Why does it seem that NIMBYism didn't exist a century ago?

[the urban politician]

Nowadays NIMBY complaints seem to be all we hear about. I often wonder if NIMBYism itself, as well as completely unreasonable planning decisions being made by total amateurs, is as great an obstacle to the rebirth of dense, urban areas as schools, crime, cheap land in the suburbs, etc etc.

Was NIMBYism this bad (or in existence at all) when great urban dreamlands like those in Manhattan, Chicago, San Francisco, Boston, etc etc were built?

My inclination is to assume "no", but I am aware that community complaints against early highrises and the shadows that they cast are at least part of the reason why setbacks came into existence. Nevertheless, thousands of highrises were built in that era.

Now, though, it seems like we have to win a war just to get developments approved in many urban neighborhoods (and often these developments aren't even highrises, but mere lowrise buildings or even townhomes). What is different about people/communities today that has created this counter-productive (IMO) mentality?

[totheskies]

In today's world, you have more money, and therefore more choice about where and how you want to live. Suburbanism was hardly an option in the early twentieth century; you could either live in a town, on a farm by yourself, or in the central city. Once the 1950s came around, the post-war generation decided to develop a different style of life, and it kind of stagnated the "urban dreamlands" that you speak of. It's a real shame, b/c at that time, most of our inner cities were much safer, and lost a lot of the people that cared about them to keep them safe.

Now, the suburban ideal-- constantly promoted by the media as having safer schools, and a more convenient, (i.e. isolated) lifestyle. Thankfully, the attitudes toward this preference are slowly beginning to change.

[Nowhereman1280]

Yeah, its because we are spoiled little brats now, we have too much money and a sense of entitlement. People never used to feel entitled to anything, we used to have to work hard long days with low wages to get simple luxuries, and used to have to fight huge wars to keep our freedom, but now we have an imperial empire and every city core is filled with hundreds of little napoleons all of who will viciously fight to preserve the views from their 1200sqft empire. Its the same reason we have Post Modern architecture, people want to feel like they have their own little palace (probably because things like Disney movies play up the Prince/Princess complex throughout our childhoods, thus many buildings look like they belong in Disney World.)

Does that make sense?

[DruidCity]

Okay, I'll throw in a different twist.
Are there times when NIMBYism is actually positive ?

I think so. My neighborhood successfully blocked a rezoning plan that would've allowed a nearby "Wal-Mart on the river" that would've resulted in the destruction of acres of environmentally-sensitive wetland and dumped tremendous traffic on streets designed to handle lower traffic levels. Some sort of development will likely happen, but it will almost certainly be more respective of the environment, will probably be more mixed-use, and will hopefully include more public access to the river and pedestrian/bike access.

[brian_b]

I would bet that a century ago people just didn't have much power to stop or alter a development on someone else's private property.

I would also bet that a century ago there wasn't as much credit available to people, meaning that large projects got built mostly by the truly wealthy who wanted to impress their rich friends and business partners.

[Attrill]

I think "NIMBYism" is used pretty broadly in this forum, and ends up covering a lot of other motivations. Not all community input is NIMBYism, and I agree with DruidCity that there are instances of it doing some good. I've done some volunteering for things that might be considered NIMBYism - basically working to stop strip mall type development in the city.

Why is it more common now than 100 years ago? Planning wasn't as formal a process 100 years ago, so there wasn't any opportunity for community input. Modern urban planning always includes phases of community input, which can sometimes result in NIMBYism.

[VivaLFuego]

I think there are many complex reasons.

A few offhand:

1. As mentioned, wealth/power is a big one; there are a far greater number of relatively wealthy and therefore influentional people now than there used to be.

2. Zoning, which wasn't really a fully-applied or studied system of land use in any significant form until the 1920s, and that was only in the most major cities (NYC, etc.). Zoning gave a "community" and it's elected officials much greater power over private property they didn't own than they ever had before, thus encouraging the trend of people feeling they have a right to dictate how a certain piece of property may be devloped or used. I suspect there is some correlation between how long a city has had restrictive zoning and how strong its NIMBY culture is.

3. (this one is much more debatable) The general rise of post-modern relativism in the latter half of the 20th century has given people the notion that any opinion can be valid, regardless of if it can be objectively proven wrong. Further, US culture veered a bit more towards collectivism, which values the say of communities over the say of individuals. Zoning is a structural reason for NIMBYism, but even with Zoning I feel like the culture circa 1890s wouldn't have been as rampant with it for these vague, undocumented and unsubstantiated reasons.

