I was surprised to read that Minneapolis has “become the first major U.S. city to end single-family zoning, a policy that has done as much as any to entrench segregation, high housing costs, and sprawl as the American urban paradigm over the past century.”
The premise that single-family zoning was actually intended as a tool of de jure racial segregation was news to me, but that’s what the article said.
Influencing the Minneapolis action was a 2017 book, The Color of Law, by Richard Rosenstein. The book’s subtitle is “A Forgotten History of How Our Government Segregated America.”
I’m not saying that I agree with the premise, but I find the argument both interesting and somewhat compelling.
The Dec. 7, 2018, article in Slate said, “Opening up Minneapolis’ wealthiest, most exclusive districts to triplexes, the theory goes, will create new opportunities for people to move for schools or a job, provide a way for aging residents to downsize without leaving their neighborhoods, help ease the affordability crunch citywide, and stem the displacement of lower-income residents in gentrifying areas.”
Slate describes Minneapolis as a “staunchly liberal” city, so this may be an isolated action, not likely to be replicated elsewhere, including here.
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