 |
Muzzio: Let’s focus
on two issues, transportation and housing. Right now, New York City
has on its agenda the World Trade Center transit hub, a possible extension
of the #7 subway line, the Train-to-the-Plane, the Second Avenue subway
and ferries. What are our transportation needs?
Paaswell: Twentieth-century planning was about transportation planning, water planning, housing planning, land-use planning, environmental planning. In the 21st century, we have to recognize that these are all parts of the same whole. So should we look at the #7 extension to the far West Side and develop the far West Side for housing or put all our money in Lower Manhattan or forget all that and put transit money into bringing riders in from the outer boroughs?
Q: Do these proposals meet our needs?
A: The issue is not transportation by itself and not land use by itself. The conjunction of policies is what’s important. The future economy of New York isn’t all going to be financial. Everybody pooh-poohs manufacturing, but I think we need a certain level of modern, clean manufacturing activity in New York.
Q: Talk about the manufacturing.
A: Smart growth says people live someplace, they work someplace, you want affordable housing, you want to create jobs—it’s starting to take place in Jamaica, Queens, for example. But the question for Jamaica is: How can we have a mix of population, mix of incomes, and a mix of jobs in Jamaica as it grows? The transportation is in already.
Q: Does the city have any kind of comprehensive economic development strategy?
A: I don’t think cities in the United States—except perhaps a few—have any long-term strategic vision of what they want to be.
Q: Why doesn’t this happen?
A: Everybody is focused on the short-term; everybody is budget-focused. We have
20th-century policies when we need 21st-century ones. In fact, my new institute,
the Community Institute, is about establishing policy change and creating new
financing methods. The institutions that grew up after World War II, which are
still in place, grew up around one thing only: economic growth. All of a sudden
in the 21st century everyone says, Hey, now that we’ve grown, we must begin to
manage with constraints. We don’t want our kids to grow up with asthma. We don’t like all the noise that surrounds us. We don’t like profligate commercial use
of land. We have to address zoning issues. Then there’s my other ‘E,’ the equity
issue. Metropolises are agglomerations of large numbers of people. You can live
wherever you want, provided you can afford it. How can we have mixed-use
housing, with work nearby, with shopping within walking distance, with families
not thinking of adding a first or second car? Nobody has considered how to put
such packages together. We need institutional change and new ways of thinking
regionally.
Q: How do you do it?
A: Real estate arbitrage is one way. In Hong Kong they paid for the subways by selling land to the Transit Authority at its undeveloped value. The authority was then able to lease or develop it at a higher value. This raised billions and paid for the most modern subway in the world. We also have to visit the word “taxes” again. Everybody’s afraid of it. California threw out a governor, in part, because he raised car taxes, and yet a large percentage of those car taxes went to pay fire fighters, the same people who fought forest fires in California. So I think the politicians really have to step up to the plate.
Q: I understand you have done some case studies.
A: In Queens, a tremendous amount of money and a tremendous amount of attention is going to be invested in Jamaica because of the new rail connection to Kennedy Airport. This raises several questions. Can you create or enlarge a community where housing is mixed with commercial development, where you can build to higher densities than you normally would? How do you reconfigure the transit system? You have all these buses on the street; do you want to put them in terminals? We need to rethink Jamaica’s downtown so that it meets the needs of people there, so they don’t have to bring cars in to go shopping. Our study found that people in Jamaica now go to Roosevelt Field or to other places to shop. They should shop downtown Jamaica. It has the density.
Q: I lived in Queens and taught in Jamaica, which had a vibrant center—you had department stores there.
A: You could have this again. Zoning incentives are necessary; Jamaica’s citizens must say to the city’s leaders, “Instead of just focusing our attention elsewhere—on Lower Manhattan or the far West Side—focus your attention here.” These are quality-of-life issues for the people living in New York now.
Paaswell: Twentieth-century planning was about transportation planning, water planning, housing planning, land-use planning, environmental planning. In the 21st century, we have to recognize that these are all parts of the same whole. So should we look at the #7 extension to the far West Side and develop the far West Side for housing or put all our money in Lower Manhattan or forget all that and put transit money into bringing riders in from the outer boroughs?
Q: Do these proposals meet our needs?
A: The issue is not transportation by itself and not land use by itself. The conjunction of policies is what’s important. The future economy of New York isn’t all going to be financial. Everybody pooh-poohs manufacturing, but I think we need a certain level of modern, clean manufacturing activity in New York.
Q: Talk about the manufacturing.
A: Smart growth says people live someplace, they work someplace, you want affordable housing, you want to create jobs—it’s starting to take place in Jamaica, Queens, for example. But the question for Jamaica is: How can we have a mix of population, mix of incomes, and a mix of jobs in Jamaica as it grows? The transportation is in already.
Q: Does the city have any kind of comprehensive economic development strategy?
A: I don’t think cities in the United States—except perhaps a few—have any long-term strategic vision of what they want to be.
Q: Why doesn’t this happen?
A: Everybody is focused on the short-term; everybody is budget-focused. We have
20th-century policies when we need 21st-century ones. In fact, my new institute,
the Community Institute, is about establishing policy change and creating new
financing methods. The institutions that grew up after World War II, which are
still in place, grew up around one thing only: economic growth. All of a sudden
in the 21st century everyone says, Hey, now that we’ve grown, we must begin to
manage with constraints. We don’t want our kids to grow up with asthma. We don’t like all the noise that surrounds us. We don’t like profligate commercial use
of land. We have to address zoning issues. Then there’s my other ‘E,’ the equity
issue. Metropolises are agglomerations of large numbers of people. You can live
wherever you want, provided you can afford it. How can we have mixed-use
housing, with work nearby, with shopping within walking distance, with families
not thinking of adding a first or second car? Nobody has considered how to put
such packages together. We need institutional change and new ways of thinking
regionally.
Q: How do you do it?
A: Real estate arbitrage is one way. In Hong Kong they paid for the subways by selling land to the Transit Authority at its undeveloped value. The authority was then able to lease or develop it at a higher value. This raised billions and paid for the most modern subway in the world. We also have to visit the word “taxes” again. Everybody’s afraid of it. California threw out a governor, in part, because he raised car taxes, and yet a large percentage of those car taxes went to pay fire fighters, the same people who fought forest fires in California. So I think the politicians really have to step up to the plate.
Q: I understand you have done some case studies.
A: In Queens, a tremendous amount of money and a tremendous amount of attention is going to be invested in Jamaica because of the new rail connection to Kennedy Airport. This raises several questions. Can you create or enlarge a community where housing is mixed with commercial development, where you can build to higher densities than you normally would? How do you reconfigure the transit system? You have all these buses on the street; do you want to put them in terminals? We need to rethink Jamaica’s downtown so that it meets the needs of people there, so they don’t have to bring cars in to go shopping. Our study found that people in Jamaica now go to Roosevelt Field or to other places to shop. They should shop downtown Jamaica. It has the density.
Q: I lived in Queens and taught in Jamaica, which had a vibrant center—you had department stores there.
A: You could have this again. Zoning incentives are necessary; Jamaica’s citizens must say to the city’s leaders, “Instead of just focusing our attention elsewhere—on Lower Manhattan or the far West Side—focus your attention here.” These are quality-of-life issues for the people living in New York now.
