Tag Archives: NIMBY

Green nimbyism

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NIMBY (Not In My Backyard) attitudes are typically associated with suburban sprawl and McMansions. So what happens when NIMBY is associated with more eco-friendly projects?

Nimbyism is nothing new. It’s even logical sometimes, perhaps not always deserving of opprobrium. After all, it is one thing to be a passionate proponent of recycling, and another to welcome a particular recycling plant — with the attendant garbage-truck traffic — on your street. General environmental principles may be at odds with convenience or even local environmental consequences.

But policymakers in the United States have been repeatedly frustrated by constituents who profess to worry about the climate and count themselves as environmentalists, but prove unwilling to adjust their lifestyles or change their behavior in any significant way…

Robert B. Cialdini, an emeritus professor at Arizona State University who studies environmental behaviors, points to two phenomena:

Humans hew to the “normative” behaviors of their community. In places where bike lanes or wind turbines or B.R.T. systems are seen as an integral part of society, people tend not protest a new one; if they are not the norm, they will. Second, whatever feelings people have about abstract issues like the environment, in practice they react more passionately to immediate rewards and punishments (like a ready parking space) than distant consequences (like the threat of warming).

Based on Cialdini’s ideas, perhaps it will just take one or two of these neighborhoods or locations adopting these projects so that it becomes normative. But who will be willing to go first? And what is the critical mass when such developments become normal?

While some might take this as evidence that certain people aren’t willing to sacrifice for green projects, I think we can take a broader view: in general, Americans don’t like two things that could possibly occur with the construction of something nearby.

1. The state in which they purchased their home or housing unit is altered. The idyllic scene they once bought into may not last forever. Whether this is due to a nearby condo building blocking the view or a new subdivision taking away a once-open field, Americans do not these sorts of changes. They paid money for a particular setting and want to maintain that setting as long as possible.

2. Their property values might be reduced. Because of the amount of money invested in homes plus hopes that many have about making at least some money when selling their homes somewhere down the line plus the amenities that come in living in places with higher property values, property values drive a lot of development decisions.

Developments like these green projects can be difficult to push through, particularly when those in opposition have money or status. Research has shown that typical dirty types of development, like power plants or landfills or public housing projects, tend to get placed in poorer areas where the people are less-equipped to fight back. Could these green projects be headed for similar places?

Mosque proposed for unincorporated site in DuPage County

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The Chicago area has experienced several proposals in recent years for mosques to be built in the suburbs. Several proposals have been in DuPage County where communities or the County have rejected plans. There is a new proposal being brought forward now for an unincorporated site near Lombard, meaning it will be under review by DuPage County:

Proclaim Truth Charitable Trust is seeking a conditional-use permit that would allow it to demolish a 65-year-old single-family house along Highland Avenue and construct a new 5,200-square-foot mosque.

Sabet Siddiqui, the group’s representative, stressed to members of DuPage County’s zoning board of appeals Thursday night that the proposed mosque would be used by about 100 families who live in the area and currently attend services in Villa Park.

“Unlike other mosques and synagogues and churches that you folks have heard in the past, this is a different scale and different scope,” Siddiqui told the board. “It’s a small neighborhood mosque.”…

Siddiqui said he believes the mosque would be “a perfect fit” for a neighborhood that already has two churches and a synagogue. He said the brick and masonry structure is designed to “match the surrounding residences as much as possible.”

Almost all the residents who attended Thursday night’s public hearing voiced support for the plan, including a representative from neighboring Congregation Etz Chaim.

In comparison to some of the other cases, it sounds like this particular proposal is experiencing a stronger welcome from residents in the neighborhood.

It would be interesting to do a study of these cases that have popped up in recent years. Do Christian churches experience the same kind of process and complaints that mosques do? How exactly do nearby residents voice concerns – it is typical NIMBY material like traffic, parking, and noise or are there broader issues brought up in the cases of the mosques? Is the support or concerns about the proposed mosques tied more to the size of the mosque or is it more about the demographics of the surrounding neighborhood?

Thinking about gentrification and preserving neighborhoods

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Megan McArdle discusses gentrification and whether “hip” (my term) or diverse urban neighborhoods can remain that way.

In reality, most neighborhoods (urban or suburban) change over time. This can happen quite rapidly in urban neighborhoods: new people move and businesses move in or out and places can be transformed in a decade or two. Gentrifying neighborhoods are always teetering on an edge where they recently were poorer but are now hip but soon could be more stodgy middle- to upper-class enclaves. It is probably rare that neighborhoods can stay in a perpetual state of gentrification because there are numerous forces pushing a neighborhood one way or another.

I wonder if arguments about wanting to preserve diverse urban neighborhoods are not that different from suburban NIMBY arguments. In each case, people who have moved into the neighborhood see something they like: perhaps good schools in the suburbs, a “hip” and diverse scene in the urban neighborhood. But then the goal can become to freeze that neighborhood in time, to resist outside forces, to try to keep the neighborhood in the state in which it was originally found. The mindset can be “I found this neighborhood and I don’t want anyone else to come in and change it from what I fell in love with.” In both contexts, this is difficult to do: time passes, the people in the neighborhood change, outside forces influence the neighborhood, and so on.

Perhaps one way to get around these sort of arguments is to suggest that the act of moving into a neighborhood (by a resident or a business) is an act with consequences: moving in necessarily contributes to changing the neighborhood. By living in a neighborhood and interacting with residents and others, the new member of the community helps push the neighborhood in a new direction. Whether this new direction is good or bad, moral or immoral, is another issue.

h/t Instapundit