Are NIMBYs Selfish? 

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This almost feels like a perfect part 3 of the NJB/Climate Town collab since Climate Town ended his video telling people they should try going to local zoning meetings but that you're likely to encounter NIMBYs there :D

Thanks for making this video. As someone who interacts with NIMBYs almost daily, it’s refreshing to better understand the other side’s “why”, even if I disagree with it. Ps - would love to see a future video on SB-9 implementation in California (see: Woodside CA)

I live in the San Francisco Bay Area, and I don't think I'd ever want to own land here. NIMBYs here aren't just against single-family housing; they seem to be against any sort of development, and I can't understand the point in owning property if you're not allowed to do something with it.

Thanks for making this video from this perspective. It really helps to understand the people you’re opposing, rather than just acting like they’re dumb or evil.

It’s all about putting the needs of the existing community ahead of those who want to move in

I feel like a lot of cities and suburbs around the country are starting to have this same problem. I live in Detroit area and I’m hoping the city of Detroit will do some serious reforming to their zoning codes. I think by getting rid some of single family housing codes would really help the city. Plus there’s a lot of buildings and run down houses that could be demolished for high rise condos. But that just my wishful thinking. 😖

you may say this later in the video but I theorize that NIMBYS can really worsen gentrification, because luxury apartments and stuff can't get built in nicer areas with the power and MONEY to run successful NIMBYS, which not only increases housing prices but makes developers (and planners) more likely to put them in places with less money and power to resist. I'm not an expert it's just something I was thinking while watching

You can't increase density without an infrastructure to support it, and I think that drives a lot of the resistance. If traffic is already terrible or flooding is already a problem, adding more people and more concrete hardly seems helpful.

Using housing as a form of wealth accumulation is a terrible practice. Housing is highly illiquid. So you can't sell it and turn it into cash when you need cash. the U.S. federal government should stop offering mortgage interest deductions and subsidized and federally guaranteed mortgages so that people won't have an incentive to put so much of their wealthy into housing. So that they will instead invest in more liquid assets like stocks and bonds. So that when Americans actually need to turn their assets into cash, they will actually be able to do so.

TLDR; yes and you should use NIMBY as a slur

I've watched all your videos. I'm not a city planner, but these videos are super fascinating. I have learned so much from your channel! I used to think NIMBYism and single unit housing zoning were good things.

This is a great summary, as usual! One of the big problems with places like SF is that strict zoning has been in place for so many decades that a few multiplexes or duplexes isn't going to solve the problem. So when developers finally do get a development plan in place, it's for a huge condo building or the large-end of a midrise. This provides an even bigger target for NIMBYs. If these neighbourhoods had been able to "gently" densify over the decades, by adding some duplexes, multiplexes, town homes, and small apartment buildings, the problem would be much less acute. Though I guess those early plans for "gentle" density were squashed by the NIMYBs of the past, so it's NIMBYs all the way down. Some people have told me that they've had _some_ success by appealing to the housing crisis that will affect the NIMBY's own children or grandchildren. If you can convince them that the problem may affect their own family, then you can sometimes make some progress. From a systemic angle though, housing fundamentally needs to stop being an investment vehicle. This at least dampens the financial incentive. There's some positive movement in that direction in the Netherlands where new housing in some cities _must_ be registered as the primary residence for the purchaser and cannot be rented or left vacant. It's got a purchase price cap and there are some unfortunate loopholes, but it's at least a step in the right direction.

living right across the bay in Oakland, it’s absolutely disgusting how opposed people are to fixing a problem they won’t shut up about.

NIMBYs: We are NOT selfish! We just want to perpetuate a severe housing crisis that's driving an entire generation into poverty in order to raise our own property values!

My dad mentioned a district community meeting where some NIMBY's serious argument against new apartments were "They will throw hot dogs at us". I have no idea what life she lived to get that idea.

Had a lovely exchange with a nimby out front of the Sac zoo trying to get people to sign a petition to repeal the bill that just passed removing single family home zoning. When I told her we need density to resolve the housing crisis she said “no we need affordability” and when I told her we get affordability with density she just said “no”. Just "no".

