I asked this question on Twitter recently, and it sparked a very good conversation.

Addison Del Mastro @ad_mastro

Urbanists/housing folks: Is there any such thing as "over-development"?

October 21st 2021

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What is your first thought? Would you answer yes or no? What sort of mental image or definition would you have of the term “overdevelopment”? Think about that a minute, and leave a comment.

Now, given the predominating viewpoint and audience here, you might assume that “overdevelopment” is a NIMBY talking point and not really a real issue. Unless you’re talking Manhattan, or Hong Kong, levels of development maybe—which for the vast majority of places is not on the table in anybody’s plans or imaginations.

I had expected most folks to answer this way. But maybe two-thirds of the answers instead argued that yes, there is such a thing as overdevelopment, and a lot of places in America are overdeveloped. More on that below.

But first, here are a few of interesting answers I received:

We had city council candidates last year who ran on “Stop Overdevelopment.” When we asked them to describe that without using any adjectives, they couldn't do it. It wound up being like pornography—they would know it when they saw it.

Yes but it’s a contextual limit, not an absolute one. I like the Strong Towns heuristic: 1. No neighborhood can be exempt from change. 2. No neighborhood should experience sudden radical change.

Green space matters, for public health, mental health, and environmental reasons. Parks are a necessity, not a luxury.

Sprawlish exurban and suburban development where it makes little sense to walk and the site has a ton of impervious surface in addition to the buildings (parking lots, swimming pools, etc.).

That last one segues into the majority of answers I received: Overdevelopment isn’t a byword for density or tall buildings, but rather should properly denote overbuilt infrastructure or land, relative to people. In other words, suburban sprawl is overdevelopment!

To some this might seem too cute, but honestly, there is a lot of insight in this. Strong Towns makes the same point when they talk about infrastructure per person: American suburbia is extremely infrastructure-intense per person, and it uses a lot of land at relatively low productivities.

Of all the arguments made against low-density sprawl, this is one of the most interesting and one of the least discussed. It totally flips our density discourse on its head. People do not equal overdevelopment; too much stuff and and land per person does. That in turn would suggest that the corresponding underdeveloped places are those existing urban environments which are no longer able to add density or grow. (See yesterday’s post for a window into how those places have changed.)

Have you heard this framing before? Is it something you’ve ever thought about? Leave a comment or send an email!

Related Reading:

What is Zoning?

Night Walking

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