The Nonlinear Library: LessWrong LW - End Single Family Zoning by Overturning Euclid V Ambler by Maxwell Tabarrok
Jul 27, 2024
11:38
Link to original article
Welcome to The Nonlinear Library, where we use Text-to-Speech software to convert the best writing from the Rationalist and EA communities into audio. This is: End Single Family Zoning by Overturning Euclid V Ambler, published by Maxwell Tabarrok on July 27, 2024 on LessWrong.
On 75 percent or more of the residential land in most major American cities
it is illegal to build anything other than a detached single-family home.
95.8 percent of total residential land area in California is zoned as single-family-only, which is 30 percent of all land in the state. Restrictive zoning regulations such as these probably lower GDP per capita in the US by
8
36%. That's potentially tens of thousands of dollars per person.
Map of land use in San Jose, California. Pink is single family only (94%)
The legal authority behind all of these zoning rules derives from a 1926 Supreme Court decision in
Village of Euclid v. Ambler Realty Co. Ambler realty held 68 acres of land in the town of Euclid, Ohio. The town, wanting to avoid influence, immigration, and industry from nearby Cleveland, passed a restrictive zoning ordinance which prevented Ambler realty from building anything but single family homes on much of their land, though they weren't attempting to build anything at the time of the case.
Ambler realty and their lawyer (
a prominent Georgist!) argued that since this zoning ordinance severely restricted the possible uses for their property and its value, forcing the ordinance upon them without compensation was unconstitutional.
The constitutionality claims in this case are about the 14th and 5th amendment. The
5th amendment to the United States Constitution states, among other things, that "private property [shall not] be taken for public use, without just compensation." The part of the 14th amendment relevant to this case just applies the 5th to state and local governments.
There are two lines of argument in the case. First is whether the restrictions imposed by Euclid's zoning ordinance constitute "taking" private property at all. If they are taking, then the 5th amendment would apply, e.g when the govt takes land via eminent domain, they need to compensate property owners. However, even government interventions that do take don't always have to offer compensation.
If the government, say, requires you to have an external staircase for fire egress, they don't have to compensate you because it protects "health, safety, and welfare" which is a "
police powers" carveout from the takings clause of the 5th amendment. The other line of argument in the case is that zoning ordinances, while they do take from property owners, do not require compensation because they are part of this police power.
Police Power
Let's start with that second question: whether zoning laws count as protecting health and safety through the police power or are takings that require compensation. A common rhetorical technique is to reach for the most extreme case of zoning: a coal powered steel foundry wants to open up right next to the pre-school, for example.
Conceding that this hypothetical is a legitimate use of the police power does not decide the case, however, because Euclid's zoning ordinance goes much further than separating noxious industry from schoolyards.
The entire area of the village is divided by the ordinance into six classes of use districts, U-1 to U-6; three classes of height districts, H-1 to H-3, and four classes of area districts, A-1 to A-4.
U-1 is restricted to single family dwellings, public parks, water towers and reservoirs, suburban and interurban electric railway passenger stations and rights of way, and farming, noncommercial greenhouse nurseries and truck gardening;
U-2 is extended to include two-family dwellings;
U-3 is further extended to include apartment houses, hotels, churches, schools, public libraries, museums, private clubs, community center buildings, hospitals, sanitariums, public playgrounds and recreation buildings, and a city ha...
Welcome to The Nonlinear Library, where we use Text-to-Speech software to convert the best writing from the Rationalist and EA communities into audio. This is: End Single Family Zoning by Overturning Euclid V Ambler, published by Maxwell Tabarrok on July 27, 2024 on LessWrong.
On 75 percent or more of the residential land in most major American cities
it is illegal to build anything other than a detached single-family home.
95.8 percent of total residential land area in California is zoned as single-family-only, which is 30 percent of all land in the state. Restrictive zoning regulations such as these probably lower GDP per capita in the US by
8
36%. That's potentially tens of thousands of dollars per person.
Map of land use in San Jose, California. Pink is single family only (94%)
The legal authority behind all of these zoning rules derives from a 1926 Supreme Court decision in
Village of Euclid v. Ambler Realty Co. Ambler realty held 68 acres of land in the town of Euclid, Ohio. The town, wanting to avoid influence, immigration, and industry from nearby Cleveland, passed a restrictive zoning ordinance which prevented Ambler realty from building anything but single family homes on much of their land, though they weren't attempting to build anything at the time of the case.
Ambler realty and their lawyer (
a prominent Georgist!) argued that since this zoning ordinance severely restricted the possible uses for their property and its value, forcing the ordinance upon them without compensation was unconstitutional.
The constitutionality claims in this case are about the 14th and 5th amendment. The
5th amendment to the United States Constitution states, among other things, that "private property [shall not] be taken for public use, without just compensation." The part of the 14th amendment relevant to this case just applies the 5th to state and local governments.
There are two lines of argument in the case. First is whether the restrictions imposed by Euclid's zoning ordinance constitute "taking" private property at all. If they are taking, then the 5th amendment would apply, e.g when the govt takes land via eminent domain, they need to compensate property owners. However, even government interventions that do take don't always have to offer compensation.
If the government, say, requires you to have an external staircase for fire egress, they don't have to compensate you because it protects "health, safety, and welfare" which is a "
police powers" carveout from the takings clause of the 5th amendment. The other line of argument in the case is that zoning ordinances, while they do take from property owners, do not require compensation because they are part of this police power.
Police Power
Let's start with that second question: whether zoning laws count as protecting health and safety through the police power or are takings that require compensation. A common rhetorical technique is to reach for the most extreme case of zoning: a coal powered steel foundry wants to open up right next to the pre-school, for example.
Conceding that this hypothetical is a legitimate use of the police power does not decide the case, however, because Euclid's zoning ordinance goes much further than separating noxious industry from schoolyards.
The entire area of the village is divided by the ordinance into six classes of use districts, U-1 to U-6; three classes of height districts, H-1 to H-3, and four classes of area districts, A-1 to A-4.
U-1 is restricted to single family dwellings, public parks, water towers and reservoirs, suburban and interurban electric railway passenger stations and rights of way, and farming, noncommercial greenhouse nurseries and truck gardening;
U-2 is extended to include two-family dwellings;
U-3 is further extended to include apartment houses, hotels, churches, schools, public libraries, museums, private clubs, community center buildings, hospitals, sanitariums, public playgrounds and recreation buildings, and a city ha...