Are NIMBYs selfish? Literally everyone: "Yes. "

As someone living in CA, this really shows what CA politics are: People vote for measures and laws that are good for the environment, housing, transit etc (example Measure M in LA County). But when reality sets in as to how to exactly implement them, they are opposed to it. Example: a new train line in LA. We desperately need more transit, but NIMBYS are slowing it down with bullshit arguments. NIMBYs also show how individualistic Americans can be. We must all realize that we live together in a society, and what we do can affect others. But alas, they don't. "Land of the free" I guess....👀

6:05 The biggest NIMBY hypocrisy is that they don't protest high density office towers. The concerns of traffic and parking go out the window despite the fact that office towers tend to be even denser and funnels in tons of traffic from nearby areas because there isn't enough residential units nearby. It's absolutely about inducing demand for the few residential units. I do not think they see themselves as defenders. That's the public face they put on. They absolutely know what they're doing. The concerns for property values are the only truthful thing that leaks out form their mask.

I’m so pleased by the recent wave of videos from the urban planning RU-vid community discussing low density zoning and NIMBYism. City Beautiful, Not Just Bikes, and Climate Town all published stellar videos this week. We really need to have these discussions now. Washington state is currently trying to push through its own inclusive zoning bill and I really hope we succeed!

Imagine if local businesses always got together to try and block any new businesses from being able to open near them or in the same city. This is basically what nimbys are doing to everyone else who wants to build new housing in this same city as them

The problem with NIMBY's is that their backyards aren't as big as the area they want to patrol. No one is putting a high rise on your property, but they want to whine the instant they can see anything they don't want on the horizon. Sorry Karen, but you can't choose to evict your neighbors because they have window plants that you think the colors clash. These people are too greedy to be calling them "not in *my* backyard." They're more, "Don't let me ever see anything that isn't my perfect little fantasy where I get all the benefits all to myself and no downsides" or DLMESATIMPLFWIGATBATMANDs, if you will. Hmm, still long winded, perhaps greedy and controling prick is a better term?

I'm glad you came here to San Francisco. It looks like you had a lot of fun with your drone. I'm surprised there was no mention of BART, the local train system, and how limited it is due to certain parts of the Bay Area rejecting it because basically for not wanting the company of people who can't afford cars. Of course, I believe you've mentioned this in previous videos, but it definitely applies to this one as well.

In San Antonio, NIMBYs are currently halting the progress of the city at large. As the nations 7th largest city, SA lacks the infrastructure and development seen in larger cities, and it has had an immense effect on our economy. Projects here either never get off the ground or are sluggish in nature. For example: the first office high rise to be built since the 1980s was completed in 2019, and the first residential high rise to ever be built in the city has faced delay after delay. Necessary projects like housing are just abandoned altogether due to backlash from communities. What we are trying to build here isn’t opulence, but rather the bare-minimum the city needs in order to survive and thrive.

As a life long NorCalian who just moved back to the Bay from Sacramento I cannot express HOW MUCH NIMBYism boils my blood. I cannot afford to live alone as much as I want to anywhere in my home region. My parents are part of the problem. They moved across the country last year to get more "backyard" and they just straight up admitted to all the horrible things that they don't like. I have given up I'm moving to Europe next year. I love the restored victorian I live in but I want to live in a single person unit with my cat instead of dealing with annoying housemates nonstop. it's absolutely insane that working full time + overtime I cannot afford my own place. I had better income to payment ratio at 19 than I do now at 36. Ridiculous.

The expectation that your house is your primary investment has a lot of downsides. It means that people view high housing prices as good instead of bad, since their retirement depends on it.

You can't protest for affordable housing and be against high density housing in your backyard. I see this all the time

I think one of the key things you fail to mention in the NIMBY debate in California is that it is exacerbated by Prop 13. Current property owners are shielded from the primary downside to increasing property values: increasing property taxes. It means that they can block development, increase scarcity, and continue to increase their wealth through increased property values while paying an ever-decreasing share of taxes. The structure of the law subsidizes their outsized impact on the housing market.

