I believe this best fits McMansion Trait #1 referring to the structure’s size. It could provide a lot of space for a few chickens or house a lot of chickens. It is probably larger than a lot of backyard coops.
At some point the chicken structure becomes too large to be a McMansion. If it is for large-scale operations, does it qualify as a chicken mansion?
Q: What will be your legacy as mayor of Naperville?
A: It has to be the financial impact on the city. Eight years seems like a long time, but it’s not when you’re trying to turn a ship like that. To turn over the city with tons of cash, not to mention federal money we didn’t touch, they’re going to be able to do a lot. And that’s my gift, to make sure the city was on the right trajectory. We’re the envy of what most cities want to be.
One of the jobs of a mayor is to champion their community. They are often the chief booster. In many American communities, professional staff – a city manager and others – address day-to-day concerns while mayors work with a council and act as cheerleader. The outgoing mayor earlier in the interview described the suburb’s success in planning, development, and revenues. Yet, always highlighting the best of the community is key and Naperville has a precedent: former mayor George Pradel did this for decades. I assume mayors will say their community is great.
Yet, it can be interesting when mayors make statements that involve other communities, implied or otherwise. It is one thing to say your community is great; it is another to say that it compares well to other communities. Some communities can be leaders or models for others. In the United States, this might involve growth or a high quality of life or economic opportunities or tackling particular issues.
Do most cities want to be Naperville or like Naperville? This might be hard to answer, particularly if leaders elsewhere will tend to focus on the good things in their own communities.
The Metro Nashville City Council approved by a 26-12 vote early Wednesday morning on the final reading to allow its sports authority to issue $760 million in bonds. That combines with $500 million in state bonds for more than $1.2 billion in public financing committed to the Titans’ enclosed stadium…
The stadium’s total cost is estimated at $2.1 billion. The Titans, with help from the NFL and personal seat licenses, will provide the remaining $840 million. The new stadium will feature a translucent roof with a capacity of approximately 60,000.
This stadium will allow Nashville and the Titans to bid for a Super Bowl, Final Fours, College Football Playoff games and more. Burke Nihill, the Titans’ president and CEO, said they are excited at the chance to host some of the world’s best events…
A new 1% hotel/motel tax, all of in-stadium sales tax and 50% of sales taxes from 130 acres around the stadium will pay off the bonds. The Titans and city officials announced an agreement in December that includes a new 30-year lease. The team agreed not to leave Nashville during that lease.
If I am reading this correctly:
More than half of the costs of the stadium are coming through public financing.
A number of new revenue sources – hotel tax, sales taxes from the stadium and the surrounding property – will pay off the bonds.
The city thinks this deal will be good because it keeps the team and allows for additional events in Nashville.
My question: who benefits the most from this arrangement? The Titans and their owners. One source has them valued at $3.5 billion August 2022. This puts them toward the bottom of the NFL rankings. A new stadium boosts their value.
In reality, the region the Big Apple comprises most of is far and away the safest part of the U.S. mainland when it comes to gun violence, while the regions Florida and Texas belong to have per capita firearm death rates (homicides and suicides) three to four times higher than New York’s. On a regional basis it’s the southern swath of the country — in cities and rural areas alike — where the rate of deadly gun violence is most acute, regions where Republicans have dominated state governments for decades.
But, the data could be interpreted in another way. Rates are expressed in the number of occurrences per a set amount of population. What do the absolute numbers say about gun deaths? One compilation of data from The University of Sydney shows 804 gun deaths in 2019.
Or, here is a 2022 article in the New York Times looking at shootings in the city:
Shootings are twice as high as in the years preceding the pandemic, and the burden falls primarily on Black and Latino neighborhoods. More than 1,800 shootings were reported annually in the past two years after dropping under 900 in 2018.
The absolute numbers sound high and can contribute to perceptions:
But fresh anxieties have driven warnings about a return to New York’s “bad old days,” when there were many years with more than 2,000 murders. To some, the resemblance between the periods lies not in the crime or the data, but in the coverage.
Rates are often used because they help make comparisons across communities with different population sizes. New York City has more shootings but it is also the largest city in the United States by a lot. There will be more crimes to possibly report on in a larger city but that is in part because of having a larger population.
Of course, if we are at a point where people just want to find a statistical interpretation that fits their perspective, we have bigger problems on our hands than simply discussing what numbers best reflect realities.
