He says so here.
His basic argument is that all it would take is high-speed intercity transport and revitalized downtowns to do this job. I am skeptical.
I should begin by saying I like the Midwest a lot--I grew up in a small city in Western Wisconsin, and spent most of my professional life in Madison. I have always rather liked cities like Cleveland, Milwaukee, St. Louis, and Duluth. I think Pittsburgh is absolutely lovely (you read that right) and is a terrific university town.
But these places (along with Detroit, Buffalo, Syracuse, etc.) have a history of concentrated manufacturing employment, which in turn created labor markets where workers had few incentives to become well eductated (for the classic article on this, see Benjamin Chinitz, Contrasts in Agglomeration: Pittsburgh and New York, AER (1961). All these places are, moreover, cold. Two of the most important predictors of population growth since World War II have been education levels of the population, and climate.
Cities in the Midwest with higher educational attainment levels, such as Minneapolis, Chicago and Columbus, have done better. I doubt downtown condos and high speed rail will turn Scranton into Floreance.
Let's do triage. There was an article in the L.A. Times talking about how the "grand" plan for downtown didn't work out.
ReplyDeletePeople just don't want to pay $600,000 for closets, drive 20 miles to the supermarket, be locked into a concrete and steel prison during the day, and have to look at all those "unkempt homeless people." (some put the number of homeless downtown now at 15,000)
A rigged contest took place to plan the area around city hall, but that seemed to have hit the skids.
Our sprawling megalopolis seems to reflect 10,000 planners in search of a concensus. Help!
What will you be doing in California when you come? Anything planning related?
Fannie and Freddie, owing to their market power, could require loan originators to collect a long checklist of information and documentation about borrowers: everyone who obtains a conforming, conventional, prime mortgage fills out the same forms.
ReplyDelete-----------------------
Dinesh
Florida Drug Treatment
David lindahl anti scam report but as a fact, we failed to review the truth; in order to delay the progress of this great man several competitors made a false report.
ReplyDeleteEven so, he had a great fall, he never let his clients down and still his name is one of the most unforgettable ones in the real estate field.
Real estate portfolio is a means to an end which has to be kept in mind while framing every decision. Right from the start, it is better to identify a point in time where the returns you achieve will allow you to make the changes you want.