How NIMBYs weaponize historic districts

Grand Central Station is a New York icon the main Concourse is often used in movies and TV shows and it's not hard to see why 67 million train commuters get to enjoy the view in person as they enter or leave Manhattan it's also located at the Terminus of Park Avenue along 42nd Street it's in the same league as the Empire State Building or Central Park so how would you feel if the city proposed to demolish the above ground part of the station to build an ugly Sports Arena not a good idea right well that's exactly what happened to the original Penn Station also located in Midtown Manhattan on the West Side Penn Station was arguably even grander than Grand Central Station it was built in 1910 and featured a cavernous and beautiful main waiting room it was one of the largest indoor public spaces in the world and had some of the same basic proportions as Saint Peter's Basilica in the Vatican which is the largest church on the planet the interior design of the space Also references Saint Peter's and features Italian travertine and Renaissance neoclassical architecture unfortunately the station was built with the assumption that travel by train would continue to grow in popularity but instead airplanes became popular in Long Distance train travel declined as the station lost money and became more and more unkempt the Pennsylvania Railroad realized they needed to make some serious changes to keep making a profit this led to their controversial decision to sell the air rights of the land to a company that ended up demolishing the incredible above ground portion of the station in the early 1960s they replaced it with Madison Square Garden a skyscraper and two other Office Buildings the station's demolition was a blow to the growing historic preservation movement in the United States but the result was the establishment of the NYC landmarks preservation commission just a few years later which in turn ended up saving Grand Central Station from a similar fate I have a video about Grand Central Station if you want more information on that Saga this Penn Station story is the one most pointed to by preservationists as it clearly demonstrates what could be lost without local governments preserving our built Heritage And if every preservation case was as clear-cut as that one I wouldn't be making this video but I'm making this video because some people misuse historic preservation to exclude people and prevent neighborhood change let's dive into the CD underbelly of historic preservation after the bike Bell the Penn Station case is an example of a historic building and historic buildings generally have a lower impact on cities than historic districts historic districts are neighborhoods designated as historic with contributing and non-contributing buildings contributing buildings are historic while non-contributing buildings are not the idea of a historic district is that you have a high percentage of historic buildings in one place and they contribute to a historic narrative or demonstrate a historic style creating a district is more efficient than individually marking each building as historic if you want a great rundown of how something is made historic including a fascinating history of my adopted hometown of San Luis Obispo go check out cynical historians video on that very topic there's a link in the description he covers the good reasons to make something historic and I'm going to talk about some of the negatives in a city marking one building as historic is probably not going to have major Ripple effects filled with consequences both intended and unintended but you better believe that's the case with historic districts let's look at the first area designated as a historic district in the United States in Charleston South Carolina it's almost universally lauded as a great example of a historic district one that has preserved a large collection of 18th and 19th century buildings it was established by the local government in 1931 and added to the National Historic register in the 1960s right around the same time as the preservation movement was getting going in New York thanks to Penn Station the preservation of buildings is one outcome of making a district historic but there are others as well the Charleston Historic District was created in part to preserve the era of Southern slavery and remove black residents from the area indeed in 1930 historic Charleston was a mixed race neighborhood but within a decade after the introduction of the historic district the residents were primarily white the Charleston Historic District removed all buildings that didn't reflect the elite images they wanted to project this also led to Decades of gentrification making the entire District a Haven for rich white residents the district also expanded over the years forcing out low-income and black residents with every addition this kind of thing happens everywhere in not just the U.S South Philadelphia created the Society Hill historic district in 1955. it was meant to preserve one of the oldest neighborhoods in the City established in the 1680s the areas full of colonial era buildings but prior to Philadelphia creating the district it was one of the city's most diverse neighborhoods it was 20 black with Eastern Europeans and Irish Catholics making up the other large blocks by 1965 population density was cut in half and the district was 90 white with only 3 percent black today Society Hill is one of the most wealthy and exclusive neighborhoods