Researcher(s):
Jesse Simpson
ENVS course(s): 499 Initiated: September 2016 Completed: December 2016 Go to project site
|
Framing Question: To what extent does planning infill development reinforce inequity?
Focus Question: How was the Residential Infill Project in Portland shaped by different stakeholders?
Portland’s ongoing Residential Infill Project (RIP) illustrates important dynamics within the contemporary housing regime. Over the last year and a half, “missing middle” housing—small-scale multi-unit or clustered housing—has rapidly become a new part of the planning paradigm. RIP is a two year, multiple stage planning process with a two-fold focus on limiting the size of new homes while allowing for “missing middle” housing options within a majority of Portland’s single-family zones. The City of Portland created a Stakeholder Advisory Commission to draft a proposal for regulating infill under the guidance of several city planners, drawing together business stakeholders, neighborhood district coalition leaders, and other community-based organizations. Significant generational and ideological polarization regarding the merits of “missing middle” housing split both public feedback and the Stakeholder Advisory Commission. Within the SAC, a pro-densification coalition of nonprofit community-based organizations and developers emerged. The pro-density faction, paralleled outside RIP SAC by the YIMBY (Yes in My Backyard) group “Portland for Everyone,” construed “missing middle” housing as key to affordability and livability, stressed the need for expanded housing supply, and challenged single-family zoning as a barrier to equity. These conceptions were contrasted by neighborhood preservationists, who decried demolition of naturally-affordable homes, condemned the effects of infill densification on parking, traffic, and neighborhood character, and posited that allowing “missing middle” housing would raise, rather than lower, housing prices. This opposition was ultimately marginalized in the planning process—neighborhood associations were dismissed as unrepresentative of their communities. By employing the language of equity and the framing of a housing crisis, this obstinate resistance to densification was circumscribed. This paper highlights the constructed nature of equity and the need to further critically examine its deployment as part of urban planning regimes.