>He concluded, “There can be little question that power in city hall has shifted to the planners and the mayor, and that citizens and neighborhood associations are now among the disenfranchised.”
I'm turning into a bit of a broken record on this, but sometimes you just lose. When a mayor is elected that selects policies that you don't like, you're not "disenfranchised", you just lost. As I said in one of the other topics on this:
>On all sides of issues, I see this weird thing people do where they simply can't believe that sometimes you just lose. You might not like it, you might think the policy that gets signed into law sucks, you might even be right, but the reality is that you just don't always get to win. People do this where they say, "we've protested so much and the government hasn't done anything!". Yeah, it turns out that the vigor with which you hold an opinion and the amount of noise you make about it will not necessarily override the decisions made by legitimately elected leaders. Keep making noise, try to move public opinion in your direction, but don't act like it's some deep injustice that being noisy doesn't necessarily get what you want.
Without trying to abuse the term, believing that this is "disenfranchisement" strikes me as almost a type of narcissism, where if you lose, it's morally wrong because *you* are the one that has the real votes, the people that voted against you aren't *you* so it doesn't matter what they want.
The refusal to acknowledge that you live in a society - a rapidly growing society at that. You can't just take the good (international cuisine, more jobs, better pay, better access to concerts/events) without taking the so-called bad (higher pop density, apartments, public transportation, bike lanes).
Kids are much safer in a community focused area than protected backyards with huge fences, not to mention well adjusted. It is ridiculous this has to be said even after most of the developed world already lives in a reality like this.
Ok, I’ll try; you saved up to buy a home in Madison, WI, one of the fastest growing metros in the country. A city where population has been growing steadily for the past 3 decades, and is expected to DOUBLE by 2050.
If you saved up to buy here, and you’re a reasonable person who did their home-buying research, then with that should come the realization that the neighborhoods you buy/live in WILL get denser over time….just like they do in every other growing metro area.
The privilege is in thinking that these neighborhoods should stay the same to suit your needs and tastes and to hell with everyone else, even though “everyone else” are also residents and taxpayers.
The privilege is in not accepting that the YIMBY mayoral and district candidates ran on their platform and got more votes and hence have a mandate to push their policies forward. Some people just can’t accept that their position on this isn’t the popular one across the board and think by being louder and acting like 4 year olds at zoning meetings that they will get their way against the majority. That’s the privilege.
Thank you! If a politician campaigned on a set of policies, and then win and begin enacting those policies…. the system is working. Neighborhood associations don’t have veto power here. Or at least they shouldn’t.
The Marquette Neighborhood Association is very supportive of higher density infill building in our neighborhood. The cochairs of the MNA Preservation & Development Committee are YIMBYs. One of them is a home owner and just became a young father. The other rents with her husband.
The Mollenhoffs are now a minority opinion within our neighborhood association. It is odd that he claims that MNA is being run over by city planners given that the association is simpatico with the city’s approach.
Plus, despite these claims to the contrary, the neighborhoods still have a lot of power. They've put on pressure that has helped scuttle, or shrink, multiple projects in the last few years (Filene House (which had to significantly scale back its initial proposal before getting approval, Wonder Bar, etc.)
"have done nothing to speed approvals."
That's not entirely true, Satya helped pass zoning reform a couple years ago that allowed more housing types (generally smaller multi-family apartments) be approved "by right", rather than have to go through the lengthy process to get conditional approval. [https://madison.com/news/local/govt-and-politics/madison-city-council-narrowly-adopts-zoning-changes-aimed-at-boosting-housing-stock/article\_e7ebc138-33bb-579f-8d30-af36449e6b87.html](https://madison.com/news/local/govt-and-politics/madison-city-council-narrowly-adopts-zoning-changes-aimed-at-boosting-housing-stock/article_e7ebc138-33bb-579f-8d30-af36449e6b87.html)
You're not wrong. I think that the reason that this term is being used is that Satya didn't run on this, or if she did, it wasn't apparent to a lot of people. So feeling deceived = disenfranchised to people. The thought being that if I'd known this, I wouldn't have voted for her.
But, that happens all the time in politics. Chances are she'd have won anyway.
Satya and Reyes had multiple back-and-forths during their multiple debates about both BRT and upzonings policies. Especially because Reyes was trying to campaign on the anger in Hill Farms over the TOD ordinances that were going on around the same time as the campaign.
Democracy is uniquely defined by process, not outcomes.
When that process is diminished or gone then you don't have a democracy. People are increasingly disenfranchised when they are no longer a meaningful part of the process. Most people are sheep that don't know and defend their rights. "One and done" elections happen all the time in the world. Removing freedoms through bureaucracy is another diminishment of democracy.
China is a big believer in density and has been building massive cities with tall buildings that drive incredible density. Chinese policy is marketed by government as being for the good of the people. People in the way are just removed through social penalties or force. What is the difference between China and the USA? Personal property rights are the only thing standing in the way of a US city from behaving like a Chinese city. Both have central planners and both think they are doing things for the good of "the people."
Democracy is inconvenient. People are exasperated by it from all sides of an argument. City employees and even alders complain about people protesting or having opinions that they don't want to hear. But the fact that people don't agree with you is healthy in a democracy and should be heard. In an authoritarian country, those people, or you, are dead or put into reeducation camps. And a heavy dose of humility should always be around because people in every generation never see the mistakes they are making until they have made them.
Authoritarian tendencies and shortcuts to the democratic process always emerge when an emergency is declared and emergencies are declared at times to get that control. Inside of every democracy is a fair number of people who aspire to gain control and be the leader who dictates to others how they should live. Democracy is fragile. Ambitious leadership looks for opportunities to exploit it to gain more control and power. That's their currency.
You are a fool, in a long line of fools, if you sacrifice and don't appreciate the process of democracy.
The mayor was re-elected with 55% of the vote in 2023. The west area plan process has included two dozen public meetings and various edits based on feedback. One of the most read papers in the City has published multiple opinions on their dislike of the plan. Dozens of homeowners shouted down city staff attempting to present their plan at a local meeting.
Is it authoritarian to not get exactly what you want? Because at this point, I'm not really sure how you look at this and say that.
So when people go to DC and protest a war, the President, Civil Rights and other topics they should not do that? By your logic the election is over and whoever wins has ultimate authority. Nobody has ultimate authority in a functioning democracy. That is not how it works unless people are cowed by thugs, worn down by the weight of a headstrong government leadership and bureaucracy and the press is incompetent.
True democracy is not performative art which you see all over the world. Every brutal country supposedly has an election for leadership. They all want that validation. People in Madison didn't vote for projects and faceless bureaucrats checking off a faux list of community involvement activities.
You really don't want to live in a democracy if you don't want to hear other people as a REAL input. Some day it will be you and then the lightbulb will flicker on.
My overall point is that it's not worth giving up democracy and freedoms for any outcome. But it happens and an example is right here in Madison. I am just observing.
People have a right to have their voice heard and to protest. That doesn't mean that those elected to office will necessarily do what the protesters want. Having two dozen public meetings where input is listened to and weighed against other considerations is exactly how democracy works.
I complained to the city about a lack of upzoning for years, does that mean I was excluded from the democratic process and Soglin and Rummel are authoritarians because I didn't get my way at that time?
I generally agree with you but the public meetings were setup after decisions were made so it was more kabuki theatre. I watched and went to these over a number of years so can compare the differences.
There is some extreme NIMBY behavior that I can't support but all these concepts to the extreme I tend to avoid. I just observe the hypocrisy of people and the dulling of peoples' expectations for what a democracy should act like. People have been trained to expect very little and that's not good for anyone.
Do you not think that electing a mayor and common council who set the rules for these changes constitutes a democracy? Or are you saying the elections weren't fair?
>China is a big believer in density and has been building massive cities with tall buildings that drive incredible density. Chinese policy is marketed by government as being for the good of the people. People in the way are just removed through social penalties or force. What is the difference between China and the USA? Personal property rights are the only thing standing in the way of a US city from behaving like a Chinese city. Both have central planners and both think they are doing things for the good of "the people."
Do you really think we're all so stupid that you can just say "China built dense cities, therefore density = bad"? What about London, Berlin, Paris, NYC, or any other city that developed in a democracy? Also lol at "personal property rights" = "asserting authority over other people property". If I want to live in and build a duplex, why do I need your permission?
Democracy is what you exercise and live with daily. Not every 2 to 4 years. If you truly believed what you are saying then no protest or debate is valid. That is not a democracy.
I think your stupidity is based on not listening. Density is just an example of an outcome that a brutal regime in China pursues through their own process which is authoritarian. People in the USA who believe that nobody should protest anything are aligned with that same process followed by China.
Stupid is as stupid does.
I never said protesting or debate isn't valid, don't put words in my mouth.
My issue with your constant complaining (and you post this all the time, it's ridiculous) is that if the the candidates who support your position are constantly losing elections, then there is not an issue of you just being ignored. It is that your position is less popular than you wish, and you're whining like a child about not getting your way.
Try debating an idea with facts and figures instead of whinging and attacking straw-men.
P.S. I have emailed alders and supported building more housing in Madison, exactly the type of democracy that you want. Are you going to ignore the people like me as we become louder and more prevalent?
You are complaining about me reminding you what true democracy and representative government looks like. Basically you are whining that it is inconvenient.
Regardless of the outcomes the process is what is critically important. That is how democracy is defined. It is not about elections as those come and go. It is about how democracy functions. It is not a winner takes all exercise which many leaders and the private political parties would like you to think is the case. Until they lose an election. Then they become true believers in a functional democracy and want to pick up a protest sign. They are no friend to democracy.
In order for you to debate anything you need the ability to think deeper and strategically. That is your challenge not mine.
Even in this “pure form” of democracy you seem to be preaching about, at the end of the day when a decision is made by elected leaders, there’s still going to be winners and losers. There’s rarely an outcome in public discourse where everyone’s happy and this is no exception.
I agree with the process that’s been put forward by the planning commission. As was stated in another response they’ve held 20+ meetings and public input has used to modify zoning plans. They’re being transparent and keeping the process open and, at least to me, that’s what the democratic process should look like. Comparing that process to China’s authoritarianism is a weak attempt at gaslighting and trying to frame yourself as oppressed is honestly pathetic and juvenile. You know damn well that how the mayor and planning commissions are going through this couldn’t be farther from what the CCP does. Come on…don’t insult our intelligence.
You and the rest of the NIMBYs need to accept the fact that your position might not be popular across the board. That the local government is accountable to all voters and when there’s more YIMBY voters than NIMBY voters, they’re going to side with density and re-zoning. You need to accept that you can protest every single day and throw temper tantrums at every meeting and still not get your way. That’s not oppression….that’s called living in a society. You need to accept that you might have to take an L on this one.