in Philly these historic districts may have preserved the historic structures but at the expense of the communities living there today the controversy from historic districts comes from the NIMBY crowd the state of California passed a law called sb9 that allows for homeowners in single-family zones to build a duplex on their lot and split their lot in half and build another house that means where there was once one house on a large lot there can now be four houses on two lots it effectively ended single-family zoning in California this law has loopholes however and one of them is that it does not apply in historic or Landmark districts now let's say you're the kind of person that doesn't want to see any change to the neighborhood at all no new housing it doesn't take a genius to figure out that you could just designate your entire neighborhood as a historic district and evade state law the state government in the City of Pasadena got into a fight because Pasadena passed in emergency ordinance after the passage of sb9 that included a definition of historic district too broad for the state's liking meaning that it could exempt larger areas of the city than necessary Pasadena already had 20 percent of its land area in a historic district fully exempt from sb9 Pasadena ended up rewriting the ordinance put his definition of historic district in line with the states Palo Alto California added over 150 properties to its historic registry to prevent them from being demolished and replaced with sb9 units that's a valid course of action but not every property identified is clearly historic and some are just head scratchers this is happening in Oregon too in 2019 the state passed a law that said that any City over 25 000 people must allow duplexes in any residential lot cities in the Portland metro area must allow duplexes triplexes fourplexes Cottage courts and Townhomes on any residential lot and unlike California this law applies to Historic districts but clever neighborhoods in Portland have figured out that the state requires extensive demolition review before taking down a contributing historic building in a district that means that anytime a historic building would be removed for higher density housing it would have to go to a vote of the city council furthermore these same neighborhoods have figured out that they can get a historic district approved by the national register of historic places administered by the National Park Service neighborhoods can seek and attain a national registered designation without city council approval the Laurelhurst Neighborhood in Portland has done just that this process means that neighborhoods can get protection without City approval but every demolition has to come to a full City Council vote this is a massive disincentive to building something new in these historic districts the neighborhood association's own analysis shows how effective this is as a deterrent to new housing comparing demolitions in Lads Edition to Sellwood both neighborhoods with historic homes though only Lads Edition is on the national register the result is less affordable housing in neighborhoods in the inner ring of Portland suburbs with great Transit and bike access the residents of the neighborhood don't seem to care much about historic preservation either by their own admission property value preservation is what they're really after with historic districts whose history are we preserving we tend to preserve the most grand ornate and impressive buildings in neighborhoods I think that's mostly due to their visual interest but those buildings particularly historic homes and mansions could have only been built by very wealthy past residents and the costs associated with maintaining those buildings are often only affordable to today's very wealthy residents Urban residents serious about historic preservation need to consider alternative historic narratives when identifying sites for preservation to Portland's credit they have passed revisions to their historic preservation ordinance to add criteria for landmarking places of significance to queer indigenous and communities of color historic preservation is not a bad thing and in many cases like Grand Central Station it's absolutely a great thing but cities are living changing entities and freezing a neighborhood in time makes it less able to respond to the needs of the future often at the benefit of the wealthy and powerful and at the expense of the poor hey since you made it this far I wanted to let you know that my next video was all about college towns the video covers topics like why do people like living in college towns why do Town relations go sour is it good thing to have so many students in one small town I'll be posting it to YouTube in a few weeks but you can actually watch it right now ad free over on nebula nebula is a Creator owned streaming service that I'm extremely proud to be a part of I'm nebula you can see all of my extra content including my great City series planning ancient Rome and a whole bunch of smaller bonus video content but me and all my Creator friends have started this new thing called nebula first thanks to all the people who have subscribed on nebula economic my content faster and earlier so every time you see a video posted by me on YouTube my next video is already on nebula other creators are doing the same thing meaning that you can watch videos from Johnny Harris legal eagle 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Channel: City Beautiful

