Tag Archives: NIMBY

Building intermodal facilities to relieve traffic congestion

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After examining a new report that Chicago has some of the worst traffic bottlenecks in the country, the suggestion is made not to add lanes to the highways but rather to build more intermodal facilities:

“This is a roadway that has 1950s technology that we are using for 2011 traffic,” said Don Schaefer, executive vice president of the Mid-West Truckers Association. “Aside from a few locations on the Illinois Tollway, there are very few roadways in the Chicago area that are engineered to handle 2011 traffic volumes.”

Adding highway lanes is unlikely to produce the capacity necessary to ease congestion, experts said. A partial solution involves building more intermodal facilities where truck trailers are loaded onto flatbed train cars and transported long distance by rail, then transferred to trucks for the last segment of trips.

One such facility is the sprawling CenterPoint Intermodal Center near Joliet, on the site of the former Joliet Arsenal. But even there, truck traffic is a problem on Arsenal Road leading to Interstate Highway 55.

“The state is building a new interchange to relieve traffic, but today truck traffic trying to get off I-55 southbound is backed up on to the highway,” Schaefer said.

While adding lanes may seem like “common sense,” studies consistently show that this simply encourages more traffic. Think about places have kept adding lanes like downtown Atlanta (I-75 corridor in particular) or the Los Angeles region. Traffic is still an issue during peak times and those roads are already at six or more lanes in each direction.

Intermodal facilities are an intriguing solution. A few thoughts about these:

1. Do most Americans even know what they are? If not, they should as many of their consumer items are routed through these facilities.

2. Part of the reason this article caught my attention is that just last week I drove right by the Centerpoint Intermodal Center which is just east of I-55 and just south of the Des Plaines River. The area was an interesting one: the large facility itself is surrounded by a number of warehouses and distribution centers, including Wal-Mart. When driving a car through such places, I tend to feel out of place as everything is a little bigger: the buildings, the space, the trucks. And yes, the ramp to get on I-55 northbound at Arsenal Road had a long backup of trucks.

Here is some more information on the CenterPoint Facility that just opened in 2010:

The facility will be a central spot where train containers from California, Texas and the Pacific Rim will be delivered for pick-up by trucks moving goods to warehouses and distribution centers throughout the Midwest.

CenterPoint already has an international intermodal facility in nearby Elwood. Combined, the sites will be the country’s largest inland port. In an era of high fuel costs and declining numbers of cross-country truck drivers, the facility is expected to be a more efficient, environmentally-friendly mode of hauling.

A third CenterPoint facility also is planned for Crete.

The $2 billion Joliet development – located on 3,800 acres south of Laraway Road between Brandon and Patterson roads – is the largest construction project in Will County.  It has created about 1,000 construction jobs.

3. What would it take to build more of these? One obvious question is where to put them. This one near Joliet is just outside the Chicago region and there is not much around it: an oil refinery and the Abraham Lincoln National Cemetery. Most importantly, there are not a lot of houses nearby. If you tried to build these closer to cities, I’m sure there would be NIMBY issues. Imagine if someone wanted to build a new one near the Circle Interchange in Chicago – residents would complain and the price of land would likely be prohibitive. There are some older facilities embedded in the Chicago region; for example, there is one in Chicago just south of Midway Airport between 65th and 73rd Streets. You can see Union Pacific’s Chicago region facilities here.

But these facilities are needed, particularly in the Chicago region with its radial railroad system and many at-grade crossings. In recent years, the goal has been to relieve some of the rail traffic closer to the city which was behind the fight over whether Canadian National should be allowed to purchase the Elgin, Joliet & Eastern beltline railroad that runs around the city and on which CN wanted to run more freight trains.