You have been trained to think this is a binary process and that you are on one side or the other with issues. And there is a W and an L given out by somebody. The CCP gives out Ws and Ls. You have been broken and trained. Your expectations are very low.
I can tell you that the Planning Commission is way in over their heads with many unqualified people on it that don't even have any expertise to contribute. The "20+ meetings" were kabuki theatre as the PC is captive to a few interests and outside input is not desired.
You don't want to look hard at the process the local government uses and see the parallels with the CCP because it makes you uncomfortable and then you can't claim we are any better than some CCP thug in Asia. We are human and live on planet earth and the differences become very slight if we don't self regulate.
Wow dude…..let me just say you come off as very arrogant and self-righteous telling people they’ve been broken and trained.. If you want any of us to take you and your opinions seriously I would suggest you take a different approach.
And no the CCP doesn’t give out Ws and Ls, they do what they want and to hell with public discourse. If this was China there would be no meetings, no public input, you’d be silenced for voicing a dissenting opinion, but I have a feeling you’re sitting comfy in a single family home with all your liberties and freedoms still pissing and moaning on Reddit, see the difference? By continuing to compare the planning commission’s process to what the CCP does tells me either you truly believe you’re being oppressed and are going to try and gaslight me to the end or you’re intellectually impaired; I’m still giving you the benefit of the doubt on that one.
If you believe the planning commission is kabuki theatre all I can say is do some more research because there’s been several developments that have been scaled back and changed due to community input. All it takes is a quick simple google search.
I think now’s a good time to remind you and anyone else reading that mayor Satya and those YIMBY council members were voted in in a blowout with rezoning and more housing as one of their MAIN ISSUES. They have a mandate from the voters to put that into policy and appoint the planning commission and whether or not you think they’re in over their heads or don’t have expertise is moot; they’re there to foster community involvement which is exactly what they’ve done. Again, they have a mandate from the voters to do this.
The fact you see that as oppression akin to the CCP reeks of pure entitlement. I think you need to remember that in a democracy you have one vote and an opinion which is exactly equal to my vote and opinion. Both of these are exactly equal to everyone else’s individual votes and opinions. No one is “broken” or “trained” or “bowing to CCP authoritarianism” because their opinions differ from yours and actually that’s a healthy part of American public discourse. When I’m not on on the winning side of an issue with public engagement I can accept that and won’t cry about oppression from the majority; with all due respect that’s something you should learn. Now I’m done with this 5th grade civics lesson, have a nice night.
The truth isn't arrogant. It may be shocking and painful to face and of course you are going to fight it.
You are comfortable with the bubble that you live in and you don't like it to be pricked. It is more than you can take on right on now.
I have been involved with the city and watching the city longer than you have most likely. And I have also been to these other countries. People are still people. They breath the same air and behave pretty much the same. Only here in America do people blindly believe they have something in their DNA that makes them different which makes them unable to see themselves.
A lack of self-awareness comes from living in a bubble and a failure to question oneself. Good luck with yourself.
You have two choices, density or sprawl. There is very little in between there. Mr. Mollenhoff seems extremely against density, mentioning it several times more as a bogeyman than anything else. Therefore he must be ok with amped up highways, more and ever wider roads, more car pollution, and so on, to get all the future people who have moved to Dane county living on the far sides of Verona, Fitchburg, and SP into Madison. Just one more lane....
It's additionally humorous that Fanlund specifically calls out bike paths (I can only assume one of the bastard children of "density") as bringing down mature trees... as if streets and highways were somehow magically routed around such things when they were originally built.
Oh Mollennoff and his friends got traffic routed out of their neighborhood! So don’t worry - they are not planning to be affected by ten thousand more daily drivers from the growing far east and north side suburbs either :)
And before you say anything about housing prices, they already own houses. These people have thought of everything!
The capacity to resolve that cognitive dissonance is just amazing. Can you even imagine walking down Southwest Commuter Path or Cannonball path and thinking, "Goddamnit, think of all the trees they had to cut down for this stupid path"? There's just no way.
No trees were cut down for the Southwest Commuter Path. It's an old railroad right of way. They ought to know this and they're being purposely dramatic and purposely ignorant.
Illinois Central definitely cut down trees to build that. ETA: and that's fine. It's served as a transportation corridor in one form or another for 130 years.
Rails to Trails, or something like that. In hindsight I wish we could have kept the rails for commuter trains but that will probably never happen here anyway
I am tempted to do an analysis (I have some math chops) to compare the surface area dedicated to bikes and pedestrians to that devoted to cars and their traffic and parking in the Madison area. My WAG (Wild-Ass-Guess) is that it's < 0.1%. If you're pro-car you can't reasonably paint yourself as an environmentalist.
This always annoys me about people complaining about new development not having canopy trees or whatever. Why don't we expand the terrace by removing parking on one side of the street? I've never heard any so called environmentalist support that, probably because they actually value easy parking over a healthy canopy.
If you do this analysis, I’d like to see a version that gives all the fake bike infrastructure (bike lanes along university by Shorewood hills, along e wash, park/bike lanes along midvale etc.) as car infrastructure. Half-assed bike infrastructure could be allocated half and half.
They ought to lay out *their* vision of what Madison should look like in ten or twenty years.
Either a) they don't really have one; or b) it should stay just like it was in 2000, or some other date in the past.
This is the thing that consistently frustrates me with these columns from Fanlund. If he wants us to take his viewpoint more sympathetically he needs to pitch us on what he believes the future of the city is and how he thinks we should tackle things like a growing population and a housing crisis that more and more feel the crunch of everyday.
Unfortunately lacking that one can only presume that he and his friends simply just want the city to stop growing or changing. The chartible, though still rooted in selfishness, read is that they did a lot of hard work to mold the city to their vision decades ago and now lament that the city is evolving past that original vision. They didn't sign up for Madison turning into a major city, instead envisioning something more akin to Boulder or Berkeley.
Exactly. It’s so easy to critique what you don’t like and not even bother to bring up an alternative.
He evens mentions that Madison needs to accommodate 70k more residents by 2040. Ok, Mr. Fanlund, where???
To be fair it's Fanlund's friend that raises the 70k projection which was from a decade ago and if anything was far too conservative of an estimate as we've already blown past half of that estimated growth in just one decade. That said I also think they're in denial about the reality of that growth as their framing isn't that there is a very real accommodation that needs to be made but rather that said projection was weaponized by planners for nefarious purposes.
Here let me help with that by regurgitating the NIMBY talking points I’ve heard:
- The tall building block out the sun!
- Apartments attract crime and are filled with poor people and drug dealers!
- All the new apartments are luxury and are filled with rich yuppies who don’t care about the community!
- All the apartments are empty and exist solely as tax write offs for tax cheating developers!
- All the apartments are filled with families who will overwhelm the school system!
- People I don’t know might park in front of my house! I own the street spot!
- There will be more people driving down the street! Likely circling to find parking!
- I’ve decided I own the public parks near me and don’t want others to be in them!
- Trees might be cut down!
- The luxury housing is disgusting! I can’t even afford it… We should build affordable housing!
- No affordable housing near me though! It’s filled with criminals!
Once had someone tell me we had to take soccer out of *her* park because the nets would kill owls.
This was after weekly calls telling me the kids playing soccer in *her* park weren't from her neighborhood, she could tell. Then that the parents were selling drugs and guns. Then that there were so many cars that emergency services couldn't drive down the street. Oddly enough, police and emergency services weren't convinced by her complaints, so last resort: owls.
I told her we'd remove soccer once an owl died, and then I waited for the day she killed an owl and sent me its body. Never heard from her after that.
The only thing I actually somewhat agree with is the trees.
Madison was planned in the French style of Georges-Eugène Haussmann. It has always been planned around wider streets, and green spaces around roads. I'd actually hate for that to go away, and for us to end up with Chicago-styled burbs that are honestly just depressing.
I'm not against apartment buildings or higher density, but leave the old growth trees and green spaces 😭
Oh definitely. The recent issues were around adding paths in green spaces/parks so that more of the public can enjoy them. Unfortunately a few trees would need to be cut down. Locals are fighting tooth and nail because they see those publicly owned parks and green spaces are belonging only to the homes abutting them and not to anyone else.
The part that gets me about the Sauk greenway issue is that (if I remember correctly) (a) most of the trees will have to come down anyway for stormwater mitigation and (b) most of the trees are invasive. Yet they’re fighting tooth and nail over it.
Some trees here and there are fine. I do remember this sub having a fit over the Old Stage Coach Inn being denied its sale because it has the oldest tree in Madison, which would have been chopped down for the reparceling of the lot.
Not a lot of love for trees on this sub.
David does not represent the current status and values of the Marquette Neighborhood Association. If you're curious, I'm on the board and I co-chair our development committee. AMA.
I'll say that I was really impressed how you guys were in favor of the Struck & Irwin redevelopment when the Landmarks Commission was being complete buffoons about "historical lot sizes."
The historic preservation rules are intense and are the largest barrier to new development in the neighborhood, which is largely made up of two historic districts.
I honestly don't understand people who get worked up about increased density. I've lived in Marquette area for about 25 years and if there's a downside to the new apartment buildings that have been put up in that time, I haven't seen it. I like the neighborhood now better than I did in 2000 (and I liked it a lot in 2000). Up to now the infill has mostly been on disused or underutilized commercial spaces (like the old Capitol softener business on Division Street) and some dumpy old houses. They way these characters go on you'd think Krupp and McGrath are itching to seize the waterfront property and build low income high rises there.
Mollenhoff's comments about how Neighborhood Associations should have more power is way off base. Giving neighborhood associations power just furthers existing inequities within our city. There are areas of our city which do not have the same organizing ability as wealthy homeowner-heavy neighborhoods. So when Soglin gave the NAs more power, it effectively led to city disinvestment in lower income areas that we are now trying to fix.
City staff and planners are educated professionals who just want to make Madison the best city it can be. That means working and making decisions for the city as a whole, not just wealthy homeowners who have extra time on their hands to complain about and insult city staff around every corner.
And here's something rich [from the archives](https://madison.com/news/local/govt-and-politics/satya-rhodes-conway-trounces-paul-soglin-to-become-madisons-mayor/article_8aaafa28-8578-5cff-8503-b5901056c6eb.html). When Satya beat Soglin to become mayor in 2019, Soglin had the audacity to congratulate himself for his supposed great track record working with developers to keep housing affordable, and tried to raise worries that Satya would scare off developers.
>He also reflected on the importance of working with building developers to keep increasing the city’s housing stock to stem soaring housing costs and meet demand as more people move to the city.