"High density housing can be defined as anything more than single family homes." In extreme cases, it even includes single family homes on slightly smaller lots.

I think it would be good to consider the role our public education funding plays in this as well. I live in Cambodia, but have lived in Japan, Korea and spent a lot of time in various parts of Europe where funding mechanisms are entirely different (and more equitable). I was talking yesterday with a Filipino colleague about the issue of property tax-based education funding, and she mentioned that this was something she never understood when talking to family members in the US. The way the USA funds schools greatly distorts property values in positive and negative reinforcement loops. How many GenX’ers out there remember the parents talking about the quality of schools in an area when making home-buying decisions? Higher property values = more funding to schools = (usually) better and better resourced schools = higher demand for the area = higher property values = and so on. If we changed the way we funded public education to guarantee equal resources, this would help over time to moderate the huge disparities in both school quality and resources, as well as inflated property values. It's not going to fix everything, but I think it should be considered as part of the equation.

Before I watch: yes

Our neighborhood has two cul-de-sacs dedicated to duplexes and townhomes. The neighbors there are great, its great that we can have a bit of density, and downtown is walkable for more people (about 1 mile on the bike path). If Bondurant Iowa can do it anywhere can

This is largely a generational conflict. Old long-time homeowners are happy to see the value of their property go up. They don't think the high cost of housing is a problem, especially in California where Proposition 13 prevents property taxes from rising more than 2% per year regardless of how much the property has gone up in value. They bought their houses decades ago when they were cheap, pay little in property taxes, and now oppose the construction of new housing which would provide young people with an affordable place to live. I have been involved in planning issues in San Mateo, where I live. I notice that the vast majority of people who participate in public city planning meetings are older white homeowners. Many are retired and have plenty of free time to attend these meetings. Younger people and renters are too busy with their jobs and families to participate. The biggest conflict in California is not between Republicans and Democrats. It is between NIMBYs and YIMBYs.

I do think that *historic preservation* is important, especially in the USA and Canada, where it seems very common to have destroyed any buildings older than about half a century. A lot of pre-1930s buildings and neighbourhoods are very walkable. Many have already been destroyed in North America. Here in the Netherlands, we still build in old neighbourhoods, but it is much more restrictive and usually only to replace things that were built after WW2. But even in more modern neighbourhoods, like the one I live from 1969, we only replace the worst buildings, and focus on high density, walkable living spaces.

In the city I live in, transitional/affordable housing has been repeatedly shot down by NIMBYs, and in the last year, some of them are realizing they've shot themselves in the foot : The homeless population here has been rising steadily in the downtown core... which is a 10 minute walk away from one of the wealthiest neighbourhoods in the city. And now they're in a huff about their garbage bags being cut open, discarded needles on the sidewalks, panhandlers in the parking lot of their local shopping plaza, and public greenspaces being used for shooting up. There's two pedestrian routes connecting downtown and the rich neighbourhood, which the city won't let them block because they know that the homeless and plebs alike would just walk through the properties of the businesses instead to get into the neighbourhood. I've stopped sympathizing; the NIMBYs are the ones who've chosen their fate.

To the question in the title, not automatically, but in modern times, overwhelmingly yes. Especially when it amounts to "only in the backyard of those without the political power or money to fight it."

Speaking of the Bay Area, the city of Woodside just declared itself a “Mountain Lion Habitat” so that it can oppose any new affordable housing development. Sad but true.

The most unbelievable part of Star Trek is that Starfleet Academy could be built in and around San Francisco. Humankind will discover warp technology and faster-than-light travel before the NIMBYs of San Francisco are defeated.

When you're rich, equality is a threat. That's why NIMBYs are opposed to policies reducing inequality.

Maybe basic necessities like housing shouldn't be left up to the free market 🤔

I'm suprised that the "YIMBY" movement wasn't talked about. YIMBY = Yes In My Back Yard.

It never occurred to me to think of NIMBYs as anything other than sociopaths.

