Otis White
You've probably heard someone say, in a debate over rail transit,
that these systems are so expensive and poorly patronized, it'd
be cheaper to give every passenger a free car instead. Humorist
P.J. O'Rourke made that claim recently in a Wall Street Journal
column. O'Rourke's target: Minneapolis' new $700 million light-rail
line, which he said was so extravagant, the city "could have
leased a BMW X-5 SUV for [every] commuter at about the same price."
But is that right? One reader ran the numbers.
Saying that he recognized O'Rourke was trying to be funny, Janek
Kozlowski suggested taking O'Rourke's offer at face value. Would
taxpayers have been better served by giving every one of Minneapolis'
15,500 transit riders a BMW SUV? Well, said Kozlowski, leases for
that many BMWs would cost $44 million a year, with leasers paying
another $2,800 a year in gas, maintenance and so on. But, of course,
that gets you only a car in the driveway.
To get to work, Kozlowski said, the displaced commuters would have
to drive on a highway. Highways cost about $20.6 million per mile
to build, with interchanges averaging $100 million apiece. To replace
the Minneapolis rail line, then, figure 12 miles of new freeway
and two interchanges, which comes out to $440 million, not including
annual maintenance, he said. But that's not all.
The commuters need a place to park their Bimmers when they get
to work. If all 15,500 could park on cheap surface lots, the lots
would cost someone (businesses, the city) another $31 million to
build. That's bad, but worse is the impact on the city treasury,
since parking lots generate a fraction of the tax revenues of a
commercial building ($3 a year per square foot vs., conservatively,
$50 for office space). Results of turning over nearly 2 million
square feet of downtown land to surface parking: The city would
lose $91 million a year in revenues.
So how do the two options compare when all the costs are taken
into consideration? Assume that the BMWs, freeway and parking lots
would last 50 years each (as rail lines do, on average). Assume,
too, that you could amortize their capital costs over that period.
Then add in the operating costs for the BMWs and maintenance for
the freeway and parking lots (and keep in mind that fares provide
nearly $10 million of the $13 million it costs to run Minneapolis'
rail line each year). Finally figure everything at present-day costs
(not including inflation).
Ka-ching: Transit costs taxpayers a little more than $17 million
a year. And what about the Bimmers, highway and parking lots? "Taxpayers
would have to dish out $166 million per year," Kozlowski concluded.
Originally published in Governing Magazine, April 8, 2005
Reprinted with permission
July 16, 2004, Daily
Breeze, Torrance, California
Guest Column: Debunking the Myths Surrounding the
Rail Systems
By Frank Lyle Bettger
Mass transit opponents have a habit of bandying about
spurious information about public transportation, including buses
and light- and heavy-rail systems.
Truth demands that these myths be exposed.
Myth No. 1: Users of the Metropolitan Transportation Authority's
Red Line subway (heavy rail) and Blue Line (light rail) system are
mostly former bus riders. Therefore, mass transit's ability to reduce
freeway congestion is minimal.
Fact: A recent MTA survey disclosed that 55 percent are
current car users. They drive to various Red Line stations for their
daily commute. The survey also showed that 37 percent of the agency's
Blue Line commuters own cars and that they choose to drive to stations
daily to board the light-rail system.
Myth No. 2: Riding the MTA's light- and heavy-rail systems
is dangerous, due to a large number of train accidents involving
motorists and or pedestrians.
Fact: Commuting by the MTA's light- and heavy-rail systems
is far safer than driving. In fiscal year 2002, there were just
0.08 accidents for every 100,000 miles traveled by Red Line trains.
During the same period, there were just 0.93 light-rail accidents
on the Blue Line for every 100,000 miles traveled.
Myth No. 3: Motorists are safer using Los Angeles County
roads and freeways than using mass transit.
Fact: Bad driving caused 3,550 deaths and 440,000 injuries
in Los Angeles County during the past five years.
Myth No. 4: MTA commuters are unhappy with the Blue Line
and Red Line's on-time performance, complaining about how long it
takes to reach their destinations.
Fact: Quite the contrary, in a recent survey Red Line
subway commuters gave the heavy-rail system a 99.6 percent approval
rating for on-time performance, while Blue Line riders give a similar
thumbs-up for that line's on-time performance.
Myth No. 5: If you build either a light-rail or heavy-rail
system, hardly anyone will use it.