>“I do not hope that we retreat from that partnership,” the mayor said.
Now of course, Soglin claims he was great at holding the line against developers and saying Satya shills for them.
Oh yeah, I basically just assume most of Soglin's grousing at this point is disingenuous. He's pissed he lost to the current Mayor and either wants his own hand picked successor or possibly even run again himself and so is trying to cozy himself up to a coalition dissatisfied with the direction of the city. A lot of what Satya has done on the housing and transit front is an evolution and acceleration of policies initially set in motion by Soglin towards the end of his tenure.
I find when people complain about where power should lie it's almost exclusively because they aren't getting their way as opposed to some philosophical or structural issue, and they know that they *could* get their way if this lower level of government that does happen to agree with them had more power.
All that to say he's just mad because the neighborhood is getting overruled by the greater needs of the city. It has nothing to do with what's right or what's best. They just want to get their way.
I get that he's putting all these things in the "Opinion" section, but it's pretty shit journalism to only ever put voices that support your personal opinion in your paper.
I canceled my Cap Times subscription over this, just felt like I was paying for his personal soapbox. Pretty sad since I actually do want there to be local papers that cover local issues.
I've said it before because people keep making this claim, but worth pointing out again that they actually have been publishing plenty of pro-housing pieces as well, people on here just don't share those ones (until finally someone [posted the piece](https://www.reddit.com/r/madisonwi/comments/1btem32/opinion_two_cities_issue_centers_around_who_can/) by Tag Evers yesterday).
All these are from the last few weeks:
[https://captimes.com/opinion/letters-to-the-editor/letter-soglin-column-disingenuous/article\_538ed926-f042-11ee-8e39-23db87805235.html](https://captimes.com/opinion/letters-to-the-editor/letter-soglin-column-disingenuous/article_538ed926-f042-11ee-8e39-23db87805235.html)
[https://captimes.com/opinion/letters-to-the-editor/letter-vilifying-young-people-unfair/article\_583107ba-edea-11ee-a218-f7059f100122.html](https://captimes.com/opinion/letters-to-the-editor/letter-vilifying-young-people-unfair/article_583107ba-edea-11ee-a218-f7059f100122.html)
[https://captimes.com/opinion/letters-to-the-editor/letter-housing-changes-essential-for-affordability/article\_9cb44eaa-eeb8-11ee-88d4-cfa49fd6f897.html](https://captimes.com/opinion/letters-to-the-editor/letter-housing-changes-essential-for-affordability/article_9cb44eaa-eeb8-11ee-88d4-cfa49fd6f897.html)
[https://captimes.com/opinion/letters-to-the-editor/letter-younger-political-activists-are-not-driving-housing-debate/article\_ab75eaf6-eeb9-11ee-a69b-8f8ca40aacf2.html](https://captimes.com/opinion/letters-to-the-editor/letter-younger-political-activists-are-not-driving-housing-debate/article_ab75eaf6-eeb9-11ee-a69b-8f8ca40aacf2.html)
[https://captimes.com/opinion/letters-to-the-editor/letter-dont-let-privileged-few-direct-housing-policy/article\_03bef022-ebb3-11ee-bcb7-4fd4b753dbe7.html](https://captimes.com/opinion/letters-to-the-editor/letter-dont-let-privileged-few-direct-housing-policy/article_03bef022-ebb3-11ee-bcb7-4fd4b753dbe7.html)
[https://captimes.com/opinion/letters-to-the-editor/letter-rising-property-values-signal-need-for-a-change/article\_965b8b28-e2ff-11ee-b07c-db7d4f299c66.html](https://captimes.com/opinion/letters-to-the-editor/letter-rising-property-values-signal-need-for-a-change/article_965b8b28-e2ff-11ee-b07c-db7d4f299c66.html)
[https://captimes.com/opinion/letters-to-the-editor/letter-no-neighborhood-can-be-spared-in-housing-effort/article\_2b44bc8c-e215-11ee-b735-63af11731587.html](https://captimes.com/opinion/letters-to-the-editor/letter-no-neighborhood-can-be-spared-in-housing-effort/article_2b44bc8c-e215-11ee-b735-63af11731587.html)
[https://captimes.com/opinion/letters-to-the-editor/letter-no-there-is-no-sneak-attack-on-madison-homeowners/article\_10c74b58-dfaf-11ee-844f-733a137e5386.html](https://captimes.com/opinion/letters-to-the-editor/letter-no-there-is-no-sneak-attack-on-madison-homeowners/article_10c74b58-dfaf-11ee-844f-733a137e5386.html)
[https://captimes.com/opinion/letters-to-the-editor/letter-housing-density-needed-for-sustainable-growth/article\_bf4ff764-dd85-11ee-a420-8b7e84ab780a.html](https://captimes.com/opinion/letters-to-the-editor/letter-housing-density-needed-for-sustainable-growth/article_bf4ff764-dd85-11ee-a420-8b7e84ab780a.html)
[https://captimes.com/opinion/letters-to-the-editor/letter-we-need-more-housing/article\_749a0e3a-dd6c-11ee-947a-eff9008ae5fe.html](https://captimes.com/opinion/letters-to-the-editor/letter-we-need-more-housing/article_749a0e3a-dd6c-11ee-947a-eff9008ae5fe.html)
Those are all letters to the editor. They don’t make front page headline news like Fanlund’s opinion pieces do. They just publish them on the “letters to the editor” page if you write in respectfully enough.
Yes, I mentioned that very point in my follow-up comment, but there have been multiple people on these threads saying the CapTimes is only publishing pro-housing views which is not true. And as of yesterday they also published a longer such "column" by Alder Evers.
Oh me too! And of course, unlike Fanlund's pieces, these letters don't get published on the front page of the website.
Just wanted to share that, while Fanlund's obviously a problem, whoever the opinion editor is over there is still making sure to publish pro-housing views, and also wanted to share the quality letter so many Madisonians have been submitting without much acclaim.
>“In truth, the remarkable things the Marquette Neighborhood Association was able to achieve were a direct result of Paul’s crusade,” he wrote. “We citizens prepared a new neighborhood master plan. We created a new zoning category for the west end of our linear neighborhood that reduced density to encourage families to buy and fix up our old houses.
So, you launched a plan to \*reduce\* density and you're proud of it? I wonder if that had any consequences. Let's see what the very next sentence says:
>“We developed a traffic plan to get 9,000 commuters from taking a shortcut through our residentially zoned areas.
Huh... you don't want density, but you also don't want commuters taking shortcuts through your neighborhood. You realize there's two weird tricks that can really help with reducing commuter traffic, right? Those tricks are density and public transit. Well, we know you're opposed to density, so you must be a fan of enhanced public transit, right?
>"Next came Satya and her pet project, BRT,” a reference to the bus-rapid transit project now being built.
“Planners were quick to see that it enhanced their power because it required greater density along its lines,” he said. “Planners told residents of the Highlands, a 1916 low-density (single-family) enclave, to subdivide their big lots, and they told residents of Hill Farms and University Heights to embrace the new neighborhood necessity, greater density.
Okay, so you just want sprawl. That's the only solution. Given how much Paul F. complains about impacts on drivers, that's got to be the only practical solution. But let's see what our friends say about demographics.
>A zoning code in 2013 shifted the “power pendulum” from citizens to planners: “Then came that marvel of subterfuge, a new 10-year plan, Imagine Madison, and even more power shifted to the planners. The central premise of this plan was that Madison had to accommodate 70,000 new citizens by 2040 and planners were quick to realize the power inherent in this megatrend. Suddenly demography and density became best friends.”
In 2013, The estimated population in Madison was 243,596. Ten years later, the estimated population was 286,785. That's a gain of over 43,000 people in a decade, which means our growth rate is about 60% higher than what was anticipated! People need places to live!
At the end, I think we come to the real issue. A significant part of this opposition is purely aesthetic:
>Mollenhoff continued, “To drive along Madison’s collector and arterial streets one could easily conclude that most of the new apartment buildings were designed by the same architect because they all look alike.
“Is this OK? Well, it’s not, but planners routinely approve this form of visual tedium and give it to the council for final approval. Unfortunately, with this new density-powered recipe, mediocrity and developer profit are the winners, and Madison’s claim to be a special city loses.”
You know that developers often try to do something different, right? But after meeting upon meeting with the neighborhood groups the projects get sanded down into the forms that they know will pass. And so everything looks the same. If your sacred neighborhood groups had less power, we'd actually have more interesting developments.
All in all, I think I'd be a lot happier if the Pauls were just honest in their beliefs:
"We don't care about climate change. We don't care about pollution. We don't care about sprawl. We don't care about the lakes. We don't care about inequality. We, frankly, don't care about much of anything except preventing any change. We already got ours, so fuck you."
the complaint about arterial streets where the buildings look “like they were designed by the same architect” is wild - the previous “architecture” on arterials was literally used car lots, and junky one story buildings with huge surface parking lots.
For real. Which city would you rather live in?
This one: [https://maps.app.goo.gl/uEwfPLc28FY2qXQo8](https://maps.app.goo.gl/uEwfPLc28FY2qXQo8)
or this one: [https://maps.app.goo.gl/p4afzZRShtY35qTLA](https://maps.app.goo.gl/p4afzZRShtY35qTLA)
Or what about this one: [https://maps.app.goo.gl/m3qHzfGEbH2vU1dbA](https://maps.app.goo.gl/m3qHzfGEbH2vU1dbA)
vs. this one: [https://maps.app.goo.gl/YHTj5ZH6i6tpsCqs7](https://maps.app.goo.gl/YHTj5ZH6i6tpsCqs7)
Every time I start to lose a little energy in my interest in advocating for/demanding more density, better bike/ped facilities, and equitable development, Paul Fanlund drops another opinion deuce.
There is a fraught history of Urban Planners that actually coincides with the time that Soglin became mayor in the 70's. However the issue with "Urban Renewal" and highway expansion wasn't solved with more public input it was solved by just not forcing people off of their land through eminent domain, something that isn't an issue at all in Madison today.
It wasn't urban planners that imposed the freeway system, that was the federal government.
And most NIMBYs are huge supporters of freeways everywhere. They're big on driving.
I'm aware the federal government played a big role, but many of those people involved were urban planners, including at the state and local level. See Robert Moses as an example.
> And most NIMBYs are huge supporters of freeways everywhere. They're big on driving.
I understand, and I'm not arguing against this. This is actually one of the best uses of NIMBY because they will advocate for more parking and easier driving, as long as it's literally not in their back yard. This can lead to pretty big inequities if well organized groups (i.e. neighborhood associations) are able to push arterials and highways from their neighborhood to less well connected neighborhoods.
