Solutions
Remove Parking Minimums
We should join Austin, Buffalo, Charlottesville, Richmond, Ann Arbor, and the many other cities in eliminating minimums parking requirements for new construction. Building parking encourages car dependence and significantly increases the cost of building housing which raises rents.
Get Rid Of Minimum Lot Sizes
A reasonably sized house can easily be built on a 1000 square foot lot yet our zoning code requires a minimum lot size of 8000 sq ft in some areas. Many of Pittsburgh’s heritage homes would be illegal to build today because of minimum lot size requirements. We should remove minimum lot sizes from our zoning code and let builders worry about whether a lot is big enough to build on.
Change the Way We Tax
Pittsburgh needs to switch to a land value tax. Currently, an empty lot pays way less in taxes than the same lot with a triplex on it. This lets speculators hold vacant lots hoping to sell them for a profit in the future instead of building housing. With a land value tax we tax the land rather than what is built on it, which makes it more expensive to hold on to unused land. Most home owners wouldn’t be affected because although they would no longer pay taxes on their homes they would pay a higher tax on their land.
Image from @simple-pleasure
Assess Regularly
Allegheny County needs to conduct frequent, regular, fair tax assessments instead of waiting to get sued and being compelled to reassess by the courts. Our current system, where new construction is pretty much the only thing that gets an accurate assessment, is effectively a tax on renters and new arrivals.
Create Incentives and Get Rid of Mandates
Pittsburgh’s affordable housing mandate, called inclusionary zoning, has a poor track record. It’s created only 35 affordable units since its inception in 2019 and has likely prevented construction of hundreds of units in Lawrenceville, Bloomfield, and Oakland. The cost of the few affordable units that are created is borne by renters rather than the city at large. We recommend incentives based affordability policies like density bonuses.
Simplify and Densify
Moderate density construction should be allowed by right everywhere in the city. Reducing complexity and unnecessary restrictions in our zoning code will make it easier to build housing, drive down rents, and reduce segregation.