Fact: Wrong again! When the Los Angeles County Transportation
Commission (or LACTC, the MTA's predecessor agency) opened the Blue
Line from downtown Los Angeles to downtown Long Beach, with two-car
trains, there were 19,600 average weekday boardings in August 1990.
The 22-mile Blue Line became so popular with light-rail commuters
that the MTA extended station platforms, and introduced three-car
trains at selected peak hours. As of May, there were 68,825 average
weekday boardings.
The Red Line subway's patronage has increased over time. In January
1993, a 4.4 mile segment was opened from Union Station (downtown
Los Angeles) to MacArthur Park. There were 13,150 average weekday
boardings in March 1993 on the MTA's four-car trains.
When another segment was opened in 1996, running 2.1 miles under
Wilshire Boulevard to Western Avenue, 31,525 average weekday boardings
were recorded. Similar increases occurred when the 4.6 mile extension
opened to Hollywood Boulevard and Vine Avenue in June 1999, with
59,000 average weekday boardings on the Red Line for July 1999 and
119,150 average weekday boardings for July 2000, when the Red Line
was extended to North Hollywood.
Myth No. 6: The federal tax on gasoline accounts for 100
percent of the total federal funding for mass transit. This shortchanges
highway users.
Fact: The fuel tax is the largest source of federal funding
for mass transportation, accounting for 80 percent of the total
federal funds spent. The remaining 20 percent comes from general
federal funds, which are an important source of mass transit funding
at both the state and local levels.
Myth No. 7: The majority of the MTA's funding does not
come from local sources, such as county Propositions A and C, which
raised the local sales tax.
Fact: Propositions A and C provide the MTA with the majority
of its funding. Proposition A, approved by voters in 1980, is a
one-half of 1 percent tax on most retail sales in Los Angeles County,
while the Proposition C sales tax, approved by voters in 1990, is
an extra one-half of 1 percent tax on retail sales. Proposition
A designates 35 percent of its funds for rail development and 40
percent for discretionary purposes, including the 16 municipal bus
operators in L.A. County.
Proposition C funds support construction and operation of bus and
rail transit systems countywide; expansion of bus and train security;
Metrolink operations; construction of transit centers and park-and-ride
lots; and mass-transit-related improvements to freeways and state
highways.
Myth No. 8: Operating buses is cheaper than rail.
Fact: It's far more cost-effective to operate a rail system.
You need only one light- or heavy-rail operator per train. Each
bus requires an individual driver. The 40-seat buses cost $330,000.
This does not include $200,000 added on to each bus to pay for the
driver's annual wages, service and repair, and insurance.
O n the other hand, each light-rail vehicle costs $3 million and
has 76 seats, with standing room for 157 riders.
The MTA's heavy-rail vehicles purchased in 1990 can seat 59, with
standing room for 169 riders. Each Blue Line train has three cars
at selected peak hours. Most Red Line subway trains consist of six
cars.
The MTA operates two-car trains daily on its Green Line (running
from Norwalk to El Segundo), with its Gold Line (connecting downtown
Los Angeles and Pasadena) consisting of two-car trains running until
8 p.m. daily.
Bottom line: No matter how you do the math, the public
is getting more bang for its buck riding the rails.
Frank Lyle Bettger, a West Los Angeles resident, has been a
light- and heavy-rail advocate since 1966.
Building A More Integrated Transportation Network
- Building an integrated transportation system in the United States
would be a real economic stimulus and increase mobility and security.
By Hank Dittmar
Since the 9-11 tragedy, United, National and US Airways have all
declared bankruptcy, and the other majors are frantically scrambling
to find a new business model through cutting service, using smaller
aircraft, and revising their route structures. As we talk about
reviving the ailing economy through tax cuts, one of the underpinnings
of the economic productivity boom of the last forty years has become
destabilized.
The impact in terms of accessibility is profound. Many cities lost
between a quarter and half of all flights in the last year, with
more cuts on the horizon. Reduced schedules at big cities led to
longer waits at hub airports. The airports, which are also economic
generators for their metropolitan areas, are in danger of default
themselves, as bankrupt airlines renege on lease agreements and
ask Congress to cut the fees and taxes that support airport construction
and security.
