Smart Growth, WA State Growth Management Act, Urban Growth Boundaries

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Smart Growth, WA State Growth Management Act,
Urban Growth Boundaries

• UDP 450
• Oct 16, 2007

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10 Principles of SG

• 1) mixed land uses
• 2) take advantage of compact building design
• 3) create housing opportunities and choices
• 4) create walkable communities
• 5) foster distinctive, attractive communities
  with a strong sense of place
• 6) preserve open space, farmland, natural beauty
  and critical environmental areas

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10 Principles of SG (cont)

• 7) strengthen and direct development towards
  existing communities
• 8) provide a variety of transportation choices
• 9) make development decisions predictable, fair
  and cost-effective
• 10) encourage community and stakeholder
  collaboration in development decisions

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SG Bottom-up approach

• Smart Growth (SG) approach began as a bottom-up
  measure based on market incentives (partnerships,
  education, priority funding), and became a
  nation-wide movement
• GMA is a top-down, command and control approach.
  It depends on locality, or state.

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SG vs GMA
a tool box approach Localities can pick and choose Comp plans mandate
Plain English Planning Terminology Legalistic Language
community building compact, community needs, clean air, water, benefits for all income groups. Same as SG
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SG vs GMA
Energy Health and safety Livable Communities Regional and state coordination
Urban growth area Reduce sprawl Property rights Permits citizen participation and coordination
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SG elements vs. GMA goals WA

• 1) Housing
• 2) Transportation and Land Use
• 3) Natural resources
• 4) Energy
• 5) Health and safety
• 6) Historic preservation
• 7) Infrastructure
• 8) Salmon-friendly land uses
• 9) Economic vitality
• 10) Livable communities
• 11) Regional and state coordination
• 12) Open space and greenbelts

• How do Washingtons SG elements differ from GMA
  goals?

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14 Goals of GMA Planning Goals (RCW 36.70A.020)

• 1. Encourage urban development in urban areas
• 2. Reduce sprawl, reduce low-density development
• 3. Encourage multimodal transportation systems
• 4. Encourage affordable housing
• 5. Encourage economic development
• 6. Provide just compensation for private property
• 7. Process permit applications timely and fairly

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14 Goals of GMA Planning Goals (RCW 36.70A.020)

• 8. Maintain and enhance natural resource-based
  industries
• 9. Encourage the retention of open space
  development of recreational opportunities
• 10. Protect the environment and enhance the
  states quality of life
• 11. Encourage citizen participation in planning
  process
• 12. Encourage the availability of public
  facilities services
• 13. Identify and encourage historic preservation
• 14. Shoreline management act

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Urban Growth Boundaries (UGBs)
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Urban Growth Boundaries (UGBs)

• Draws lines/areas around the city to promote
  development inside the boundary
• Most rigid form of growth management
• 1. Limits long-term urban land consumption
  (20 years)
• 2. Politically difficult to change the boundary

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UGBs (cont.)

• Blue Line (elevation 5,750 ft) the earliest
  form of GM in Boulder
• created Greenbelt in 1992 via land acquisition
  (from sales tax revenues)
• Hawaii
• stringent state regulations about zoning urban,
  rural, conservation and agricultural districts

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Merits of UGB

• Sets a limit to continuous sprawl
• Promotes densification and in-fill development
• Facilitates mixed-use projects
• May help to promote more transit use

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Merits of UGB

• Influences consumer choice
• Facilitates some higher density development
  (higher density is a relative term by
  international standards)
• Fosters variety of housing types

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Merits of UGB (cont.)

• Changes Developers Attitudes
• Cannot go anywhere else within a metropolitan
  region, if all cities have similar restrictions
• More effective with Statewide GM rather than
  city-by-city cases (e.g. CA), where developers
  can find pro-growth communities

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Drawbacks of UGB

• Leapfrog development beyond the boundary, adding
  to commuting times
• UGBs alone do not address the issue of adequate
  public facility provision (heavy traffic, school
  overcrowding, overloaded public services, etc)
  within the boundary

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Drawbacks of UGB (cont.)

• Inequity among property rights holders inside and
  out
• Knaap argues that UGBs can never constrain
  development because of the 20-year land
  requirement

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BOUNDARY TYPES

• Types
• UGB (Urban Growth Boundary) Oregon (1973/1979)
• UGA (Urban Growth Area) Washington (1990)
• Urban District Hawaii
• 3 Districts Urban/agricultural/conservation
• Greenbelt Boulder, CO (1992)
• Land acquisition via sales tax increase
• cf. London , since 1947 Seoul, Korea, since
  1971)

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• Washington State

• Puget Sound Region

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• London

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• Seoul, Korea

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UGBs vs. GREENBELTS

• Greenbelts preserve huge land areas against
  development GBs are more conducive to leapfrog
  development
• UGB is more likely to result in densification in
  the U.S. because in Seoul and London densities
  are already very high
• Greenbelts have been less flexible in terms of
  boundary changes (Korean changed in 2002 after
  31 years of adoption)

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Critique of UGB

• UGBs may bring undesirably draconian outcomes
  because they are not directly linked to the
  underlying market failures responsible for
  sprawl.
• Brueckner, Jan, Urban Sprawl Diagnosis and
  Remedies, p. 14, Urbana, IL Institute for
  Government and Public Affairs

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Defenders of UGB

• UGB is one of the most effective growth
  management technique
• a clean break between potentially inconsistent
  urban and rural land uses, thereby protecting
  rural land from urban spillovers while also
  providing important environmental and economic
  benefits to urban development.
• quoted by Knaap, p. 3 in Nelson and Duncan,
  Growth Management Principles and Practices.
  Chicago, IL APA Press, p.147

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Defenders of UGB (cont)

• Farm and forest land protection outside UGB
• Knapp, Gerrit J. and Arthur C. Nelson (1992),
  The Regulated Landscape, Cambridge, MA Lincoln
  Institute of Land Policy.

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UGB and Land Prices

• GB designation reduced land values
• land within the GB 26 percent less than in the
  excepted areas
• Nelson, Arthur (1988), An Empirical Note on
  How Regional Urban Containment Policy Influences
  an Interaction Between Greenbelt and Exurban Land
  Markets, Journal of the American Planning
  Association, Spring 178-84.

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UGB and Housing Prices

• UGBs effects on housing prices are not
  statistically significant (although they could be
  as high as 15-21K)
• Phillips, Justin and Eban Goodstein (1998),
  Growth Management and Housing Prices the Case
  of Portland, OR, unpublished draft, Portland,
  OR Lewis and Clark College, Forthcoming,
  Contemporary Economics Policy) -

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UGB and Housing Prices

• Thus, they conclude, Portlands relatively large
  price increases over the last decade reflect a
  conventional housing market dynamica
  speculative bull market riding on the back of an
  initial demand surge. (Knaap, 2000, p.10)

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Inventory Approaches

• Knaap and Hopkins suggested new approach to deal
  with housing/land prices with UGB via an
  inventory approach
• Release an appropriate amount of land gradually
  depending upon market conditions
• Knaap Hopkins (2001) The Inventory Approach to
  Urban Growth Boundaries, Journal of the
  American Planning Association, 67(3), p.314-26.