An article and an op-ed piece clash in today's NYT: NY, is chided for becoming a "city that never walks" while Portland goes airborned (re: gondola) with mass transit. The latter is the $57 million Portland Aerial Tram, which plugs along at 22 mph from the Willamette River up to the campus of the Oregon Health and Science University. The opinion piece, written by Robert Sullivan, takes NYC to task for going after aggressive...cyclers and calls the great city a victim of its own success with families who have moved back into the City and brought their suburban way of life in tow (perhaps an SUV). It says that New Yorkers always find an excuse NOT to ride public transportation. The solution is introduced in the form of getting the cars out of the city and expanding public open spaces. It then cites a number of U.S. cities - Denver included - that have light rail and asks why NYC can't add light rail to 42nd Street. It also brings back the ghost of Robert Moses, who built huge real estate projects and sliced through existing neighborhoods with highways and byways like the Cross Bronx Expressway. An architecture article in last week's NYT casts a more sympathetic glance at Moses with 20/20 hindsight. The article ends by looking at the broader sweep of 20th century America
The subtitle of Mr. Caro’s book is “Robert Moses and the Fall of New York.” But ultimately, the exhibitions’ organizers say, they felt it was important to judge Moses’ impact on New York in the context of what happened across the nation during his tenure, like middle-class flight from cities and the construction of highways that spurred the rise of suburbs.Like many icons from our history, Moses had to break a few eggs to make an omelette, and his impact - good or bad - on one of the world's greatest city's is not in question.
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On 1.25.07, the WSJ posted an interactive survey of 28 major metro housing markets. Here's how Denver fared:
- MLS listings down 4% at year end 2006 from a year earlier (the 27 other metro areas were up!)
- Recent price trending lower from the previous month [Banc of America Securities]
- An "average" employment outlook [job growth projections from Moody's Economy.com for 2 years ending 12.31.08]
- 3.1% of loan payments are overdue [US average of 2.51% based on data from Equifax and Moody's Economy.com]
- The entry pictures a three-bed, three bath home in northeast Denver that has been listed since Jan. 4 and is priced at $254,900.
The Journal embeds this survey in a story entitled "Housing Glut Gives Buyers Upper Hand" and points out that buyer traffic appears to be picking up as homebuilders dangle incentives and as interest rates remain historically low.
On the same day (page A2), a story appeared reporting that 2006 saw the largest annual decline in national sales of existing homes since 1989. The latest annually adjusted figure, according to NAR, is 6.22 million homes. Still, the 2006 total was the third highest since NAR began tracking existing home sales in 1968, and prices went up slightly at the national level. In the month of December, the West registered the largest regional decline, off 15.5% in a year-over-year comparison. The article cites differing opinions from economists on whether we have seen the worst or not. The CEO of D.R. Horton thinks we'll reach the bottom in mid-2007 but will not see a vigorous recovery thereafter.
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The Housing Bubble blogger cites the RMN article on Commonwealth Heights at RidgeGate, followed by an article from Billings, Mont. Whether it's south suburban Denver or downtown Billings, these projects are precedent-setting, at least to some extent, and have to convince enough consumers to buy into to the urban mystique. After all, pay $400,000 to live in dowtown Billings? Many still aren't buying it, and many of these new ideas will just have to sink or swim.
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