Brandon Donnelly — Daily insights for city builders. Published since 2013 by Toronto-based real estate developer Brandon Donnelly. — Page 1360

Urbanist  Aaron Renn recently published an interesting article in City Journal called “ Libertarians of Convenience ”. It talks about how today’s urban progressives are selectively favoring deregulation for the things that only matter to them – everything from urban housing to food trucks.

Here’s a snippet:

But it’s hard to avoid thinking, too, that some of the inconsistency reflects elite biases. The things that liberal-minded city residents like and want to do—eat from hip food trucks, smoke dope, and other “bourgeois bohemian” pursuits—should be left as free as possible, consequences be damned (raw-milk advocates downplay the nearly 1,000 cases of illnesses caused by it from 2007 through 2012). Those that they consider déclassé—Big Gulps, Marlboro Lights, McDonalds—should be restricted or even shut down. It’s regulation for thee but not for me.

I like his angle, because we’re probably all – at least a little – guilty of subjectively wanting more of the things we like and less of the things we don’t like.

What do you think of his argument ?

Today I came across the following tweet by Brad Tabke. (Brad is the mayor of Shakopee, Minnesota .)

@clmarohn ’s version of hell from the top of the Memphis pyramid. pic.twitter.com/XLd5hlNY1I

— Brad Tabke, Mayor (@MayorTabke) May 7, 2015

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On the left of the image is downtown Memphis. On the right is the Mississippi River. And in the middle is, well, a bunch of elevated highways. 

It’s a powerful image regardless of where you happen to be from. But if you’re from Toronto, you might know why I’m posting it today.

This morning I was reading a CityLab article talking about a homeowner in London’s wealthy Kensington neighborhood who painted her house in red stripes after the city and her neighbors derailed her renovation plans. I’m thinking it is supposed to be symbolic of government “red tape.”

She had hoped to add a two-floor “mega-basement” to her home, which is curiously enough a thing in London due to how restrictive traditional home expansions can be. Locally they are called “ iceberg homes .”

What’s interesting about this phenomenon is that it shows you how far people will go to find and/or create the space they want in the neighborhoods they want to live in. Kensington is an incredibly wealthy area and so one has to assume that she is not without other housing options.

As another example, here’s how the article describes her house:

The candy-striped home in question, for example, is actually a mews house, a kind of outbuilding running along an alley behind a great house, originally intended as a place to tidy horses, carriages and maids away from the main residence.

So not only did she want to create an “iceberg home”, but she wanted to do so in what was previously a back alley. In Toronto, this home would be called a laneway house .

What this tells me is that as real estate values rise, people will naturally start to seek out overlooked spaces to repurpose. They will look for some way to carve out a home. And it’s for that reason that I think laneway housing is an inevitable outcome here in Toronto .