Los Angeles-based car YouTuber effspot stumbled across something we’ve heard about but haven’t been able to dig up solid evidence of: dealerships are hiding a ton of new inventory in secret locations. Now you might think these dealers are putting their overstock vehicles in some secure location like a warehouse or locked lot, and some definitely are, but effspot found hundreds of Jeeps, Dodges, Rams, and Chryslers stashed in a public parking garage, all apparently put there by just one dealership.
This is a potentially interesting find. How common is this?
Dealerships have been running this scheme for months and months, but it’s starting to fall apart despite some media outlets trying to claim there may be no return to normal for the car market. Instead, both the new and used markets are going in only one direction: down. Just how quickly and by how much remains to be seen, but don’t believe car dealerships have hardly any vehicles and need to overcharge you big time for the privilege of new car ownership.
So we go from one parking garage is “dealerships have been running this scheme for months and months”? Roughly 51 seconds into the YouTube video, the maker says “these dealerships, or at least this particular dealership” has engaged in these practices. Later, at 5:52, he asks whether this is happening around the country.
This does not necessarily mean the larger argument is not true. But, the evidence presented here shows one parking garage and cars from one dealer. How broad is this practice? We do not know from this video and story.
This might just be the daily story of the Internet and social media. Interesting things are posted. Information is shared. People describe their experiences. But, it is difficult to know how this matches larger patterns or not. An individual reader might be able to make connections across stories. Or, people online could connect the dots for others. For example, others could make videos on YouTube detailing their finds of auto inventory in different locations. Sometimes these connections are made, often they are not. The next day comes and there is more information to process and relatively little that helps fit all the pieces together.
Academics, developers and people in their 20s and 30s—particularly those most active on social media—have reached an unusual level of consensus. Their solution, supported by a wealth of scholarly research, is simple and elegant: Loosen regulations, such as zoning, and build more homes of any kind—cheap, modest and palatial…
Inconveniently for the Yimbys, Austin, like other cities, is still way more expensive than it was years ago, even though it’s built so many apartments. As a result, a small group of academics is starting to question the free-market path. These critics note that the market leads developers to build luxury housing on scarce and sought-after property to maximize the return on their investment. “Yimbys say, ‘We have to let the market build,’ ” says Benjamin Teresa, an urban planning scholar at Virginia Commonwealth University. “But what kind of housing are you building, and for whom?”…
But the very popularity of these places with the affluent drives up housing costs, making it harder for companies to find workers and pushing firms to relocate elsewhere. The Austin metro area, one of the fastest-growing in the US, with a population exceeding 2 million, has benefited from corporations fleeing the high cost of housing elsewhere, particularly on the east and west coasts of the US. Home of the University of Texas’ flagship campus, it’s lured Elon Musk’s Tesla, along with Oracle, from Silicon Valley. JPMorgan Chase and Charles Schwab are expanding there, too...
Frustration over rising rents has led cities to consider government interventions that were once deemed discredited. Boston, Orlando and Kingston, New York, have taken fresh looks at rent control, which had been blamed for distorting the market and raising the cost of other apartments.
If a builder or developer gets the green light to build housing, why would they choose to build cheaper units if they can build more expensive units and make more money?
As the article notes, perhaps this requires cities to see housing as not just a market good or something subject to market fluctuations. If housing is just another commodity that requires a big return on investment, why not go big in asking for expensive rates? Rent control or publicly subsidized housing may require more intervention, but they could also be necessary to provide any housing within the reach of residents with fewer resources.
Which cities are able to successfully buck these trends will be interesting to see. If policies become more explicit about affordable housing units, will developers push back publicly? Will an important city then see a downturn in building and investment?
As I have studied McMansions, I found numerous suggestions that aging residents may not want such homes given their current needs. This recent explanation sums up some of the possible issues older residents face:
The McMansion purchased years ago with its acres of ground might now seem too much to handle. With younger family members gone, there may not seem to be so much motivation for larger space. Homes with high balconies and difficult to maneuver staircases present safety challenges. Communities that maintain the grounds can be attractive.
Do the issues older residents face necessarily preclude having a McMansion? In the paragraph above, here are the issues mentioned and the ways McMansions might actually help address these issues:
Too much property. Could the McMansion be expanded to take up even more of the property? Or, convert that two-story McMansion into a more sprawling McMansion ranch. While McMansions are sometimes criticized for their size compared to their neighbors, having loss property to maintain could be a plus.
High balconies and interesting staircases could pose problems. Yet, with the space inside a McMansion, could not all of these areas be addressed by renovations? Instead of a twisting staircase, make use of some of that grand foyer to build a straight staircase with a lift.
How about more McMansion neighborhoods with HOAs? Millions of Americans already live with HOAs so why not put them to work here making sure grounds and housing exteriors are kept up as residents age?