Balancing libertarian and humanitarian instincts when using the word “NIMBY”

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Megan McArdle discusses how the word NIMBY is a prejorative term that tends to be used in instances when the user doesn’t approve of particular uses (opposed to uses that they would approve):

I think this is a little bit too cute.  I read DePillis pretty regularly, and I don’t usually see her calling out, say, people opposing a local Wal-Mart as “NIMBYs”; they’re “opposition groups”.  The term NIMBY seems to be reserved for people who oppose locating things in their back yards that DePillis herself thinks are laudable.  Small wonder that when she uses the word, people take it as a perjorative.

Nonetheless, she has a point: many people oppose having necessary but potentially disruptive things located near them, even if you think those things are a good idea; if you do, you should own it, not make up ridiculously implausible stories about how those inner-city kids wouldn’t really enjoy a halfway house in a nice, suburban neighborhood; they’d be much happier in a crack-infested ghetto like the one where they came from.  Don’t you know you shouldn’t remove creatures from their natural habitat?
 
In the case of people in some DC neighborhoods, they may even be justified.  Anacostia–and my own neighborhood–house an unusually large number of social service organizations, because land has been cheap, and the communities have lacked the socioeconomic power to block new projects the way that, say, Dupont and Friendship Heights have.  I don’t know the statistics on Anacostia, but Eckington/Truxton Circle house thirteen social service groups, from women’s shelters to So Others Might Eat, a wonderful organization that serves thousands of meals to homeless people every day.  Frankly, I haven’t found them disruptive–and indeed, didn’t really know they were there until controversy erupted over a plan to build a fourteenth service facilities.  But the fact remains that a lot of the homeless people hang out in what passes for the area’s park space between meals, and more than a few spend the day drinking single-serving beers from the area’s many liquor stores…
 
In this case, my libertarian instinct squares with my humanitarian instinct: at least in the case of private charities, I cannot, in good conscience, oppose letting them do whatever they want with the property they buy (within reasonable limits on things like toxic fumes and all-night jackhammer parties.)  But I don’t think it’s helpful to brand my neighbors who do as NIMBYs.  Oversaturation of neighborhoods with social services is a genuine problem for those neighborhoods.  We should treat it with at least as much respect as we give to those who don’t want to live near a big-box store.

McArdle seems to be suggesting that the use of the term NIMBY escalates a discussion about land use to an unhelpful level. As soon as the word is brought out, the terms of the discussion changes as the user implies that people are being selfish and those being called NIMBY then have to go on the defensive. Additionally, NIMBY is in the eyes of the beholder: what one person would see as desirable is an abomination to another.

The term McMansion, something I have spent a lot of time studying, is used in a similar manner. Just like NIMBY, the term evokes larger issues such as excessive consumption, sprawl, the disruption of a neighborhood, etc. McMansion and NIMBY are not simple descriptive terms that just refer to a big house or opposition to a particular land use. Both are politicized terms. NIMBY often refers to wealthier, white, more educated homeowners who want to protect their private utopias that many see as exclusionary and government subsidized.

Are there helpful alternatives to the term NIMBY?

Two common issues in affordable housing battles illustrated in Pawcatuck, Connecticut

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A fight over affordable housing in Pawcatuck, Connecticut highlights several common issues in these battles:

1. The author suggests the development will ultimately go forward because of Connecticut’s particular zoning laws:

In the event of a denial by the PZC and subsequent appeal of that decision, Connecticut State Law 8-30g puts the burden on the PZC to prove substantial risk to public health and that those “public interests clearly outweigh the need for affordable housing; and (C) such public interests cannot be protected by reasonable changes to the affordable housing development.”

In other words, the proposed housing complex must pose a threat to the well-being of its neighbors. A mixed-use plan which calls for first floors eventually to be converted to commercial use, the proposal includes three buildings; two-three story buildings of 20 one-bedroom, 20 two-bedroom, four, three-bedroom and one, three-bedroom caretaker detached house, 89 parking spots and a playground.

This regulation about affordable housing sounds like it has more teeth than those in other states. For example,  Illinois tried to impose regulations in 2004 (read some important documents and annual reports here) but as far as I know, major changes have not occurred.