Outstanding video. Does well to explain all perspectives without being super fiery like a lot of new urbanism channels are lol

NIMBY means not in my backyard. But no one is building anything in your backyard, they are building on land you do not own.

Every NIMBY ever in Metro Vancouver: "I am not against affordable housing, I just don't want it in my neighbourhood". Also, thank you for stating that new housing construction almost never brings property values down. In Metro Vancouver, it can actually increase them. Once a street starts to densify, the value of every property goes up as its development potential increases.

Before watching the video: I live in Houston, homelessness and lack of affordable housing coupled with awful wages is a problem. I'm on nextdoor and it's just a shame fest on homeless people and unhoused people. Yes, there will be drug use and violence, but thats a mental health and physical health crisis, they can't afford help. Yes, they stink and don't look good. They don't have access to cleaning supplies, food, and regular showers or a safe place to sleep and rest. Yes, its annoying to be asked for money. So I donate, I vote, and I work in social services. It's not a fix, but one person can't fix a systemic problem. But they're homeless, Karen, they CAN'T go somewhere else and be better, YOU just don't wanna look at them. I've been rude to them too, but mostly because they harass and bother young women who are traveling alone. I'm not gonna be nice, dude, when you run up to me at night at the bus stop. Imma be loud and rude because that's how I stay alive. I make 31 a year before taxes. My rent is 1025 a month for a split home with terrible wiring, broken stairs, and a rude landlord near downtown (not like I can afford to be downtown) and the single family homes near me have no yard, terrible parking, and yet cost in the upper 300s. I take the bus 45 minutes to work. I've been a squatter, I've been evicted, I've slept in winter coats. I get it. A lot of people don't and the NIMBYs are the main ones. And gentrifiers are the worst. They'll tear down and infest OTHER neighborhoods, but NEVER their own... it's classist, racist, and just awful for us millennials/gen zers who's family doesn't have generational wealth to buy and sell and renovate. After watching the video: My opinion stands. NIMBYs as an overwhelming white, middle class, and powerful group target minorities while claiming to be the victims of "big government". Gross and yawn. They demonize the poor, brown, and foreign while talking about whitewashed history.

My town is a twin borough in England called Blackburn with Darwen, traditionally house/rent prices have been similar across the borough but over the last few years there has been a shift. Darwen prices are now 150% more for rents and about 30% more for comparable housing. Reason is the council announced two different plans one in Blackburn and the Darwen East Project, the Blackburn project went off without a hitch and in the region of 4000 new homes have been created. Whereas in Darwen there have been numerous complaints, delays and additional assessments after 'green space' challenges, so only one site has been completed out of six with the site that was completed being by far the smallest at 80 new homes. The frustrating part is some of the same people sharing the petitions around on Facebook are the same one going on the town noticeboards complaining about house prices.

There are 2 big issues with NIMBYs I see in my neck of the woods. 1) There are so many levels of density between single family home and 15 story high rise, but NIMBYs tend to be universally opposed to ANY affordable development (where I live, there is opposition to single family detached townhome developments). Cities all across the world have granny flats, duplexes, 4 story midrise in mixed use developments, etc. If it could be built and people could see that it poses little issue, things would probably mellow out a bit. But since it is mostly illegal to build those in most of the US, and NIMBYs seem opposed to any density, getting them built as things currently stand is a tall hill to climb. It would take a pretty substantial reimagining of the entire residential landscape in metro areas throughout the US. 2) I dislike the NIMBY position overall, but something that I do have to agree with them on is transportation. NYC is pretty bad at investing in infrastructure in the outer boroughs. The city requires density to make infrastructure improvements, but then lag on actually implementing them when a development is built. If there is a pattern of that happening, I can't blame people for not wanting new development. I do blame them for being obsessed with providing parking for every single housing development no matter how small, how decently the neighborhood is connected to transit, and how many people in the neighborhood actually drive. From experience, some NIMBY's literally can't conceive of people not getting around by car, which makes any planned development need to include a bunch of parking, increasing the impact to the neighborhood and increasing costs.

