There’s been a lot of recent discussion of how zoning restrictions lead to higher housing prices. It’s less often noted that NIMBYism also helps to explain the mediocre quality of American infrastructure. For instance, NIMBYism explains why there is no high-speed rail service between Boston and Washington DC.
I recently tried to book a flight from Orange County to Austin, and could not find any non-stop flights on the days I will be traveling. (Frontier has three flights a week; the other airlines have none.) I did some investigation and found that Southwest previously offered nonstop flights, but had to stop in 2017 because they could not get enough landing slots from the airport. The Orange County Airport is capped at 10.8 million passengers a year, and they have reached maximum capacity.
I did some more investigation and found that Orange County intended to build a big modern airport in Irvine, but local opposition killed the proposal. The proposed airport was going to take over a huge military facility that already had plenty of space, and lots of big runways going both east-west and north-south. It would have been absolutely ideal for Orange County residents. This map shows the current small Orange County airport (called John Wayne) on the left, and on the right side you can see the large old military base. In the satellite photo, some of the runways have already been obliterated. Instead of creating what President Trump would call a “big beautiful airport”, they are going to create a huge new park, which is not needed in an area that already has plenty of park facilities.
As a result, we are stuck with lousy infrastructure. We either have to drive all the way up to LA or take flights that change planes in Dallas. Orange County is the 6th most populous county in America, and is full of both high paid people and corporate business offices, which means there is a huge demand for air travel. We should have a decent airport.
Don’t get me wrong; there are much bigger problems in the world that pampered Orange County residents like me being inconvenienced. My point is that all of this discussion of spending more federal tax dollars on infrastructure misses the point. We already spend plenty of money. Either we can’t get permission to build (as on the East Coast or in Irvine), or we refuse to use Chinese construction firms and hence spend many times more than necessary (as with the so-called “high speed rail” being built between LA and San Francisco at a cost of $100 billion.)
BTW, Singapore became “great” by building infrastructure with inexpensive foreign construction workers. Trump has a choice; he can make America great or he can adopt nationalistic economic policies. He cannot do both.
PS. Yes, the airport I wanted would have meant a bit more noise over my house—I can live with that.
READER COMMENTS
Benjamin Cole
Sep 22 2018 at 1:46am
Great post.
Yes, the red-state, GOP, right-wing residents of Orange County voted down the airport, various freeway extensions, and in Newport Beach if you want to build any structure of more than 250,000-square-feet, you need approval….from city voters in a direct vote. Those are just some of the lowlights. I could on, such as wide-scale downzoning of properties in the 1990s.
But, in defense of NIMBYists, they are only voting in their own economic interest, if totally against free markets and economic development.
Housing is very scarce and valuable, and OC is in many ways a nicer pace to live than ever. Cleaner air (due to smog controls), great beaches with cleaner water (due to treatment plants), and as Scott Sumner has noted, underground cables, and various planning laws that make living comfortable.
The higher cost of living in OC has pushed riff-raffy types inland, and crime rates are low.
Does it get any better than OC?
Free markets are great (for somewhere else).
Floccina
Sep 25 2018 at 3:56pm
I love your comment. I imagine some affluent keep your socialist hands off my medicare and Social Security retiree sitting on bigger a home than he need in Orange County voting against any building to push prices up and claiming you cannot cut my SS and Medicare. I paid for it. Cut off his socialist Social Security and Medicare and he might have cash in and sell his home and move to Florida where building is allowed, so some young person needing a job can move in.
Alan Goldhammer
Sep 22 2018 at 7:58am
Scott – I think you are referring to the former El Toro Marine airfield, correct? The battle over the use of the land was decided over a decade ago and you should have mentioned that. What is common sense to one group of people (pro-airport folks) is not to a second. There were concerted efforts to convert the base into a commercial airport but in the end, the “will” of the people decided not to. Yes, it was preferable to convert El Toro and close John Wayne but that was not to be.
I don’t understand the reference to Singapore. That nation-city is unique in the world and I don’t think there is a common parallel even to Orange County.
edgar
Sep 22 2018 at 9:57am
Prevailing wage requirements would apply to any publicly-funded infrastructure project in California. If any federal money was involved, the Davis Bacon Act would kick in. Importing foreign workers would have no impact at all on labor costs.
gmm
Sep 22 2018 at 10:53am
That’s just pointing out that what about is suggesting would require changes in regulations. I think Scott knows that.
Scott Sumner
Sep 22 2018 at 11:29am
Ben, You said:
“and as Scott Sumner has noted, underground cables, and various planning laws that make living comfortable.”
I never “noted” that, nor do I believe it to be true.
Alan, Not clear what the “will” of the people was. Most of the votes showed a majority in favor of the new airport.
Edgar, Obviously, I favor eliminating those laws.
Alan Goldhammer
Sep 22 2018 at 12:13pm
Scott – The last two votes were overwhelmingly against the airport. As I noted in the first post, this was a misguided decision by the voters but the decision wasn’t even close.
Scott Sumner
Sep 22 2018 at 2:33pm
Alan, I don’t agree. There were two votes in favor of the airport. That should have settled the question. The foes would not give up, and a third vote killed the project.
One reason these sorts of projects fail is that our regulatory regime allows opponents to tie projects up in the courts for years or decades, delaying until they can wear down the other side.
Benjamin Cole
Sep 22 2018 at 8:44pm
Scott–
I thought one of your observations on Japan was the telephone and cable and power lines strung from poles (also common in Thailand).
When you returned to Orange County, you commented on how orderly things appeared.
If I am mistaken, I apologize.
Still, there is the annoying observation: the residents of Orange County have done very well, economically speaking, by eschewing development and free markets in many regards, particularly in regards to property zoning.
Kevin Erdmann posits that without zoning, residential property values would be lower in California, not only lower but lower in the aggregate!
Scott Sumner
Sep 24 2018 at 7:48pm
Ben, You clearly don’t believe that a free market economy has ever existed anywhere. So what makes you think it would not work well? If all the economies in the world are planned, what does planning tell us about the relative performance of economies?
As for power lines, it take just as much “planning” to put them above ground as underground.
John Thacker
Sep 25 2018 at 2:45pm
“use Chinese construction firms”
To get lower transit construction costs, you don’t need Chinese firms. Spanish, Japanese, Korean, even French are all orders of magnitude cheaper. (Some of this is legal systems and NIMBYism.)
Comments are closed.