If planning commissions can’t do much about such proposals, how can communities fight back (if they desire)? I assume the typical NIMBY arguments, like traffic, might be thrown out to show the development is a danger to the well-being of the neighbors.

2. There is some mention about who would actually qualify for the affordable housing:

“We’re not dealing with low income housing, but attainable housing, Bates said. He said “civil servants that cannot afford McMansions,” like police officers and teachers.

The affordable housing formula calls for 20 percent of the units to be provided for families whose income is 80 percent of median income, 15 percent must be at 60 percent of median income with the balance at 100 percent of the median income—or market price for rents.

Interestingly, the attorney for the development (Bates) is the one suggesting it is about “attainable housing.” For worried residents, suggesting that the housing is really for teachers and police sounds much better. The subtext is that this really isn’t about bringing lower-class or poor residents into the community. On the other hand, the Connecticut regulations are tied to income. Pawcatuck had a median household income (2009 estimate) of nearly $58,000 so a household at 60% is making $34,800.

In the end, is opposition to the development about the density of housing that might not fit the community, is it about the kind of residents who might move in, or is it about property values?

(Read about another fight over affordable housing in Winnetka, Illinois.)

Seeking height variances for DuPage mosques

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I’ve been keeping track of several proposals  for mosques in DuPage County (including one near Lombard) that have been working their way through the approval process. One issue has been the height of the buildings. A group looking to build a mosque near Willowbrook is going to seek an exception to existing regulations:

The Muslim Educational and Cultural Center of America is one of two Islamic groups to be denied a height variance request this year by DuPage.

County board members granted MECCA’s request for a conditional-use permit so it can build a roughly 47,000-square-foot mosque along 91st Street near Route 83. But in a separate action, they refused to give the group permission to exceed the height restriction of 36 feet so it could have a 69-foot dome and 79-foot minaret.

Mark Daniel, an Elmhurst-based attorney representing MECCA, said the group has reapplied for a shorter 50-foot dome and 60-foot minaret. A public hearing on the new height variance request is scheduled for November…

Board members who opposed the height variance said MECCA representatives failed to show the denial would result in a legal hardship.

While the lawyer for MECCA suggests that there are plenty of religious buildings nearby over 36 feet, the County says the new rules went into effect in 2005 and have been followed since.

I would guess that the 2005 regulations were put into place because of NIMBY concerns: residents didn’t want large structures dominating the sky near them. Since the steeple seems to be on the way out, perhaps having a tall building now indicates that the structure will be quite large, leading to the typical concerns of traffic and late night crowds. Looking at the Google Map satellite view of the intersection of 91st Street and Route 83, it appears there are a number of nearby residential neighborhoods.

If the County has applied these rules to all religious groups, perhaps MECCA could suggest that the entire regulation be examined. Thirty-six feet tall is roughly 3+ stories, somewhat sizable but not that tall. MECCA’s proposal is for about double that height. Indeed, another Chicago-area organization has suggested the height regulations are unfair:

In the meantime, the Council of Islamic Organizations of Greater Chicago this week issued a statement claiming that legal experts have questioned the method DuPage used to adopt its existing height limit. The council said the “potentially illegally adopted” restriction violates state law and the federal Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act.

It would be interesting to then hear from these legal experts.

“Opportunity hoarding” in suburban schools

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Two education researchers argue that suburban schools have practiced “opportunity hoarding”:

While urban schools’ not keeping pace with suburban schools is an acknowledged problem, few have studied the causes of the discrepancies. John Rury and Argun Saatcioglu, professor and assistant professor of educational leadership and policy studies, recently published an article in the American Journal of Education showing how some suburban school districts gained advantages, thereby excluding them from some others. “Opportunity hoarding,” a term coined by sociologist Charles Tilley, claims that a group that gains advantages tends to work to maintain them.

“Basically, it’s rules of exclusion,” Rury said of the term. “Many suburbs are almost a textbook case of people doing that. They are often marketed as ‘exclusive neighborhoods.’”