Wow! You missed the big one. ADVERSITY TO CHANGE. People hate change, particularly in their communities. They want things to be as they’ve always been (or some fantasy version of that in their minds). Plus (sarcasm alert) you know that high density will bring “those people”.

I think the state of California needs to take away local control when it comes to housing and zoning.

One thing I would note re: home values in the United States is that because of our lack of safety nets and services, for anyone who isn't extremely rich, an owned home is your safety net. Get cancer and need to pay huge amounts of money for treatment? You have your equity. Lose your job? Equity. That's one reason why the 2008 crash was such a disaster in this country. This isn't a reason to oppose building for many reasons, including that good development doesn't reduce properties values, but I think it is worth understanding one reason why in the US a potential loss of value it so terrifying. One other thing that I think could overcome nimbism is, weirdly, stronger design restrictions. For far too long, cities have let developers build ugly multi-family, when if the developers just spend a few more dollars you would have something that fits within the neighborhood character. For example, in Mid-town Sacramento and Oak Park, you really have two classes of multifamily. You have older multifamly built prior to WWII that, in many cases, looks just as good, if not better than many of the single family houses while holding significantly more people. Honestly, some of my favorite buildings in midtown are these kind of craftsman style apartment buildings that actually just kind of look like mansions but are MFH*. Then you have the post-WWII apartments that tended to be built cheap and ugly. This continues with 5 over 1s with weird material choices. There are clear exceptions to this -- there have been a fair number of decent looking buildings built as well -- but generally, you know the NIMBYs see the ugly buildings and expect that. I think you'd see less opposition to re-zoning if you put design constraints, even as you take minimize size limits like setbacks and height restrictions. *And these were not subdivided SFH homes. That's also super common and one of the best ways that our old victorian mansions got preserved. By dividing old mansions, they were able to make these buildings, which require pretty extreme maintenance, pencil out and prevented them from being torn down to build something more reasonable. I think midtown Sacramento would have far fewer of these buildings if the city in the 30-80s said "nah, that needs to stay SFH for the character of the neighborhood." You'd have seen more buildings torn down, and smaller, uglier houses built. So, in some ways, removing zoning restrictions could help preserve the character of neighborhoods.

My favorite NIMBY story is when my son was attending university. One of his professors who taught an environmental science track class, and was a vocal environmentalist, was fighting against the installation of wind turbines on the local ridge line. His reason? Well he had just built his dream home and ranch complex and the turbines were going to “RUIN” his view. Classic NIMBY.

Nimbys have usually made a substantial investment in their properties, so they want to protect it. Furthermore, the tax system in the US subsidizes home ownership. I was once active in a well-know NJ environmental organization. Most of the volunteer activists were suburban Nimbys. They wanted our organization to fight development in their neighborhoods. God forbid that somebody wants to put up a convenience store in Cracker Barrel Corner. And no gas pipelines or power lines either! I lived in Jersey City, a dense area, for a few years. The gentrifiers complain about the limited street parking and the traffic for their SUVs. Tell them to use Jersey City's splendid new light rail and the answer is "Huh?"

I think most of us are nimby's at least to some extent. No one likes it when your own comfort is threatened. The problem is when people can't see the greater good and don't budge on anything at all. THAT is selfish. I do think that governments, planners and developers could do better at empathising with residents though. What is needed is sensible development proposals, loosening of restrictions without removing ALL restrictions and respect for the character of the local area. If new developments aren't ridiculously tall and fit in nicely with the local architecture, they are much more likely to be accepted. And if you upgrade the transport infrastructure at the same time, it should help to get people on side.

every time i drive on the George washington bridge and sit in traffic for an hour, i curse the NIMBYs who prevented the Rooseelt Bridge from being built. so few people made traffic miserable for millions of people

Great insight into this issue. Would be great to hear places where change is working (and where it’s not).

I'm yet to see a couple blocks of density failing to raise the property value of single homes within short walking distance of it within a decade. Density brings services, and services bring further value. Except in cases where active segregation plays a part, of course, but those can go to hell, which should be warm and cozy year round.

