The list of practical and moral objections to zoning is endless, yet its proponents have managed to make it happen...Why?  Houston is the most vibrant and desirable of the large cities in the U.S.  It has a lower cost of living, fewer ethnic problems, greater opportunities and less government... and so far, no zoning.

Would Greenway Plaza exist if there had been zoning...No.  Do the people who sold their homes for 10 times their residential value regret their decision?... no.  In fact, every subdivision in the Greenway Plaza area was standing in line to be next.  In a zoned Houston, such change might have happened gradually, but only with an enormously inflated cost, lots of jobs for Architects and Lawyers, and a lot less payback to the constituents.

Without zoning, Houston has been able to respond like no other major city to the economic needs of its citizens.  Houston has made dramatic land-use changes possible when they are economically [and socially] appropriate.  The city has been responsive to and responsible for its needs without the cumbersome inefficiency, cost,  and indecision of bureaucratic review.

A city is the product of its inhabitants’ best and worst influences much like a child is created and influenced by his or her parents.  Like all parents, we must eventually realize that our creation must exist without our guidance.  No matter how much we sentimentalize the issues, a city, like a child, is a product of its time and place.  To survive, a city must be dynamic and have the opportunity to change or even exceed its heritage. 

What right do we have to superimpose our present standards on the future?  How can we be so arrogant and so sure that the future won’t be as good as or better than the present?  The greatest legacy we can leave our children and our cities is an environment that offers them the possibility and the opportunity to grow and expand.

Life is a dynamic process, not a static event.  Likewise, a city has a momentum of its own, drawing on its diverse aggregate of inhabitants, each with his or her own priorities, time tables and accountabilities.  We must remember that it is impossible to predict with a certainty the direction or scope of a city’s growth from one day to the next.

Zoning is expensive, ineffective, and repressive.  It is a capricious game played by power brokers of all persuasions, most of whom are distant and inaccessible to all but the insiders and their cronies.  There is little or no voter control over the decisions made by the politically appointed, even though their decisions are supposedly, executed in the name of the voter’s welfare.

Zoning frequently amounts to little more than an elaborate method of archiving every minute land-use decision so that the focus of the planning commission becomes more involved in fixing present mistakes than preventing future mistakes.  Zoning gives us a patchwork quilt of out-of-context decisions [variances] based on one particular viewpoint rather than the dynamics of a city’s growth.  Rather than providing a platform for rational growth, zoning provides a stumbling block.

The irony is that much of the order that zoning purports to protect couldn’t happen under the rules and restrictions of zoning.  Many cities’ most treasured landmarks simply wouldn’t exist, and any equivalent in the future will face an immensely expensive and very painful birth.  Sixth Street in Austin, Deep Ellum in Dallas, the warehouse district in San Francisco, SOHO and Greenwich Village in New York all prized for their diversity could not have been legislated into existence but in fact would have been stifled.  Now, however, they are protected by zoning as static environments like exhibits in a museum.  Zoning prohibits the very elements that fostered the development of such landmark areas in the first place... individuality, creativity, and change.

Houston became one of the most desirable cities in which to live and work without zoning, but all of a sudden, based on vague and un-provable contentions that have actually failed in other cities; we seem to be on the verge of abandoning the most successful formula in the country.

Houston already has in place a reasonable and highly effective voluntary mechanism for protecting residential [and commercial] neighborhoods-deed restrictions.  These are initiated by the affected people, not by politicians.  Deed restrictions can do far more to maintain the character of a neighborhood than zoning ever could: they are immediate, voluntary, democratic, nonpolitical, and cheap.  In addition, enforcement of deed restrictions can be facilitated without the city’s participation and without the bureaucratic nightmare of the planning commission.  Why would anyone settle for less?

While the rest of the world unravels the layers of repressive big brother government, we who should know better add them back.  Ironically, the opportunities for growth and improvement in the quality of life are more accessible to more levels of the population than they have ever been.  Zoning is government by conformity and fear, not possibility and enrichment.