Suburban schools have not always had advantages over their urban counterparts. Rury and Saatcioglu studied census data from 1940, 1960 and 1980.

“In the ’40s, urban schools were it. They were the best schools,” Rury said. “Forty years later, it was just the opposite.”

This would fit with a larger story of suburbanites escaping the problems of the city after World War II.

This overview makes it sound like the researchers propose a zero-sum game: if suburban schools have more resources, city schools necessarily have less. Is this necessarily the case? And what evidence is there that suburban schools and communities don’t want to give up their school’s advantages – a resistance to forms of property tax sharing? How could suburbanites be convinced that giving up their own advantages, such as better schools, is worthwhile?

The comment about the switch from the good schools being in the city to the suburbs reminds me of the book Schools Betrayed: Roots of Failure in Inner-City Education. This text looks at what changed in the Chicago Public Schools between 1940 and 1960, emphasizing the increasing segregation within these Northern schools.

Not just single-family homes: McMansions can be townhouses

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McMansions typically refer to single-family homes. I had not seen this before but here is a reference to “McMansion townhouses” in a letter to the editor:

The proposal also appears to be extremely bad financially for the county. EYA proposes to build 30 McMansion townhouses on River Road at the Kenwood doorstep. Each household will have two to three automobiles, not counting transient maids, maintenance, deliveries and other service vehicles, adding to present traffic. Presently, this dangerously narrow bottleneck pours excessive traffic onto River Road at the Kenwood doorway. Furthermore, the proposal to allow an outlet onto Little Falls Parkway is bad precedent and the proposed inadequate land swap and will do nothing to solve the traffic impact. It will diminish the amount of “real” park land. Little Falls Parkway is already overly and dangerously congested — it is an extremely narrow road at the proposed outlet.

An earlier piece on the proposed development says the townhomes would be built on a former industrial site. More details from a report suggests there will be “25 market-rate townhomes and four Moderately Priced Dwelling Units.”

Even though I found several documents regarding this proposal, I don’t know exactly what the townhomes will look like. If I had to guess at what a McMansion townhouse might look like, here are some ideas:

1. The structure incorporating several townhouses would look cartoonish with large rooflines, bloated details (two-story pillars, three-car garages that stick out, etc.), and a disregard for nearby architecture.

2. The homes would take up a large percentage of the lots, prominently backing up to other developments who won’t be able to avoid the new construction.

3. These will be large homes, perhaps greater than 3,000 square feet.

But perhaps the usage of McMansion in this case is a little different. It could refer to:

1. The homes are newer construction. By virtue of being new, the townhomes get this moniker.

2. Larger processes of sprawl. Residents who already live in the area want to defend what they bought into, preserve open space (even if it is fairly ugly industrial land), and limit the density of development.

3. The term is simply meant to paint the townhomes in a negative light, regardless of their actual design.

I will have to keep my eyes open to see if others refer to McMansion townhouses.

As a side note, this letter contains a classic NIMBY argument: the new development will add too much traffic to the area and the development will not bring in the money needed to offset the services that will be required.

Thinking about the lack of outdoor basketball courts, Part 2

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Yesterday, I wrote about a discussion a friend and I had about what we perceive as a lack of decent outdoor basketball courts. Perhaps we aren’t the only ones who think this is an issue. Here are the thoughts of one writer in Burlington, North Carolina:

One thing I’ve noticed as an adult is that there are fewer outdoor courts than there used to be. There’s not a single one in my neighborhood, which does have a pool, tennis courts, fields, walking trails, a lake and a playground. Those portable goals you find along streets in the suburbs don’t count.

I don’t know if residential developers at some point came to see basketball courts as hotbeds for malfeasance, but I think it’s ridiculous that in the middle of one of the three-most basketball-crazed states in the Union I can’t walk to a basketball court from my house.