IMO people who work service jobs in NIMBY areas should make them live with their decisions and transfer to another store, leaving the jobs unable to be staffed. If you don't want any affordable housing in your neighborhood for service workers than you don't need any services that they provide.

I’m a nimby in my area because they keep putting in expensive apartment buildings in my low income area and my property taxes have doubled since I moved in.

In the Bay Area, the Calmod project, bringing European quality regional rail to the Bay Area and preparing the San Francisco Peninsula for high speed rail, was almost block because of Tech NIMBYS

Ok but why is it so hard to just build building that are architecturally similar to other buildings instead of a concrete high rise

This video is fantastic. Thanks for everything you do.

I own a single family home in a larger city. I’m in a neighborhood full of homes 100+ years old, mine included. My first bachelors is in history and they’re attempting to implement our neighborhood as a protected historic district, clearly in an attempt to prevent development in parts of our neighborhood that are clearly no longer historic… We purchased our home not even a year ago and it’s already gone up $150,000 and these people who have undoubtedly seen a 500% rise in their home value since they purchased them wont shut up about preserving their home value. It’s so damn selfish. I like where I am but I remember where I used to be and how hard it was to get out of and I truly can’t stand tue selfishness of these people.

I've been wanting to show up at local meetings to try an make a difference, but I personally don't have much of a stomach for conflict and am legitimately terrified that I would just end up loosing my composure over all of the fallacious and self-serving reasoning that NIMBY's employ. I really admire anyone who goes to these meetings and is able to politely and gracefully make the case for why we need to correct these strict zoning laws and hopefully I can find the courage myself to do the same.

Nimbys: Not in my backyard! Basic economics: Fine, but now your city is going to become too expensive for you to live in, so your backyard won’t be your backyard for much longer! Nimbys: ....

I really care about preservation of old buildings, but I think that communities shouldn't be allowed to regulate based on units per land area. I don't mind communities imposing height restrictions or maximum parking restrictions, to prevent towering apartment blocks and tons of parked cars, or enforcing some amount of style restrictions, if a neighborhood has a consistent architectural style, but there are so many great 2, 4, or even more unit houses that just look like a normal large house. Also, let people build mixed use, every community should have a corner shop, and every corner shop should have an apartment on top.

Good job and thank you. As a three-term planning commissioner in a Bay Area city I'm thankful that you are pulling the cover off of general NIMBYism. You accurately call it selfish. I've often considered it a case of the Haves against the Have Nots. With the Haves saying, "I've got mine now you go somewhere else and get yours." (Even if your job is here and your employer pays taxes here, for my benefit.) And I'm so tired of hearing people complain about "Traffic". I have, during a public meeting, asked these people, "When you're sitting in your car, complaining about the traffic, do you consider yourself part of the problem, or is it just everyone else around you?" The thing NIMBY's don't understand is, that development in your neighborhood can actually improve it. My neighborhood has been under constant construction for the 20 years I've lived here. We have nearly doubled the amount of housing. In my opinion, traffic is only marginally increased. But we have a larger, better park and a more vibrant, people (and dog) filled community. This neighborhood is much better than is was 20 years ago.

Homes should never have been made an investment vehicle, and the same is true with any other basic human need. Imagine if we turned food into an investment. I'm sure it would be successful and the owners of food would make a huge amount of money, but the effect on society would be as terrible as the effect has been on housing

I live in San Francisco, and I also hate nimby. But cause I don’t own land, my opinion means nothing.

The issue with the arguments to protect neighborhoods from gentrification is that nothing can protect a neighborhood from gentrification. All attempts at it are futile and restricting housing supply only speeds it up since wealthy residents come in and just buy the existing housing stock. Rent control also doesn't work against this because it just further restricts the market. Really what we need to do is abolish the regulations, only preserve individual historic buildings instead of entire districts, and make it so that if a new building follows the rules, they have the unconditional right to build without citizens being able to step in and oppose it. If you meet zoning regulations, you shouldn't have to still ask the city to approve your project.

