[jakelazaroff]

Of course it is — unproductive land use creates negative externalities that affect the entire surrounding community. It's like saying "a factory dumping waste into a river doesn't pollute the commons if the river runs through their property".

The article explains this well:

> The office, filled with workers and transactions, generates far more in economic activity and value creation than its land value and, therefore, rises the highest. The apartment, where dozens of residents live, stands nearly as high. The rowhomes add steady, smaller value. But the parking lot does something different. It dips below the surface, shown as a red bar sinking into the ground.

> Why below ground? Because in economic terms, a parking lot doesn’t simply fail to add value; it actively subtracts value. Every year it sits idle, it consumes some of the most valuable land in the city.

> When valuable downtown land lies idle, it blocks the housing, jobs, and amenities that could exist there. The costs ripple outward: higher rents, longer commutes, fewer opportunities nearby. What could have been a productive part of the community instead becomes a hole in its fabric.

[jjav]

> generates far more in economic activity

The LVT focus on profit above all else is why it is an unsatisfactory solution.

If the most important goal for every plot of land is to maximize its economic activity & tax revenue, that's going to be a miserable place to live.

All of the space uses that make a town nice to live in, are also underutilizing the land if the sole goal is to maximize economic activity.

Open space with native vegetation, parks, playgrounds, sports fields of all kinds like soccer fields, community pools, hiking trails.. all of that is wasted land if viewed through the lens of LVT maximization. All that space should be crammed full of high rise offices and apartments.

[Based-A]

LVTs focus is on maximizing land value, not profit. It just so happens that when a landowner maximizes the value a piece of their land provides, higher profits are almost guaranteed.

It's also a bit of a mistake to view LVT solely through an economic lense. Sure, we quantify it through a dollar amount or a difference in profits, but the value in LVT comes from how individuals value the land as a whole. So you are absolutely correct that a place without native vegetation, parks, playgrounds, etc. is going to be valued less than a place with those amenities by a lot of people. But only if people value greenspace and amenities more than pure economic output, which is mostly the case when it comes to residential spaces.

If people value greenspace, than the land around said greenspace will have a higher value. LVT would then incentivize those land owners to maximize their value, which would obviously include not destroying or removing the greenspace. Instead of would (likely) be to densify housing, or convert existing buildings to mixed-use spaces.

[lotsofpulp]

> Open space with native vegetation, parks, playgrounds, sports fields of all kinds like soccer fields, community pools, hiking trails.. all of that is wasted land if viewed through the lens of LVT maximization.

No, because all of that would be open to the community. The waste is only if it was locked up for use by certain people.

[refurb]

> Of course it is — unproductive land use creates negative externalities that affect the entire surrounding community.

By definition “commons” means public land. So if they buy the land, it’s no longer commons.

And the claim that unproductive land use affects the commons is not a very informative statement.

Everything affects the commons, it’s inevitable of a world with more than 1 persons.

[cucumber3732842]

>Of course it is — unproductive land use creates negative externalities that affect the entire surrounding community. It's like saying "a factory dumping waste into a river doesn't pollute the commons if the river runs through their property".

Pretty damn rich to say such a thing when exactly this sort of hand wringing that brought this whole crap about.

"oh no, think about how the commons will be polluted if we don't compel people to build parking space". -some karen in 1970, probably

The right thing go do is back off the regulation. Let land owners do what they please. If that's a parking space (it almost certainly won't be in the overwhelming majority of cases) so be it. And then when there's enough demand parking garages will go up.

[shiroiuma]

>The right thing go do is back off the regulation. Let land owners do what they please. If that's a parking space (it almost certainly won't be in the overwhelming majority of cases) so be it.

This is exactly how it is here in Tokyo. People are free to build parking lots (or parking garages even) if they want. But they don't, except in rare cases, because it's far more profitable to build an apartment building or shop or some other building there. Though for apartments, they'll usually build a small parking lot (or garage for a big apartment building) and charge very high rent for residents who want to park their car there, which is a small minority of residents.

[jakelazaroff]

I mean, yeah, that's exactly what I'm saying? End mandatory parking minimums, institute a land value tax and then let the market decide whether parking is truly a valuable use of space.

[pclmulqdq]

The river dumping analogy is so bad it's laughable. Obviously you don't own the entire river when the river merely runs through your property nor do you own the ocean or the watershed, and property values surrounding yours go down by a measurable amount when you dump things in the river. What negative externalities does a parking lot create that an empty lot does not? Minimal noise from people pulling in and out? Extra walking time between lots that are built up? Some pollution from the cars? These are normal externalities from literally any building that might be there as well. You can see how this is a different class than a polluted river, and is literally immeasurable.

With regards to the argument presented in the article, it's arguable that parking lots create value by making places accessible to more people. As such, a parking lot raises the property values and economic output of neighboring properties. I didn't see anything about that covered in the article, nor did I see any actual data. This is why chambers of commerce and the like support parking mandates, because they actually have positive externalities, not negative ones.

[ericmay]

> With regards to the argument presented in the article, it's arguable that parking lots create value by making places accessible to more people.

I think it's arguable, but I think it's not the full picture. Let's look at downtown Columbus, Ohio where I live. With the parking lots that exist, there's less housing, which means that people move further away from where they work, creating traffic, creating highway construction costs, insurance, &c. I'm quite sure that creating a parking lot makes the location of my employer (well not mine literally) more valuable, but it does seem like it creates more costs. If those lots were, say, because it's a downtown location a 10-story building with 300 residents those people would be shopping downtown, going to restaurants and bars downtown, spending more time there, &c.

There are cases where a parking lot does create economic value, though I think those are more nuanced and limited. I'm not sure your point nor the one you were responding to, nor mine for that matter, are able to really calculate the economic costs of surface parking lots without taking into account factors like, well where the hell is the thing?

> As such, a parking lot raises the property values and economic output of neighboring properties.

Cherry-picking this comment. I'd add to what I wrote above, but I'd also add that I'm not sure that there is evidence to support this statement and if you take this to its quasi-logical extreme you wind up with your entire neighborhood just being one gigantic skyscraper with a Costco and doctors office inside surrounded by parking lots or something. And then the increased profit flows to Costco's shareholders which is fine, but for your local economy that's kind of bad versus having a variety of stores that can open and close. It's putting your eggs in one basket, so to speak.

[cucumber3732842]

>The river dumping analogy is so bad it's laughable.

The frame of mind that brings such comparisons about is anything but funny in a world where all our votes count the same.