Here is another example from a writer in Lima, Ohio, though he seems to be referring also to basketball hoops in driveways:

Taking my game to Bradfield was not exactly breaking down a barrier, but it was a difficult step for a 15 year old looking for the best competition in the city. I sat on the sidelines for two days before one of the older players, Cleo Vaughn, picked me for his team. Vaughn, whose own athletic odyssey was stuff of dreams, took me under his wing and I owe much of my own emergence as a player to his guidance. Cleo began picking me up in his car and taking me to courts all over the city. Each one of these basketball courts was unique and presented its own challenges.

Whittier playground offered great full-court games with a colorful and vocal crowd of onlookers but if you lost, you were forced to wait for hours because there were so many young players waiting their turn. The most physical games could be found at Mizpah Mission in the deep south end. There was only a single basket there at the time, but those three-on-three games were the most intense in the city. You could always find a great game at Northside playground but the courts were so long it felt like you had run a marathon when the game ended. And there were many other great outdoor venues, all unique in their own design and makeup.

But my favorite courts remained the outdoor courts at Bradfield Center and the most memorable times were the nights that the flame from the Standard Oil Refinery was turned up full blast and the light it shed was powerful enough to allow us to play late into the evenings and avoid the heat of midday.

Both of these stories talk about particular places and are also tinged with nostalgia. These columnists have good memories of playing on outdoor courts and now see fewer young adults playing on outside courts. The first writer suggests developers may not be interested in building courts while the second suggests kids grow up playing indoors in organized sports rather than free-wheeling games in driveways or neighborhood parks.

Of course, this is anecdotal evidence and these two columnists disagree about the cause of this.

The problem may not just be limited to the United States: here is an online petition signed by 554 people asking for at least one nice outdoor basketball court in all Australian cities:

Kids around Australia, as well as teenagers and young adults, always email us (MSF) and tell us that the new highschool court in their area is closed after school hours… so what’s the point of having a facility when the local youth can’t use it to it’s full potential? Where’s the night lights? Where’s the support for the people who want to play sports instead of hanging out with friends at nightclubs or at home playing video games? not just at night though, we’re talking about during the day also. The youth do not have enough positive recreational facilities to unite at. And if there are a few, the basketball courts are usually ALWAYS the cheapest and worst quality that end up steering kids away. Fact.

Our proposition; on behalf of millions of other Australians; build ONE Superior outdoor basketball court in each Australian City… central to all suburbs. Close to transport. Secure and Safe. Night lights. Open 24 hours. The highest standard of ring systems and surface. And then you will all see; the Domino Effect. These superior outdoor courts will become populated with positivity and energy; believe it. And once it succeeds in one community, other communities and councils will follow in these footsteps.

It is interesting that this petition tries to flip Reason #1 for fewer basketball courts (they create more problems with the people they attract) on its head by suggesting these courts are actually helpful in combating other social problems. If kids play on outdoor courts, they are not just sitting around playing video games and they are not getting into more active trouble elsewhere. If this argument is correct, could this then a NIMBY issue where immediate neighbors don’t want the basketball courts even though the courts would benefit society as a whole? If this is what happens, the neighbors win out, courts can’t be built near where people actually live, and fewer communities decide to build outdoor courts overall. Parks themselves, basketball courts or not, can become NIMBY sites as their public space threatens nearby public space.

(At least New York City claims to have plenty of outdoor courts: “There are hundreds of outdoor courts in New York City. In the basketball capital of the world, it’s possible to find a game within walking distance of any location. Recreation Centers in all five boroughs have indoor courts as well.”)

Suburban treehouse illustrates typical NIMBY debates

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A man in Arlington Heights, Illinois built a fairly large treehouse in his backyard: “It has a wraparound deck, two levels, small windows, siding and roofing that mimics the family home’s.” It drew the attention of several neighbors who then complained to the village who subsequently passed new regulations for treehouses. However, since this treehouse was built before the new regulations, it can stay put.

This could just be a local issue except that the pattern of events fits many NIMBY discussions in suburban communities. Here are some of the comments made by people involved in the story:

Village Manager Bill Dixon said treehouses have not been a major issue in town and urged the village board not to overreact to one particular case, no matter how bad.