The attack on Iraq has exacerbated the situation, leading to heightened
concern about security, and causing many pleasure travelers to cancel
trips while business travelers teleconference instead. It looks
like our short war has led to a long period of instability, with
the travel and tourism industry being the next domino to fall. Hotel
vacancies are approaching 25 percent, and a study last fall by the
United States Conference of Mayors and Travel Business Roundtable
reported $30 billion in losses to metropolitan economies in 2001
and 2002 from reduced travel and tourism.
Now, however, the very viability of the transportation system is
threatened. The failure of the network-based airlines is cutting
small and medium-sized cities out of the loop and diminishing the
overall strength of the network. The Interstate Highway System is
at capacity and failing in its role as a long-distance travel system
connecting major metropolitan areas. The rail network is shrinking
as well, as the railroads defer investments to only those needed
to carry high-value cargo. This threatens overall economic productivity,
as advances in transportation have been key to such innovations
as just in time manufacturing and advanced logistics.
The root of the problem is that our transportation system was never
designed as an integrated air-rail-highway system where one mode
could provide service should another fail. Air-rail connections
have long been a compelling feature of travel in Europe and Japan
but exist at only a few airports in the U.S., and the lack of freight-transfer
facilities have long been the Achilles heel of the just-in-time
manufacturing system.
We have learned the value of redundancy in networks time after
time, with recent examples being Amtrak's role in the Northeast
Corridor after post September 11 shut down of our aviation system.
Sadly, convenient options are available only in the Boston-Washington
Corridor and in a few corridors on the West Coast.
Simply returning to the days of regulation and propping up the
airlines by subsidizing air service isn't the solution. Nor is a
dramatic increase in taxes to add new highway lanes the answer.
Instead we need to unlock the hidden capacity in our transportation
networks to trigger the next wave of productivity improvements.
We need careful balancing of further deregulation and targeted infrastructure
investment, not elimination of user fees that pay for vital transportation
facilities and needed airport security.
We need to view airports as "travel ports", where one
can access air service for longer distance flights and high-speed
commuter and intercity rail and bus service for shorter trips. We
can do the same thing with freight by eliminating key chokepoints
that prevent the use of rail freight for higher value time-sensitive
cargo, and that obstruct travel and transfer within metropolitan
areas.
Regulatory barriers that prevent states from investing in integrated
facilities must be eliminated, as must anti-trust barriers that
inhibit airlines, bus systems and railroads from partnering to provide
service. We also need to create an integrated trust fund to bring
intercity rail and bus into airports, to create integrated freight
transfer facilities, and to improve rail infrastructure.
This means replacing the Essential Air Service program -- which
props up failing airline routes -- and the annual Amtrak appropriation
fight with an Essential Transportation Service program. This would
provide smaller communities with reliable transportation services
– bus, rail or air -- without regard to the mode of travel.
Many of Amtrak's long distance routes are primarily justified for
national connectivity and not by high demand, just like essential
air service. Let's eliminate the policy muddle.
Lastly, we need to create a stable source of funding for intercity
rail service, primarily in the 100-to-400-mile market that is being
abandoned by the airlines. Amtrak should cease being primarily a
long distance operator, and should instead become primarily a short
and medium distance carrier, networked with air for the longer trips
at major hubs and with intercity bus for less dense corridors.
The legacy of 9/11 and the subsequent security regime need not
be the collapse of the airline and tourism industries. The solution
is an integrated transportation network serviced by robust partnerships
between the air, rail, bus and highway providers. Rather, prompt
action by President Bush and Congress can put in place a transportation
network that will support a postwar economic boom.
Hank Dittmar is Co-Director of Reconnecting America, a nongovernmental
effort to create a more interconnected and economically viable national
transportation system. He is also Chair of the Congress for the
New Urbanism.
Making TODs Work: Lessons from Portland's Orenco Station - A project
manager gives a real-world account of the successes and failures
of one of the nation's most closely watched new transit-oriented
communities, and its role in the regional growth management strategy.
By Michael Mehaffy
The planning practices of few jurisdictions are as closely studied
– or as hotly debated – as those of Portland, Oregon.
The region's innovative growth management system and transit-oriented
development efforts are hailed by some as near-perfect national
models for livable growth, and bashed by others as clumsy infringements
of property rights and free enterprise, reflecting only the unworkable
utopian dreams of planners.
A growing body of evidence suggests the truth may lie somewhere
between these extremes. Some things are indeed working in Portland,
and ought to be studied as models – or at any rate clues for
how to make things work better elsewhere. Other things are not working,
and ought to serve as cautionary tales.