Views: 111,433

Keywords: city planning, town planning, urban planning, urban design

Id: W_N1Y9qRkjo

Length: 10min 10sec (610 seconds)

Published: Fri Apr 14 2023

Reddit Comments

[u/jax2love]

One of the neighborhoods in my city is trying to do something similar with a zoning overlay since they know they can’t get the necessary support for a locally designated historic district. I’m very much looking forward to shutting it down since their goal seems to be preventing ADUs.

[u/zechrx]

Historic preservation can be a good thing, but it can also be a tool for segregation and to completely block development in a city. It's inevitable that as states make more efforts to tackle their housing crisis, cities will try every approach to turn as much of their land into historic districts as possible.

[u/[deleted]]

There is straight up misinformation in this video. Being federally listed on the NRHP, which the video calls “national historic register” does not prevent demolition or provide any protections whatsoever, that is solely up to the local municipality.

His examples about gentrification are from the 1930s and 1950s, with shockingly little actual facts to back up his claims.

Each historic district has its own set of rules and new construction, especially ADU’s are not prohibited in every district.

He also just posts pictures of buildings he personally thinks arent worthy of historic preservation, but that’s just his opinion. One of his examples was a great mid-century New Formalism style building that would certainly be considered significant by any preservationist worth their salt.

Historic preservation cannot solve, nor is it a significant cause of the housing crisis we are experiencing in their country. Less that 1% of all buildings are protected from demolition in this country. The numbers just aren’t there. The intangible numbers of what historic preservation has done for tourism in certain cities is incalculable. What happened in Philly and Charleston was bad, but that gentrification was gonna happen anyway as historic city centers became desirable again after the initial suburbanization of America’s housing.

The author could have done proper research and found good new historic districts with flexible rules and the desired goal of controlled densification (ADU’s, subdivision of existing buildings, new compatible construction), but he only searched for the bad examples, because he had his conclusion in his mind before he even started making this video.

[u/SauteedGoogootz]

As a preservationist, please remember that zoning and preservation are seperate. Historic districts very often allow higher density than many non-historic single family neighborhoods. Yes, NIMBYs do try to use preservation to stop development, but there are also clear standards that professional preservationists have to follow. The main issue with the lack of housing is more often the underlying zoning than historic district designation, even low-scale residential historic districts can accommodate infill - either behind the main house or through the redevelopment of noncontributing properties.

[u/[deleted]]

"No see it's ok when we prevent the development of densified and pedestrianized communities, because history or something!"

This is the same kind of mindset as people who lose it over statues being vandalized or torn down, we don't live in the age of byzantine iconoclasm, shit that's blocking development to resolve the housing crisis and to fight car dependency can be put in a text book if it's so important it needs to be remembered but only turned out to be so once someone suggested maybe lower income families should have accessibility to upscale communities and their amenities as well.

[u/monsieurvampy]

I'm commenting without watching the video. Here is a random list of thoughts as someone who is a Preservation Planner and has been in many different municipalities across different states.

• Local Historic Preservation Ordinance reflects the desire (to degree) of the public.
• Local Historic Preservation regulations vary drastically. At the end of the day it's usually about authenticity (integrity). What makes this historic.
• Preservation and Zoning are not one thing. It can be one thing. I have worked with varying degrees of "one" thing.
• Often times local historic (and landmark) districts offer greater density and more housing variety. This is due to the fact they were largely built before strict zoning laws were in place. (This less so for Post WWII neighborhoods.)
• These do not exist to be the Fashion Police or Regulate Taste. (Though from experience, it comes down to that because people want easy)
• The two larger programs I have worked in, less than 10% of the structures/properties (the programs count things differently) were historic in that city. This does not limit housing. Some programs may have a larger percentage, there is ample room for redevelopment.
• Historic (or Landmark) Districts tend to protect property values.
• Historic Preservation IS neighborhood planning.
• Historic Preservation is sound economic development.
• Historic Preservation is sound sustainability.
• Upzoning single family lots to allow for greater density such as a triplex or quadplex could still achieve density and design for new construction or additions to fit within single family. Its not hard. Just have to put effort.

[u/Ketaskooter]

Historic buildings, structures, things are past reasonable in many areas. My state will generally allow anything over 50 years old to be designated as Historic. Its beyond ridiculous and puts road blocks to change things. The BLM/Forest Service has designated some trash piles dumped in the 40s as historic as well. Sorry rusted cans are not at all interesting.

[u/madmoneymcgee]

My modest proposal is that we abandon the idea of a historic district and restrict it to just individual buildings.

A whole district is vague and ends up being ahistoric since often it covers a few different eras and changes anyway. Unless you’re going to do a full recreation a la colonial Williamsburg (where they tore down 19th century buildings that no longer fit the era they wanted) you just end up freezing a neighborhood how it looked the year the district was applied and not then years you’re trying to preserve.

[u/No-Lunch4249]

Yeah I’m very torn on historic districts for this. One one hand, yeah sometimes there is legitimate architectural beauty and cultural heritage worthy of being preserved.

On the other hand, cities are ever growing and changing things, more like a living organism than anything else. These historic districts often lead to NIMBYism and gentrification