- Zoned Out: Regulation, Markets, and Choices in Transportationand Metropolitan Land Use
Is the sprawling modern American metropolis a product of individuals making choices about residential location and transportation in the free market, or does sprawl result from government regulation limiting what developers can build? Historians of technology may find this an odd question, [End Page 880] especially if they know the history of urban planning in the United States. Zoning arose as a response to the disorder of the industrial city at the turn of the twentieth century. Zoning regulations adopted by local governments typically limit the use, height, and size of structures. They control the siting on a parcel and the orientation relative to the street. They often segregate areas of cities and suburbs into zones assigned only for one particular use. Within a commercial zone, developers create new commercial strips by combining one-story retail structures with parking areas designed for maximal automobile access. Add in an adjacent zone of mass-produced single-family structures with a minimum house and lot size laid out along cul-de-sacs and collector streets and you have two of the key elements of modern-day sprawl.
Many economists and some planners have argued that sprawl is the "natural" result of market forces meeting public preferences. Jonathan Levine's book is an adept and relatively ahistorical argument that sprawl results from intense government regulation through land-use zoning. Fundamentally, it is about beating the economics-based policy analysts at their own game. Levine carefully sets out his agenda and plots a middle road. At the start he is very critical of anti-sprawl advocates, many of whom propose more intense planning regulations in response to sprawl. Defenders of automobile-based land-use development are left with the free-market argument. Building mass-transit systems and requiring higher densities and/or mixed-use development might then be seen as market interference.
Levine shows that the urban policy and urban economics literature's conception of the present situation as free market arises out of theories about the marketplace of municipal jurisdictions and notions of zoning as a "collective property right." People fearing smart-growth policy interference in the market are actually scared of increased "permissiveness." Such policies include many smart-growth codes and, specifically, Portland's urban-growth boundary. Levine presents evidence that there is both a restricted supply of alternatives to sprawl and an unmet demand for these alternatives. He concludes by calling for the application of "a more consistent market-oriented philosophy" to the subject of metropolitan land use and transportation (p. 190).
Historians of technology should read Levine if they want to trace the detailed history of the idea that the present system of land-use zoning results in a free market of place. Zoned Out is a critique of other policy analyses using the "scientific" tools of policy analysis. At times Levine's argument requires patience as he unwraps other writers' assumptions. Too often he uses odd analogies. Nor does he directly address the questions of how we ended up "zoned out." While he quotes the Supreme Court's Euclid v. Ambler and Belle Terre decisions, he does not discuss the cultural and political impact of segregating urban space into areas of legally defined [End Page 881] "single family" homes. To provide context for Levine's argument, readers should consult Dolores Hayden's excellent history of suburbia, Building Suburbia: Greenfields and Urban Growth, 1820–2000 (2003).
That said, Levine's book is a very useful tool in the present policy debate on sprawl. It illustrates the necessity of claiming the free market for one's own side in a policy debate. I suspect a more historical work would question market ideology about land-use decisions and travel preferences.
Dr. Frisch is an assistant professor of urban planning and design in the Department of Architecture, Urban Planning and Design at the University of Missouri–Kansas City. He has written about how planning and zoning impact...