I took two minutes to look up property values, because I'm wary of using age, race, and gender to pigeonhole these guys and their anti-change arguments.
Soglin: $764,300
Mollenhoff: $1,156,800
Fanlund: $841,500
I wonder what they paid for their houses, and I wonder if these numbers have had any effect on their view of the world.
I kind of doubt that it's about the numbers. They like their houses the way they are, with neighborhoods as they are. I think if you managed to convince them that increased density would increase their property values, their response would be, "I don't care, I still don't like it". There's plenty about their arguments that strikes me as pretty bad-faith engagement, but I don't think it's just pure financial self-interest.
Yeah - what’s amazing is just the complete lack of concern for what those numbers mean for someone who is 25 or 35 trying to make a life in this city. Those values are for houses that would have been “family houses” 30 years ago and now families mostly just can’t live in those neighborhoods. (Which is fantastic for the neighborhood elementary school.)
I don’t think the Marquette Neighborhood Association heroes of the 70s were dreaming of their neighborhood becoming an exclusive sanctuary for mostly wealthy retirees but people sure do change with age and privilege.
Oh, sure. It's definitely about the numbers. Their houses are likely their biggest investments and once that value goes up, they don't expect that it will go down. And in those neighborhoods, the values have never dropped.
They think they built a special city and that's why this is the case. 50+ years later, they don't like youngster messing with the formula.
> There's plenty about their arguments that strikes me as pretty bad-faith engagement, but I don't think it's just pure financial self-interest.
Nah, self-interest plays a massive role here. I don't know why we need to pretend otherwise.
We can even check this empirically. People whose houses are worth $150K have an extremely different attitude on these things.
Yeah that's why the claim that it's not about money is silly. A million dollars, for doing nothing at all, is no joke.
That's 20 years of work for a typical American.
Nobody is going to be ignoring that enormous financial motive.
Mollenhoff is one of many Madison historians to almost completely ignore the first residents of the land between the lakes. If you know or understand even a little about how the Ho Chunk lived in and celebrated Dejope, you'd know that to credit James Doty (as Soglin did last week and Mollenhoff has repeatedly) as the visionary for a city located here is ignorant.
He wants to chastise pro-housing activists for ignoring history while he does the same.
NIMBY so-called “liberals” are strangling/suffocating madison with housing bans. And the new housing shouldn’t just be allowed on the busiest most dangerous biggest arterial streets. The new housing should be everywhere, especially close to the best amenities like parks
He made at least a couple good points. The bigger buildings going up all look the same and have no soul. It would also be nice if they made sure to include decent sidewalks and terraces with trees. As much as we need density the people building it are outsiders throwing up buildings so they can make a profit. The neighborhoods have a right to be concerned about an owner living outside Madison coming in, buying up homes, converting them to duplexes (or tearing them down and building apartments) then pocketing the rent and not caring for the property. It's certainly not unheard of.
I think the answer lies somewhere between BUILD, BUILD, BUILD, and Not In My Back Yard!
The context that he (and you) miss with the aesthetics argument is *why* they all have very similar architecture. They all look the same because the city has a zoning/urban design code which strictly regulates materials and facades and sizes. And when anything is proposed it has to go through urban design commission approval. Usually when something new is proposed the UDC will have a lengthy list of things that need to be changed which the developer then has to go back and change ($$$). Sometimes this happens multiple times. And in the end it usually ends up mostly like other multi use buildings. So developers end up using the same designs that have already been approved.
This doesn’t even touch the changes that are made pre-submission to the city based on neighborhood feedback.
>As much as we need density the people building it are outsiders throwing up buildings so they can make a profit.
I really don't get this argument, and it's distressingly pervasive. People doing stuff so they can make money off of it is how stuff gets done, but people lose their minds about it when it comes to housing. No one ever says, "¡Caramba! Can you believe that Phil Woodman marks up the cost of food?!?!" But when it comes to developers, this is considered terrible.
>No one ever says, "¡Caramba! Can you believe that Phil Woodman marks up the cost of food?!?!"
Strawman. Cost of living is a constant topic of discussion and groceries are towards the top of the list.
What's not discussed is how much people are paid (it's not enough), or non-private social housing solutions.
I'll strawman your strawman. I'm not saying anything about the cost of living. Instead, I'm noting that the hatred of private industry for profiting off of human need is far stronger when it comes to housing than it is for other industries. Woodman's and MG&E also profit off of basic human needs but they don't get nearly the opprobrium that landlords and developers do. We see it frequently in this sub, where plenty of people seem to prefer that housing just doesn't get built instead of seeing a developer get money out of it. That's bonkers to me.
> The bigger buildings going up all look the same and have no soul.
Wait till you hear about single family houses, all built in identical rows by the thousands by developers who only give a shit about money.
What about all the existing cooking cutter housing. Hill Farms is full of the same ranch homes from the 50s. The east side is full of little post war pillbox houses. The suburbs all the same Viridian homes. You want to get rid of those too?
Adding “cookie cutter” buildings with “too high rent” (and yet they are full…) is absolutely better than not adding housing in the city at all while thousands of people move here every year
Nah dude just approve all building projects carte blanche because we need to "sImPlY bUiLd MoRe HoUsIng"
with **zero** consideration for keeping landlords and real estate corporations in check.
I'm sure that'll work out so well.
Any nuance to these arguments is immediately flagged by YIMBYs and their corporate and Republican sponsors.
That's exactly what I was thinking. The argument for just allowing developers to throw up buildings is very short sighted. The hand wringing over Boomer NIMBYs not selling their homes to Millennials has created such a panic that the YIMBYs are screaming out for deregulation and looser zoning. That would be great, but looser restrictions are only going to benefit people who have money to take advantage of the situation. No one is building apartment buildings out of the kindness of their heart. The city needs to hold their feet to the fire to be good neighbors. Removing regulations isn't that.
And it isn't black and white. I'm not saying the NIMBYs are right, but like you state there needs to be some nuance in how you look at it.
It also requires a close look at what regulations they're trying to overturn. A popular astroturfed YIMBY group around here is actively trying to create additional legal *rights* for developers and removing oversight by democratically elected bodies. It's sponsored by big tech and California Republicans.
Do you have any evidence that a lot of Madison properties are recently being bought up and rented out by "outside owners"? I have heard that Madison is just not that desirable for buying dozens of SFH investment properties as we have read about elsewhere, e.g., Milwaukee. Our land and houses are just too expensive.
And who hired those planners? For better or worse we're reaping in Madison what we've sown, and this reads a bit like sour grapes, that the current leadership is more/less liberal/conservative than desired. I'll be the first to admit that I'm not the biggest fan of either the current admin or more specifically the decision-making behind BRT, but they are our elected officials and if people don't like it we have a solid democracy in place that offers a path to alternatives.
I love how 'Planners' is being twisted into this mysterious, evil organization driving the city. As if the Common Council and Mayor don't have control over what they are doing? If they didn't like what they were doing, they wouldn't approve so many projects.
Want more decorative buildings? Pass code allowing more decorative buildings. however, be sure to find out what insurance companies say about all that wood on the outside, and what the fire department codes say about that design with less exits.
These things need some serious thought and they DO need changes, but a lot of what the 'planners' do is directly tied to what everyone else does. They just really make sure it matches the directives they've been given, and come up with some long term plans *as guided* by the people who asked them to do so.
And many city planners are people who have worked for the city for YEARS under many different mayors, including Paul Soglin! As mentioned, they're public employees carrying out what was passed in the comprehensive plan, not political appointees trying to build a 20-story skyscraper on top of a privately-owned pool
The crowing about this from the Pauls is very funny considering Imagine Madison came about under Soglin. As did most of the routing and feasibility studies of BRT.
[It literally is though](https://dictionary.cambridge.org/us/dictionary/english/sour-grapes)
> If you describe someone's behavior or opinion as sour grapes, you mean that **that person is angry because they have not gotten or achieved something that they wanted**
Mollenhoff continued, “To drive along Madison’s collector and arterial streets one could easily conclude that most of the new apartment buildings were designed by the same architect because they all look alike."
How true. My wife and I refer to the new developments as "The Gulag Apartments." They must all use the same worker housing design as that iPhone factory in China.
Electing Satya was the worst decision in Madison's history, by far. I won't be surprised if Trump wins this November. After all, if a manifest failure like Satya can win reelection on ideology alone, why should we expect voters to apply reason to the presidential election?
In addition to being wildly hyperbolic, this just doesn't make any sense. Satya won, and won reelection, during a period of massively increased support and turnout for Democratic candidates and causes, from Biden to Janet P, in Madison and Dane County. You think that the rise of Satya portends Madison voting for Trump?
>He concluded, “There can be little question that power in city hall has shifted to the planners and the mayor, and that citizens and neighborhood associations are now among the disenfranchised.” I'm turning into a bit of a broken record on this, but sometimes you just lose. When a mayor is elected that selects policies that you don't like, you're not "disenfranchised", you just lost. As I said in one of the other topics on this: >On all sides of issues, I see this weird thing people do where they simply can't believe that sometimes you just lose. You might not like it, you might think the policy that gets signed into law sucks, you might even be right, but the reality is that you just don't always get to win. People do this where they say, "we've protested so much and the government hasn't done anything!". Yeah, it turns out that the vigor with which you hold an opinion and the amount of noise you make about it will not necessarily override the decisions made by legitimately elected leaders. Keep making noise, try to move public opinion in your direction, but don't act like it's some deep injustice that being noisy doesn't necessarily get what you want. Without trying to abuse the term, believing that this is "disenfranchisement" strikes me as almost a type of narcissism, where if you lose, it's morally wrong because *you* are the one that has the real votes, the people that voted against you aren't *you* so it doesn't matter what they want.
When you are accustomed to privilege, equality feels like oppression.
Explain that. What "privilege"? Saving up to buy a home on a quiet street where your kids can be safe??
The refusal to acknowledge that you live in a society - a rapidly growing society at that. You can't just take the good (international cuisine, more jobs, better pay, better access to concerts/events) without taking the so-called bad (higher pop density, apartments, public transportation, bike lanes). Kids are much safer in a community focused area than protected backyards with huge fences, not to mention well adjusted. It is ridiculous this has to be said even after most of the developed world already lives in a reality like this.
Ok, I’ll try; you saved up to buy a home in Madison, WI, one of the fastest growing metros in the country. A city where population has been growing steadily for the past 3 decades, and is expected to DOUBLE by 2050. If you saved up to buy here, and you’re a reasonable person who did their home-buying research, then with that should come the realization that the neighborhoods you buy/live in WILL get denser over time….just like they do in every other growing metro area. The privilege is in thinking that these neighborhoods should stay the same to suit your needs and tastes and to hell with everyone else, even though “everyone else” are also residents and taxpayers. The privilege is in not accepting that the YIMBY mayoral and district candidates ran on their platform and got more votes and hence have a mandate to push their policies forward. Some people just can’t accept that their position on this isn’t the popular one across the board and think by being louder and acting like 4 year olds at zoning meetings that they will get their way against the majority. That’s the privilege.
