Saturday, February 26, 2005

Urban sprawl. . . . . .

Well, it looks like people who are either (probably) smarter than I, or (certainly) work harder than I do on their blog, have come up with something I've long suspected. The Portland urban growth limits are not as wonderful as all the local mandarins would like us to think.

Take a look at Amy Ridenour's blog which argues that the effect of limiting sprawl with the growth limit is to drive up home prices. Who'da thunk it? If you reduce the supply of something, the demand will drive prices up. I can't imagine who might benefit from such a thing. Can you?

Oh, nevermind. It's probably all about sprawl, 'cause if we didn't have wise laws like the urban growth limit, why in no time all of Los Angeles would move here and clog the place up. Three and a half million people in a little confined area like Oregon is already claustraphobic. So, the only solution is to pack us all closer together.

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