“There are 18,000 single-family homes in town, but this is the only one we’re hearing about,” he said.

But Trustee Thomas Glasgow, who lives in the neighborhood, said the treehouse is overwhelming. He believes property values in the area have diminished as a result.

At Glasgow’s recommendation, the board agreed to limit the structures to the height of the home on the property.

Mayor Arlene Mulder expressed concern, however, that the code could effectively ban treehouses for some properties.

But Trustee Joseph Farwell said: “Sometimes, you can’t build exactly what you want where you want it because you live in a community.”…

But Piotrowski [one of the neighbors], who spoke at a recent village board meeting, said the new rules don’t go far enough. He wants to see the houses banned all together because he believes they are not safe.

For his part, Belmonte said the whole conflict could have been avoided if Piotrowski had raised his concerns right from the start.

In one story, you have many of the elements of a typical NIMBY issue: a person does something with their property that some neighbors do not like. These neighbors argue the action reduces property values and raises safety concerns. The community ends up creating new regulations to avoid such issues in the future while knowing that they may be limiting people from doing similar things. The property owner says that if the neighbors had simply come to him first, none of the rest of this had to happen.

The key quote to me comes from one of the village trustees: “Sometimes, you can’t build exactly what you want where you want it because you live in a community.” This is true – communities have all sorts of regulations and zoning in place to help limit some of these issues. And much of this has been codified even further in homeowners associations that really limit some of the possible actions by individual owners. Homeowners submit to these regulations because they don’t want to have to worry about what their neighbors might do and to protect their all important housing values. But the enduring question from this story and other similar cases is this: where does a community draw the line between the rights of individual property owners and the interests of neighbors and the rest of the community? At least in Arlington Heights, future treehouse builders will be more limited in what they construct in order to balance these two competing interests.

The importance of property values to NIMBYism

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NIMBYism is cited as a common American issue as homeowners often fight hard to protect their pristine homes and neighborhoods. I was reminded of this by an article looking at seven neighbors that damage property values:

Here, the seven suprising neighbors that can reduce your home’s value:

Power Plants. The data is fairly clear on the impact of power plants on nearby home values — it usually hurts them. A study from the University of California at Berkeley shows that home values within two miles of a power plant can decrease between 4% and 7%.

Landfills. A study from the Pima County (Arizona) Assessor’s office shows that a subdivision located near a landfill (and all other residential factors being equal, like house size, school quality and residential incomes) loses 6% to 10% in value compared to a subdivision that isn’t located near a dump.

Robert A. Simons, an urban planning professor at Cleveland State University, says that if you live within two miles of a Superfund site (a landfill that the government designates as a hazardous waste site), your home’s value could decline by up to 15%.

Sex Offenders. Living in close proximity to a registered sex offender is one of the biggest downward drivers of home values. Researchers at Longwood University’s College of Business & Economics conclude that the closer you live to a sex offender, the more your home will depreciate. In the paper, Estimating the Effect of Crime Risk on Property Values and Time on Market: Evidence from Megan’s Law in Virginia, Longwood researchers say, “the presence of a registered sex offender living within one-tenth of a mile reduces home values by about 9%, and these same homes take as much as 10% longer to sell than homes not located near registered sex offenders.”

Delinquent Bill Payers. One surprising way that neighbors can bring down the value of surrounding homes, especially in town home or condo communities, is by not paying their maintenance fees or their mortgages. “Bad neighbors bring values down by not paying their maintenance fees, in some cases their mortgage payments, and not maintaining the home’s appearance,” says Pordes. “These homeowners usually do not care about real estate values.”

Foreclosed Homes. Perhaps the biggest single factor that drives nearby home values down is a foreclosure. A recent study by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology concludes that a neighbor’s foreclosed home can slash the value of homes within 250 feet of the foreclosed properties by an average of 27%. Says Federal Reserve Governor Joseph Tracy recently in his economic outlook for 2011: “The growing inventory of defaulted mortgages continues to weigh down any recovery in the housing market… Problems in housing markets can impact economic growth.”