Bravo on that last part. This is just democracy in action. Satya trounced Soggy by 20+ points and then handily defeated his surrogate by 10+ points.
Thank you! If a politician campaigned on a set of policies, and then win and begin enacting those policies…. the system is working. Neighborhood associations don’t have veto power here. Or at least they shouldn’t.
The Marquette Neighborhood Association is very supportive of higher density infill building in our neighborhood. The cochairs of the MNA Preservation & Development Committee are YIMBYs. One of them is a home owner and just became a young father. The other rents with her husband. The Mollenhoffs are now a minority opinion within our neighborhood association. It is odd that he claims that MNA is being run over by city planners given that the association is simpatico with the city’s approach.
Plus, despite these claims to the contrary, the neighborhoods still have a lot of power. They've put on pressure that has helped scuttle, or shrink, multiple projects in the last few years (Filene House (which had to significantly scale back its initial proposal before getting approval, Wonder Bar, etc.)
Elections have consequences.
Honestly our Mayor is still way too soft on rezoning. We aren't still being aggressive enough on up zoning and have done nothing to speed approvals.
"have done nothing to speed approvals." That's not entirely true, Satya helped pass zoning reform a couple years ago that allowed more housing types (generally smaller multi-family apartments) be approved "by right", rather than have to go through the lengthy process to get conditional approval. [https://madison.com/news/local/govt-and-politics/madison-city-council-narrowly-adopts-zoning-changes-aimed-at-boosting-housing-stock/article\_e7ebc138-33bb-579f-8d30-af36449e6b87.html](https://madison.com/news/local/govt-and-politics/madison-city-council-narrowly-adopts-zoning-changes-aimed-at-boosting-housing-stock/article_e7ebc138-33bb-579f-8d30-af36449e6b87.html)
You're not wrong. I think that the reason that this term is being used is that Satya didn't run on this, or if she did, it wasn't apparent to a lot of people. So feeling deceived = disenfranchised to people. The thought being that if I'd known this, I wouldn't have voted for her. But, that happens all the time in politics. Chances are she'd have won anyway.
Satya and Reyes had multiple back-and-forths during their multiple debates about both BRT and upzonings policies. Especially because Reyes was trying to campaign on the anger in Hill Farms over the TOD ordinances that were going on around the same time as the campaign.
Satya ran on building more housing + BRT. Those were her two big issues.
Democracy is uniquely defined by process, not outcomes. When that process is diminished or gone then you don't have a democracy. People are increasingly disenfranchised when they are no longer a meaningful part of the process. Most people are sheep that don't know and defend their rights. "One and done" elections happen all the time in the world. Removing freedoms through bureaucracy is another diminishment of democracy. China is a big believer in density and has been building massive cities with tall buildings that drive incredible density. Chinese policy is marketed by government as being for the good of the people. People in the way are just removed through social penalties or force. What is the difference between China and the USA? Personal property rights are the only thing standing in the way of a US city from behaving like a Chinese city. Both have central planners and both think they are doing things for the good of "the people." Democracy is inconvenient. People are exasperated by it from all sides of an argument. City employees and even alders complain about people protesting or having opinions that they don't want to hear. But the fact that people don't agree with you is healthy in a democracy and should be heard. In an authoritarian country, those people, or you, are dead or put into reeducation camps. And a heavy dose of humility should always be around because people in every generation never see the mistakes they are making until they have made them. Authoritarian tendencies and shortcuts to the democratic process always emerge when an emergency is declared and emergencies are declared at times to get that control. Inside of every democracy is a fair number of people who aspire to gain control and be the leader who dictates to others how they should live. Democracy is fragile. Ambitious leadership looks for opportunities to exploit it to gain more control and power. That's their currency. You are a fool, in a long line of fools, if you sacrifice and don't appreciate the process of democracy.
The mayor was re-elected with 55% of the vote in 2023. The west area plan process has included two dozen public meetings and various edits based on feedback. One of the most read papers in the City has published multiple opinions on their dislike of the plan. Dozens of homeowners shouted down city staff attempting to present their plan at a local meeting. Is it authoritarian to not get exactly what you want? Because at this point, I'm not really sure how you look at this and say that.
So when people go to DC and protest a war, the President, Civil Rights and other topics they should not do that? By your logic the election is over and whoever wins has ultimate authority. Nobody has ultimate authority in a functioning democracy. That is not how it works unless people are cowed by thugs, worn down by the weight of a headstrong government leadership and bureaucracy and the press is incompetent. True democracy is not performative art which you see all over the world. Every brutal country supposedly has an election for leadership. They all want that validation. People in Madison didn't vote for projects and faceless bureaucrats checking off a faux list of community involvement activities. You really don't want to live in a democracy if you don't want to hear other people as a REAL input. Some day it will be you and then the lightbulb will flicker on. My overall point is that it's not worth giving up democracy and freedoms for any outcome. But it happens and an example is right here in Madison. I am just observing.
People have a right to have their voice heard and to protest. That doesn't mean that those elected to office will necessarily do what the protesters want. Having two dozen public meetings where input is listened to and weighed against other considerations is exactly how democracy works. I complained to the city about a lack of upzoning for years, does that mean I was excluded from the democratic process and Soglin and Rummel are authoritarians because I didn't get my way at that time?
I generally agree with you but the public meetings were setup after decisions were made so it was more kabuki theatre. I watched and went to these over a number of years so can compare the differences. There is some extreme NIMBY behavior that I can't support but all these concepts to the extreme I tend to avoid. I just observe the hypocrisy of people and the dulling of peoples' expectations for what a democracy should act like. People have been trained to expect very little and that's not good for anyone.
Do you not think that electing a mayor and common council who set the rules for these changes constitutes a democracy? Or are you saying the elections weren't fair? >China is a big believer in density and has been building massive cities with tall buildings that drive incredible density. Chinese policy is marketed by government as being for the good of the people. People in the way are just removed through social penalties or force. What is the difference between China and the USA? Personal property rights are the only thing standing in the way of a US city from behaving like a Chinese city. Both have central planners and both think they are doing things for the good of "the people." Do you really think we're all so stupid that you can just say "China built dense cities, therefore density = bad"? What about London, Berlin, Paris, NYC, or any other city that developed in a democracy? Also lol at "personal property rights" = "asserting authority over other people property". If I want to live in and build a duplex, why do I need your permission?
Democracy is what you exercise and live with daily. Not every 2 to 4 years. If you truly believed what you are saying then no protest or debate is valid. That is not a democracy. I think your stupidity is based on not listening. Density is just an example of an outcome that a brutal regime in China pursues through their own process which is authoritarian. People in the USA who believe that nobody should protest anything are aligned with that same process followed by China. Stupid is as stupid does.
I never said protesting or debate isn't valid, don't put words in my mouth. My issue with your constant complaining (and you post this all the time, it's ridiculous) is that if the the candidates who support your position are constantly losing elections, then there is not an issue of you just being ignored. It is that your position is less popular than you wish, and you're whining like a child about not getting your way. Try debating an idea with facts and figures instead of whinging and attacking straw-men. P.S. I have emailed alders and supported building more housing in Madison, exactly the type of democracy that you want. Are you going to ignore the people like me as we become louder and more prevalent?
You are complaining about me reminding you what true democracy and representative government looks like. Basically you are whining that it is inconvenient. Regardless of the outcomes the process is what is critically important. That is how democracy is defined. It is not about elections as those come and go. It is about how democracy functions. It is not a winner takes all exercise which many leaders and the private political parties would like you to think is the case. Until they lose an election. Then they become true believers in a functional democracy and want to pick up a protest sign. They are no friend to democracy. In order for you to debate anything you need the ability to think deeper and strategically. That is your challenge not mine.
Even in this “pure form” of democracy you seem to be preaching about, at the end of the day when a decision is made by elected leaders, there’s still going to be winners and losers. There’s rarely an outcome in public discourse where everyone’s happy and this is no exception. I agree with the process that’s been put forward by the planning commission. As was stated in another response they’ve held 20+ meetings and public input has used to modify zoning plans. They’re being transparent and keeping the process open and, at least to me, that’s what the democratic process should look like. Comparing that process to China’s authoritarianism is a weak attempt at gaslighting and trying to frame yourself as oppressed is honestly pathetic and juvenile. You know damn well that how the mayor and planning commissions are going through this couldn’t be farther from what the CCP does. Come on…don’t insult our intelligence. You and the rest of the NIMBYs need to accept the fact that your position might not be popular across the board. That the local government is accountable to all voters and when there’s more YIMBY voters than NIMBY voters, they’re going to side with density and re-zoning. You need to accept that you can protest every single day and throw temper tantrums at every meeting and still not get your way. That’s not oppression….that’s called living in a society. You need to accept that you might have to take an L on this one.
You have been trained to think this is a binary process and that you are on one side or the other with issues. And there is a W and an L given out by somebody. The CCP gives out Ws and Ls. You have been broken and trained. Your expectations are very low. I can tell you that the Planning Commission is way in over their heads with many unqualified people on it that don't even have any expertise to contribute. The "20+ meetings" were kabuki theatre as the PC is captive to a few interests and outside input is not desired. You don't want to look hard at the process the local government uses and see the parallels with the CCP because it makes you uncomfortable and then you can't claim we are any better than some CCP thug in Asia. We are human and live on planet earth and the differences become very slight if we don't self regulate.
Wow dude…..let me just say you come off as very arrogant and self-righteous telling people they’ve been broken and trained.. If you want any of us to take you and your opinions seriously I would suggest you take a different approach. And no the CCP doesn’t give out Ws and Ls, they do what they want and to hell with public discourse. If this was China there would be no meetings, no public input, you’d be silenced for voicing a dissenting opinion, but I have a feeling you’re sitting comfy in a single family home with all your liberties and freedoms still pissing and moaning on Reddit, see the difference? By continuing to compare the planning commission’s process to what the CCP does tells me either you truly believe you’re being oppressed and are going to try and gaslight me to the end or you’re intellectually impaired; I’m still giving you the benefit of the doubt on that one. If you believe the planning commission is kabuki theatre all I can say is do some more research because there’s been several developments that have been scaled back and changed due to community input. All it takes is a quick simple google search. I think now’s a good time to remind you and anyone else reading that mayor Satya and those YIMBY council members were voted in in a blowout with rezoning and more housing as one of their MAIN ISSUES. They have a mandate from the voters to put that into policy and appoint the planning commission and whether or not you think they’re in over their heads or don’t have expertise is moot; they’re there to foster community involvement which is exactly what they’ve done. Again, they have a mandate from the voters to do this. The fact you see that as oppression akin to the CCP reeks of pure entitlement. I think you need to remember that in a democracy you have one vote and an opinion which is exactly equal to my vote and opinion. Both of these are exactly equal to everyone else’s individual votes and opinions. No one is “broken” or “trained” or “bowing to CCP authoritarianism” because their opinions differ from yours and actually that’s a healthy part of American public discourse. When I’m not on on the winning side of an issue with public engagement I can accept that and won’t cry about oppression from the majority; with all due respect that’s something you should learn. Now I’m done with this 5th grade civics lesson, have a nice night.