A key strategy of the Portland regional approach has been to rezone
land adjacent to light rail stations to create new mixed-use, transit-oriented
development. In several prominent cases, the station areas have
been designated as mixed-use town centers, following the New Urbanist
program of well-connected, pedestrian-friendly streets and a diverse
mix of housing, retail and civic uses.
Orenco Station has emerged as perhaps the most prominent laboratory
in that regional experiment, in part because it offers a real-world
test of a great many specific aspects of that program. In Orenco
Station there is a pedestrian axis to the light rail station, around
which a grid of alley-loaded "skinny streets" extends;
a walkable town center of mixed-use shops, services and residential;
"liner" buildings with limited on-street parking and lots
tucked behind; a range of housing types and prices, from $79,000
to over $500,000, as well as rental units; pedestrian-friendly street
design and scale; "granny flats" and live/work units;
loft units above retail; and of course, much higher density than
is typical for the American suburbs, up to 25 units to the acre.
Skeptics suggested that PacTrust -- the pension fund partnership
and master developer for whom I served as project manager -- was
unwise to cooperate in creating this kind of development. After
all, there were no real precedents even for attached product in
that suburban market, let alone the kinds of radical densities and
other features proposed. But while the company was certainly wary
of the dangers, research also suggested an unmet appetite in the
market for this kind of community, one that has since been borne
out.
In addition, a number of steps were taken to mitigate risk, including
early sale of some parcels to co-developers. Most significant, the
company made it a condition that it would be given the flexibility
to follow the market and protect its interests as needed; with that
important limitation, it would commit to implementing the regional
policy goals. This meant the company would become a full participant
in writing the new zoning and working out the vision of the community,
based on extensive market research, study of precedents, private-sector
expertise and entrepreneurial vision.
This relationship of trust and pragmatic collaboration with public
entities was perhaps the most critical element in the decision to
move ahead, and to pursue all the ambitious features that were later
realized. It may also have been the most critical element in the
ultimate success of the project, as it set the stage for the detailed
problem-solving with jurisdiction staff that is critical in such
a complex project.
In spite of the early skepticism, it is increasingly clear that
the community is an encouraging success. Initial sales and subsequent
appreciation have been strong, and town center retail occupancies
are at 99% in spite of the slump.
Moreover, a sociology study (Podobnik, 2002) has shown very high
levels of resident satisfaction with the community, very high "social
cohesion", and relatively high transit and alternate mode transportation
habits (a 22% modal split versus about 6% regionally). Many of those
automobile trips are also "captured" within the community,
reducing overall travel. Considering the suburban setting, this
achievement should not be underestimated.
But it is important to note that many features of the plan deviated
substantially from planners' original prescriptive intentions. Most
significant, the automobile -- still the choice of most suburbanites
for most trips – has been realistically accommodated, though
in ways that better mitigate its negative effects on livability.
Other aspects of the community show room for improvement. The natural
character of the place has not fully developed, leaving a somewhat
unreal quality, in part because of some unbuilt parcels now owned
by other entities, and in part because of top-down design and production
methods to achieve economies of scale and control. Both economic
and ethnic diversity, though unusually broad for the American suburbs,
are nowhere near true urban levels.
The live/work townhomes, while successful enough to prompt a second
phase, were not the successes expected, in part because the workspace
was too small to be effective, and the split-level design complicated
ADA access.
Perhaps most importantly, the team did not have control –
or, in one notable case, sold off control -- of key parcels of land
surrounding the station. It was also an unhappy fact of history
that the station location was eccentric to the community and removed
from the major arterial that bisects the site. In a more ideal world,
the team would have had better control over these conditions –
and would have maintained it.
Some key "lessons learned":
- Density demands design. Abstract land use designations are only
the beginning, and the essential task is to create a coherent
neighborhood structure with livable features and services.
- Build a great team. Assemble a skilled and talented consultant
team early on, led by private entities with vision and risk-management
skills, to closely collaborate and problem-solve together.
- Bring the jurisdictions onto the team. Major challenges are
still posed by obsolete national building codes, traffic engineering
practices, and local zoning; and their solution requires the close
cooperation and collaboration of public entities – from
elected representatives down to desk staff – as well as
skilled private consultants.
- Do your homework. The devil will be in the details of the design.