Sure, smaller spaces might be attractive for seniors but it can be hard to give up space once one has lived with it. There may be plenty of opportunities for older Americans to remain in McMansions if they want to and there are models for how this can be done.
At this time of year, the lawns of the Chicago area are slowly emerging. Some residents are already mowing to address one key feature of an acceptable suburban lawn: it must be even.
You can have a green, full, and weed-free lawn but it is not complete if it is uneven. This primarily has to do with grass height. The acceptable lawn is uniform. The grass looks like a flat surface. It does not have to look exactly like a golf fairway or green but the idea is the same. A lawn with weird dips and rises can also make it look uneven compared to a flat surface or a continually sloping area.
In the spring, the grass may be particularly uneven. Some of it is due to the activity of dogs. Some of it has to do with all the rain and moisture the grass has had. The growth might be different across a lawn, meaning mowing would lower the height of the grass in some spots and not be needed elsewhere.
This time will pass as more growth, higher temperatures, and regular mowing evens out lawns. For those who like lawns that do not have a uniform height, now is the time to enjoy.
One surprising victim might be the Twin Cities suburbs. Take the 64,000-person suburb of Eagan, Minnesota where, earlier this year, two announcements upended the commercial landscape. Two of the city’s largest employers terminated leases at massive office parks, both of which served as local corporate headquarters…
Because commercial property is taxed at a higher rate than residential, for a city like Eagan, with a $42 million budget, the loss of two large corporate headquarters is a hit to its bottom line. In 2022, the two office parks provided about $3 million in tax dollars to the city, county and school board. (The city of Eagan’s cut of the tax revenue sits at around a third of that total.)
Whatever happens to these two sites, they’ll likely be assessed at much lower values moving forward, likely swaying the rest of the suburban commercial real estate market. This puts pressure on Eagan’s single-family residential property to make up the difference, shifting the low-tax balance that draws people to live second-ring suburbs in the first place.
For their part, Eagan city leaders say these kinds of economic changes are nothing new, and the city is well-positioned to survive…
She cited the changing loss of previous corporate headquarters in the city, including Lockheed Martin and Northwest Airlines, both of which disappeared due to mergers or outsourcing.
Multiple forces are at work:
Corporate offices change over time, before and after COVID-19. This suburb has seen companies go before and they found different businesses to lease office space.
It is less clear the direction of the current office space market and financial markets are nervous. With more work from home and more Internet business, how much physical office space is necessary in the coming years?
Filled office parks can help suburbs generate significant revenues and reduce tax burdens for others. Vacant buildings do not this at the same rate.
Buildings that are vacant long-term are negative symbols. Communities want to have thriving businesses, not empty buildings. The longer the vacancy stretches, the bigger the consequences.
Communities can redevelop such properties but this requires money, proactive local officials, and partners.
From Dallas and Minneapolis to New York and Los Angeles, offices sit vacant or underused, showing the staying power of the work-from-home era. But cleardesks and quiet break rooms aren’t just a headache for bosses eager to gather teams in person.
Investors and regulators, on high alert for signs of trouble in the financial system following recent bank failures, are now homing in on the downturn in the $20 trillion US commercial real estate market.
After detailing the economic effects of this, particularly how banks might be affected, here is some evidence for the headline:
Office properties have been getting hammered the hardest. Hybrid work remains popular, affecting the rents many building owners can charge. Average occupancy of offices in the United States is still less than half March 2020 levels, according to data from security provider Kastle.
And then it is back to the possible fallout, including:
Trouble may build as the economy slows. Hill thinks US commercial property valuations could fall roughly 20% to 25% this year. For offices, declines could be even steeper, topping 30%.
The headline suggests half of offices are empty. The primary piece of evidence in the article says that average office occupancy “is still less than half March 2020 levels.” Does that mean average office occupancy was 100% in March 2020? Does this mean half of office buildings have no people in them? Even if the real figure about empty offices is 30% or 40%, this would be a big number with lots of ramifications.
Office occupancy across 10 major US cities crossed 50.4% of pre-pandemic levels for the first time since early 2020, according to security swipe tracker Kastle Systems. That marks the first time occupancy has crossed the 50% mark since March 2020, when many offices sent workers home because of Covid.
Again, the comparison is pre-COVID levels, not necessarily 50% of total possible occupancy. Again, this is a significant change that is a little different than claiming offices are more than 50% filled.
This all might be pedantic, but, if we should pay attention to offices, working from home, and the consequences of changes to commercial real estate, what are the actual figures regarding how much office space is occupied and/or leased?
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