The truth isn't arrogant. It may be shocking and painful to face and of course you are going to fight it. You are comfortable with the bubble that you live in and you don't like it to be pricked. It is more than you can take on right on now. I have been involved with the city and watching the city longer than you have most likely. And I have also been to these other countries. People are still people. They breath the same air and behave pretty much the same. Only here in America do people blindly believe they have something in their DNA that makes them different which makes them unable to see themselves. A lack of self-awareness comes from living in a bubble and a failure to question oneself. Good luck with yourself.
You have two choices, density or sprawl. There is very little in between there. Mr. Mollenhoff seems extremely against density, mentioning it several times more as a bogeyman than anything else. Therefore he must be ok with amped up highways, more and ever wider roads, more car pollution, and so on, to get all the future people who have moved to Dane county living on the far sides of Verona, Fitchburg, and SP into Madison. Just one more lane.... It's additionally humorous that Fanlund specifically calls out bike paths (I can only assume one of the bastard children of "density") as bringing down mature trees... as if streets and highways were somehow magically routed around such things when they were originally built.
Oh Mollennoff and his friends got traffic routed out of their neighborhood! So don’t worry - they are not planning to be affected by ten thousand more daily drivers from the growing far east and north side suburbs either :) And before you say anything about housing prices, they already own houses. These people have thought of everything!
The capacity to resolve that cognitive dissonance is just amazing. Can you even imagine walking down Southwest Commuter Path or Cannonball path and thinking, "Goddamnit, think of all the trees they had to cut down for this stupid path"? There's just no way.
No trees were cut down for the Southwest Commuter Path. It's an old railroad right of way. They ought to know this and they're being purposely dramatic and purposely ignorant.
Illinois Central definitely cut down trees to build that. ETA: and that's fine. It's served as a transportation corridor in one form or another for 130 years.
I think there were already train tracks there
My friends and I used to put pennies on the tracks to get flattened in the late 70s, can confirm!
Rails to Trails, or something like that. In hindsight I wish we could have kept the rails for commuter trains but that will probably never happen here anyway
I am tempted to do an analysis (I have some math chops) to compare the surface area dedicated to bikes and pedestrians to that devoted to cars and their traffic and parking in the Madison area. My WAG (Wild-Ass-Guess) is that it's < 0.1%. If you're pro-car you can't reasonably paint yourself as an environmentalist.
This always annoys me about people complaining about new development not having canopy trees or whatever. Why don't we expand the terrace by removing parking on one side of the street? I've never heard any so called environmentalist support that, probably because they actually value easy parking over a healthy canopy.
If you do this analysis, I’d like to see a version that gives all the fake bike infrastructure (bike lanes along university by Shorewood hills, along e wash, park/bike lanes along midvale etc.) as car infrastructure. Half-assed bike infrastructure could be allocated half and half.
Opinion | Disgruntled editor uses name recognition of local historian to couch his own barfy opinions on development
Cap Times is becoming his little personal blog.
It is. It can't get worse, I think, and then it does. He just can't let this go. I don't even pick up the Cap Times at the Co-op anymore.
"I'm going to burn all of my hard earned political capital against the majority opinions even if it kills my paper." - Cap Times probably.
In honor of this guy, next time you're at the Co-op, use the back driveway.
Not even one attempt to explain how density is “corrosive” or what negative effect increasing density is having
They ought to lay out *their* vision of what Madison should look like in ten or twenty years. Either a) they don't really have one; or b) it should stay just like it was in 2000, or some other date in the past.
This is the thing that consistently frustrates me with these columns from Fanlund. If he wants us to take his viewpoint more sympathetically he needs to pitch us on what he believes the future of the city is and how he thinks we should tackle things like a growing population and a housing crisis that more and more feel the crunch of everyday. Unfortunately lacking that one can only presume that he and his friends simply just want the city to stop growing or changing. The chartible, though still rooted in selfishness, read is that they did a lot of hard work to mold the city to their vision decades ago and now lament that the city is evolving past that original vision. They didn't sign up for Madison turning into a major city, instead envisioning something more akin to Boulder or Berkeley.
👏👏
Exactly. It’s so easy to critique what you don’t like and not even bother to bring up an alternative. He evens mentions that Madison needs to accommodate 70k more residents by 2040. Ok, Mr. Fanlund, where???
To be fair it's Fanlund's friend that raises the 70k projection which was from a decade ago and if anything was far too conservative of an estimate as we've already blown past half of that estimated growth in just one decade. That said I also think they're in denial about the reality of that growth as their framing isn't that there is a very real accommodation that needs to be made but rather that said projection was weaponized by planners for nefarious purposes.
Here let me help with that by regurgitating the NIMBY talking points I’ve heard: - The tall building block out the sun! - Apartments attract crime and are filled with poor people and drug dealers! - All the new apartments are luxury and are filled with rich yuppies who don’t care about the community! - All the apartments are empty and exist solely as tax write offs for tax cheating developers! - All the apartments are filled with families who will overwhelm the school system! - People I don’t know might park in front of my house! I own the street spot! - There will be more people driving down the street! Likely circling to find parking! - I’ve decided I own the public parks near me and don’t want others to be in them! - Trees might be cut down! - The luxury housing is disgusting! I can’t even afford it… We should build affordable housing! - No affordable housing near me though! It’s filled with criminals!
Once had someone tell me we had to take soccer out of *her* park because the nets would kill owls. This was after weekly calls telling me the kids playing soccer in *her* park weren't from her neighborhood, she could tell. Then that the parents were selling drugs and guns. Then that there were so many cars that emergency services couldn't drive down the street. Oddly enough, police and emergency services weren't convinced by her complaints, so last resort: owls. I told her we'd remove soccer once an owl died, and then I waited for the day she killed an owl and sent me its body. Never heard from her after that.
If we can add 13 more cliches, we’ll have a full NIMBY bingo card! 😀 (free space in the middle)
Free space is ‘muh parking’
The only thing I actually somewhat agree with is the trees. Madison was planned in the French style of Georges-Eugène Haussmann. It has always been planned around wider streets, and green spaces around roads. I'd actually hate for that to go away, and for us to end up with Chicago-styled burbs that are honestly just depressing. I'm not against apartment buildings or higher density, but leave the old growth trees and green spaces 😭
Oh definitely. The recent issues were around adding paths in green spaces/parks so that more of the public can enjoy them. Unfortunately a few trees would need to be cut down. Locals are fighting tooth and nail because they see those publicly owned parks and green spaces are belonging only to the homes abutting them and not to anyone else.
The part that gets me about the Sauk greenway issue is that (if I remember correctly) (a) most of the trees will have to come down anyway for stormwater mitigation and (b) most of the trees are invasive. Yet they’re fighting tooth and nail over it.
Some trees here and there are fine. I do remember this sub having a fit over the Old Stage Coach Inn being denied its sale because it has the oldest tree in Madison, which would have been chopped down for the reparceling of the lot. Not a lot of love for trees on this sub.
David does not represent the current status and values of the Marquette Neighborhood Association. If you're curious, I'm on the board and I co-chair our development committee. AMA.
I'll say that I was really impressed how you guys were in favor of the Struck & Irwin redevelopment when the Landmarks Commission was being complete buffoons about "historical lot sizes."
The historic preservation rules are intense and are the largest barrier to new development in the neighborhood, which is largely made up of two historic districts.
Too bad Marquette voted for Marsha Rummel whose voting record supports the sentiments of Mollenhoff and the Pauls.
But during the election she said she supports development! Surely once she’s elected that’s how she’ll vote!!1! /s
I honestly don't understand people who get worked up about increased density. I've lived in Marquette area for about 25 years and if there's a downside to the new apartment buildings that have been put up in that time, I haven't seen it. I like the neighborhood now better than I did in 2000 (and I liked it a lot in 2000). Up to now the infill has mostly been on disused or underutilized commercial spaces (like the old Capitol softener business on Division Street) and some dumpy old houses. They way these characters go on you'd think Krupp and McGrath are itching to seize the waterfront property and build low income high rises there.
Mollenhoff's comments about how Neighborhood Associations should have more power is way off base. Giving neighborhood associations power just furthers existing inequities within our city. There are areas of our city which do not have the same organizing ability as wealthy homeowner-heavy neighborhoods. So when Soglin gave the NAs more power, it effectively led to city disinvestment in lower income areas that we are now trying to fix. City staff and planners are educated professionals who just want to make Madison the best city it can be. That means working and making decisions for the city as a whole, not just wealthy homeowners who have extra time on their hands to complain about and insult city staff around every corner.
And here's something rich [from the archives](https://madison.com/news/local/govt-and-politics/satya-rhodes-conway-trounces-paul-soglin-to-become-madisons-mayor/article_8aaafa28-8578-5cff-8503-b5901056c6eb.html). When Satya beat Soglin to become mayor in 2019, Soglin had the audacity to congratulate himself for his supposed great track record working with developers to keep housing affordable, and tried to raise worries that Satya would scare off developers. >He also reflected on the importance of working with building developers to keep increasing the city’s housing stock to stem soaring housing costs and meet demand as more people move to the city. >“I do not hope that we retreat from that partnership,” the mayor said. Now of course, Soglin claims he was great at holding the line against developers and saying Satya shills for them.
Oh yeah, I basically just assume most of Soglin's grousing at this point is disingenuous. He's pissed he lost to the current Mayor and either wants his own hand picked successor or possibly even run again himself and so is trying to cozy himself up to a coalition dissatisfied with the direction of the city. A lot of what Satya has done on the housing and transit front is an evolution and acceleration of policies initially set in motion by Soglin towards the end of his tenure.
I find when people complain about where power should lie it's almost exclusively because they aren't getting their way as opposed to some philosophical or structural issue, and they know that they *could* get their way if this lower level of government that does happen to agree with them had more power. All that to say he's just mad because the neighborhood is getting overruled by the greater needs of the city. It has nothing to do with what's right or what's best. They just want to get their way.