This video talks about NIMBYs, but only focuses on urban areas where more housing *should* be built. Rural areas that should be returned to wilderness suffer from awfully zoned sprawling development. And conveniently, you allow that gentrification is bad for "marginalized" groups. Nevermind that change is a constant and affects many groups. Development and gentrification can change the character negatively in rural areas in favor of sprawl. That doesn't make those evil "non-marginalized" people bad nimbys for effectively wanting the same thing as their urban counterparts. Quite the double standard you hold.

Lots of good points. A compromise I would like to see possible is higher density but they are all owner occupied. When people have an investment in the neighborhood they treat it better. I lived in a mobile home park that was all owner occupied and it was a very nice place. Before that I lived in a part of Los Angeles where all the townhomes were rentals for several blocks. This area was a dump. Lack of parking because people rented out rooms, dog poop all over the small greenspaces because people didn't care, graffitti, and general disarray like poorly maintained buildings and broken sidewalks because the landlords didn't care and the renters didn't take the initiative or bother with the fight to get better sidewalks, or have the landlord fix things. I wish their was a way to force owner occupation. Sure it does take away one financial ladder of being able to rent it out as you move up, but because of space limitations most places in big cities are already rentals and have been for generations. Many children and grandchildren of previous owners who live in other states still hold on to rentals and don't have a care or an interest in pride of ownership.

Appreciate the thoughtful video and trying to empathize with a group whose ideas you don’t align with. High density housing can potentially make single family dwellings nearby even more valuable through scarcity not in the overall number of dwellings, but in the overall proportion of single family dwellings available per capita.

It’s entirely selfish. People should be allowed to do whatever they want with their property as long as it doesn’t have a significant impact on the physical function of a neighbors property. There should be no zoning boards or input on property. It either meets the simple rules and gets automat approval for not impacting neighboring land, or it doesn’t. Japan does this well.

Another way NIMBYs want to have their cake and eat it too: They want to do the historic preservation of Jane Jacobs and the racism of Robert Moses.

The urban areas of cities should de-annex the suburban parts and let the residents find ways to provide their own services/infrastructure maintenance. Let them keep their backyards, but force them to actually pay for it.

Anti gentrification advocates also impede a lot of housing development, especially in the Bay Area, and voice support against high density housing developments that aren’t below market rate.

The irony is this is exactly why hiring ANYONE to work at any company there is so obscenely expensive. It's VERY hard to trick people to work for companies there for anything other than obscenely high salaries.

The one point I don't see discussed enough is the inherent classism under-girding the logic of NIMBYism. NIMBY folks I have spoken with, or read writings of, seem to think - as pointed out in the video - more housing density in their neighborhood will 1) allow for people with less money (undesirables) to live there, resulting in 2) a reduction to both their property value and imagined social class points. Maybe they can sprinkle some econbabble on top, but that is the argument laid bare. I often see this being couched in issues over parking or traffic, but those can and must be seen and dealt with as orthogonal transportation issues. Self-perceived privacy and safety also come up, which again begs the question of "why are the potential new people living there some how worse than the current people?". If you talk to people raising issues with higher density development you can clearly see what they're worried about is possible interactions with people they perceive as lower-class or "changing the character of the neighborhood" to someone that doesn't look like them. In private conversation vocal NIMBY people don't deny it. They often won't even refer to "renters" as their neighbors!

How about passing a bill that requires developers to construct their buildings in the character of the neighbourhood? That'll solve at least 50% of the NIMBY arguments and one that I actually agree with.

I have very little patience for NIMBY's. They seem to have this, "I've got mine, screw you!" attitude. They like their wealthy and beautiful enclaves just the way they are thank you very much. Heaven forbid that people who can't afford million dollar homes would move in there! It's just pure selfishness. And what kills me is that they will agree that we need to build affordable housing---but just not in their neighborhood. Put it somewhere else! Can't have the peasants living near them by golly! We have no sense of "we" in this country. It's all me, me, me.

City Beautiful, you should really try to start a movement to encourage people to cycle, get out of cars, and reduce euclidien zoning! We will stand with you!

why don't historical districts just allow higher density but require historical architecture?