Start with good market science, not only in assessing what buyers
have already bought, but in understanding potential buyers and
envisioning what they will want and need. Then be prepared for
lots of detailed problem-solving and research.
- Learn from history. There are many valuable lessons in successful
older neighborhoods, and in how their mix of uses functions successfully.
Do not slavishly copy, but do not ignore the great problem-solving
resources collected in traditional design.
- Keep a firm hand at the tiller. Do not let disparate owners
or builders destroy the standard of design quality. Do not surrender
control prematurely.
- But let the design evolve. At the same time be prepared to allow
many inputs and many hands, and let the design evolve with changing
real-world conditions, while preserving a coherent neighborhood
structure.
Perhaps the final lesson of Orenco Station – to be further
established with ongoing research -- is that there is indeed great
potential for such transit-oriented and mixed-use development to
create more livable, more sustainable neighborhood development.
At the same time, formidable challenges remain: the diseconomies
of mixed use construction, the burden of obsolete codes, the complex
entitlement process, the demands for top-notch design, and the political
challenges to public infrastructure funding needed for light rail
itself. But in our view, such public subsidies come under the entirely
proper Constitutional mandate to provide for the general welfare.
In that sense, the freedom of consumers to choose to live in such
communities – as they clearly do – is matched by the
freedom of voters to choose the kind of public realm they will create
in a democracy.
Additional useful links:
Podobnik
sociology study
Case
study with additional information
Orenco
Station website
Michael Mehaffy is president of Structura Naturalis Inc., a
Portland, Ore. based urban design and consulting firm. For five
years he has served as PacTrust's project manager for Orenco Station,
and he now serves as a project manager and consultant for mixed-use
projects on the Oregon coast and elsewhere.
Campaign of Sabotage - How government policies have inadvertently
sabotaged public transit.
By Michael Lewyn
Transit users are second-class citizens in most American cities
and suburbs. For example, the Boston metropolitan area has a subway
system serving its urban core and a commuter train system serving
its suburbs - yet even in metropolitan Boston, just 32% of entry-level
employers are within one-quarter mile of a transit stop.1 And the
situation is even worse in smaller cities, many of which have no
bus service after rush hour.2
Why do American communities have so little transit service? Pundits
and politicians justify the status quo on the grounds that, in the
words of Tom DeLay, public transit "has failed in this country
. . . despite a taxpayers' investment of over $100 billion."3
The story told by transit critics is a simple one: government spends
money on public transit, yet most Americans don't use it. Thus,
public transit is a waste of money.
But this story overlooks an important fact: far from encouraging
Americans to use buses and trains, government at all levels has
inadvertently sabotaged public transit by:
- Funding the competition. Until the 1960s, the federal government
spent billions of dollars on highway building,4
but did not support trains and streetcars (which were generally
run by private companies until competition from government highways
made them into money-losers).5 And
today, the federal governments spends more than four times as
much money on highways as on transit (over $30 billion per year
for highways, about $7 billion for transit).6
New and widened roads often go to suburbs without significant
transit service, and thereby open up those areas for development.7
Thus, highway spending shifts people and jobs to areas without
public transit, thus gutting transit ridership.
- Unfunded mandates. The federal government has effectively reduced
transit service by loading down transit agencies with unfunded
mandates. For example, the Americans with Disabilities Act (which
requires transit systems to provide accessible service to the
disabled) costs transit providers $1.4 billion per year,8 and
Section 13-c of the Federal Transit Act (which limits transit
systems' ability to reduce labor costs by laying off employees)9
costs transit providers $2-3 billion per year.10 Thus, about half
of federal transit subsidies are canceled out by the costs of
federal regulation.
- Paying Americans to move to auto-dependent suburbs. Since 1934,
the Federal Housing Administration (FHA) has insured home mortgages.
For the first few decades of its existence, FHA insured mortgages
only in "low-risk areas" (usually defined as newer,
whiter areas, i.e., suburbs), thus making suburban homes cheaper
than urban homes.11 Because suburbs usually have less transit
service than cities, FHA policies reduced transit ridership.
- Packing poverty into cities. New Deal-era public housing legislation
encouraged cities to build public housing for the poor, but gave
suburbs veto power over public housing,12 and in fact discouraged
suburbs from building public housing by mandating that one unit
of substandard housing be eliminated for each unit of public housing
built13 (thus ensuring that suburbs with little substandard housing
could not build public housing). By packing public housing for
the poor into cities, federal law packed poor people into cities.