4. There actually were plenty of NIMBYs in olden times, but they were limited to the very wealthy. The story of the political authorization, land acquisition, and design of the Northern State Parkway in Long Island in the 20s and 30s is a textbook example of early NIMBYism.

[krudmonk]

Nowadays NIMBYs just have more forums for voicing their displeasure and more avenues for getting their way.

[Alliance]

people today feel they have more rights to voice thier uneducated opinions.

However, NIMBY's can be a positive force...not when they oppose development, but when they demand aspects of a development be present (street retail etc).

[fflint]

I agree with brian b: those in the past who wanted to halt new construction simply didn't have the clout enjoyed by today's NIMBYs.

That, of course, begs the question "why?"--why do today's NIMBYs have more clout? I think the answer is based in precedent, cultural precedent as well as political and (to a lesser extent) legal. That precedent was set by 1960s preservationists, who succeeded in saving buildings and neighborhoods from the wrecking ball precisely because their arguments had such salience with the public public (and eventually their local representatives). I mean, let's be real--the many massive and abominable mistakes made under the rubric of "progress" and "urban renewal" increasingly bothered the general public as the post-war decades wore on. 1960s preservationists weren't ideological extremists tilting at windmills--they had a real cause, a popular cause, a sensible cause.

And while the preservationist precedent was based not in post-modern relativism, but in old-fashioned modern logic, VivaLFuego could be right that today's NIMBYs may be deluded by a relativistic impulse. And, I would add, animated by not a little selfishness.

Jane Jacobs didn't argue Greenwich Villlage should survive merely because it was just as good as a double-decker freeway surrounded by surface parking lots, and so nothing should change because nobody can say one thing is better than another--no. She argued, clearly and concisely in books and lectures and on the sidewalk with a bullhorn that the Village was far superior to a freeway and parking lots in terms of culture, aesthetics, public health and welfare, social function, economics and historical value. And the public rallied around that argument--because it made sense to them. Because her logic was sound and her counter-narrative was compelling on the merits.

Today's NIMBYs seem to be looting the remaining sentiment for the preceding preservationist arguments, but in service to personal, private success and benefit. Retaining one's pretty kitchen-window views, one's sense of entitlement to easy street parking, and one's high home value may please certain individuals, but do not have any substantive intellectual tie to the historic preservationist precedent from which today's NIMBYs attempt to draw their power and legitimacy.

[Cirrus]

I don’t think it has as much to do with clout as folks are making it out to be. People back then did manage to invent zoning and its related mechanisms primarily to keep out noxious, industrial uses. They managed to NIMBY just fine when there was an issue they cared about to NIMBY over.

No, I think the answer is that 100 years ago we knew how to build quality places and were used to cities (or small towns), so people didn’t believe that “development” was inherently a bad thing. Since then generations of Americans have been conditioned to believe that cities are bad, and anything new is worse than whatever came before. Such conditioning is reinforced when anything actually gets built, because so much of what we build really is absolutely shit.

The fact that 100 years ago people used to tolerate their neighborhoods being named after the developer who built them should indicate that this scorn against development didn’t exist back then.

In other words, even suburbanite NIMBYs know how crappy suburbs are, they’re just incapable of envisioning *any* good human environments, so they come to believe all human development is bad. When we manage to once again consistently build places that are superior to what came before, NIMBYism will cease to dominate as it does today.

[BnaBreaker]

I don’t think it has as much to do with clout as folks are making it out to be. People back then did manage to invent zoning and its related mechanisms primarily to keep out noxious, industrial uses. They managed to NIMBY just fine when there was an issue they cared about to NIMBY over.

No, I think the answer is that 100 years ago we knew how to build quality places and were used to cities (or small towns), so people didn’t believe that “development” was inherently a bad thing. Since then generations of Americans have been conditioned to believe that cities are bad, and anything new is worse than whatever came before. Such conditioning is reinforced when anything actually gets built, because so much of what we build really is absolutely shit.

The fact that 100 years ago people used to tolerate their neighborhoods being named after the developer who built them should indicate that this scorn against development didn’t exist back then.

In other words, even suburbanite NIMBYs know how crappy suburbs are, they’re just incapable of envisioning *any* good human environments, so they come to believe all human development is bad.

I am in complete agreement there.

[fflint]

so much of what we build really is absolutely shit.
Agreed on this statement, and agreed on how it fuels modern NIMBYism (just as it fueled the early preservationist movement). People are much more likely to oppose a new development--just about anywhere--if they suspect or know it will be ugly and of low quality.