The "high property values" argument always strikes me as absolutely fucking insane. The only reasons you would want your house (in reality: your land, since buildings generally depreciate over time) to increase in value are if you wanted to sell it or put it down as collateral on a loan. What on earth do people accomplish by "keeping property values up" and then continuing to live there? Oh, right. They want *other* properties nearby to be expensive to prevent poor people from living there.

As for power plants . 1st question should be why are powerplant and or utility in general large . Utility should be a given to every domicile and every domicile should be a mini powerplant . BUT NO GOVERNMENT REGULATIONS make so only huge corporation for profit so government can tax's them and the individual.

You're so upbeat and optimistic! I commend you. I'd be really struggling to speak so positively about this topic; makes me so mad. In my city of Melbourne, Australia, we're planning a huge outer rail loop, connecting the spokes of our existing rail system. The stabling yard is proposed to be build on landfill, but the public opposition is immense.

Get rid of zoning laws, and housing regulations generally.

“Are NIMBYs selfi..” YES

I think my nana would be a nimby. She complained that a fast food truck at the corner of her street would decrease her houses property value. A fast food truck!

In Vancouver I think everyone (not even by choice) is becoming NIMBY, because the amount of unreasonable high density buildings being built. It's frustrating because none of it is affordable, It is all 15 stories plus and being built by private investors while single family homes are about 500K above the national average, nobody I know from high school can afford more than an old single or shared apartment or they just left the city. I guess you could say I'm NIMBY but I really want high density houses, just units that are 5 stories but it's just getting worse. All around the city apartments from the 70s that are 4 or 5 stories are being torn down and replaced with 10+ if not 20 or 30 story ivory towers. lately it seems like a lot of us Vancouverites are really angry at the greed of the city not being considerate of people working service jobs who could never afford these stupid glass boxes with rooftop gardens and such. Unfortunately there are people who can afford them moving in often from outside the country leaving residents who are 3rd or 4th generation to need to move out.

Great content. Translates to what I see with our situation here in Sydney Australia perfectly too. "Traffic" "overshadowing" "preserve local character" "power to the locals" "greedy developers"... guess NIMBYs are the same wherever you go. They blame developers as "selfish" every day, without realising they're the exact same themselves.

No wonder why everyone is moving out from California

Are NYMBYs selfish? The short answer is Yes. The long answer is YEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEES.

As someone who just spent a semester living in SF and seeing the situation there, it's so hard to feel any sympathy for people who live there year round and still want to protect single-family zoning. Many areas have minimal access to Muni without a 30 minute+ Walk, and alot of these streets with homes on both sides are so narrow when cars are parked on both curbs that I had to clench my teeth and my buttcheeks just to drop some friends off. The only major development that I know if is Stonestown around SF State which I think will provide a lot of nice housing and create solid community, but it'll be such a small development compared to the needs of the city right now that it too will be dragged into $3k+ a month rent which is very sad to see.

The 2009 film Up has done a lot to reinforce the NIMBY mindset.

Perhaps locals don’t want their city replaced with generic contemporary developer designed buildings. If developers designed under historic architectural styles NIMBYs would better embrace these high density buildings.

Its time for the states to come in and massively simplify zoning codes, shrink lot size requirements to something like 20x50. there should be maybe 10 types of allowed zoning. (mixed here refers to residential, commercial and light industrial) limited uses, ex marshes parks/plazas local gov buildings transit (yes I'm allow places to carve out space for future transit projects. what an idea) low density mixed upto 7 medium density mixed 8-20 high density mixed 21 stories+ industrial and commercial heavy industrial

I would take no zoning laws like here in the Philippines rather US-style zoning. We can almost go to any place for only about an hour, more or less either by car, bike, or public transport. NIMBYs and their areas are basically shunned here and their lands and homes depreciate in value fast.

It doesn't help that you have movies like UP! that promotes the NIMBY position whereas where's the movies that promote higher density housing as a good thing? I'm not talking about the "coffins" in Hong Kong but sustainable higher density neighborhoods