Even though I am an Architect, Planner, and builder, I want no part of dictating the land-use patterns and, consequently, the economic affairs of a whole city.  I truly love and respect the diversity of culture, motive and ability that is possible in the growth of a healthy city.  If I ever wanted protection from an activity that I found repugnant, I would live in an area with deed restrictions and/or fences and guard dogs which provided me with the necessary protection.... but I would never consider imprisoning anyone else with my values.  It hurts me deeply to see Houston even consider zoning as an apparent solution to anything.
 

The most significant consequence of Metro’s current focus on rail systems is to implicitly initiate regional Zoning.

In conjunction with the HGAC and their Regional Transportation Plan, a plan that is increasingly focused on “Livable Centers”, and Metro’s fixation on fixed rail modalities with their explicit need to have stations positioned at permanent locations, Metro is determining future land use, de-facto Zoning. 
This approach by Metro is in direct contrast to legitimate “Transportation Planning”, that is, or should be, responsive to existing demands and legitimate projections [including probability factors] of changing needs into the future as well as consideration of alternative and constantly changing modalities and land uses. 

Existing movement corridors with existing modalities are self governing, until and even when development exceeds the capacities of the native modalities. 
1. Those modalities can become overwhelmed at which point they must be improved or development and land uses will relocate. 
2. When infrastructure demanding modalities are superimposed over existing development patterns the development patterns and land uses are forced to change in response. 
The difference is that under the first condition the changes are generally gradual and self determined whereas under the second condition the changes are sudden, arbitrary, and externally driven, implicit zoning. 

The impact of Metro’s only existing rail line on the midtown area is a dramatic example of the second condition:

3 blocks from the lavish Metro tower, the midtown the wasteland begins with 5 or more complete blocks of vacant land on the West side of Main street and vacant or abandoned buildings and additional vacant land on the East side.  This stretch of the rail line is broken up into increments of 6 or more blocks with only 4 cross street connections, very limited Main Street vehicular access, two stations 8 or 9 blocks apart, and a total of only 3 paved pedestrian paths across the median for the total length of the segment from the Pierce elevated to Richmond.  This means that a pedestrian wishing to cross Main Street may have to walk 3 or 4 blocks simply to cross the street.   This was Houston’s “Main Street” and it has been reduced to an empty “mall” occupied by only small portion of the possible “tenants” found normal city center areas. 

The current midtown area boom in redevelopment activity has been anticipated for the last 30 years and is now in “full swing”, except for Main Street, which is in decline.  This decline can be directly attributed to the Metro Rail line.  In addition this corridor is probably destined to not recover because of the extreme limitations of the design of the rail right of way and lack of cross connectivity.  This is land use restriction, by another name, land use Zoning [negative zoning].

The balance between “control” and support is a delicate one especially when the considered modalities require significant infrastructures [right of ways, utilities, and user transfer facilities].  In contrast, modalities that are “independent” of dedicated right of ways can respond to present and future conditions with very little if any negative impact on existing land uses, or at least do so over a significant transition period.

It is probable that the future growth of a region will require a change in strategy for a specific destination to destination pattern.  Nearby town to major commercial center commutes when the existing modality patterns reach functional capacity, traffic patterns to expanding special use centers [zoo, museum, medical center], and transfers between modalities.  These situations may require consideration of either expansions or modifications to the existing modalities. 

At our current point in Urban and Regional transportation planning the process becomes more complex because it must, by definition, deal with: 

1. past, present, and possible future modalities
2. historical issues of technological development
3. Past, present and future anticipated urban growth patterns along the corridors.
4. social and political acceptance issues and differences
5. densities of existing and anticipated uses
6. And the old evil, “Assumptions”. 
7. The choice to enhance existing modalities or to consider alternatives.

The critical responsibility for legitimate transportation planning is to respond to existing and preferred independent development and growth patterns and not to use transportation to attempt to control or to accidentally control those patterns. [Reference the midtown example].

It is also critical that there be transparency in the planning process and engagement of the corridor activities in the process, maintaining a “respond to” mission as opposed to “control” or “I’m the boss” approach.

Lastly it must include a process for periodic reassessment to review of the consequences of earlier choices to include opportunities for change in priority or strategy, including major change.

The most difficult part of any planning activity is that: Certainty only exists in hindsight, or in the certainty of future uncertainty.

Let’s hope Houston can rise to the need with honesty and integrity.