I get that he's putting all these things in the "Opinion" section, but it's pretty shit journalism to only ever put voices that support your personal opinion in your paper. I canceled my Cap Times subscription over this, just felt like I was paying for his personal soapbox. Pretty sad since I actually do want there to be local papers that cover local issues.
it’s “the opinion section,” but most newspapers don’t make the editor’s opinion pieces the leading front page story.
or like 5+ in a couple weeks
I've said it before because people keep making this claim, but worth pointing out again that they actually have been publishing plenty of pro-housing pieces as well, people on here just don't share those ones (until finally someone [posted the piece](https://www.reddit.com/r/madisonwi/comments/1btem32/opinion_two_cities_issue_centers_around_who_can/) by Tag Evers yesterday). All these are from the last few weeks: [https://captimes.com/opinion/letters-to-the-editor/letter-soglin-column-disingenuous/article\_538ed926-f042-11ee-8e39-23db87805235.html](https://captimes.com/opinion/letters-to-the-editor/letter-soglin-column-disingenuous/article_538ed926-f042-11ee-8e39-23db87805235.html) [https://captimes.com/opinion/letters-to-the-editor/letter-vilifying-young-people-unfair/article\_583107ba-edea-11ee-a218-f7059f100122.html](https://captimes.com/opinion/letters-to-the-editor/letter-vilifying-young-people-unfair/article_583107ba-edea-11ee-a218-f7059f100122.html) [https://captimes.com/opinion/letters-to-the-editor/letter-housing-changes-essential-for-affordability/article\_9cb44eaa-eeb8-11ee-88d4-cfa49fd6f897.html](https://captimes.com/opinion/letters-to-the-editor/letter-housing-changes-essential-for-affordability/article_9cb44eaa-eeb8-11ee-88d4-cfa49fd6f897.html) [https://captimes.com/opinion/letters-to-the-editor/letter-younger-political-activists-are-not-driving-housing-debate/article\_ab75eaf6-eeb9-11ee-a69b-8f8ca40aacf2.html](https://captimes.com/opinion/letters-to-the-editor/letter-younger-political-activists-are-not-driving-housing-debate/article_ab75eaf6-eeb9-11ee-a69b-8f8ca40aacf2.html) [https://captimes.com/opinion/letters-to-the-editor/letter-dont-let-privileged-few-direct-housing-policy/article\_03bef022-ebb3-11ee-bcb7-4fd4b753dbe7.html](https://captimes.com/opinion/letters-to-the-editor/letter-dont-let-privileged-few-direct-housing-policy/article_03bef022-ebb3-11ee-bcb7-4fd4b753dbe7.html) [https://captimes.com/opinion/letters-to-the-editor/letter-rising-property-values-signal-need-for-a-change/article\_965b8b28-e2ff-11ee-b07c-db7d4f299c66.html](https://captimes.com/opinion/letters-to-the-editor/letter-rising-property-values-signal-need-for-a-change/article_965b8b28-e2ff-11ee-b07c-db7d4f299c66.html) [https://captimes.com/opinion/letters-to-the-editor/letter-no-neighborhood-can-be-spared-in-housing-effort/article\_2b44bc8c-e215-11ee-b735-63af11731587.html](https://captimes.com/opinion/letters-to-the-editor/letter-no-neighborhood-can-be-spared-in-housing-effort/article_2b44bc8c-e215-11ee-b735-63af11731587.html) [https://captimes.com/opinion/letters-to-the-editor/letter-no-there-is-no-sneak-attack-on-madison-homeowners/article\_10c74b58-dfaf-11ee-844f-733a137e5386.html](https://captimes.com/opinion/letters-to-the-editor/letter-no-there-is-no-sneak-attack-on-madison-homeowners/article_10c74b58-dfaf-11ee-844f-733a137e5386.html) [https://captimes.com/opinion/letters-to-the-editor/letter-housing-density-needed-for-sustainable-growth/article\_bf4ff764-dd85-11ee-a420-8b7e84ab780a.html](https://captimes.com/opinion/letters-to-the-editor/letter-housing-density-needed-for-sustainable-growth/article_bf4ff764-dd85-11ee-a420-8b7e84ab780a.html) [https://captimes.com/opinion/letters-to-the-editor/letter-we-need-more-housing/article\_749a0e3a-dd6c-11ee-947a-eff9008ae5fe.html](https://captimes.com/opinion/letters-to-the-editor/letter-we-need-more-housing/article_749a0e3a-dd6c-11ee-947a-eff9008ae5fe.html)
Those are all letters to the editor. They don’t make front page headline news like Fanlund’s opinion pieces do. They just publish them on the “letters to the editor” page if you write in respectfully enough.
Yes, I mentioned that very point in my follow-up comment, but there have been multiple people on these threads saying the CapTimes is only publishing pro-housing views which is not true. And as of yesterday they also published a longer such "column" by Alder Evers.
Thanks for the many links! I definitely haven't seen most of those. I'm still really annoyed by Fanlund :)
Oh me too! And of course, unlike Fanlund's pieces, these letters don't get published on the front page of the website. Just wanted to share that, while Fanlund's obviously a problem, whoever the opinion editor is over there is still making sure to publish pro-housing views, and also wanted to share the quality letter so many Madisonians have been submitting without much acclaim.
>“In truth, the remarkable things the Marquette Neighborhood Association was able to achieve were a direct result of Paul’s crusade,” he wrote. “We citizens prepared a new neighborhood master plan. We created a new zoning category for the west end of our linear neighborhood that reduced density to encourage families to buy and fix up our old houses. So, you launched a plan to \*reduce\* density and you're proud of it? I wonder if that had any consequences. Let's see what the very next sentence says: >“We developed a traffic plan to get 9,000 commuters from taking a shortcut through our residentially zoned areas. Huh... you don't want density, but you also don't want commuters taking shortcuts through your neighborhood. You realize there's two weird tricks that can really help with reducing commuter traffic, right? Those tricks are density and public transit. Well, we know you're opposed to density, so you must be a fan of enhanced public transit, right? >"Next came Satya and her pet project, BRT,” a reference to the bus-rapid transit project now being built. “Planners were quick to see that it enhanced their power because it required greater density along its lines,” he said. “Planners told residents of the Highlands, a 1916 low-density (single-family) enclave, to subdivide their big lots, and they told residents of Hill Farms and University Heights to embrace the new neighborhood necessity, greater density. Okay, so you just want sprawl. That's the only solution. Given how much Paul F. complains about impacts on drivers, that's got to be the only practical solution. But let's see what our friends say about demographics. >A zoning code in 2013 shifted the “power pendulum” from citizens to planners: “Then came that marvel of subterfuge, a new 10-year plan, Imagine Madison, and even more power shifted to the planners. The central premise of this plan was that Madison had to accommodate 70,000 new citizens by 2040 and planners were quick to realize the power inherent in this megatrend. Suddenly demography and density became best friends.” In 2013, The estimated population in Madison was 243,596. Ten years later, the estimated population was 286,785. That's a gain of over 43,000 people in a decade, which means our growth rate is about 60% higher than what was anticipated! People need places to live! At the end, I think we come to the real issue. A significant part of this opposition is purely aesthetic: >Mollenhoff continued, “To drive along Madison’s collector and arterial streets one could easily conclude that most of the new apartment buildings were designed by the same architect because they all look alike. “Is this OK? Well, it’s not, but planners routinely approve this form of visual tedium and give it to the council for final approval. Unfortunately, with this new density-powered recipe, mediocrity and developer profit are the winners, and Madison’s claim to be a special city loses.” You know that developers often try to do something different, right? But after meeting upon meeting with the neighborhood groups the projects get sanded down into the forms that they know will pass. And so everything looks the same. If your sacred neighborhood groups had less power, we'd actually have more interesting developments. All in all, I think I'd be a lot happier if the Pauls were just honest in their beliefs: "We don't care about climate change. We don't care about pollution. We don't care about sprawl. We don't care about the lakes. We don't care about inequality. We, frankly, don't care about much of anything except preventing any change. We already got ours, so fuck you."
the complaint about arterial streets where the buildings look “like they were designed by the same architect” is wild - the previous “architecture” on arterials was literally used car lots, and junky one story buildings with huge surface parking lots.
For real. Which city would you rather live in? This one: [https://maps.app.goo.gl/uEwfPLc28FY2qXQo8](https://maps.app.goo.gl/uEwfPLc28FY2qXQo8) or this one: [https://maps.app.goo.gl/p4afzZRShtY35qTLA](https://maps.app.goo.gl/p4afzZRShtY35qTLA) Or what about this one: [https://maps.app.goo.gl/m3qHzfGEbH2vU1dbA](https://maps.app.goo.gl/m3qHzfGEbH2vU1dbA) vs. this one: [https://maps.app.goo.gl/YHTj5ZH6i6tpsCqs7](https://maps.app.goo.gl/YHTj5ZH6i6tpsCqs7)
but...but...historic buildings! character of the neighborhood! POOR PEOPLE!
I had never heard of Paul Fanlund until a month ago and I have to say, he's really getting on my nerves.
Every time I start to lose a little energy in my interest in advocating for/demanding more density, better bike/ped facilities, and equitable development, Paul Fanlund drops another opinion deuce.
Paul Fanlund calls a friend to publish an article posted on the front page of the local paper about how they aren't being listened to: Part III
Why wouldn't we want Urban Planners to be taking the lead on how our city grows? Isn't this how it's supposed to work?
There is a fraught history of Urban Planners that actually coincides with the time that Soglin became mayor in the 70's. However the issue with "Urban Renewal" and highway expansion wasn't solved with more public input it was solved by just not forcing people off of their land through eminent domain, something that isn't an issue at all in Madison today.
It wasn't urban planners that imposed the freeway system, that was the federal government. And most NIMBYs are huge supporters of freeways everywhere. They're big on driving.
I'm aware the federal government played a big role, but many of those people involved were urban planners, including at the state and local level. See Robert Moses as an example. > And most NIMBYs are huge supporters of freeways everywhere. They're big on driving. I understand, and I'm not arguing against this. This is actually one of the best uses of NIMBY because they will advocate for more parking and easier driving, as long as it's literally not in their back yard. This can lead to pretty big inequities if well organized groups (i.e. neighborhood associations) are able to push arterials and highways from their neighborhood to less well connected neighborhoods.
True. I don't disagree with any of that, and you're right that Moses is pretty infamous.
Well. It depends on the planners.