[arbeiter]

What happened is Jane Jacobs created a monster. We converted the concept of community activism that sprang from saving the Village, into a self-serving practice that is more about retaining property values and unobstructed views for the few. The difference is that Jane Jacobs was NIOBY - not in our backyard - she was saving an entire neighborhood, an entire way of life. What you see today is people who are overly empowered by that idea and have thus re-imagined the idea of stopping development into something that benefits the very few.

NIMBYism didn't really exist back in the olden days because there wasn't the type of political activism and populist-style empowerment that has turned middle-class America into a bunch of selfish bastards. Another reason is that people were more focused on factories belching smoke and highways bulldozing houses back then - things like a skyscraper being too tall or a building being placed over an older one were peanut issues in the scheme of things.

[harryc]

When the Chicago underground rail system was put in the tunnels were dug first, then the merchants were solicited for connections. Fields refused to have it anywhere near his building for fear of settling, then he was informed it was already in and was given a tour, it was connected soon after.

[Attrill]

People are much more likely to oppose a new development--just about anywhere--if they suspect or know it will be ugly and of low quality.

Absolutely. One of my biggest fears for the Chicago Spire project was that Streeterville residents (a hotbed of NIMBYism) would hold up the project. There was some resistance to the project, but nothing that held up the project. I think in most cases a quality building will meet with less resistance.

[Cirrus]

just as it fueled the early preservationist movementImportant point, with important ramifications for the future. The preservationist movement came about because all that old stuff was so much better than the new stuff replacing it. But what will happen now that that the stuff that was new then is old now? Do we protect shitty modernism just because it's old?

Preservationists who have not been honest with themselves, who have convinced themselves that preservationism is about protecting the OLD rather than the GOOD, will be in for a fight when it comes time to ditch the shitty old (modernism) in favor of better new.

[Attrill]

If people don't like it it won't be protected. What is going to replace an older building also has a big impact on whether there will be opposition to the new building.

I worked to save the Goldblatt's building (http://www.pbcchicago.com/subhtml/goldbl.asp) in West Town in the mid-90's. I didn't get involved because I thought the building was great, I did it because I hated the idea of it being replaced with a grocery store and a massive parking lot. If they had been talking about building something high-density I wouldn't have gotten involved at all.

[dktshb]

I would say it was the automobile or lack thereof.

[donybrx]

It is an over-used term and like racism has been thrown out so often as the sole, vague reason (lazy thinking comes into play) that it has little value and becomes a convenient epithet, just as 'racism' has become so very mis-used,watered down and used inappropriately to convienently convey dismay instead of getting to specific considerations. Both 'NIMBY' and 'racism' are now empty simplifications......

[VivaLFuego]

Do we protect shitty modernism just because it's old?

To be fair, I think there's many, many examples of excellent Modernism that deserve to preserved, regardless of what they replaced. Aside from some signature skyscrapers and a few developers/architects who care, most of the crap that gets put up in the Chicago neighborhoods these days is pretty awful compared to the "modern" vernacular that was erected circa 1950s-60s, e.g. the urban renewal era.

But the overall point, that just becase something is old doesn't mean it's worth preserving, is well taken.

[the urban politician]

One aspect that (almost) nobody has discussed is the impact of the automobile. Parking and the accommodation of the car seems to be the single biggest NIMBY argument across the board.

Now I realize that people generally did not own cars a century ago, but how much does the car issue factor into modern NIMBYism, regardless about building design or layout?

I say this because many of you talk about quality developments getting a better reception from NIMBY groups, but from my observation, even well-designed buildings have been rejected by NIMBY's if they don't fulfill parking requirements.

[muppet]

there was such a barrage of complaints on the unveiling of the Eiffel Tower plans for the 1900 Paris Exposition that they decided it was a temporary structure to be dismantled straight after the exhibition. The populace referred it to that 'monstrosity' or 'that ugly thing' even when it was up, but gladly grew to love it.

[The_Analyst]

Also add to the reasons for NIMBYism is the rise of environmental conservation efforts. Go back before the 60's and no one would object to building an industrial plant next to a lake or paving over vast swaths of fields for parking lots. Nowadays, nearly every city with a waterfront has restrictions of what can be built there and almost all open space that is proposed for development has at least a few locals crying about the impact to the "spotted leg butterfly" or some such thing. It used to be that people would be grateful if someone wanted to come in and fill in a swamp and build something--that was progress. Now, swamps are wetlands and are to be preserved at all costs.

And the latest new excuse? Global warming.

I'm all for balanced growth but most NIMBY's are unwilling to consider any sort of growth even when it is something of benefit to the community such as hospitals or schools.