Comments by "Nunya Bidness" (@nunyabidness3075) on "How does Houston plan without zoning?" video.

  1. Overall a good video, but very misleading for a few reasons. 1. Houston does almost nothing to enforce deed restrictions. The only regular activity they do is to force HOA sign off before issuing a permit. If there is not an active HOA, the owner can almost always move ahead with no problem. There are many deed restricted communities with no active HOA. My friend built his store in one despite the restrictions. The city/county/state treated him as if he wasn’t violating any deed restrictions. They harassed him all sorts of stupid, bureaucratic ways, but ignored the covenants on file. 2. HOA’s vary greatly in what they allow. Only members have input. Changes are VERY, VERY hard to make. Many HOAs have almost no actual power to enforce restrictions or even collect dues. They have no license for violence. Almost all these HOAs have for leverage is the ability to stop the permitting process and collect liens at closings. That’s it. 3. Lack of a zoning ordnance means the owner, and thus the market, decides most land use. Zoning commissions can, and do, make even bigger mistakes than the market. They steal millions from land owners all the time. They are often corrupt. They favor developers unless and until citizens organize, and then mob tyranny takes over. If you are not trying to build a sky scraper or dangerous industrial site in Houston, you are pretty good to go. If you are doing something really obnoxious, you will need lawyers, but otherwise, you are fine. Good neighbors have only to fear bad neighbors, not the government. 4. Housing prices are affected by zoning, or lack of it. What’s different about Austin versus other Texas cities is that only they ever really tried to control growth of their city using land use restrictions. It’s a danger putting all your government types in one city along with your biggest university, they think they can run things even though they are the two types of people least able to run anything without creating more problems than they solve.
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  2.  @subwooferbone  The bike network and density is growing. Soon, everything from Timbergrove and Oak Forest will connect along White Oak Bayou to the Heights, down into Montrose and the museum district then through the Med center and out Braes Bayou. This is all connected to Downtown and then goes east towards the colleges on that side of town and into various neighborhoods. We don’t have to change all of Houston, we only need to satisfy demand for people to find the kind of places they want here. That’s a Houston thing. There’s enough push back here to stop buckos from making everyone live the way they want to live. Theres PLENTY of evidence that people forced into density they don’t like causes problems.
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