Because middle-class people tend to avoid the poor and problems
associated with poverty (such as crime), federal public housing
law encouraged middle-class flight to suburbia, which in turn
reduced transit ridership as families moved from transit-packed
cities to auto-dominated suburbs.
- Using school systems to drive commuters into suburbia. Most
states mandate that students be assigned to schools based on their
home address – which means urban children go to urban schools
and suburban children go to suburban schools.14 Because cities
tend to have more poverty than suburbs, city schools tend to have
more children who are from low-income backgrounds (and thus harder
to educate) than suburban schools. Thus, state laws effectively
mandate that cities have worse schools than suburbs, thus encouraging
middle-class flight from cities, thus reducing transit ridership.
- Using zoning laws to make suburbs as auto-oriented as possible.
Many American municipalities have enacted minimum lot size laws
to reduce population density; for example, the average Atlanta-area
acre contains no more than a home or two.15 Public transit is
less feasible in low-density areas: as residences are spread farther
apart, fewer commuters can walk convenient distances to bus and
train stops. Thus, zoning in its current form reduces transit
ridership.
In sum, a wide variety of government policies have had the effect
of sabotaging, rather than promoting, public transit. Nevertheless,
transit ridership has actually been growing since 1995 - and if
government ever reduces its anti-transit activism, this trend might
continue.
Footnotes
1. Conservation Law Foundation, City Routes, City Rights 20 (1998).
See also Michael Lewyn, Thou Shalt Put No Stumbling Blocks Before
The Blind, 52 Hastings Law Journal 1037, 1041-43 (2001) (citing
similar statistics for other cities and metropolitan areas).
2. Id. at 1042-43. See also David G. Oedel, The Legacy of Jim Crow
in Macon, Georgia, in Just Transportation 97 (Robert D. Bullard
and Glenn S. Johnson, eds. 1997).
3. 137 Cong. Record H8199-02 (1991), available at 1991 WL 213667.
4. Lewyn, supra at 1045-47 (discussing history of federal highway
spending in more detail).
5. Paul Weyrich & William S. Lind, Conservatives and Mass Transit:
Is It Time For A New Look? 10 (1996).
6. See Budget Plans to Shape TEA-21 Renewal, Transfer, March 14,
2003, available online at http://www.transact.org/transfer/trans03/03_14.asp#3
(noting current budget baseline of $31.6 billion for highways, $7.2
billion for transit).
7. See Lewyn, supra at 1048-51 (making argument in more detail,
and in particular citing National Association of Home Builders survey
showing that 55% of home buyer would move to a newer area if highway
access improved); Sierra Club v. US DOT, 962 F. Supp. 1037, 1043
(N.D. Ill. 1997) ("Highways create demand for travel and [suburban]
expansion by their very existence").
8. Testimony of the American Public Transportation Association,
Subcommittee on Surface Transportation of the House Committee on
Transportation and Infrastructure, Sept. 26, 1996, 1996 WL 10831544.
See also Brian Doherty, Disabilities Act: Source of Unreasonable
Accommodations, San Diego Union-Tribune, July 16, 1995 at G1 (ADA's
paratransit provisions alone cost transit agencies $1.1 billion
per year). Because these figures are several years old, they may
underestimate the ADA's costs.
9. Editorial, Untied, Houston Chronicle, June 29, 1995 at 36, available
at 1995 WL 5912413 (statute mandates that transit agencies pay six
years' wages and benefits to employees affected by layoffs).
10. John-Walters, Bus-Jacking the Revolution, Policy Review, Jan/Feb.
1996 at 8.
11. Kenneth Jackson, Crabgrass Frontier 207 (1985).
12. Id. at 224.
13. Michael H. Schill & Susan Wachter, The Spatial Bias of
Federal Housing Law and Policy, 143 U. Pennsylvania Law Review 1285,
1293 (1995).
14. Lewyn, supra at 1058.
15. Arthur C. Nelson, Exclusionary Practices and Urban Sprawl in
Metropolitan Atlanta, 17 Ga. St. U. L. Rev. 1087 (2001) (discussing
exclusionary zoning in Atlanta, and noting that as a result average
lot size in metro Atlanta over 3/4 of acre).
Michael Lewyn is a native Atlantan and teaches at John Marshall
Law School in Atlanta, Georgia.
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