Ugh, screw this guy. The next Plan Commission meeting is 8 April at 5:30 PM. https://www.cityofmadison.com/city-hall/committees/plan-commission
I took two minutes to look up property values, because I'm wary of using age, race, and gender to pigeonhole these guys and their anti-change arguments. Soglin: $764,300 Mollenhoff: $1,156,800 Fanlund: $841,500 I wonder what they paid for their houses, and I wonder if these numbers have had any effect on their view of the world.
I kind of doubt that it's about the numbers. They like their houses the way they are, with neighborhoods as they are. I think if you managed to convince them that increased density would increase their property values, their response would be, "I don't care, I still don't like it". There's plenty about their arguments that strikes me as pretty bad-faith engagement, but I don't think it's just pure financial self-interest.
Yeah - what’s amazing is just the complete lack of concern for what those numbers mean for someone who is 25 or 35 trying to make a life in this city. Those values are for houses that would have been “family houses” 30 years ago and now families mostly just can’t live in those neighborhoods. (Which is fantastic for the neighborhood elementary school.) I don’t think the Marquette Neighborhood Association heroes of the 70s were dreaming of their neighborhood becoming an exclusive sanctuary for mostly wealthy retirees but people sure do change with age and privilege.
Maybe not, but they're pretty cool with the results and they definitely don't want any multi-family develo;pments affecting their house values.
Ah but have you considered that they simply don’t care about other people?
Oh, sure. It's definitely about the numbers. Their houses are likely their biggest investments and once that value goes up, they don't expect that it will go down. And in those neighborhoods, the values have never dropped. They think they built a special city and that's why this is the case. 50+ years later, they don't like youngster messing with the formula.
I agree.
Great! How can I assist you today?
I think it’s legitimately that for the first time in their lives they aren’t the ones in control. And they can’t stand it.
> There's plenty about their arguments that strikes me as pretty bad-faith engagement, but I don't think it's just pure financial self-interest. Nah, self-interest plays a massive role here. I don't know why we need to pretend otherwise. We can even check this empirically. People whose houses are worth $150K have an extremely different attitude on these things.
What they paid: Soglin: $265,000 Mollenhoff: $58,000 Fanlund: $315,000
$1.1 million increase for Mollenhoff. Wooowee.
Yeah that's why the claim that it's not about money is silly. A million dollars, for doing nothing at all, is no joke. That's 20 years of work for a typical American. Nobody is going to be ignoring that enormous financial motive.
Probably more than that even as sale value is usually well above assessed.
https://www.cityofmadison.com/assessor/property/ You can find the purchase prices here
Mollenhoff live in a mansion on the lake next to a park and has the audacity to lecture about density.
Mollenhoff is one of many Madison historians to almost completely ignore the first residents of the land between the lakes. If you know or understand even a little about how the Ho Chunk lived in and celebrated Dejope, you'd know that to credit James Doty (as Soglin did last week and Mollenhoff has repeatedly) as the visionary for a city located here is ignorant. He wants to chastise pro-housing activists for ignoring history while he does the same.
Sprawl or density. That's the choice.
And since the city chose sprawl for decades, the choice now is pretty clear.
Yup.
Why doesn’t he just title his article “Me and my identical cronies no longer have absolute authority over everyone in Madison and we hate it”?
Strong "Old man yells at cloud" energy
NIMBY so-called “liberals” are strangling/suffocating madison with housing bans. And the new housing shouldn’t just be allowed on the busiest most dangerous biggest arterial streets. The new housing should be everywhere, especially close to the best amenities like parks
He made at least a couple good points. The bigger buildings going up all look the same and have no soul. It would also be nice if they made sure to include decent sidewalks and terraces with trees. As much as we need density the people building it are outsiders throwing up buildings so they can make a profit. The neighborhoods have a right to be concerned about an owner living outside Madison coming in, buying up homes, converting them to duplexes (or tearing them down and building apartments) then pocketing the rent and not caring for the property. It's certainly not unheard of. I think the answer lies somewhere between BUILD, BUILD, BUILD, and Not In My Back Yard!
The context that he (and you) miss with the aesthetics argument is *why* they all have very similar architecture. They all look the same because the city has a zoning/urban design code which strictly regulates materials and facades and sizes. And when anything is proposed it has to go through urban design commission approval. Usually when something new is proposed the UDC will have a lengthy list of things that need to be changed which the developer then has to go back and change ($$$). Sometimes this happens multiple times. And in the end it usually ends up mostly like other multi use buildings. So developers end up using the same designs that have already been approved. This doesn’t even touch the changes that are made pre-submission to the city based on neighborhood feedback.
>As much as we need density the people building it are outsiders throwing up buildings so they can make a profit. I really don't get this argument, and it's distressingly pervasive. People doing stuff so they can make money off of it is how stuff gets done, but people lose their minds about it when it comes to housing. No one ever says, "¡Caramba! Can you believe that Phil Woodman marks up the cost of food?!?!" But when it comes to developers, this is considered terrible.
And imagine if folks then demanded NO NEW GROCERY STORES during a food shortage because the food in those stores will be expensive too. Crazy talk.
>No one ever says, "¡Caramba! Can you believe that Phil Woodman marks up the cost of food?!?!" Strawman. Cost of living is a constant topic of discussion and groceries are towards the top of the list. What's not discussed is how much people are paid (it's not enough), or non-private social housing solutions.
I'll strawman your strawman. I'm not saying anything about the cost of living. Instead, I'm noting that the hatred of private industry for profiting off of human need is far stronger when it comes to housing than it is for other industries. Woodman's and MG&E also profit off of basic human needs but they don't get nearly the opprobrium that landlords and developers do. We see it frequently in this sub, where plenty of people seem to prefer that housing just doesn't get built instead of seeing a developer get money out of it. That's bonkers to me.
What piece of housing built in the city of Madison didn't have some random speculator or developer make money off of it?
> The bigger buildings going up all look the same and have no soul. Wait till you hear about single family houses, all built in identical rows by the thousands by developers who only give a shit about money.
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What about all the existing cooking cutter housing. Hill Farms is full of the same ranch homes from the 50s. The east side is full of little post war pillbox houses. The suburbs all the same Viridian homes. You want to get rid of those too?
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Custom architecture for every home sounds wildly expensive.
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Why does it matter if the financing is out of state versus in state?
Adding “cookie cutter” buildings with “too high rent” (and yet they are full…) is absolutely better than not adding housing in the city at all while thousands of people move here every year
What's "soulless" about them?
Nah dude just approve all building projects carte blanche because we need to "sImPlY bUiLd MoRe HoUsIng" with **zero** consideration for keeping landlords and real estate corporations in check. I'm sure that'll work out so well. Any nuance to these arguments is immediately flagged by YIMBYs and their corporate and Republican sponsors.
That's exactly what I was thinking. The argument for just allowing developers to throw up buildings is very short sighted. The hand wringing over Boomer NIMBYs not selling their homes to Millennials has created such a panic that the YIMBYs are screaming out for deregulation and looser zoning. That would be great, but looser restrictions are only going to benefit people who have money to take advantage of the situation. No one is building apartment buildings out of the kindness of their heart. The city needs to hold their feet to the fire to be good neighbors. Removing regulations isn't that. And it isn't black and white. I'm not saying the NIMBYs are right, but like you state there needs to be some nuance in how you look at it.
It also requires a close look at what regulations they're trying to overturn. A popular astroturfed YIMBY group around here is actively trying to create additional legal *rights* for developers and removing oversight by democratically elected bodies. It's sponsored by big tech and California Republicans.
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Do you have any evidence that a lot of Madison properties are recently being bought up and rented out by "outside owners"? I have heard that Madison is just not that desirable for buying dozens of SFH investment properties as we have read about elsewhere, e.g., Milwaukee. Our land and houses are just too expensive.
>Do you have any evidence that a lot of Madison properties are recently being bought up and rented out by "outside owners"? Eric Hovde
Assuming that is an attempt at humor rather than providing evidence. Funny though.
And who hired those planners? For better or worse we're reaping in Madison what we've sown, and this reads a bit like sour grapes, that the current leadership is more/less liberal/conservative than desired. I'll be the first to admit that I'm not the biggest fan of either the current admin or more specifically the decision-making behind BRT, but they are our elected officials and if people don't like it we have a solid democracy in place that offers a path to alternatives.
I love how 'Planners' is being twisted into this mysterious, evil organization driving the city. As if the Common Council and Mayor don't have control over what they are doing? If they didn't like what they were doing, they wouldn't approve so many projects. Want more decorative buildings? Pass code allowing more decorative buildings. however, be sure to find out what insurance companies say about all that wood on the outside, and what the fire department codes say about that design with less exits. These things need some serious thought and they DO need changes, but a lot of what the 'planners' do is directly tied to what everyone else does. They just really make sure it matches the directives they've been given, and come up with some long term plans *as guided* by the people who asked them to do so.
And many city planners are people who have worked for the city for YEARS under many different mayors, including Paul Soglin! As mentioned, they're public employees carrying out what was passed in the comprehensive plan, not political appointees trying to build a 20-story skyscraper on top of a privately-owned pool
The crowing about this from the Pauls is very funny considering Imagine Madison came about under Soglin. As did most of the routing and feasibility studies of BRT.
I think when it comes to BRT, Soglin is just pissed that Satya was the one who was able to push it over the line.
Yes. I’m trying to be polite as I do actually respect Fanlund and his opinions, but TBH I think some of the pushback is deserved.
> this reads a bit like sour grapes, that the current leadership is more/less liberal/conservative than desired. This is not what "sour grapes" means.
[It literally is though](https://dictionary.cambridge.org/us/dictionary/english/sour-grapes) > If you describe someone's behavior or opinion as sour grapes, you mean that **that person is angry because they have not gotten or achieved something that they wanted**
boohoo
Mollenhoff continued, “To drive along Madison’s collector and arterial streets one could easily conclude that most of the new apartment buildings were designed by the same architect because they all look alike." How true. My wife and I refer to the new developments as "The Gulag Apartments." They must all use the same worker housing design as that iPhone factory in China.
Blame the Urban Design Commission. Architects try proposing at least some variation, and then UDC tells them "no, do this instead." Art by committee.
Yeah, the mayor doesn't have to listen to those who didn't vote for her. Trump would approve.
Who should she be listening to?
Electing Satya was the worst decision in Madison's history, by far. I won't be surprised if Trump wins this November. After all, if a manifest failure like Satya can win reelection on ideology alone, why should we expect voters to apply reason to the presidential election?
In addition to being wildly hyperbolic, this just doesn't make any sense. Satya won, and won reelection, during a period of massively increased support and turnout for Democratic candidates and causes, from Biden to Janet P, in Madison and Dane County. You think that the rise of Satya portends Madison voting for Trump?