Lackluster Landscaping. Studies show that lawn care has a big impact on surrounding home values. Virginia Tech University released a report stating that pristine landscaping can jack up the value of a home by 5% to 10%. But if the lawn looks like it just hosted the world rugby tournament, it can be a green thumb to the eye of local home prices.

Closed Schools. Sometimes, neighborhood problems can stem from local government action. For example, if a cash-strapped city or town closes a neighborhood school, that can easily steer home values south. The National Association of Realtors says that 75% of home shoppers, the quality and availability of schools in the neighborhood is either “somewhat important” or “very important.”

As the article notes, what an individual homeowner can do about these situations might be limited. Perhaps the best way to avoid this is simply to do one’s homework before moving into a neighborhood to assess what has happened or might happen in the future. This could involve checking community websites, reading local news, and talking with current residents. But, there are always trade-offs involved in this process. If someone desires a cheaper home, perhaps they might move into an area that has one of these conditions.

At the same time, there are plenty of land uses or neighbors that are not cited in the article where homeowners band together to protect their community. Here are a few recent situations in the Chicago region: a battle over affordable housing in Winnetka (with an update here), Naperville residents opposed to Show-Me’s and Evanston residents opposed to a Tilted Kilt restaurant, and a debate over lighting in Barrington Hills. Compared to a power plant or landfill, these uses seem much less obvious and yet are important concerns for residents of wealthier communities.

On the whole, this article illustrates that one of the primary goals of a homeowner is to protect and/or grow their property values. In order to do this, a homeowner may have to be in opposition to larger neighborhood or community goals. After all, power plants and landfills and sex offenders have to be somewhere. But, if you have the economic means in the United States, you generally move to nicer and nicer neighborhoods where these NIMBY concerns are likely reduced. It would be interesting to track how people’s neighborhood or suburban moves over the years progressively place them further and further away from such property value lowering uses.

Islamic groups in Chicago suburbs discuss zoning, the building of mosques

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In the last year or so, several proposals to build mosques in the Chicago region have met with zoning resistance (see this example in unincorporated Lombard). In order to ease some of these issues, several Islamic groups in DuPage County met to discuss how to better present their cases for new religious buildings:

Members of several suburban Islamic organizations heard from experts in land use and zoning law Saturday at a convention designed to help groups work together and understand the process of building new religious institutions…

The event comes as the county board recently reviewed five zoning cases from Muslim communities looking to construct worship spaces in unincorporated areas of DuPage County.

A representative of one such group said fostering relationships with elected officials and keeping the public informed are key to improving a mosque construction plan’s chances of success. Bringing up the possibility of religious prejudice or Isalmophobia, is counterproductive, said Hani Atassi of Muslim Educational and Cultural Center of America, which won approval in March to build a mosque along 91st street near Willowbrook…

Many concerns raised by elected officials and prospective mosque neighbors are legitimate ones about parking, noise, extra light and stormwater management, said Kathleen Foley, a fellow at the Institute for Social Policy and Understanding, who spoke at Saturday’s summit.

“Not all opponents are bigots. Not all of them are driven by fear,” Foley said. “Sometimes parking concerns are just parking concerns.”

The suggestion here is that the zoning resistance is not due to fears of mosques or Muslims but rather is typical suburban NIMBYism. And the answer to dealing with this is to try to improve relations with neighbors so that the new building is not seen as a threat to the neighborhood.

Is there some way to better balance local zoning rules with the interests of religious groups? Mosques are not the only buildings that have had difficulty getting past zoning boards; there was a recent article about churches that have encountered similar difficulties, whether in suburban neighborhoods or downtowns that communities would rather space go to tax-generating commercial space. The larger issue here is suburban NIMBYism that often seems resistant to any changes, let alone the construction of more houses or religious buildings. When we hear that “sometimes parking concerns are just parking concerns,” we should be discussing whether these parking concerns are really justified.